Minor Latin poets; with introductions and English translations

AETNAWho has not told '^ of the Colchians—melhiy ofwarriors on farthest soil ? Who but has uttered adiru:e for Pergamos set on her blazing Argive pyreand the mother mourning the poignant slaying of hersons, or the day that turned its course in horror, orthe dragon's tooth sown mid the sprinkling of seed ?Who has not lamented the lying signal of the shipthat kept not troth, or chanted the plaint of Minos'daughter forlorn on a deserted shore ?— yes, everyform in which legend has been thrown into ancientsong.More gallantly I set my spirit toiling on a taskuntried ; what are the forces for this mighty working,how great the energy which releases in dense arraythe eternal flames, thrusts masses of rock from thelowest depth with gigantic noise and burns everythingnear in rills of fire—this is the burden of my lay.First, let none be deceived by the fictions poetstell—that Aetna is the home of a god, that the firegushing from her swollen jaws is Vulcan's fire, andthat the echo in that cavernous prison comes fromhis restless work. No task so paltry have the gods.To meanest crafts one may not rightly lower thestars ; their sway is royal, aloft in a remote heaventhey reck not to handle the toil of artisans.* The mythological topics here briefly dismissed as hackneyedsubjects of poetry are, in the order of mention, Jason'sArgonautic expedition to Colchis ; the burning of Troy by theGreeks ; Hecuba's loss of her sons ; the retreat of the Sun-Godfrom the " banquet of Thyestes " on human flesh ; the crop ofwarriors which sprang from the dragon's teeth sown byCadmus ; the fatal failiu-e of Theseus to keep his compact yrithhis father to hoist sails of good omen in the event of a successfulreturn to Athens; and Theseus' desertion in Xaxos of KingMinos' daughter, Ariadne, who had enabled him to thread thelabyrinth in Crete.