Odes 3.23 (Gladstone): Coelo Supinas

If, each new moon, thy hands thou lift,
To Heaven, my rustic Phidyle,
And if thy Lar with perfumed gift,
And grain, and swine, appeased be,

Your vines shall mock scirocco blasts,
Your crop the withering blight survive,
And when the dangerous autumn casts
The apple, still your younglings thrive.

Yon heifer, mark, beneath some oak
Of Algidus, or on the tracks
Of Alban meadows waits the stroke,
To stain with gore the Pontiffs axe.

Not such for thee. Thy gods to sue,
No crowd of yearlings slaughterest thou:
Thou giv'st those modest gods their due
With rosemary and myrtle bough.

Though giftless hands the altar touch,
Our household gods gaze with content
On cake and salt, and ask not such
As costliest offerings present.