Eclogues
Virgil
Vergil. The Poems of Vergil. Rhoades, James, translator. London: Oxford University Press, 1921.
- of yonder veteran beeches, all the land
- was by the songs of your Menalcas saved.
- Heard it you had, and so the rumour ran,
- but 'mid the clash of arms, my Lycidas,
- our songs avail no more than, as 'tis said,
- doves of Dodona when an eagle comes.
- Nay, had I not, from hollow ilex-bole
- warned by a raven on the left, cut short
- the rising feud, nor I, your Moeris here,
- no, nor Menalcas, were alive to-day.
- Alack! could any of so foul a crime
- be guilty? Ah! how nearly, thyself,
- reft was the solace that we had in thee,
- Menalcas! Who then of the Nymphs had sung,
- or who with flowering herbs bestrewn the ground,
- and o'er the fountains drawn a leafy veil?—
- who sung the stave I filched from you that day
- to Amaryllis wending, our hearts' joy?—
- “While I am gone, 'tis but a little way,
- feed, Tityrus, my goats, and, having fed,