Georgics

Virgil

Vergil. The Poems of Vergil. Rhoades, James, translator. London: Oxford University Press, 1921.

  1. What makes the cornfield smile; beneath what star
  2. Maecenas, it is meet to turn the sod
  3. Or marry elm with vine; how tend the steer;
  4. What pains for cattle-keeping, or what proof
  5. Of patient trial serves for thrifty bees;—
  6. Such are my themes. O universal lights
  7. Most glorious! ye that lead the gliding year
  8. Along the sky, Liber and Ceres mild,
  9. If by your bounty holpen earth once changed
  10. Chaonian acorn for the plump wheat-ear,
  11. And mingled with the grape, your new-found gift,
  12. The draughts of Achelous; and ye Fauns
  13. To rustics ever kind, come foot it, Fauns
  14. And Dryad-maids together; your gifts I sing.
  15. And thou, for whose delight the war-horse first
  16. Sprang from earth's womb at thy great trident's stroke,
  17. Neptune; and haunter of the groves, for whom
  18. Three hundred snow-white heifers browse the brakes,
  19. The fertile brakes of Ceos; and clothed in power,
  20. Thy native forest and Lycean lawns,
  21. Pan, shepherd-god, forsaking, as the love
  22. Of thine own Maenalus constrains thee, hear
  23. And help, O lord of Tegea! And thou, too,
  24. Minerva, from whose hand the olive sprung;
  25. And boy-discoverer of the curved plough;
  26. And, bearing a young cypress root-uptorn,
  27. Silvanus, and Gods all and Goddesses,
  28. Who make the fields your care, both ye who nurse
  29. The tender unsown increase, and from heaven
  30. Shed on man's sowing the riches of your rain:
  31. And thou, even thou, of whom we know not yet
  32. What mansion of the skies shall hold thee soon,
  33. Whether to watch o'er cities be thy will,
  34. Great Caesar, and to take the earth in charge,
  35. That so the mighty world may welcome thee
  36. Lord of her increase, master of her times,
  37. Binding thy mother's myrtle round thy brow,
  38. Or as the boundless ocean's God thou come,
  39. Sole dread of seamen, till far Thule bow
  40. Before thee, and Tethys win thee to her son
  41. With all her waves for dower; or as a star
  42. Lend thy fresh beams our lagging months to cheer,
  43. Where 'twixt the Maid and those pursuing Claws
  44. A space is opening; see! red Scorpio's self
  45. His arms draws in, yea, and hath left thee more
  46. Than thy full meed of heaven: be what thou wilt—
  47. For neither Tartarus hopes to call thee king,
  48. Nor may so dire a lust of sovereignty
  49. E'er light upon thee, howso Greece admire
  50. Elysium's fields, and Proserpine not heed
  51. Her mother's voice entreating to return—
  52. Vouchsafe a prosperous voyage, and smile on this
  53. My bold endeavour, and pitying, even as I,
  54. These poor way-wildered swains, at once begin,
  55. Grow timely used unto the voice of prayer.