Georgics
Virgil
Vergil. The Poems of Vergil. Rhoades, James, translator. London: Oxford University Press, 1921.
- Fast flies meanwhile the irreparable hour,
- As point to point our charmed round we trace.
- Enough of herds. This second task remains,
- The wool-clad flocks and shaggy goats to treat.
- Here lies a labour; hence for glory look,
- Brave husbandmen. Nor doubtfully know
- How hard it is for words to triumph here,
- And shed their lustre on a theme so slight:
- But I am caught by ravishing desire
- Above the lone Parnassian steep; I love
- To walk the heights, from whence no earlier track
- Slopes gently downward to Castalia's spring.
- Now, awful Pales, strike a louder tone.
- First, for the sheep soft pencotes I decree
- To browse in, till green summer's swift return;
- And that the hard earth under them with straw
- And handfuls of the fern be littered deep,
- Lest chill of ice such tender cattle harm
- With scab and loathly foot-rot. Passing thence
- I bid the goats with arbute-leaves be stored,
- And served with fresh spring-water, and their pens
- Turned southward from the blast, to face the suns
- Of winter, when Aquarius' icy beam
- Now sinks in showers upon the parting year.
- These too no lightlier our protection claim,
- Nor prove of poorer service, howsoe'er
- Milesian fleeces dipped in Tyrian reds
- Repay the barterer; these with offspring teem
- More numerous; these yield plenteous store of milk:
- The more each dry-wrung udder froths the pail,
- More copious soon the teat-pressed torrents flow.
- Ay, and on Cinyps' bank the he-goats too
- Their beards and grizzled chins and bristling hair
- Let clip for camp-use, or as rugs to wrap
- Seafaring wretches. But they browse the woods
- And summits of Lycaeus, and rough briers,
- And brakes that love the highland: of themselves
- Right heedfully the she-goats homeward troop
- Before their kids, and with plump udders clogged
- Scarce cross the threshold. Wherefore rather ye,
- The less they crave man's vigilance, be fain
- From ice to fend them and from snowy winds;
- Bring food and feast them with their branchy fare,
- Nor lock your hay-loft all the winter long.
- But when glad summer at the west wind's call
- Sends either flock to pasture in the glades,
- Soon as the day-star shineth, hie we then
- To the cool meadows, while the dawn is young,
- The grass yet hoary, and to browsing herds
- The dew tastes sweetest on the tender sward.
- When heaven's fourth hour draws on the thickening drought,
- And shrill cicalas pierce the brake with song,
- Then at the well-springs bid them, or deep pools,
- From troughs of holm-oak quaff the running wave:
- But at day's hottest seek a shadowy vale,
- Where some vast ancient-timbered oak of Jove
- Spreads his huge branches, or where huddling black
- Ilex on ilex cowers in awful shade.
- Then once more give them water sparingly,
- And feed once more, till sunset, when cool eve
- Allays the air, and dewy moonbeams slake
- The forest glades, with halcyon's song the shore,
- And every thicket with the goldfinch rings.
- Of Libya's shepherds why the tale pursue?
- Why sing their pastures and the scattered huts
- They house in? Oft their cattle day and night
- Graze the whole month together, and go forth
- Into far deserts where no shelter is,
- So flat the plain and boundless. All his goods
- The Afric swain bears with him, house and home,
- Arms, Cretan quiver, and Amyclaean dog;
- As some keen Roman in his country's arms
- Plies the swift march beneath a cruel load;
- Soon with tents pitched and at his post he stands,
- Ere looked for by the foe.
- Not thus the tribes
- Of Scythia by the far Maeotic wave,
- Where turbid Ister whirls his yellow sands,
- And Rhodope stretched out beneath the pole
- Comes trending backward. There the herds they keep
- Close-pent in byres, nor any grass is seen
- Upon the plain, nor leaves upon the tree:
- But with snow-ridges and deep frost afar
- Heaped seven ells high the earth lies featureless:
- Still winter? still the north wind's icy breath!
- Nay, never sun disparts the shadows pale,
- Or as he rides the steep of heaven, or dips
- In ocean's fiery bath his plunging car.
- Quick ice-crusts curdle on the running stream,
- And iron-hooped wheels the water's back now bears,
- To broad wains opened, as erewhile to ships;
- Brass vessels oft asunder burst, and clothes
- Stiffen upon the wearers; juicy wines
- They cleave with axes; to one frozen mass
- Whole pools are turned; and on their untrimmed beards
- Stiff clings the jagged icicle. Meanwhile
- All heaven no less is filled with falling snow;
- The cattle perish: oxen's mighty frames
- Stand island-like amid the frost, and stags
- In huddling herds, by that strange weight benumbed,
- Scarce top the surface with their antler-points.
- These with no hounds they hunt, nor net with toils,
- Nor scare with terror of the crimson plume;
- But, as in vain they breast the opposing block,
- Butcher them, knife in hand, and so dispatch
- Loud-bellowing, and with glad shouts hale them home.
- Themselves in deep-dug caverns underground
- Dwell free and careless; to their hearths they heave
- Oak-logs and elm-trees whole, and fire them there,
- There play the night out, and in festive glee
- With barm and service sour the wine-cup mock.
- So 'neath the seven-starred Hyperborean wain
- The folk live tameless, buffeted with blasts
- Of Eurus from Rhipaean hills, and wrap
- Their bodies in the tawny fells of beasts.
- If wool delight thee, first, be far removed
- All prickly boskage, burrs and caltrops; shun
- Luxuriant pastures; at the outset choose
- White flocks with downy fleeces. For the ram,
- How white soe'er himself, be but the tongue
- 'Neath his moist palate black, reject him, lest
- He sully with dark spots his offspring's fleece,
- And seek some other o'er the teeming plain.
- Even with such snowy bribe of wool, if ear
- May trust the tale, Pan, God of Arcady,
- Snared and beguiled thee, Luna, calling thee
- To the deep woods; nor thou didst spurn his call.