Georgics
Virgil
Vergil. The Poems of Vergil. Rhoades, James, translator. London: Oxford University Press, 1921.
- And now, both leaders from the field recalled,
- Who hath the worser seeming, do to death,
- Lest royal waste wax burdensome, but let
- His better lord it on the empty throne.
- One with gold-burnished flakes will shine like fire,
- For twofold are their kinds, the nobler he,
- Of peerless front and lit with flashing scales;
- That other, from neglect and squalor foul,
- Drags slow a cumbrous belly. As with kings,
- So too with people, diverse is their mould,
- Some rough and loathly, as when the wayfarer
- Scapes from a whirl of dust, and scorched with heat
- Spits forth the dry grit from his parched mouth:
- The others shine forth and flash with lightning-gleam,
- Their backs all blazoned with bright drops of gold
- Symmetric: this the likelier breed; from these,
- When heaven brings round the season, thou shalt strain
- Sweet honey, nor yet so sweet as passing clear,
- And mellowing on the tongue the wine-god's fire.
- But when the swarms fly aimlessly abroad,
- Disport themselves in heaven and spurn their cells,
- Leaving the hive unwarmed, from such vain play
- Must you refrain their volatile desires,
- Nor hard the task: tear off the monarchs' wings;
- While these prove loiterers, none beside will dare
- Mount heaven, or pluck the standards from the camp.
- Let gardens with the breath of saffron flowers
- Allure them, and the lord of Hellespont,
- Priapus, wielder of the willow-scythe,
- Safe in his keeping hold from birds and thieves.
- And let the man to whom such cares are dear
- Himself bring thyme and pine-trees from the heights,
- And strew them in broad belts about their home;
- No hand but his the blistering task should ply,
- Plant the young slips, or shed the genial showers.
- And I myself, were I not even now
- Furling my sails, and, nigh the journey's end,
- Eager to turn my vessel's prow to shore,
- Perchance would sing what careful husbandry
- Makes the trim garden smile; of Paestum too,
- Whose roses bloom and fade and bloom again;
- How endives glory in the streams they drink,
- And green banks in their parsley, and how the gourd
- Twists through the grass and rounds him to paunch;
- Nor of Narcissus had my lips been dumb,
- That loiterer of the flowers, nor supple-stemmed
- Acanthus, with the praise of ivies pale,
- And myrtles clinging to the shores they love.
- For 'neath the shade of tall Oebalia's towers,
- Where dark Galaesus laves the yellowing fields,
- An old man once I mind me to have seen—
- From Corycus he came—to whom had fallen
- Some few poor acres of neglected land,
- And they nor fruitful' neath the plodding steer,
- Meet for the grazing herd, nor good for vines.
- Yet he, the while his meagre garden-herbs
- Among the thorns he planted, and all round
- White lilies, vervains, and lean poppy set,
- In pride of spirit matched the wealth of kings,
- And home returning not till night was late,
- With unbought plenty heaped his board on high.
- He was the first to cull the rose in spring,
- He the ripe fruits in autumn; and ere yet
- Winter had ceased in sullen ire to rive
- The rocks with frost, and with her icy bit
- Curb in the running waters, there was he
- Plucking the rathe faint hyacinth, while he chid
- Summer's slow footsteps and the lagging West.
- Therefore he too with earliest brooding bees
- And their full swarms o'erflowed, and first was he
- To press the bubbling honey from the comb;
- Lime-trees were his, and many a branching pine;
- And all the fruits wherewith in early bloom
- The orchard-tree had clothed her, in full tale
- Hung there, by mellowing autumn perfected.
- He too transplanted tall-grown elms a-row,
- Time-toughened pear, thorns bursting with the plum
- And plane now yielding serviceable shade
- For dry lips to drink under: but these things,
- Shut off by rigorous limits, I pass by,
- And leave for others to sing after me.