The Georgics by Virgil

Author:Virgil
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Virgil, Georgics, Aeneid, Troyan Horse, Iliad, epic, journey, troy, war, ancient, history, adventure, history
Publisher: The Big Nest
Published: 2014-07-01T00:00:00+00:00

Not toward thy rising, Eurus, or the sun’s,

But westward and north-west, or whence up-springs

Black Auster, that glooms heaven with rainy cold.

Hence from their groin slow drips a poisonous juice,

By shepherds truly named hippomanes,

Hippomanes, fell stepdames oft have culled,

And mixed with herbs and spells of baneful bode.

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.

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