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The light in terror, or some snake, that wont

  ‘Neath shade and sheltering roof to creep, and shower

  Its bane among the cattle, hugs the ground,

  Fell scourge of kine. Shepherd, seize stakes, seize stones!

  And as he rears defiance, and puffs out

  A hissing throat, down with him! see how low

  That cowering crest is vailed in flight, the while,

  His midmost coils and final sweep of tail

  Relaxing, the last fold drags lingering spires.

  Then that vile worm that in Calabrian glades

  Uprears his breast, and wreathes a scaly back,

  His length of belly pied with mighty spots-

  While from their founts gush any streams, while yet

  With showers of Spring and rainy south-winds earth

  Is moistened, lo! he haunts the pools, and here

  Housed in the banks, with fish and chattering frogs

  Crams the black void of his insatiate maw.

  Soon as the fens are parched, and earth with heat

  Is gaping, forth he darts into the dry,

  Rolls eyes of fire and rages through the fields,

  Furious from thirst and by the drought dismayed.

  Me list not then beneath the open heaven

  To snatch soft slumber, nor on forest-ridge

  Lie stretched along the grass, when, slipped his slough,

  To glittering youth transformed he winds his spires,

  And eggs or younglings leaving in his lair,

  Towers sunward, lightening with three-forked tongue.

  Of sickness, too, the causes and the signs

  I’ll teach thee. Loathly scab assails the sheep,

  When chilly showers have probed them to the quick,

  And winter stark with hoar-frost, or when sweat

  Unpurged cleaves to them after shearing done,

  And rough thorns rend their bodies. Hence it is

  Shepherds their whole flock steep in running streams,

  While, plunged beneath the flood, with drenched fell,

  The ram, launched free, goes drifting down the tide.

  Else, having shorn, they smear their bodies o’er

  With acrid oil-lees, and mix silver-scum

  And native sulphur and Idaean pitch,

  Wax mollified with ointment, and therewith

  Sea-leek, strong hellebores, bitumen black.

  Yet ne’er doth kindlier fortune crown his toil,

  Than if with blade of iron a man dare lance

  The ulcer’s mouth ope: for the taint is fed

  And quickened by confinement; while the swain

  His hand of healing from the wound withholds,

  Or sits for happier signs imploring heaven.

  Aye, and when inward to the bleater’s bones

  The pain hath sunk and rages, and their limbs

  By thirsty fever are consumed, ’tis good

  To draw the enkindled heat therefrom, and pierce

  Within the hoof-clefts a blood-bounding vein.

  Of tribes Bisaltic such the wonted use,

  And keen Gelonian, when to Rhodope

  He flies, or Getic desert, and quaffs milk

  With horse-blood curdled.

  Seest one far afield

  Oft to the shade’s mild covert win, or pull

  The grass tops listlessly, or hindmost lag,

  Or, browsing, cast her down amid the plain,

  At night retire belated and alone;

  With quick knife check the mischief, ere it creep

  With dire contagion through the unwary herd.

  Less thick and fast the whirlwind scours the main

  With tempest in its wake, than swarm the plagues

  Of cattle; nor seize they single lives alone,

  But sudden clear whole feeding grounds, the flock

  With all its promise, and extirpate the breed.

  Well would he trow it who, so long after, still

  High Alps and Noric hill-forts should behold,

  And Iapydian Timavus’ fields,

  Ay, still behold the shepherds’ realms a waste,

  And far and wide the lawns untenanted.

  Here from distempered heavens erewhile arose

  A piteous season, with the full fierce heat

  Of autumn glowed, and cattle-kindreds all

  And all wild creatures to destruction gave,

  Tainted the pools, the fodder charged with bane.

  Nor simple was the way of death, but when

  Hot thirst through every vein impelled had drawn

  Their wretched limbs together, anon o’erflowed

  A watery flux, and all their bones piecemeal

  Sapped by corruption to itself absorbed.

  Oft in mid sacrifice to heaven- the white

  Wool-woven fillet half wreathed about his brow-

  Some victim, standing by the altar, there

  Betwixt the loitering carles a-dying fell:

  Or, if betimes the slaughtering priest had struck,

  Nor with its heaped entrails blazed the pile,

  Nor seer to seeker thence could answer yield;

  Nay, scarce the up-stabbing knife with blood was stained,

  Scarce sullied with thin gore the surface-sand.

  Hence die the calves in many a pasture fair,

  Or at full cribs their lives’ sweet breath resign;

  Hence on the fawning dog comes madness, hence

  Racks the sick swine a gasping cough that chokes

  With swelling at the jaws: the conquering steed,

  Uncrowned of effort and heedless of the sward,

  Faints, turns him from the springs, and paws the earth

  With ceaseless hoof: low droop his ears, wherefrom

  Bursts fitful sweat, a sweat that waxes cold

  Upon the dying beast; the skin is dry,

  And rigidly repels the handler’s touch.

  These earlier signs they give that presage doom.

  But, if the advancing plague ‘gin fiercer grow,

  Then are their eyes all fire, deep-drawn their breath,

  At times groan-laboured: with long sobbing heave

  Their lowest flanks; from either nostril streams

  Black blood; a rough tongue clogs the obstructed jaws.

  ’Twas helpful through inverted horn to pour

  Draughts of the wine-god down; sole way it seemed

  To save the dying: soon this too proved their bane,

  And, reinvigorate but with frenzy’s fire,

  Even at death’s pinch- the gods some happier fate

  Deal to the just, such madness to their foes-

  Each with bared teeth his own limbs mangling tore.

  See! as he smokes beneath the stubborn share,

  The bull drops, vomiting foam-dabbled gore,

  And heaves his latest groans. Sad goes the swain,

  Unhooks the steer that mourns his fellow’s fate,

  And in mid labour leaves the plough-gear fast.

  Nor tall wood’s shadow, nor soft sward may stir

  That heart’s emotion, nor rock-channelled flood,

  More pure than amber speeding to the plain:

  But see! his flanks fail under him, his eyes

  Are dulled with deadly torpor, and his neck

  Sinks to the earth with drooping weight. What now

  Besteads him toil or service? to have turned

  The heavy sod with ploughshare? And yet these

  Ne’er knew the Massic wine-god’s baneful boon,

  Nor twice replenished banquets: but on leaves

  They fare, and virgin grasses, and their cups

  Are crystal springs and streams with running tired,

  Their healthful slumbers never broke by care.

  Then only, say they, through that country side

  For Juno’s rites were cattle far to seek,

  And ill-matched buffaloes the chariots drew

  To their high
fanes. So, painfully with rakes

  They grub the soil, aye, with their very nails

  Dig in the corn-seeds, and with strained neck

  O’er the high uplands drag the creaking wains.

  No wolf for ambush pries about the pen,

  Nor round the flock prowls nightly; pain more sharp

  Subdues him: the shy deer and fleet-foot stags

  With hounds now wander by the haunts of men

  Vast ocean’s offspring, and all tribes that swim,

  On the shore’s confine the wave washes up,

  Like shipwrecked bodies: seals, unwonted there,

  Flee to the rivers. Now the viper dies,

  For all his den’s close winding, and with scales

  Erect the astonied water-worms. The air

  Brooks not the very birds, that headlong fall,

  And leave their life beneath the soaring cloud.

  Moreover now nor change of fodder serves,

  And subtlest cures but injure; then were foiled

  The masters, Chiron sprung from Phillyron,

  And Amythaon’s son Melampus. See!

  From Stygian darkness launched into the light

  Comes raging pale Tisiphone; she drives

  Disease and fear before her, day by day

  Still rearing higher that all-devouring head.

  With bleat of flocks and lowings thick resound

  Rivers and parched banks and sloping heights.

  At last in crowds she slaughters them, she chokes

  The very stalls with carrion-heaps that rot

  In hideous corruption, till men learn

  With earth to cover them, in pits to hide.

  For e’en the fells are useless; nor the flesh

  With water may they purge, or tame with fire,

  Nor shear the fleeces even, gnawed through and through

  With foul disease, nor touch the putrid webs;

  But, had one dared the loathly weeds to try,

  Red blisters and an unclean sweat o’erran

  His noisome limbs, till, no long tarriance made,

  The fiery curse his tainted frame devoured.

  GEORGIC IV

  Of air-born honey, gift of heaven, I now

  Take up the tale. Upon this theme no less

  Look thou, Maecenas, with indulgent eye.

  A marvellous display of puny powers,

  High-hearted chiefs, a nation’s history,

  Its traits, its bent, its battles and its clans,

  All, each, shall pass before you, while I sing.

  Slight though the poet’s theme, not slight the praise,

  So frown not heaven, and Phoebus hear his call.

  First find your bees a settled sure abode,

  Where neither winds can enter (winds blow back

  The foragers with food returning home)

  Nor sheep and butting kids tread down the flowers,

  Nor heifer wandering wide upon the plain

  Dash off the dew, and bruise the springing blades.

  Let the gay lizard too keep far aloof

  His scale-clad body from their honied stalls,

  And the bee-eater, and what birds beside,

  And Procne smirched with blood upon the breast

  From her own murderous hands. For these roam wide

  Wasting all substance, or the bees themselves

  Strike flying, and in their beaks bear home, to glut

  Those savage nestlings with the dainty prey.

  But let clear springs and moss-green pools be near,

  And through the grass a streamlet hurrying run,

  Some palm-tree o’er the porch extend its shade,

  Or huge-grown oleaster, that in Spring,

  Their own sweet Spring-tide, when the new-made chiefs

  Lead forth the young swarms, and, escaped their comb,

  The colony comes forth to sport and play,

  The neighbouring bank may lure them from the heat,

  Or bough befriend with hospitable shade.

  O’er the mid-waters, whether swift or still,

  Cast willow-branches and big stones enow,

  Bridge after bridge, where they may footing find

  And spread their wide wings to the summer sun,

  If haply Eurus, swooping as they pause,

  Have dashed with spray or plunged them in the deep.

  And let green cassias and far-scented thymes,

  And savory with its heavy-laden breath

  Bloom round about, and violet-beds hard by

  Sip sweetness from the fertilizing springs.

  For the hive’s self, or stitched of hollow bark,

  Or from tough osier woven, let the doors

  Be strait of entrance; for stiff winter’s cold

  Congeals the honey, and heat resolves and thaws,

  To bees alike disastrous; not for naught

  So haste they to cement the tiny pores

  That pierce their walls, and fill the crevices

  With pollen from the flowers, and glean and keep

  To this same end the glue, that binds more fast

  Than bird-lime or the pitch from Ida’s pines.

  Oft too in burrowed holes, if fame be true,

  They make their cosy subterranean home,

  And deeply lodged in hollow rocks are found,

  Or in the cavern of an age-hewn tree.

  Thou not the less smear round their crannied cribs

  With warm smooth mud-coat, and strew leaves above;

  But near their home let neither yew-tree grow,

  Nor reddening crabs be roasted, and mistrust

  Deep marish-ground and mire with noisome smell,

  Or where the hollow rocks sonorous ring,

  And the word spoken buffets and rebounds.

  What more? When now the golden sun has put

  Winter to headlong flight beneath the world,

  And oped the doors of heaven with summer ray,

  Forthwith they roam the glades and forests o’er,

  Rifle the painted flowers, or sip the streams,

  Light-hovering on the surface. Hence it is

  With some sweet rapture, that we know not of,

  Their little ones they foster, hence with skill

  Work out new wax or clinging honey mould.

  So when the cage-escaped hosts you see

  Float heavenward through the hot clear air, until

  You marvel at yon dusky cloud that spreads

  And lengthens on the wind, then mark them well;

  For then ’tis ever the fresh springs they seek

  And bowery shelter: hither must you bring

  The savoury sweets I bid, and sprinkle them,

  Bruised balsam and the wax-flower’s lowly weed,

  And wake and shake the tinkling cymbals heard

  By the great Mother: on the anointed spots

  Themselves will settle, and in wonted wise

  Seek of themselves the cradle’s inmost depth.

  But if to battle they have hied them forth-

  For oft ‘twixt king and king with uproar dire

  Fierce feud arises, and at once from far

  You may discern what passion sways the mob,

  And how their hearts are throbbing for the strife;

  Hark! the hoarse brazen note that warriors know

  Chides on the loiterers, and the ear may catch

  A sound that mocks the war-trump’s broken blasts;

  Then in hot haste they muster, then flash wings,

  Sharpen their pointed beaks and knit their thews,

  And round the king, even to his royal tent,

  Throng rallying, and with shouts defy the foe.

  So, when a dry Spring and clear space is given,

  Forth from the gates they burst, they clash on high;

  A din arises; they are heaped and rolled

  Into one mighty mass, and headlong fall,

  Not denselier hail through heaven, nor pelting so


  Rains from the shaken oak its acorn-shower.

  Conspicuous by their wings the chiefs themselves

  Press through the heart of battle, and display

  A giant’s spirit in each pigmy frame,

  Steadfast no inch to yield till these or those

  The victor’s ponderous arm has turned to flight.

  Such fiery passions and such fierce assaults

  A little sprinkled dust controls and quells.

  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,