Complete Works of Virgil Page 9

  To care of sire the mother’s care succeeds.

  When great with young they wander nigh their time,

  Let no man suffer them to drag the yoke

  In heavy wains, nor leap across the way,

  Nor scour the meads, nor swim the rushing flood.

  In lonely lawns they feed them, by the course

  Of brimming streams, where moss is, and the banks

  With grass are greenest, where are sheltering caves,

  And far outstretched the rock-flung shadow lies.

  Round wooded Silarus and the ilex-bowers

  Of green Alburnus swarms a winged pest-

  Its Roman name Asilus, by the Greeks

  Termed Oestros- fierce it is, and harshly hums,

  Driving whole herds in terror through the groves,

  Till heaven is madded by their bellowing din,

  And Tanager’s dry bed and forest-banks.

  With this same scourge did Juno wreak of old

  The terrors of her wrath, a plague devised

  Against the heifer sprung from Inachus.

  From this too thou, since in the noontide heats

  ’Tis most persistent, fend thy teeming herds,

  And feed them when the sun is newly risen,

  Or the first stars are ushering in the night.

  But, yeaning ended, all their tender care

  Is to the calves transferred; at once with marks

  They brand them, both to designate their race,

  And which to rear for breeding, or devote

  As altar-victims, or to cleave the ground

  And into ridges tear and turn the sod.

  The rest along the greensward graze at will.

  Those that to rustic uses thou wouldst mould,

  As calves encourage and take steps to tame,

  While pliant wills and plastic youth allow.

  And first of slender withies round the throat

  Loose collars hang, then when their free-born necks

  Are used to service, with the self-same bands

  Yoke them in pairs, and steer by steer compel

  Keep pace together. And time it is that oft

  Unfreighted wheels be drawn along the ground

  Behind them, as to dint the surface-dust;

  Then let the beechen axle strain and creak

  ‘Neath some stout burden, whilst a brazen pole

  Drags on the wheels made fast thereto. Meanwhile

  For their unbroken youth not grass alone,

  Nor meagre willow-leaves and marish-sedge,

  But corn-ears with thy hand pluck from the crops.

  Nor shall the brood-kine, as of yore, for thee

  Brim high the snowy milking-pail, but spend

  Their udders’ fullness on their own sweet young.

  But if fierce squadrons and the ranks of war

  Delight thee rather, or on wheels to glide

  At Pisa, with Alpheus fleeting by,

  And in the grove of Jupiter urge on

  The flying chariot, be your steed’s first task

  To face the warrior’s armed rage, and brook

  The trumpet, and long roar of rumbling wheels,

  And clink of chiming bridles in the stall;

  Then more and more to love his master’s voice

  Caressing, or loud hand that claps his neck.

  Ay, thus far let him learn to dare, when first

  Weaned from his mother, and his mouth at times

  Yield to the supple halter, even while yet

  Weak, tottering-limbed, and ignorant of life.

  But, three years ended, when the fourth arrives,

  Now let him tarry not to run the ring

  With rhythmic hoof-beat echoing, and now learn

  Alternately to curve each bending leg,

  And be like one that struggleth; then at last

  Challenge the winds to race him, and at speed

  Launched through the open, like a reinless thing,

  Scarce print his footsteps on the surface-sand.

  As when with power from Hyperborean climes

  The north wind stoops, and scatters from his path

  Dry clouds and storms of Scythia; the tall corn

  And rippling plains ‘gin shiver with light gusts;

  A sound is heard among the forest-tops;

  Long waves come racing shoreward: fast he flies,

  With instant pinion sweeping earth and main.

  A steed like this or on the mighty course

  Of Elis at the goal will sweat, and shower

  Red foam-flakes from his mouth, or, kindlier task,

  With patient neck support the Belgian car.

  Then, broken at last, let swell their burly frame

  With fattening corn-mash, for, unbroke, they will

  With pride wax wanton, and, when caught, refuse

  Tough lash to brook or jagged curb obey.

  But no device so fortifies their power

  As love’s blind stings of passion to forefend,

  Whether on steed or steer thy choice be set.

  Ay, therefore ’tis they banish bulls afar

  To solitary pastures, or behind

  Some mountain-barrier, or broad streams beyond,

  Or else in plenteous stalls pen fast at home.

  For, even through sight of her, the female wastes

  His strength with smouldering fire, till he forget

  Both grass and woodland. She indeed full oft

  With her sweet charms can lovers proud compel

  To battle for the conquest horn to horn.

  In Sila’s forest feeds the heifer fair,

  While each on each the furious rivals run;

  Wound follows wound; the black blood laves their limbs;

  Horns push and strive against opposing horns,

  With mighty groaning; all the forest-side

  And far Olympus bellow back the roar.

  Nor wont the champions in one stall to couch;

  But he that’s worsted hies him to strange climes

  Far off, an exile, moaning much the shame,

  The blows of that proud conqueror, then love’s loss

  Avenged not; with one glance toward the byre,

  His ancient royalties behind him lie.

  So with all heed his strength he practiseth,

  And nightlong makes the hard bare stones his bed,

  And feeds on prickly leaf and pointed rush,

  And proves himself, and butting at a tree

  Learns to fling wrath into his horns, with blows

  Provokes the air, and scattering clouds of sand

  Makes prelude of the battle; afterward,

  With strength repaired and gathered might breaks camp,

  And hurls him headlong on the unthinking foe:

  As in mid ocean when a wave far of

  Begins to whiten, mustering from the main

  Its rounded breast, and, onward rolled to land

  Falls with prodigious roar among the rocks,

  Huge as a very mountain: but the depths

  Upseethe in swirling eddies, and disgorge

  The murky sand-lees from their sunken bed.

  Nay, every race on earth of men, and beasts,

  And ocean-folk, and flocks, and painted birds,

  Rush to the raging fire: love sways them all.

  Never than then more fiercely o’er the plain

  Prowls heedless of her whelps the lioness:

  Nor monstrous bears such wide-spread havoc-doom

  Deal through the forests; then the boar is fierce,

  Most deadly then the tigress: then, alack!

  Ill roaming is it on Libya’s lonely plains.

  Mark you what shivering thrills the horse’s frame,

  If but a waft the well-known gust conveys?

  Nor curb can check them then, nor lash severe,

  Nor rocks and caverned crags, nor barrier-floods,

  That rend and whirl and wash the hills
away.

  Then speeds amain the great Sabellian boar,

  His tushes whets, with forefoot tears the ground,

  Rubs ‘gainst a tree his flanks, and to and fro

  Hardens each wallowing shoulder to the wound.

  What of the youth, when love’s relentless might

  Stirs the fierce fire within his veins? Behold!

  In blindest midnight how he swims the gulf

  Convulsed with bursting storm-clouds! Over him

  Heaven’s huge gate thunders; the rock-shattered main

  Utters a warning cry; nor parents’ tears

  Can backward call him, nor the maid he loves,

  Too soon to die on his untimely pyre.

  What of the spotted ounce to Bacchus dear,

  Or warlike wolf-kin or the breed of dogs?

  Why tell how timorous stags the battle join?

  O’er all conspicuous is the rage of mares,

  By Venus’ self inspired of old, what time

  The Potnian four with rending jaws devoured

  The limbs of Glaucus. Love-constrained they roam

  Past Gargarus, past the loud Ascanian flood;

  They climb the mountains, and the torrents swim;

  And when their eager marrow first conceives

  The fire, in Spring-tide chiefly, for with Spring

  Warmth doth their frames revisit, then they stand

  All facing westward on the rocky heights,

  And of the gentle breezes take their fill;

  And oft unmated, marvellous to tell,

  But of the wind impregnate, far and wide

  O’er craggy height and lowly vale they scud,

  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. 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.

  But who for milk hath longing, must himself

  Carry lucerne and lotus-leaves enow

  With salt herbs to the cote, whence more they love

  The streams, more stretch their udders, and give back

  A subtle taste of saltness in the milk.

  Many there be who from their mothers keep

  The new-born kids, and straightway bind their mouths

  With iron-tipped muzzles. What they milk at dawn,

  Or in the daylight hours, at night they press;

  What darkling or at sunset, this ere morn

  They bear away in baskets- for to town

  The shepherd hies him- or with dash of salt

  Just sprinkle, and lay by for winter use.

  Nor be thy dogs last cared for; but alike

  Swift Spartan hounds and fierce Molossian feed

  On fattening whey. Never, with these to watch,

  Dread nightly thief afold and ravening wolves,

  Or Spanish desperadoes in the rear.

  And oft the shy wild asses thou wilt chase,

  With hounds, too, hunt the hare, with hounds the doe;

  Oft from his woodland wallowing-den uprouse

  The boar, and scare him with their baying, and drive,

  And o’er the mountains urge into the toils

  Some antlered monster to their chiming cry.

  Learn also scented cedar-wood to burn

  Within the stalls, and snakes of noxious smell

  With fumes of galbanum to drive away.

  Oft under long-neglected cribs, or lurks

  A viper ill to handle, that hath fled