of black Styx and the shades infernal. Here, with his tortuous coils, the mighty Snake glides forth, river-like, about and between the two Bears-the Bears that shrink from the plunge 'neath Ocean's plain. There, men say, is either the silence of lifeless night, and gloom ever thickening beneath night's pall; or else Dawn returns from us and brings them back the day, and when on us the rising Sun first breathes with panting steeds, there glowing Vesper is kindling his evening rays. Hence, though the sky be fitful, we can foretell the weather's changes, hence the harvest-tide and sowing-time; when it is meet to lash with oars the sea's faithless calm, when to launch our well-rigged fleet, or in the woods to fell the pine in season. Not in vain do we watch the signs, as they rise and set, and the year, uniform in its four several seasons. 259 Whenever a cold shower keeps the farmer indoors, he can prepare at leisure much that ere long in clear weather must needs be hurried. The ploughman hammers out the hard tooth of the blunted share, scoops troughs from trees, or sets a brand upon his flocks and labels upon his corn-heaps.1 Others sharpen stakes and two-pronged forks, or make bands of Amerian willows for the limber vine. Now let the pliant basket be woven of briar twigs, now roast corn by the fire, now grind it on the stone. Nay, even on holy days, the laws of God and man permit you to do certain tasks. No scruples ever forbade us to guide down2 the water-rills, to defend a crop with a hedge, to set snares for birds, to fire brambles, or to plunge bleating flocks into the health-giving stream, Oft, too, the driver 1 numeros = tesseras, i.e. labels or tickets, designating quantity, &c. 2i.e. in irrigation; cf. 1. 108. saepe oleo tardi costas agitator aselli Ipsa dies alios alio dedit ordine Luna 275 280 MPR 285 felicis operum. quintam fuge: pallidus Orcus Eumenidesque satae; tum partu Terra nefando Coeumque Iapetumque creat saevumque Typhoea et coniuratos caelum rescindere fratres. ter sunt conati imponere Pelio Ossam scilicet, atque Ossae frondosum involvere Olympum ; ter pater exstructos disiecit fulmine montis. septima post decimam felix et ponere vitem et prensos domitare boves et licia telae addere. nona fugae melior, contraria furtis. Multa adeo gelida melius se nocte dedere, aut cum sole novo terras inrorat Eous. nocte leves melius stipulae, nocte arida prata tondentur, noctes lentus non deficit umor. et quidam seros hiberni ad luminis ignes pervigilat ferroque faces inspicat acuto; interea longum cantu solata laborem arguto coniunx percurrit pectine telas, aut dulcis musti Volcano decoquit umorem et foliis undam trepidi despumat aëni. at rubicunda Ceres medio succiditur aestu, et medio tostas aestu terit area fruges. nudus ara, sere nudus; hiems ignava colono. frigoribus parto agricolae plerumque fruuntur mutuaque inter se laeti convivia curant. invitat genialis hiems curasque resolvit, 290 295 300 283 deiecit R. 292 pervigilant P. 284 vites R. 296 trepidi P2, Servius: trepidis MR (aenis): tepidi P1. loads his slow donkey's sides with oil or cheap fruits, and as he comes back from town brings with him an indented millstone or a mass of black pitch. 1 276 The Moon herself has ordained various days in various grades as lucky for work. Shun the fifth ; then pale Orcus and the Furies were born: then in monstrous labour Earth bore Coeus, and Iapetus, and fierce Typhoeus, and the brethren 1 who were banded to break down Heaven. Thrice did they essay, forsooth, to pile Ossa on Pelion, and over Ossa to roll leafy Olympus; thrice, with his bolt, the Father dashed apart their up-piled mountains. The seventeenth is lucky for planting the vine, for yoking and breaking in oxen, and for adding the leashes to the warp. The ninth is a friend to the runaway, a foe to the thief. 287 Yea, and many things make better progress in the cool of night, or when at early sunrise the day-star bedews the earth. At night the light stubble is best shorn, at night the thirsty meadows; at night the softening moisture fails not. One I know spends wakeful hours by the late blaze of a winter-fire, and with sharp knife points torches; his wife the while solaces with song her long toil, runs the shrill shuttle through the web, or on the fire boils down the sweet juice of must, and skims with leaves the wave of the bubbling cauldron. But Ceres' golden grain is cut down in noonday heat, and in noonday heat the floor threshes the parched ears. Strip to plough, strip to sow; winter is the farmer's lazy time. In cold weather farmers chiefly enjoy their gains, and feast together in merry companies. Winter's cheer calls them, and loosens the weight of care-even as when laden 1 i.e. the Giants, though what is here narrated is elsewhere (Aen. VI. 582) attributed to the two Aloidae. 306 ceu pressae cum iam portum tetigere carinae, puppibus et laeti nautae imposuere coronas. sed tamen et quernas glandes tum stringere tempus et lauri bacas oleamque cruentaque myrta, tum gruibus pedicas et retia ponere cervis auritosque sequi lepores, tum figere dammas stuppea torquentem Balearis verbera fundae, cum iix alta iacet, glaciem cum flumina trudunt. 310 Quid tempestates autumni et sidera dicam, atque, ubi iam breviorque dies et mollior aestas, quae vigilanda viris, vel cum ruit imbriferum ver, spicea iam campis cum messis inhorruit et cum frumenta in viridi stipula lactentia turgent? saepe ego, cum flavis messorem induceret arvis agricola et fragili iam stringeret hordea culmo, omnia ventorum concurrere proelia vidi, 315 325 quae gravidam late segetem ab radicibus imis sublimem expulsam eruerent; ita turbine nigro 320 ferret hiems culmumque levem stipulasque volantis. saepe etiam immensum caelo venit agmen aquarum et foedam glomerant tempestatem imbribus atris MR collectae ex alto nubes; ruit arduus aether, et pluvia ingenti sata laeta boumque labores diluit; implentur fossae et cava flumina crescunt cum sonitu fervetque fretis spirantibus aequor. ipse pater media nimborum in nocte corusca fulmina molitur dextra: quo maxuma motu terra tremit; fugere ferae et mortalia corda per gentes humilis stravit pavor: ille flagranti aut Athon aut Rhodopen aut alta Ceraunia telo 309 torquentes R. 315 latentia M1: iactentia R. 318 consurgere R. 321 nigrantis P1. 330 keels have at last reached port, and the merry sailors have crowned the poops with garlands. Still, then is the time to strip the acorns and laurel-berries, the olive and blood-red myrtle; the time to set snares for cranes and nets for the stag, and to chase the long-eared hares; the time to smite the does, as you whirl the hempen thongs of a Balearic sling-when the snow lies deep, when the rivers roll down the ice. 311 Why need I tell of autumn's changes and stars, and for what our workers must watch, as the day now grows shorter and summer softer, or when spring pours down in showers, as the bearded harvest now bristles in the fields, and the corn on its green stem swells with milk? Often, as the farmer was bringing the reaper into his yellow fields and was now stripping the brittle-stalked barley,1 my own eyes have seen all the winds clash in battle, tearing up the heavy crop far and wide from its deepest roots and tossing it on high; then with its black whirlwind the storm would sweep off the light stalk and flying stubble. Often, too, there appears in the sky a mighty column of waters, and clouds mustered from on high roll up a murky tempest of black showers: down falls the lofty heaven, and with its deluge of rain washes away the gladsome crops and the labours of oxen. The dykes fill, the deep-channelled rivers swell and roar, and the sea steams in its heaving friths. The Father himself, in the midnight of storm-clouds, wields his bolts with flashing hand. At that shock shivers the mighty earth; far flee the beasts and o'er all the world crouching terror lays low men's hearts: he with blazing bolt dashes down Athos or Rhodope or the Ceraunian peaks. The winds 1 Page prefers “stripping the barley-ears from the brittle (i.e. ripe) stalk.” |