4. Maior, supply natu. -5. Incertas, fluctuating, trembling. Zephyris motantibus, with the shifting Zephyrs; join with incertas.—5, 6. Sub umbras, and the dative antro, stand in coordinate relation to succedimus. Comp. Ae. I, 627.-7. Sparsit. See on E. IV, 52.-9. Amyntas might as well vie with Apollo as with me. The young singer does not like to be compared with Amyntas as a rival.- -10. Ignis, loves; stories of the love of Phyllis.10, 11. Phyllis, Alconis, Codri, all pastoral names, having no reference to the historical personages of Greece who bore the same. Alconis is an objective genitive; the others are probably intended to be subjective. -11. Habes, as in E. III, 52.- -13, 14. Immo, etc., nay (not those), but rather these strains which I lately wrote out, and while composing (modulans) marked in turn (first in words and then in musical notes), etc. This interpretation, which is generally adopted, makes alterna refer to the strains (carmina) of alternating poetry and music, noted on the beech one after the other successively, just as Mopsus had composed and performed them. The pipe, of course, did not accompany the voice in our sense, but was used for preludes and interludes.-15. Then talk about Amyntas.-16-18. Menalcas apologizes for his rash comparison of the two.-19. Desine with the accusative, as in E. VIII, 62, IX, 66. Puer, a frequent designation of shepherds. So below v. 54. -20-44. A pastoral elegy on the death of the divine shepherd Daphnis, who is intended to represent the murdered Caesar.

-21. Testes Nymphis, supply fuistis. "Ye were witnesses to the Nymphs,' of the tears they shed.- 23. Crudelia. The stars are supposed to control human destiny for good or evil. To Venus and her descendants they have been unpropitious in bringing such a fate upon the greatest of the line. Mater refers to Venus, the mother or ancestress of the Julian family.- -24. Non alli, no herdsmen. On those days of mourning all common avocations were forgotten. 25, 26. Nec-nec. These particles repeat separately the general negative contained in nulla, which qualifies both verbs alike. Comp. the Greek form ovdes, OUTE-OUTE. So the negatives in E. IV, 55, 56.- -26. Graminis herbam, the blades of grass. Herba is properly a collective term.28. Both the mountains and woods reecho the voices of African lions mourning thy death.- -27. Poenos, Carthaginian, African, as an epithet. See on E. I, 55, and Ae. V, 312.- -28. Loquuntur, for dicunt. Nature says that the wild beasts moaned by repeating their cries with her own echoes.

-27,

-29-31. Daphnis taught men to yoke tigers to the chariot, and to perform the sacred rites of Bacchus. That is, he taught men to domesticate beasts before untamed, so as to till the ground and cultivate the vine. Some understand this to be an allusion to the civil reforms of Caesar; and it may well include his great plans of internal improvement.—29. Armenias-tigres. According to the myth of Bacchus, that god, when returning from his conquest of India, was drawn in his triumphal chariot by tigers.-30. Inducere, not for ducere, to lead the dances, but for eigáyew, to introduce.—31. These words describe the thyrsus, or staff carried by the worshipers of Bacchus; a long slender rod (lentas hastas) wreathed with grape-leaves and ivy. Mollibus. Comp. Ae. VII, 390.- -34." (So) art thou all the glory of thy companions." -35-39. Since the death of Daphnis the fields and gardens have gone to waste; Pales, the goddess of herdsmen, and Apollo (once the herdsman of Admetus) have forsaken the fields. Pales and Apollo are associated again in Ge. III, 1. -36. Quibus. The antecedent, his, is to be supplied in v. 37, after nascuntur.-40. "Strow the ground where his ashes lie, with leaves and flowers; plant leafy shade-trees around the (neighboring) fountains. The custom of scattering flowers on the tomb seems to be referred to in spargite-foliis, and that of rearing trees around favorite fountains in inducite umbras.- 45-52. Menalcas is enraptured with the divine song of Mopsus, yet will also modestly make his offering of

praise.- 46. Quale agrees with the antecedent instead of sopor, on account of the meter. The second "quale" agrees with restinguere taken substantially; such (or so sweet) as quenching our thirst, etc.- 48. Magistrum, that is, Daphnis.- 49. Alter ab illo, the next to him; for such you have proved yourself by this song.- -50. Quocumque modo, in some fashion, no matter how far short of you. -52. Daphnin takes the Greek ending here on account of the meter. The termination im is usually preferred in words of this class.- -53. Tali munere, than such an offering of praise as you now propose. -54. Puer refers to Daphnis.- -54, 55. Ista carmina, those hymns of yours; such songs or strains as those you now promise; whether precisely the same which Stimicon has heard, or something new and similar.80. Daphnis enters the abode of Olympus above the stars. Because he is thus exalted, joy possesses the world which loved him; the woods and fields, Pan, the herdsinen, the rustic Nymphs, all rejoice; now under his divine influence peace and safety prevail, and as a god we shall worship him for ever. -56. Candidus, divinely fair. Ladewig and some others translate "robed in white." Insuetum, not seen before. Miratur, beholds with wonder.

etc.

-56

-60, 61. Characteristics of the golden age. 63. Intonsi, unshorn; rough with woods.. -64. Deus-Menalca! Thus shout the woods and mountains to Menalcas.- -65. Sis felix. Comp. Ae. I, 330.- -65, 66. Four altars are supposed to have been raised at the same time, two to Daphnis and two to Apollo, because the annual rites in honor of Caesar and Apollo were celebrated at the same period, those of Caesar on the 12th of July, and those of Apollo on the 13th. Caesar's birth-day was on the 13th; but, as the Sibylline books were said to prohibit any other ceremonial on the day set apart for the rites of Apollo, the senate decreed that those of Caesar should be celebrated on the 12th.- -66. Altaria is in apposition with the second duas, and equivalent to "quae sunt altaria." It describes the particular kind of ara, namely, an altar on which victims could be slain. Only fruits or bloodless offerings could be made on the altars of deified men, like Daphnis. --67, 68. Bina, duo. Both signify "two annually.". -69. In primis, above all, especially. Multo Baccho. Comp. Ge. II, 190.- -70. Messis, by metonomy for aestas.- -71. Nectar, in apposition with vina. Wine from the Greek islands was not imported into Italy until about B. c. 54; hence, novum.72, 73. The song and dance shall accompany the festival.- -74, 75. Haec, These honors shall be thine both at the feast of the vintage, when we give thanks to Bacchus and the attendant Nymphs, and at the ceremonial of blessing the fields, when we lead the victims round the fields and sacrifice. to Ceres. The latter rites are called the ambarvalia. See Ge. I, 339-45. -76-78. See on E. I, 60, and comp. Ae. I, 607.- -80. Damnabis-votis, you also (like other gods) shall hold (men) bound by vows; that is, by pledges of sacrifice made to you as to other deities in time of trial. See on Ae. V, 237.-81-84. If Menalcas was charmed with the hymn of Mopsus, so is the latter with that of his friend. What present can he make him meet for such lofty strains ?- -85-89. They exchange gifts in token of mutual esteem.-85. Ante, first; before you have made up your mind.86, 87. In the person of Menalcas, Vergil quotes words from the first verses of his second and third Eclogues, to indicate that he had used this pipe in composing and singing them. -87. Haec docuit, this taught me, this gave me the melody for, or inspired me with "Formosum Corydon," étc.- -88. This herdsman's staff, so prized by me that I would not give it even to the lovely Antigines, I give to thee.- -90. Paribus nodis, with knots equally distributed. It was a staff made, perhaps, of a slender thorn sapling, with knots distributed quite equally along its length, and shaved down and polished. Aere. The pedum had a bronze or copper pike at one end bound on by a ring of the same metal.

ECLOGUE VI.

THIS poem is dedicated to Varus, who probably succeeded Pollio in the government of Cisalpine Gaul, and who, according to some early authorities, had been a fellow-pupil of Vergil under Syro. While our poet gracefully declines to undertake the task, to which he had probably been urged by Varus, of composing an epic on the late wars (tristia bella), including the exploits of Varus himself, he entertains him with this Eclogue, which describes the artifice by which two shepherds, Chromis and Mnasylus, aided by the Nymph Aegle, entrap the god Sileneus, and compel him to give them an exhibition of his skill in song. The god sings to them of the origin of the world, and of various traditions of mythology.

The system of cosmogony with which he begins is that of Epicurus, which Vergil and Varus had learned from Syro.

1. Prima, not "the first who," but "at the first"; at the beginning of my career as a poet. Comp. primus, Ae. I, 1. My Muse, Thalia, preferred pastoral (Syracusan, Sicilian) poetry. My talent was only for rustic themes.

-3-5.

2. Thalia may be used strictly as the Muse of pastoral poetry, over which she presides as well as over comedy; or it may be taken, as the names of other Muses are sometimes used, to signify Muse in general.When I assumed to sing of kings and wars, or to compose epics, Apollo plucked my ear, as if to say: "Do you hear? this is no task for you. Your proper themes are lowly rustic scenes and characters." This mode of declining the request of his friend reminds us of the similar apology of Horace at a later period for not undertaking to sing of the achievements of Agrippa. 0. I, 6. Deductum, reduced, hence, slender, humble; the opposite of amplum, grand, heroic. -6. Super-erunt, separated by tmesis; there will remain (besides me), there will not be wanting those who, etc.- -8. Musam, by metonomy for song.- -9. Non iniussa cano, for I sing the songs or things commanded by Apollo. Siquis repeated, expresses the longing of the poet for success. -10, 11. If any in the love of pastoral song shall read my verses, he shall find thy name, Varus, often repeated there, and thus to him my lowly tamarisks (myricae), and all the wood shall sing of Varus.Quae sibi praescripsit, which has inscribed upon itself, which is inscribed with.

-12.

14. Pueri, probably shepherds; perhaps youthful fauns or satyrs.15. Ut semper. Comp. E. I, 54.- -16. Procul, off, away, out of place, distant from their proper position on his head. Procul is a relative term, meaning distant only with reference to the ordinary or natural connection of objects. The garlands were lying apart, having scarcely (tantum, just, but no more than) slipped down from his head.- -17. Gravis, heavy for his languid hand, which in the helplessness of sleep hardly retained its hold of the wellworn handle. Join ansa as an ablative of manner with pendebat. We may also understand e manu.-18. Spe luserat. Comp. Ae. I, 352.- -19. It seems to have been a common belief of the ancients that beings possessed of the gift of prophecy could be forced to make revelations when entrapped and bound. Comp. Ge. IV, 396. The myth concerning Midas and Silenus is an illustration, and also the account which Homer gives in Ods. IV, 414 sqq., of Proteus bound by Menelaus. Ex vincula sertis. A similar displacement of a preposition occurs in E. IX, 36.-20. The youths, already somewhat daunted by the audacity of their undertaking, are reassured by the appearance of Aegle. This is the usual interpretation; but the meaning may be that her sudden appearance at first frightens them as though she would oppose their proceedings, though, as it turns out, she comes to join in the frolic. Timidis, in this case, would be proleptic. Superveniet with the connective, que is equivalent to superveniens. -21. Aegle The repetition of a word with the mention of some additional attribute or circumstance is a

1

favorite figure. See below vv. 55, 56, Ae. II, 405, 406, et al. Iamque videnti, and even as he opens his eyes.be satisfied that you seem to have been too much for me. -24. Now let me go, boys. You ought to overpowered a god (though it is really but an accident) ought to be enough To seem to have for you, without holding me any longer in durance. potuisse. Others take videri in its literal meaning with me as subject, thus: Vos is the subject of "It is sufficient that I could be exposed to view.".

ablative of situation.

(Aegle) shall be given another kind of reward; not the songs I will give -26. Huic, etc., to her you. Aliud is occasionally found with a partitive genitive in the singular, as, aliud causae, Cic. Fl. 39, though partitive in form rather than in sense. Ipse seems to mean "of his own accord." spoken to his captors, at once, without further compulsion, he begins. As soon as he has good-naturedly 27. In numerum, in measure, keeping time with his song. Comp. Ge. I, 175; Ac. VIII, 458.- -27-30. The satyrs and wild beasts, and even inanimate things, are moved by his music, so that Parnassus is not so charmed with the singing of Apollo, nor the mountains of Thrace by that of Orpheus.31-40. The Epicurean theory of the origin of the world. In the beginning nothing existed but boundless void (magnum inane), and in it the undivided, or still commingled, seed-substances or atoms (coacta semina), that is, carth, air (anima), water, and fire. stances (his primis) were developed all things, and even the heavens (orbis Out of these primitive material submundi). Then gradually the earth became fixed and solid, excluding Nereus or the waters (Nerea), and confining them to the bed of the ocean, and brought forth on its own surface the various things which it was fitted to produce. Many terms in the passage seem to have been borrowed from Lucretius. -31. Coacta, still combined or blended in chaos.33. Liquidus, fluid, as fire is composed of the most subtile of the atomic substances.34. Ipse-orbis. Even the fluid (tener) orb of the world, the circumambient acther, became solid; a crystal firmament.interrogative ut is continued through the remainder of the paragraph. Ponto, -35. The construction of the the irregular position thus given to atque, unexampled in Vergil, has led -38. Altius has usually been joined with cadant, but some of the recent commentators to remove the comma from solem and place it after altius, translating thus: "The lands wonder that a new sun now shines from a higher region."the heavens and the earth, Silenus recounts some of the myths and traditions -41. Having described the "evolution" of of the human race, beginning with the creation of men from the stones thrown by Pyrrha. Caucasias volucres. The plural is poetic. Promethei, the theft of Prometheus, the stealing of fire from the chariot-wheel of the sun, that he might convey it to men.of Hercules and the Argonauts for the loss of the young Hylas, companion 43, 44. He sings of the grief of Hercules, stolen by the Nymphs of a fountain in Mysia, near which the Argonauts had landed. Quo fonte, equivalent to ad quem fontem. sings, in addition to these themes, of the fountain at which (or where) the sailors had called with loud voices on Hylas lost, so that," etc.Hyla omne sonaret, scanned like vale, vale, etc., in E. III, 79. In both pas44, Hyla, sages the voice naturally makes such a pause' in uttering the cry that the hiatus disappears.of the daughters of the Tirynthian king Proetus. 45-60. The story of Pasiphae is compared with that of Minos, was the victim of an unnatural passion inspired by Venus at the 46. Pasiphae, the wife instigation of Neptune, who was angry with Minos for keeping the bull which had come up out of the sea, instead of sacrificing it to him. Solatur is an example of the use of the verb found also below in vv. 62, 63, and in E. IX, 19, in which the speaker transfers, as it were, the action from the person spoken of to himself. of Pasiphae consoling herself with the love, etc. He describes her as grati"Silenus consoles Pasiphae" means he sings

42. Furtum

"He

66

fying her mad passion. 47. Virgo, maid, sometimes, as here, a general term for "woman.". 49. Non ulla secuta est, no one (of them) sought after, etc.; none of them was doomed to such brutish love as Pasiphae.50, 51. Quamvis, etc., although (so completely was her nature transformed to the instinct of a cow) she had dreaded the yoke for her neck.-51. Quaesisset. She could not but believe that she had horns on her smooth forehead, and often raised her hands to seek for them.-52. The reference is again to Pasiphae.- -53. Ille. The iuvencus. Hyacintho; that is, on the flowery turf." Fultus has the last syllable lengthened by the ictus.-55-60. Claudite, etc., the words of Pasiphae, in the frenzy of her love roaming over the hills in search of the beast.- -61. Atalanta, the daughter of Schoeneus, was to be the wife of the suitor who should excel her in the foot-race. Hippomanes, or, as some say, Milanio, obtained three golden apples from Cyprus by the favor of Venus, and dropped them on the course behind him. The maiden (puella), tempted by the beauty of the apples, turned aside, and thus was won. Hesperidum; such as those of the Hesperides; golden, beautiful. See on Hyblaeis, E. 1, 55, and Ae. V, 311.-61, 62. The sisters of Phaethon wept for him until they were turned into alders.-62, 63. Circumdat, erigit. See on Solatur, 46. -64-73. Vergil takes occasion here to introduce the praises of his friend, the gifted poet Cornelius Gallus, to whom he afterward addressed the tenth Eclogue.-64. Errantem, etc. This is not an unfrequent kind of allegory, representing the reveries of the imagination in poetic creation as a translation of the poet himself bodily to Helicon, or Tempe, or some other favorite abode of Apollo and the Muses. Comp. Horace, Ở. ÍII, 4, 6.65. Ut, interrogative, introducing the sentence. -66. Viro, to or before the honored poet; referring to Gallus. Sororum, the Muses. Chorus, the choir or company of the Muses. -67. Divino carmine, an ablative of description.69. Calamos. Linus, in the name of the Muses, bestows upon Gallus, in token of his merit as a poet, the pastoral pipes or syrinx which they had formerly given to Hesiod (Ascraee seni), the father of bucolic poetry.

-70. Seni, as not unfrequently, ancient. -72, 73. Gallus has composed a poem in imitation of an Idyl of Euphorion of Chalcis, describing the origin of the Grynaean oracle and grove of Apollo. The poem of Gallus is so beautiful that it has made this oracle the pride of Apollo, and hence one of his favorite titles is "Grynaeus." See on Ae. IV, 345. -73. Se iactet, as in Ae. VI, 877.74-81. Returning to themes of mythology, Silenus ends his song with the stories of Scylla and Tereus.- -74. Ut narraverit and mutatam are to be supplied after aut. "How he told of the change of Scylla." Scylla, the daughter of Nisus, king of Megara, is sometimes confounded, as here, with Scylla the monster of the Sicilian Straits, daughter of Phoreys. Nisi. See on Hectoris, Ae. III, 319. In quam there is a mixed relation of object and subject accusative. We may translate as if the reading were fama est, traditum est, or ferunt.-76. Dulichias, for Ithicas, refers to the fleet of Ulysses.77. Tímidos, terrified, made timid, proleptic, as in the second interpretation of timidis, above v. 20.- -78-81. Philomela, the daughter of Pandion, king of Athens, being violated by Tereus, king of Thrace and husband of her sister Procne, in revenge the two sisters killed Itys, the son of Tereus and Procne, and then served up the body as a banquet (dapes) for his table; afterward showing him the head (dona). Tereus attempted to slay them, but they fled, Philomela in the form of a nightingale, and Procne in that of a swallow, while Tereus was changed into a lapwing.78. Mutatos Terei artus, for Tereum mutatum," the transforming of Tereus." Quo cursu, with what flight or speed. Others: "With what kind of motion," as distinguished from that of her former condition as a human being. 80, 81. Quibus alis, that is, "with the wings of what bird." Ante, beforehand, first; mourning (infelix), and flitting a moment around her home