54. cantari dignus] Cf. line 1 n. dignus qui cantaretur.

In prose this would be

56-80. Daphnis is deified, and therefore all the country rejoices and the deities of the country. The wolves cease to raven; the mountains, the rocks, the vineyards proclaim his deity. Be thou favourable to us, O Daphnis: lo, beside the altars of Phoebus I will raise two to thee, and offer rural offerings, and hold a festival twice in each recurring year: yea, thy name and fame shall abide for ever and husbandmen shall pay thee vows.

56. candidus] 'clothed in glory': the adjective describes the radiant splendour of a heavenly being. Cf. Bunyan's phrase 'the shining ones.'

Observe the emphatic position of the word in marked contrast to exstinctum, line 20, ‘dead...deified.' So too the next lines express exultation in contrast with the lamentation of 11. 20-28. Pope imitates these lines, Pastoral 4. 69.

58. ergo] 'therefore,' i.e. because of his deification.

60. nec lupus...] Cf. the description of the golden age in 4. 22. Render Neither does the wolf devise an ambush against the flock nor nets treachery against the stag.'

61. amat...] These words give the reason why such felicity shall exist it is because Daphnis 'loves repose.' otia expresses the quiet and peaceful calm of undisturbed rural life, cf. 1. 6. For bonus see line 65 n.

63. intonsi] 'unshorn,' i.e. forest-covered. The passage recalls Is. xiv. 7 The whole earth is at rest and is quiet: they break forth into singing. Yea, the fir trees rejoice at thee, and the cedars of Lebanon, saying....'

64. sonant] active; 'cry aloud,' their cry being 'deus, deus ille, Menalca,' cf. 1. 5 n.

65. sis bonus...] 'O, be thou kind and propitious to thine own,' i.e. to the shepherds, amongst whom thou didst once dwell. bonus and felix, when applied to a deity, describe a desire to bring good and happiness to men; cf. Aen. 1. 330; 12. 646.

aras, governed by en, which is equivalent to a verb: 'behold four altars.'

66. duas altaria Phoebo] 'two whereon to offer sacrifice for Phoebus,' lit. 'two as sacrificial altars for Phoebus.' The altare is a superstructure placed upon the ara when victims were offered: victims were not offered to rural deities.

67. bina...duo]

If bina is not used loosely, this must mean that he would place two cups of milk on each altar, and two bowls of oil, one on each altar.

Milk, oil, and wine represent the products of the earth.

69. convivia] 'the feasts' which followed the festal offering to the god.

70. ante focum...] See line 75, where the festivals on which these offerings are to be made to Daphnis are specified, though obscurely.

71. vina...] 'I will pour from goblets Ariusian wines, a nectar new,' i.e. as a libation in thy honour. The better wines were introduced with dessert (mensae secundae), which was preceded by a libation. Chian wines were celebrated, and among them the Ariusian was reckoned chief (see Marquardt); it is therefore called nectar 'a drink of the gods,' and novum because it was at this time a novelty in Italy.

74. et cum...] 'both when we duly pay to the Nymphs our solemn vows and when we purify the fields.'

The ordinary Ambarvalia (see 3. 77 n.) to which lustrabimus agros refers took place at the extreme end of winter (G. 1. 340) when spring was just beginning, but there was apparently a similar festival just before harvest (G. 1. 347), to which Virgil may be here alluding, and, if so, this would explain messis line 70. But what was the winter festival to be held ante focum? We know of none, and indeed the worship of the Nymphs is Sicilian and not Italian, so that it is impossible to say what was in Virgil's mind. Some suggest the Liberalia, the festival of Bacchus and Ceres (line 79), the givers of wine and corn, which was held on the 17th of March.

77. dum rore cicadae] Cf. Hesiod Shield of Herc. 393 τέττιξ...ᾧ τε πόσις καὶ βρῶσις θῆλυς ἐέρση.

80. damnabis...] 'Thou too (as well as Bacchus and Ceres) shalt condemn in vows,' i.e. to the fulfilment of vows. A person who makes a vow promises something to a god in case the god shall first do something for him: when the god has done his part, the person making the vow becomes 'bound by his vow' (voti reus) and the god is said to 'condemn him in his vow,' i. e. order him to pay it. The construction damnare voti is more common, but on the other hand we have both capite damnare and capitis damnare, see Pub. Sch. Lat. Gr. § 135.

81-90. Mo. What can I give you in return for a song more delightful than the whispering of the south wind, the plashing of waves upon the shore, or the murmur of streams adown a valley? ME. I present you with this pipe which taught me many beautiful

songs.

Mo. And here is a shepherd's crook which Antigenes begged from me in vain.

85. ante] 'first': he anticipates Mopsus, who is hesitating as to what he shall give, and presents him with a pipe.

86. formosum... Alexim] See Ecl. 2. 1: he refers to the song by its first words, and the whole phrase formosum... Alexim is acc. after docuit. So we should say 'taught me "God save the Queen."

87. cuium pecus...Meliboei]

See Ecl. 3. 1.

88. quod, me...] 'which, though he often asked me, Antigenes could not win (from me).'

90. formosum...] 'beautiful with regular knots and brass': probably the knots were natural but the stick had been specially selected for the regularity with which they occurred; the 'brass' would refer to the brass end or crook.

ECLOGUE VI

This

After the Perusine war (41 B. C.) Pollio, who had been legate in Transpadane Gaul and aided Virgil to recover his farm (see Ecl. 1), had been superseded, as being a partisan of Antony, by an adherent of Octavian called Alfenus Varus. change of circumstances seems to have caused some difficulty to Virgil, and he is said to have nearly lost his life in a contest with Arrius, a centurion, to whom his farm had been assigned: anyhow Varus and his friend Cornelius Gallus (see Ecl. 10) helped him, and Virgil addresses this Eclogue to his patron.

The poet speaks as though Varus had urged him to attempt epic poetry and excuses himself from the task, at the same time asking Varus to accept the dedication (line 12) of the pastoral poem which follows, and which relates how two shepherds caught Silenus and induced him to sing a song containing an account of the creation and many famous legends.

1-12. My first poems were pastoral, when I attempted epic themes Apollo checked me, and so, Varus, leaving it to others to sing of your fame and of wars, I ask your acceptance of this rural song which as dedicated to you will be dear to the god of poetry.

1. prima...cum canerem] 'At first my muse... ...(but) when I began to sing....' The sentence consists of two contrasted clauses, the first introduced by prima and the second by cum canerem : first he wrote pastoral poetry, then attempted epic. Most

editors place a full- stop after Thalia, thus destroying the

sentence.

Syracosio, cf. 4. 1 n. ludere, cf. 1. 10 n. : the word here contrasts the sportive' character of pastoral verse with the seriousness and gloom (line 7) of epic poetry.

2. erubuit...habitare] 'blushed to inhabit'; for inf. cf. G. 4. 10 n. Thalia was not only the muse of comedy but also of pastoral poetry, and is represented with a shepherd's crook (pedum) in her hand.

3. Cynthius aurem...] Phoebus admonishes him as the god of song. The ear was regarded as the seat of memory; hence in summoning witnesses the ear was touched, cf. Pliny H. N. 11. 103 est in aure ima memoriae locus quem tangentes antestamur.

This passage is imitated by Horace Od. 4. 15. 1; Ovid A. A. 2. 493, and Milton Lycidas 77 Phoebus replied and touched my trembling ears.'

5. deductum carmen] The word deducere, which originally describes 'drawing out' the thread from a ball of wool in spinning, is commonly used of literary composition (cf. Hor. Sat. 2. 1. 4 deduci versus, Ep. 2. 1. 225 tenui deducta poemata filo), the verses being drawn out by the poet from his mass of raw material into a long and shapely thread of narrative. Here in opposition to pingues we may render 'finely spun.'

6. super...erunt] = supererunt by Tmesis, cf. 8. 17 praeque ...veniens. 'For there will ever be poets in plenty to long to sing....'

7. condere] For condere used of making or 'putting together' verses, cf. 2. 4 n. Here it is not to put together verse' but to put into verse,' 'tell of in verse,' cf. 10. 50.

We do not know enough about Varus to determine what these gloomy wars' were: possibly he may have performed some exploits during the civil wars to which Virgil alludes. 8. agrestem...] Repeated from 1. 2.

9. non iniussa cano] The pastoral song which he is about to sing, though not what Varus had asked for, is yet 'not unbidden' since Phoebus had suggested it.

tamen haec quoque: 'even these verses poor though they be' tamen notwithstanding' refers to the contrast which fills the poet's mind between humble pastoral verse and lofty epic.

si quis...si quis: repetition to emphasise the poet's modest doubt whether any one will read them. Of course the modesty is affected.

10. myricae...nemus] Cf. 4. 2 n. He does not mean that his verses will be about Varus, but that they will be dedicated to him.

12. quam...] 'than that page which has written the name of Varus at its head.'

13-30. Two shepherds find Silenus asleep after a carouse and proceed to make him prisoner by binding him with his own garlands. As the price of his freedom he agrees to sing them a song which he had long promised them. As he begins to sing the Fauns and wild beasts dance to the measure and the oaks move their heads in harmony.

14. Silenum] Silenus is the constant companion of Bacchus or Dionysus, and, as Bacchus is not only the god of the vine but also the god of the Dionysiac mysteries and the introducer of civilisation, so his tutor is not only a very obese and drunken god but also an eminently learned one: hence the desire of the shepherds to hear his discourse.

15. inflatum...] 'having his veins, as ever, still swollen with yesterday's revelry.' For inflatum venas cf. 1. 54 n.

16. serta...] 'his garlands lay close by just fallen from his head': procul does not necessarily imply that the distance between two things is great, but merely that they are separated (cf. G. 4. 424; Aen. 10. 835); here the next words show that it means 'close by.'

Many editors join procul tantum 'just a little way off' and compare Theocr. 1. 45 TUTOòν 8σσоν åπweev, but this is artificial and unnecessary.

17. et gravis...] Notice the description: the tankard is big-bellied like a beetle (káv@apos) and heavy; its handle is 'well-worn' with use and is still faithfully grasped by the sleeper. With pendebat supply e manu.

19. ipsis ex vincula sertis] 'fetters fashioned from his garlands themselves'; for the rare position of ex cf. Lucr. 3. 10 tuis ex, inclute, chartis.

20. timidis] 'fearful,' i.e. frightened at their own boldness, in artistic contrast with Aegle, who is by no means timorous but proceeds to paint the god's face though he is now beginning to open his eyes' (iamque videnti).

23. quo] 'to what end?'

24. satis est potuisse videri] "tis enough (for you) that you seem to have been able (to make a prisoner of me).'

Others render 'it is enough that I have been able to be seen by you,' but after satis est = satis est vobis the pronoun me cannot naturally be supplied and must have been expressed.