Eclogues

Virgil

Vergil. The Poems of Vergil. Rhoades, James, translator. London: Oxford University Press, 1921.

  1. pan, god of Arcady, with blood-red juice
  2. of the elder-berry, and with vermilion, dyed.
  3. “Wilt ever make an end?” quoth he, “behold
  4. love recks not aught of it: his heart no more
  5. with tears is sated than with streams the grass,
  6. bees with the cytisus, or goats with leaves.”
  7. “Yet will ye sing, Arcadians, of my woes
  8. upon your mountains,” sadly he replied—
  9. “Arcadians, that alone have skill to sing.
  10. O then how softly would my ashes rest,
  11. if of my love, one day, your flutes should tell!
  12. And would that I, of your own fellowship,
  13. or dresser of the ripening grape had been,
  14. or guardian of the flock! for surely then,
  15. let Phyllis, or Amyntas, or who else,
  16. bewitch me—what if swart Amyntas be?