Eclogues

Virgil

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

  1. there lacketh nothing save the power of song.
  2. Songs can the very moon draw down from heaven
  3. circe with singing changed from human form
  4. the comrades of Ulysses, and by song
  5. is the cold meadow-snake, asunder burst.
  6. These triple threads of threefold colour first
  7. I twine about thee, and three times withal
  8. around these altars do thine image bear:
  9. uneven numbers are the god's delight.
  10. Now, Amaryllis, ply in triple knots
  11. the threefold colours; ply them fast, and say
  12. this is the chain of Venus that I ply.
  13. As by the kindling of the self-same fire
  14. harder this clay, this wax the softer grows,
  15. so by my love may Daphnis; sprinkle meal,
  16. and with bitumen burn the brittle bays.