Eclogues

Virgil

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

  1. reft was the solace that we had in thee,
  2. Menalcas! Who then of the Nymphs had sung,
  3. or who with flowering herbs bestrewn the ground,
  4. and o'er the fountains drawn a leafy veil?—
  5. who sung the stave I filched from you that day
  6. to Amaryllis wending, our hearts' joy?—
  7. “While I am gone, 'tis but a little way,
  8. feed, Tityrus, my goats, and, having fed,
  9. drive to the drinking-pool, and, as you drive,
  10. beware the he-goat; with his horn he butts.“
MOERIS
  1. Ay, or to Varus that half-finished lay,
  2. “Varus, thy name, so still our Mantua live—
  3. Mantua to poor Cremona all too near—
  4. shall singing swans bear upward to the stars.”
LYCIDAS
  1. So may your swarms Cyrnean yew-trees shun,
  2. your kine with cytisus their udders swell,
  3. begin, if aught you have. The Muses made
  4. me too a singer; I too have sung; the swains
  5. call me a poet, but I believe them not:
  6. for naught of mine, or worthy Varius yet