Georgics

Virgil

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

  1. Us too behoves Arcturus' sign observe,
  2. And the Kids' seasons and the shining Snake,
  3. No less than those who o'er the windy main
  4. Borne homeward tempt the Pontic, and the jaws
  5. Of oyster-rife Abydos. When the Scales
  6. Now poising fair the hours of sleep and day
  7. Give half the world to sunshine, half to shade,
  8. Then urge your bulls, my masters; sow the plain
  9. Even to the verge of tameless winter's showers
  10. With barley: then, too, time it is to hide
  11. Your flax in earth, and poppy, Ceres' joy,
  12. Aye, more than time to bend above the plough,
  13. While earth, yet dry, forbids not, and the clouds
  14. Are buoyant. With the spring comes bean-sowing;
  15. Thee, too, Lucerne, the crumbling furrows then
  16. Receive, and millet's annual care returns,
  17. What time the white bull with his gilded horns
  18. Opens the year, before whose threatening front,
  19. Routed the dog-star sinks. But if it be
  20. For wheaten harvest and the hardy spelt,
  21. Thou tax the soil, to corn-ears wholly given,
  22. Let Atlas' daughters hide them in the dawn,
  23. The Cretan star, a crown of fire, depart,
  24. Or e'er the furrow's claim of seed thou quit,
  25. Or haste thee to entrust the whole year's hope
  26. To earth that would not. Many have begun
  27. Ere Maia's star be setting; these, I trow,
  28. Their looked-for harvest fools with empty ears.
  29. But if the vetch and common kidney-bean
  30. Thou'rt fain to sow, nor scorn to make thy care
  31. Pelusiac lentil, no uncertain sign
  32. Bootes' fall will send thee; then begin,
  33. Pursue thy sowing till half the frosts be done.