Georgics

Virgil

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

  1. If eager for the prized Olympian palm
  2. One breed the horse, or bullock strong to plough,
  3. Be his prime care a shapely dam to choose.
  4. Of kine grim-faced is goodliest, with coarse head
  5. And burly neck, whose hanging dewlaps reach
  6. From chin to knee; of boundless length her flank;
  7. Large every way she is, large-footed even,
  8. With incurved horns and shaggy ears beneath.
  9. Nor let mislike me one with spots of white
  10. Conspicuous, or that spurns the yoke, whose horn
  11. At times hath vice in't: liker bull-faced she,
  12. And tall-limbed wholly, and with tip of tail
  13. Brushing her footsteps as she walks along.
  14. The age for Hymen's rites, Lucina's pangs,
  15. Ere ten years ended, after four begins;
  16. Their residue of days nor apt to teem,
  17. Nor strong for ploughing. Meantime, while youth's delight
  18. Survives within them, loose the males: be first
  19. To speed thy herds of cattle to their loves,
  20. Breed stock with stock, and keep the race supplied.
  21. Ah! life's best hours are ever first to fly
  22. From hapless mortals; in their place succeed
  23. Disease and dolorous eld; till travail sore
  24. And death unpitying sweep them from the scene.
  25. Still will be some, whose form thou fain wouldst change;
  26. Renew them still; with yearly choice of young
  27. Preventing losses, lest too late thou rue.
  1. Nor steeds crave less selection; but on those
  2. Thou think'st to rear, the promise of their line,
  3. From earliest youth thy chiefest pains bestow.
  4. See from the first yon high-bred colt afield,
  5. His lofty step, his limbs' elastic tread:
  6. Dauntless he leads the herd, still first to try
  7. The threatening flood, or brave the unknown bridge,
  8. By no vain noise affrighted; lofty-necked,
  9. With clean-cut head, short belly, and stout back;
  10. His sprightly breast exuberant with brawn.
  11. Chestnut and grey are good; the worst-hued white
  12. And sorrel. Then lo! if arms are clashed afar,
  13. Bide still he cannot: ears stiffen and limbs quake;
  14. His nostrils snort and roll out wreaths of fire.
  15. Dense is his mane, that when uplifted falls
  16. On his right shoulder; betwixt either loin
  17. The spine runs double; his earth-dinting hoof
  18. Rings with the ponderous beat of solid horn.
  19. Even such a horse was Cyllarus, reined and tamed
  20. By Pollux of Amyclae; such the pair
  21. In Grecian song renowned, those steeds of Mars,
  22. And famed Achilles' team: in such-like form
  23. Great Saturn's self with mane flung loose on neck
  24. Sped at his wife's approach, and flying filled
  25. The heights of Pelion with his piercing neigh.