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Falls down and dies; and, dying, spews a flood
Of foamy madness, mix'd with clotted blood.
The clown, who, cursing Providence, repines,
His mournful fellow from the team disjoins;
With many a groan forsakes his fruitless care,
And in th' unfinish'd furrow leaves the share.
The pining steer no shades of lofty woods,
Nor flow'ry meads, can ease, nor crystal floods
Roll'd from the rock: his flabby flanks decrease;
His eyes are settled in a stupid peace;
His bulk too weighty for his thighs is grown;
And his unwieldly neck hangs drooping down.
Now what avails his well-deserving toil
To turn the glebe, or smooth the rugged soil?
And yet he never supt in solemn state,
(Nor undigesteu feasts did urge his fate)
Nor day to night luxuriously did join,
Nor surfeited on rich Campanian wine.
Simple his bev'rage, homely was his food,
The wholesome herbage, and the running flood:
No dreadful dreams awak'd him with affright:
His pains by day secur'd his rest at night.

"Twas then that buffaloes, ill pair'd, were seen To draw the car of Jove's imperial queen, For want of oxen; and the lab'ring swain Scratch'd, with a rake, a furrow for his grain, And cover'd with his hand, the shallow seed again.

He yokes himself, and up the hilly height
With his own shoulders, draws the wagon's
weight.
[prowl'd
The nightly wolf, that round th' inclosure
To leap the fence, now plots not on the fold,
Tam'd with a sharper pain. The fearful doe,
And flying stag, amidst the greyhounds go,
And round the dwellings roam of man, their
fiercer foe.

The scaly nations of the sea profound,
Like shipwreck'd carcasses, are driv'n aground,
And mighty phocæ, never seen before

In shallow streams, are stranded on the shore.
The viper dead within her hole is found :
Defenceless was the shelter of the ground.
The water-snake, whom fish and paddocks fed,
With staring scales lies poison'd in his bed:
To birds their native heav'ns contagious prove:
From clouds they fall, and leave their souls
above.

Besides, to change their pasture 't is in vain,
Dr trust to physic: physic is their bane.
The learned leeches in despair depart,
And shake their heads, desponding of their art.

Tisiphone let loose from under ground, Majestically pale, now treads the round, Before her drives Diseases and Affright, And ev'ry moment rises to the sight, Aspiring to the skies, encroaching on the light. The rivers, and their banks, and hills around, With lowings and with dying bleats resound.

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At length, she strikes a universal blow:
To death at once whole herds of cattle go:
Sheep, oxen, horses, fall: and, heap'd on high,
The diff ring species in confusion lie,

Till, warn'd by frequent ills, the way they found
To lodge their loathsome carrion under ground;
For useless to the currier were their hides;
Nor could their tainted flesh with ocean-tides
Be freed from filth; nor could Vulcanian flame
The stench abolish, or the savour tame,
Nor safely could they shear their fleecy store,
(Made drunk with pois'nous juice, and stiff with
gore)

Or touch the web: but, if the vest they wear
Red blisters rising on their paps appear

And flaming carbuncles, and noisome sweat, And clammy dews, that loathsome lice beget; 'Till the slow-creeping evil eats his way, Consumes the parching limbs, and makes the life his prey.

GEORGIC IV. ARGUMENT.

Virgil has taken care to raise the subject of each
Georgic. In the first, he has only dead matter on
which to work. In the second, he just steps on
the world of life, and describes that degree of it
which is to be found in vegetables. In the third,
he advances to animals: and, in the last, he sin-
gles out the bee, which may be reckoned the most
sagacious of them, for his subject.
In this Georgic, he shows us what station is most
proper for the bees, and when they begin to ga
ther honey: how to call them home when they
swarin; and how to part them when they are en-
gaged in battle. From hence he takes occasion
to discover their different kinds: and, after an ex-
cursion, relates their prudent and politic a adminis-
tration of affairs, and the general diseases that
often rage in their hives. with the proper symp
toms and remedies of each disease. In the last
place he lays down a method of repairing their
kind, supposing their whole breed lost; and giver
at large the history of its invention.

THE gifts of heav'n my following song pursues,
Aerial honey, and ambrosial dews.
Mæcenas, read this other part, that sings
Embattl'd squadrons and advent'rous kings-
A mighty pomp, though made of little things.
Their arms, their arts, their manners, I dis-

close,

And how they war, and whence the people rose. Slight is the subject, but the praise not small, If heav'n assist, and Phoebus hear my call.

First, for thy bees a quiet station find, And lodge them under covert of the wind ;[drive (For winds, when homeward they return, will The loaded carriers from their evening hive,) Far from the cows' and goats' insulting crew, That trample down the flow'rs, and brush the dew.

The painted lizard, and the birds of prey,
Foes of the frugal kind, be far away-

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( For what remains, when golden suns appear,
And under earth have driv'n the winter year,
The winged nation wanders through the skies,
And o'er the plains and shady forests flies:
Then, stooping on the meads and leafy bow'rs,
They skim the floods, and sip the purple
flow'rs.

Exalted hence, and drunk with secret joy,
Their young succession all their cares employ:
They breed, they brood, instruct, and educate,
And make provision for the future state:
They work their waxen lodgings in their hives,
They labour honey to sustain their lives.
But when thou seest a swarming cloud arise,
That sweeps aloft, and darkens all the skies,
The motions of their hasty flight attend;
And know, to floods or woods, their airy march
they bend.

New to the pleasures of their native spring-
The banks of brooks may make a cold retreat
For the raw soldiers from the scalding heat,
And neighb'ring trees with friendly shade invite
The troops, unus'd to long laborious flight."
Then o'er the running stream or standing lake,And
A passage for thy weary people make;

With osier floats the standing water strew;
Of massy stones make bridges, if it flow;
That basking in the sun thy becs may lie,
And, resting there their flaggy pinions dry,
When, late returning home, the laden host
By raging winds is wreck'd upon the coast.
Wild thyme and sav'ry set around their cell,
Sweet to the taste, and fragrant to the smell:
Set rows of rosemary with flow'ring stein,
And let the purple vi'lets drink the stream.

Whether thou build the palace of thy bees
With twisted osiers, or with barks of trees,
Make but a narrow mouth; for as the cold
Congeals into a lump the liquid gold,
So 'tis again dissolv'd by summer's heat;
And the sweet labours by extremes defeat.
And therefore not in vain, th' industrous kind
With dauby wax and flow'ts the chinks have
lin'd,

And with their stores of gather'd glue, contrive
To stop the vents and crannies of their hive.
Not birdlime, or Idæan pitch, produce
A more tenacious mass of clammy juice.

Nor bees are lodg'd in hives alone, but found
In chambers of their own beneath the ground:
Their vaulted roofs are hung in pumices,
And in the rotten trunks of hollow trees.

But plaster thou the chinky hives with clay,
And leafy branches o'er their lodgings lay:
Nor place them where too deep a water flows,
Or where the yew, their pois'nous neighbour,
grows;

Nor roast red crabs, t' offend the niceness of
their nose;
[ground;
Nor near the streaming stench of muddy
Nor hollow rocks that render back the sound,
And double images of voice rebound

Then melfoil beat, and honey-suckles pound; With these alluring savours strew the ground. mix with tinkling brass the cymbal's droning sound.

Straight to their ancient cells, recall'd from
air,

The reconcil'd deserter's will repair.
But, if intestine broils alarm the hive,
(For two pretenders oft for empire strive)
The vulgar in divided factions jar;
And murm'ring sounds proclaim the civil war.
Inflam'd with ire, and trembling with disdain,
Scarce can their limbs their mighty souls con-

tain.

With shouts, the coward's courage they excite,
And martial clangors call them out to fight:
With hoarse alarms the hollow camp rebounds,
That imitate the trumpets angry sounds:
Then to their common standards they repair;
The nimble horsemen scour the fields of air;
In form of battle drawn, they issue forth,
And ev'ry knight is proud to prove his worth.
Prest for their country's honour, and their
kings,

On their sharp beaks they wet their pointed
stings,

And exercise their arms, and tremble with their wings.

Full in the midst the haughty monarchs ride;
The trusty guards come up, and close the
side;

With shouts the daring foe to battle is defied.
Thus, in the season of unclouded spring,
To war they follow their undaunted king,
Crowd through their gates; and, in the fields of
light,

The shocking squadrons meet in mortal fight.
Headlong they fall from high, and wounded
wound;

And heaps of slaughter'd soldiers Lite the ground.

Hard hailstones lie not thicker on the plain,
Nor shaken oaks such show'rs of acorns rain.
With gorgeous wings, the marks of sovereign
sway,

The two contending princes make their way;
Intrepid through the midst of danger go,
Their friends encourage and amaze the foe.
With mighty souls in narrow bodies prest,
They challenge, and encounter breast to breast;
So fix'd on fame, unknowing how to fly,
And obstinately bent to win or die,
That long the doubtful combat they maintain,
Till one prevails-for one can only reign.
Yet all these dreadful deeds, this deadly fray,
A cast of scatter'd dust will soon allay,
And undecided leave the fortune of the day.
When both the chiefs are sunder'd from the
fight,

Then to the lawful king restore his right;
And let the wasteful prodigal be slain,
That he, who best deserves, alone may reign.
With ease distinguish'd is the regal race:
One monarch wears an honest open
face:
Shap'd to his size, and godlike to behold,
His royal body shines with specks of gold,
And ruddy scales; for empire he design'd,
Is better born, and of a nobler kind.
That other looks like nature in disgrace:
Gaunt are his sides, and sullen is his face,
And like their grizzly prince appear his gloomy
Grim, ghastly, rugged, like a thirsty train [race.
That long have travell'd through a desert plain,
And spit from their dry chaps the gather'd dust
again.

The better brood, unlike the bastard crew,
Are mark'd with royal streaks of shining hue;
Giitt'ring and ardent though in body less:
From these at pointed seasons, hope to press
Huge heavy honeycombs, of golden juice
Not only sweet, but pure, and fit for use,
T'allay the strength and hardness of the wine,
And with old Bacchus, new metheglin join.

But, when the swarms are eager of their
play,

And loathe their empty hives, and idly stray,
Restrain the wanton fugitives, and take
A timely care to bring the truants back,
The task is easy-but to clip the wings
Of their high-flying arbitrary kings.

At their command, the people swarm away:
Confine the tyrant, and the slaves will stay:
Sweet gardens, full of saffron flowers, invite
The wand'ring gluttons, and retard their flight
Besides the god obscene, who frights away,
With his lath sword, the thieves and birds of
prey,

With his own hand, the guardian of the bees, For slips of pine may search the mountain trees,

And with wild thyme and sav'ry plant the plain,

Till his hard horny fingers ache with pain;
And deck with frutiful trees the fields around,
And with refreshing waters drench the ground.
Now, did I not so near my labours end,
Strike sail, and hast'ning to the harbour tend,
My song to flow'ry gardens might extend-
To teach the vegetable arts to sing,
The Pæstan roses, and their double spring;
How succ'ry drinks the running streams, and
how

Green beds of parsley near the river grow;
How cucumbers along the surface creep,
With crooked bodies, and with bellies deep-
The late narcissus, and the winding trail
Of bear's foot, myrtles green, and ivy pale:
For, where with stately tow'rs Tarentum
stands,

And deep Galæsus soaks the yellow sands,
I chanc'd an old Corycian swain to know,
Lord of few acres, and those barren too,
Unfit for sheep or vines, and more unfit to sow:
Yet, lab'ring well his little spot of ground,
Some scatt'ring pot-herbs here and there he
found,

Which, cultivated with his daily care,

And bruis'd with vervain, were his frugal fare. Sometimes white lilies did their leaves afford With 'wholesome poppy flow'rs, to mend his homely board:

For, late returning home, he supp'd at ease, And wisely deem'd the wealth of monarchs less:

The little of his own, because his own did please.
To quit his care, he gather'd first of all,
In spring the roses, apples in the fall:
And, when cold winter split the rocks in twain,
And ice the running rivers did restrain,
He stripp'd the bear's-foot of its leafy growth,
And, calling western winds, accus'd the spring

of sloth.

He therefore first among the swains was found
To read the product of his labour'd ground,
And squeeze the comb, with golden liquor
crown'd.

His limes were first in flow'rs; his lofty pines,
With friendly shade, secur'd his tender vines.
For ev'ry bloom his trees in spring afford,
An autumn apple was by tale restor❜d.
He knew to rank his elms in even rows,
For fruit the grafted pear-tree to dispose,
And tame to plums the sourness of the sloes.
With spreading planes he made a cool retreat,
To shade good fellows from the summer's heat,
But, straiten'd in my space, I must forsake
This task, for others afterwards to take.

Describe we next the nature of the bees,
Bestow'd by Jove for secret services,

When, by the tinkling sound of timbrels led,
The king of heav'n in Cretan caves they fed.
Of all the race of animals, alone
The bees have common cities of their own,
And common sons: beneath one law they live,
And with one common stock their traffic drive.
Each has a certain home, a sev'ral stall:
All is the state's; the state provides for all.
Mindful of coining cold, they share the pain,
And hoard, for winter's use, the summer's gain.
Some o'er the public magazines preside;
And some are sent new forage to provide.
These drudge in fields abroad; and those at
home

Lay deep foundations for the labour'd comb,
With dew, narcissus-leaves, and clammy gum.
To pitch the waxen flooring some contrive;
Some nurse the future nation of the hive;
Sweet honey some condense; some purge the
grout;

The rest, in cells apart, the liquid nectar shut:
All, with united force, combine to drive
The lazy drones from the laborious hive:
With envy stung, they view each others deeds:
With diligence the fragrant work proceeds.
As when the Cyclops, at th' almighty nod,
New thunder hasten for their angry god,
Subdu'd in fire the stubborn metal lies;
One brawny smith the puffing bellows plies,
And draws and blows reciprocating air:
Others to quench the hissing mass prepare:
With lifted arms they order ev'ry blow,
And chime their sounding hammers in a row;
With labour'd anvils Etna groans below.
Strongly they strike; huge flakes of flames ex-
pire:

With tongs they turn the steel, and vex it in the fire.

If little things with great we may compare,
Such are the bees, and such their busy care;
Studious of honey, each in his degree, [bee-
The youthful swain, the grave experienc'd
That in the field; this, in affairs of state
Employ'd at home, abides within the gate,
To fortify the combs, to build the wall,

Το

prop the ruins, lest the fabric fall:
But, late at night, with weary pinions come
The lab'ring youth, and heavy laden, home.
Plains, meads, and orchards, all the day he plies;
The gleans of yellow thyme distend his thighs:
He spoils the saffron flow'rs: he sips the blues
Of vi'lets, wilding blooms, and willow dews.
Their toil is common; common is their sleep;
They shake their wings when morn begins to
peep;

Rush through the city gates without delay;
Nor ends their work but with declining day.
Then, having spent the last remains of light,
They give their bodies due repose at night,
VOL. II.-4

When hollow murmurs of their evering bells Dismiss the sleepy swains, and toll them to their cells.

When once in beds their weary limbs they steep,

No buzzing sounds disturb their golden sleep
'Tis sacred silence all. Nor dare they stray,
When rain is promis'd, or a stormy day;
But near the city walls their wat❜ring take,
Nor forage far, but short excursions make.

And as when empty barks on billows float,
With sandy ballast sailors trim the boat;
So bees bear gravel stones, whose poising
weight

Steers through the whistling winds their steady flight.

But (what's more strange) their modest ap-
petites,

Averse from Venus, fly the nuptial rites.
No lust enervates their heroic mind,
Nor wastes their strength on wanton woman-
kind;

But in their mouths reside their genial pow'rs: They gather children from the leaves and flow'rs.

Thus make they kings to fill the regal seat,
And thus their little citizens create,
And waxen cities build, the palaces of state.
And oft on rocks their tender wings they tear,
And sink beneath the burdens which they bear:
Such rage of honey in their bosom beats,
And such a zeal they have for flow'ry sweets.

Thus, though the race of life they quickly run, Which in the space of sev'n short years is done : Th' immortal line in sure succession reigns; The fortune of the family remains;

And grandsires' grandsires the long list contains.

Besides, not Egypt, India, Media, more
With servile awe their idol king adore:
While he survives, in concord and content
The commons live, by no divisions rent:
But the great monarch's death dissolves the
government.

All goes to ruin; they themselves contrive
To rob the honey, and subvert the hive.
The king presides, his subjects' toil surveys,
The servile route their careful Cæsar praise:
Him they extol; they worship him alone;
They crowd his levees, and support his throne:
They raise him on their shoulders with a shout;
And, when their sov'reign's quarrel calls them
out,

His foes to mortal combat they defy,
And think it honour at his feet to die.

Induc'd by such examples some have taught
That bees have portion of etherial thought-
Endu'd with particles of heavenly fires;
For God the whole created mass inspires.

Through heav'n, and earth, and ocean's depth, he throws

His influence round, and kindles as he goes, Hence flocks, and herds, and men, and beasts, and fowls,

With breath are quicken'd, and attract their souls;

Hence take the forms his prescience did ordain, And into him at length resolve again.

No room is left for death: they mount the sky, And to their own congenial planets fly.

Now, when thou hast decreed to seize their stores,

And by prerogative to break their doors,
With sprinkled water first the city choke,
And then pursue the citizens with smoke.
Two honey-harvests fall in ev'ry year:
First, when the pleasing Pleiades appear,
And, springing upward, spurn the briny seas:
Again, when their affrighted choir surveys
The wat'ry Scorpion mend his pace behind,
With a black train of storms, and winter wind,
They plunge into the deep, and safe protection
find.

Prone to revenge, the bees, a wrathful race, When once provok'd, assault the aggressor's face,

And through the purple veins a passage find; There fix their stings, and leave their souls behind.

But, if a pinching winter thou foresee And wouldst preserve thy famish'd family; With fragrant thyme the city fumigate, And break the waxen walls to save the state. For lurking lizards often lodge, by stealth; Within the suburbs, and purloin their wealth; And worms, that shun the light, a dark retreat Have found in combs, and undermin'd the seat; Or lazy drones, without their share of pain, In winter-quarters free, devour the gain; Or wasps infest the camp with loud alarms, And mix in battle with unequal arm Or secret moths are there in silence fed; Or spiders in the vault their snary webs have spread.

The more oppress'd by foes, or famine-pin'd, The more increase thy care to save the sinking kind:

With greens and flow'rs recruit their empty hives,

And seek fresh forage to sustain their lives. But, since they share with man one cominon fate,

In health and sickness, and in turns of state,Observe the symptoms. When they fall away, And languish with insensible decay,

They change their hue; with haggard eyes they stare;

Lean are their looks, and shagged is their hair:

And crowds of dead, that never must return
To their lov'd hives, in decent pomp are borne
Their friends attend the hearse; the next rela-
tions mourn.

The sick, for air, before the portal gasp,
Their feeble legs within each other clasp,
Or idle in their empty hives remain,
Benumb'd with cold, and listless of their gain.
Soft whispers then, and broken sounds, are
heard,

As when the woods by gentle winds are stirr❜d,
Such stifled noise as the close furnace hides,
Or dying murmurs of departing tides.
This when thou seest galbanean odours use,
And honey in the sickly hive infuse.
Through reeden pipes convey the golden flood,
T' invite the people to their wonted food.
Mix it with thicken'd juice of sodden wines,
And raisins from the grapes of Psythian vines.
To these add pounded galls, and roses dry,
And, with Cecropian thyme, strong-scented
centaury.

A flow'r there is, that grows in meadowground,

Amellus call'd, and easy to be found;
For, from one root, the rising stem bestows
A wood of leaves, and vi'let purple boughs:
The flow'r itself is glorious to behold,
And shines on altars like refulgent gold-
Sharp to the taste-by shepherds near the

stream

Of Mella found; and thence they gave the name.
Boil this restoring root in gen'rous wine,
And set beside the door, the sickly stock to dine.
But, if the lab'ring kind be wholly lost,
And not to be retriev'd with care or cost;
T is time to touch the precepts of an art
Th' Arcadian master did of old impart;
And how he stock'd his empty hives again,
Renew'd with putrid gore of oxen slain.
An ancient legend I prepare to sing,
And upward follow Fame's immortal spring;
For, where with sevenfold horns mysterious
Nile

Surrounds the skirts of Egypt's fruitful isle,
And where in pomp the sunburnt people ride,
On painted barges o'er the teeming tide,
Which, pouring down from Ethiopian lands,
Makes green the soil with slime, and black pro-

lific sands

That length of region, and large tract of ground,
In this one art a sure relief have found.
First, in a place, by nature close, they build
A narrow flooring, gutter'd, wall'd, and til'd,
In this, four windows are contriv'd, that strike
To the four winds oppos'd, their beams oblique.
A steer of two years old they take, whose head
Now first with burnish'd horns begins to

spread:

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