Complete Works of Virgil

by Virgil

  And green banks in their parsley, and how the gourd

  Twists through the grass and rounds him to paunch;

  Nor of Narcissus had my lips been dumb,

  That loiterer of the flowers, nor supple-stemmed

  Acanthus, with the praise of ivies pale,

  And myrtles clinging to the shores they love.

  For ‘neath the shade of tall Oebalia’s towers,

  Where dark Galaesus laves the yellowing fields,

  An old man once I mind me to have seen-

  From Corycus he came- to whom had fallen

  Some few poor acres of neglected land,

  And they nor fruitful’ neath the plodding steer,

  Meet for the grazing herd, nor good for vines.

  Yet he, the while his meagre garden-herbs

  Among the thorns he planted, and all round

  White lilies, vervains, and lean poppy set,

  In pride of spirit matched the wealth of kings,

  And home returning not till night was late,

  With unbought plenty heaped his board on high.

  He was the first to cull the rose in spring,

  He the ripe fruits in autumn; and ere yet

  Winter had ceased in sullen ire to rive

  The rocks with frost, and with her icy bit

  Curb in the running waters, there was he

  Plucking the rathe faint hyacinth, while he chid

  Summer’s slow footsteps and the lagging West.

  Therefore he too with earliest brooding bees

  And their full swarms o’erflowed, and first was he

  To press the bubbling honey from the comb;

  Lime-trees were his, and many a branching pine;

  And all the fruits wherewith in early bloom

  The orchard-tree had clothed her, in full tale

  Hung there, by mellowing autumn perfected.

  He too transplanted tall-grown elms a-row,

  Time-toughened pear, thorns bursting with the plum

  And plane now yielding serviceable shade

  For dry lips to drink under: but these things,

  Shut off by rigorous limits, I pass by,

  And leave for others to sing after me.

  Come, then, I will unfold the natural powers

  Great Jove himself upon the bees bestowed,

  The boon for which, led by the shrill sweet strains

  Of the Curetes and their clashing brass,

  They fed the King of heaven in Dicte’s cave.

  Alone of all things they receive and hold

  Community of offspring, and they house

  Together in one city, and beneath

  The shelter of majestic laws they live;

  And they alone fixed home and country know,

  And in the summer, warned of coming cold,

  Make proof of toil, and for the general store

  Hoard up their gathered harvesting. For some

  Watch o’er the victualling of the hive, and these

  By settled order ply their tasks afield;

  And some within the confines of their home

  Plant firm the comb’s first layer, Narcissus’ tear,

  And sticky gum oozed from the bark of trees,

  Then set the clinging wax to hang therefrom.

  Others the while lead forth the full-grown young,

  Their country’s hope, and others press and pack

  The thrice repured honey, and stretch their cells

  To bursting with the clear-strained nectar sweet.

  Some, too, the wardship of the gates befalls,

  Who watch in turn for showers and cloudy skies,

  Or ease returning labourers of their load,

  Or form a band and from their precincts drive

  The drones, a lazy herd. How glows the work!

  How sweet the honey smells of perfumed thyme

  Like the Cyclopes, when in haste they forge

  From the slow-yielding ore the thunderbolts,

  Some from the bull’s-hide bellows in and out

  Let the blasts drive, some dip i’ the water-trough

  The sputtering metal: with the anvil’s weight

  Groans Etna: they alternately in time

  With giant strength uplift their sinewy arms,

  Or twist the iron with the forceps’ grip-

  Not otherwise, to measure small with great,

  The love of getting planted in their breasts

  Goads on the bees, that haunt old Cecrops’ heights,

  Each in his sphere to labour. The old have charge

  To keep the town, and build the walled combs,

  And mould the cunning chambers; but the youth,

  Their tired legs packed with thyme, come labouring home

  Belated, for afar they range to feed

  On arbutes and the grey-green willow-leaves,

  And cassia and the crocus blushing red,

  Glue-yielding limes, and hyacinths dusky-eyed.

  One hour for rest have all, and one for toil:

  With dawn they hurry from the gates- no room

  For loiterers there: and once again, when even

  Now bids them quit their pasturing on the plain,

  Then homeward make they, then refresh their strength:

  A hum arises: hark! they buzz and buzz

  About the doors and threshold; till at length

  Safe laid to rest they hush them for the night,

  And welcome slumber laps their weary limbs.

  But from the homestead not too far they fare,

  When showers hang like to fall, nor, east winds nigh,

  Confide in heaven, but ‘neath the city walls

  Safe-circling fetch them water, or essay

  Brief out-goings, and oft weigh-up tiny stones,

  As light craft ballast in the tossing tide,

  Wherewith they poise them through the cloudy vast.

  This law of life, too, by the bees obeyed,

  Will move thy wonder, that nor sex with sex

  Yoke they in marriage, nor yield their limbs to love,

  Nor know the pangs of labour, but alone

  From leaves and honied herbs, the mothers, each,

  Gather their offspring in their mouths, alone

  Supply new kings and pigmy commonwealth,

  And their old court and waxen realm repair.

  Oft, too, while wandering, against jagged stones

  Their wings they fray, and ‘neath the burden yield

  Their liberal lives: so deep their love of flowers,

  So glorious deem they honey’s proud acquist.

  Therefore, though each a life of narrow span,

  Ne’er stretched to summers more than seven, befalls,

  Yet deathless doth the race endure, and still

  Perennial stands the fortune of their line,

  From grandsire unto grandsire backward told.

  Moreover, not Aegyptus, nor the realm

  Of boundless Lydia, no, nor Parthia’s hordes,

  Nor Median Hydaspes, to their king

  Do such obeisance: lives the king unscathed,

  One will inspires the million: is he dead,

  Snapt is the bond of fealty; they themselves

  Ravage their toil-wrought honey, and rend amain

  Their own comb’s waxen trellis. He is the lord

  Of all their labour; him with awful eye

  They reverence, and with murmuring throngs surround,

  In crowds attend, oft shoulder him on high,

  Or with their bodies shield him in the fight,

  And seek through showering wounds a glorious death.

  Led by these tokens, and with such traits to guide,

  Some say that unto bees a share is given

  Of the Divine Intelligence, and to drink

  Pure draughts of ether; for God permeates all-

  Earth, and wide ocean, and the vault of heaven-

  From whom flocks, herds, men, beasts of every kin
d,

  Draw each at birth the fine essential flame;

  Yea, and that all things hence to Him return,

  Brought back by dissolution, nor can death

  Find place: but, each into his starry rank,

  Alive they soar, and mount the heights of heaven.

  If now their narrow home thou wouldst unseal,

  And broach the treasures of the honey-house,

  With draught of water first toment thy lips,

  And spread before thee fumes of trailing smoke.

  Twice is the teeming produce gathered in,

  Twofold their time of harvest year by year,

  Once when Taygete the Pleiad uplifts

  Her comely forehead for the earth to see,

  With foot of scorn spurning the ocean-streams,

  Once when in gloom she flies the watery Fish,

  And dips from heaven into the wintry wave.

  Unbounded then their wrath; if hurt, they breathe

  Venom into their bite, cleave to the veins

  And let the sting lie buried, and leave their lives

  Behind them in the wound. But if you dread

  Too rigorous a winter, and would fain

  Temper the coming time, and their bruised hearts

  And broken estate to pity move thy soul,

  Yet who would fear to fumigate with thyme,

  Or cut the empty wax away? for oft

  Into their comb the newt has gnawed unseen,

  And the light-loathing beetles crammed their bed,

  And he that sits at others’ board to feast,

  The do-naught drone; or ‘gainst the unequal foe

  Swoops the fierce hornet, or the moth’s fell tribe;

  Or spider, victim of Minerva’s spite,

  Athwart the doorway hangs her swaying net.

  The more impoverished they, the keenlier all

  To mend the fallen fortunes of their race

  Will nerve them, fill the cells up, tier on tier,

  And weave their granaries from the rifled flowers.

  Now, seeing that life doth even to bee-folk bring

  Our human chances, if in dire disease

  Their bodies’ strength should languish- which anon

  By no uncertain tokens may be told-

  Forthwith the sick change hue; grim leanness mars

  Their visage; then from out the cells they bear

  Forms reft of light, and lead the mournful pomp;

  Or foot to foot about the porch they hang,

  Or within closed doors loiter, listless all

  From famine, and benumbed with shrivelling cold.

  Then is a deep note heard, a long-drawn hum,

  As when the chill South through the forests sighs,

  As when the troubled ocean hoarsely booms

  With back-swung billow, as ravening tide of fire

  Surges, shut fast within the furnace-walls.

  Then do I bid burn scented galbanum,

  And, honey-streams through reeden troughs instilled,

  Challenge and cheer their flagging appetite

  To taste the well-known food; and it shall boot

  To mix therewith the savour bruised from gall,

  And rose-leaves dried, or must to thickness boiled

  By a fierce fire, or juice of raisin-grapes

  From Psithian vine, and with its bitter smell

  Centaury, and the famed Cecropian thyme.

  There is a meadow-flower by country folk

  Hight star-wort; ’tis a plant not far to seek;

  For from one sod an ample growth it rears,

  Itself all golden, but girt with plenteous leaves,

  Where glory of purple shines through violet gloom.

  With chaplets woven hereof full oft are decked

  Heaven’s altars: harsh its taste upon the tongue;

  Shepherds in vales smooth-shorn of nibbling flocks

  By Mella’s winding waters gather it.

  The roots of this, well seethed in fragrant wine,

  Set in brimmed baskets at their doors for food.

  But if one’s whole stock fail him at a stroke,

  Nor hath he whence to breed the race anew,

  ’Tis time the wondrous secret to disclose

  Taught by the swain of Arcady, even how

  The blood of slaughtered bullocks oft has borne

  Bees from corruption. I will trace me back

  To its prime source the story’s tangled thread,

  And thence unravel. For where thy happy folk,

  Canopus, city of Pellaean fame,

  Dwell by the Nile’s lagoon-like overflow,

  And high o’er furrows they have called their own

  Skim in their painted wherries; where, hard by,

  The quivered Persian presses, and that flood

  Which from the swart-skinned Aethiop bears him down,

  Swift-parted into sevenfold branching mouths

  With black mud fattens and makes Aegypt green,

  That whole domain its welfare’s hope secure

  Rests on this art alone. And first is chosen

  A strait recess, cramped closer to this end,

  Which next with narrow roof of tiles atop

  ‘Twixt prisoning walls they pinch, and add hereto

  From the four winds four slanting window-slits.

  Then seek they from the herd a steer, whose horns

  With two years’ growth are curling, and stop fast,

  Plunge madly as he may, the panting mouth

  And nostrils twain, and done with blows to death,

  Batter his flesh to pulp i’ the hide yet whole,

  And shut the doors, and leave him there to lie.

  But ‘neath his ribs they scatter broken boughs,

  With thyme and fresh-pulled cassias: this is done

  When first the west winds bid the waters flow,

  Ere flush the meadows with new tints, and ere

  The twittering swallow buildeth from the beams.

  Meanwhile the juice within his softened bones

  Heats and ferments, and things of wondrous birth,

  Footless at first, anon with feet and wings,

  Swarm there and buzz, a marvel to behold;

  And more and more the fleeting breeze they take,

  Till, like a shower that pours from summer-clouds,

  Forth burst they, or like shafts from quivering string

  When Parthia’s flying hosts provoke the fray.

  Say what was he, what God, that fashioned forth

  This art for us, O Muses? of man’s skill

  Whence came the new adventure? From thy vale,

  Peneian Tempe, turning, bee-bereft,

  So runs the tale, by famine and disease,

  Mournful the shepherd Aristaeus stood

  Fast by the haunted river-head, and thus

  With many a plaint to her that bare him cried:

  “Mother, Cyrene, mother, who hast thy home

  Beneath this whirling flood, if he thou sayest,

  Apollo, lord of Thymbra, be my sire,

  Sprung from the Gods’ high line, why barest thou me

  With fortune’s ban for birthright? Where is now

  Thy love to me-ward banished from thy breast?

  O! wherefore didst thou bid me hope for heaven?

  Lo! even the crown of this poor mortal life,

  Which all my skilful care by field and fold,

  No art neglected, scarce had fashioned forth,

  Even this falls from me, yet thou call’st me son.

  Nay, then, arise! With thine own hands pluck up

  My fruit-plantations: on the homestead fling

  Pitiless fire; make havoc of my crops;

  Burn the young plants, and wield the stubborn axe

  Against my vines, if there hath taken the

  Such loathing of my greatness.” But that cry,

  Even from her chamber in the river-deeps,

  His mother hea
rd: around her spun the nymphs

  Milesian wool stained through with hyaline dye,

  Drymo, Xantho, Ligea, Phyllodoce,

  Their glossy locks o’er snowy shoulders shed,

  Cydippe and Lycorias yellow-haired,

  A maiden one, one newly learned even then

  To bear Lucina’s birth-pang. Clio, too,

  And Beroe, sisters, ocean-children both,

  Both zoned with gold and girt with dappled fell,

  Ephyre and Opis, and from Asian meads

  Deiopea, and, bow at length laid by,

  Fleet-footed Arethusa. But in their midst

  Fair Clymene was telling o’er the tale

  Of Vulcan’s idle vigilance and the stealth

  Of Mars’ sweet rapine, and from Chaos old

  Counted the jostling love-joys of the Gods.

  Charmed by whose lay, the while their woolly tasks

  With spindles down they drew, yet once again

  Smote on his mother’s ears the mournful plaint

  Of Aristaeus; on their glassy thrones

  Amazement held them all; but Arethuse

  Before the rest put forth her auburn head,

  Peering above the wave-top, and from far

  Exclaimed, “Cyrene, sister, not for naught

  Scared by a groan so deep, behold! ’tis he,

  Even Aristaeus, thy heart’s fondest care,

  Here by the brink of the Peneian sire

  Stands woebegone and weeping, and by name

  Cries out upon thee for thy cruelty.”

  To whom, strange terror knocking at her heart,

  “Bring, bring him to our sight,” the mother cried;

  “His feet may tread the threshold even of Gods.”

  So saying, she bids the flood yawn wide and yield

  A pathway for his footsteps; but the wave

  Arched mountain-wise closed round him, and within

  Its mighty bosom welcomed, and let speed

  To the deep river-bed. And now, with eyes

  Of wonder gazing on his mother’s hall

  And watery kingdom and cave-prisoned pools

  And echoing groves, he went, and, stunned by that

  Stupendous whirl of waters, separate saw

  All streams beneath the mighty earth that glide,

  Phasis and Lycus, and that fountain-head

  Whence first the deep Enipeus leaps to light,

  Whence father Tiber, and whence Anio’s flood,

  And Hypanis that roars amid his rocks,

  And Mysian Caicus, and, bull-browed

  ‘Twixt either gilded horn, Eridanus,

  Than whom none other through the laughing plains

  More furious pours into the purple sea.

  Soon as the chamber’s hanging roof of stone

  Was gained, and now Cyrene from her son

  Had heard his idle weeping, in due course