LITMIR.BIZ

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        And gardens all perfumed with native smells;

        Where carved Priapus has his fixed abode,

        The robber's terror, and the scarecrow god.

        Wild thyme and pine-trees from their barren hill

        Transplant, and nurse them in the neighbouring soil,

        Set fruit-trees round, nor e'er indulge thy sloth,

        But water them, and urge their shady growth.

           And here, perhaps, were not I giving o'er,

        And striking sail, and making to the shore,

        I'd show what art the gardener's toils require,

        Why rosy pæstum blushes twice a year;

        What streams the verdant succory supply,

        And how the thirsty plant drinks rivers dry;

        With what a cheerful green does parsley grace,

        And writhes the bellying cucumber along the twisted grass;

        Nor would I pass the soft acanthus o'er,

        Ivy nor myrtle-trees that love the shore;

        Nor daffodils, that late from earth's slow womb

        Unrumple their swoln buds, and show their yellow bloom.

           For once I saw in the Tarentine vale,

        Where slow Galesus drenched the washy soil,

        An old Corician yeoman, who had got

        A few neglected acres to his lot,

        Where neither corn nor pasture graced the field,

        Nor would the vine her purple harvest yield;

        But savoury herbs among the thorns were found,

        Vervain and poppy-flowers his garden crown'd,

        And drooping lilies whitened all the ground.

        Blest with these riches he could empires slight,

        And when he rested from his toils at night,

        The earth unpurchased dainties would afford,

        And his own garden furnished out his board:

        The spring did first his opening roses blow,

        First ripening autumn bent his fruitful bough.

        When piercing colds had burst the brittle stone,

        And freezing rivers stiffened as they run,

        He then would prune the tenderest of his trees,

        Chide the late spring, and lingering western breeze:

        His bees first swarmed, and made his vessels foam

        With the rich squeezing of the juicy comb.

        Here lindens and the sappy pine increased;

        Here, when gay flowers his smiling orchard dressed,

        As many blossoms as the spring could show,

        So many dangling apples mellowed on the bough.

        In rows his elms and knotty pear-trees bloom,

        And thorns ennobled now to bear a plum,

        And spreading plane-trees, where, supinely laid,

        He now enjoys the cool, and quaffs beneath the shade.

        But these for want of room I must omit,

        And leave for future poets to recite.

           Now I'll proceed their natures to declare,

        Which Jove himself did on the bees confer

        Because, invited by the timbrel's sound,

        Lodged in a cave, the almighty babe they found,

        And the young god nursed kindly under-ground.

           Of all the winged inhabitants of air,

        These only make their young the public care;

        In well-disposed societies they live,

        And laws and statutes regulate their hive;

        Nor stray like others unconfined abroad,

        But know set stations, and a fixed abode:

        Each provident of cold in summer flies

        Through fields and woods, to seek for new supplies,

        And in the common stock unlades his thighs.

        Some watch the food, some in the meadows ply,

        Taste every bud, and suck each blossom dry;

        Whilst others, labouring in their cells at home,

        Temper Narcissus' clammy tears with gum,

        For the first groundwork of the golden comb;

        On this they found their waxen works, and raise

        The yellow fabric on its gluey base.

        Some educate the young, or hatch the seed

        With vital warmth, and future nations breed;

        Whilst others thicken all the slimy dews,

        And into purest honey work the juice;

        Then fill the hollows of the comb, and swell

        With luscious nectar every flowing cell.

        By turns they watch, by turns with curious eyes

        Survey the heavens, and search the clouded skies,

        To find out breeding storms, and tell what tempests rise.

        By turns they ease the loaden swarms, or drive

        The drone, a lazy insect, from their hive.

        The work is warmly plied through all the cells,

        And strong with thyme the new-made honey smells.

           So in their caves the brawny Cyclops sweat,

        When with huge strokes the stubborn wedge they beat,

        And all the unshapen thunderbolt complete;

        Alternately their hammers rise and fall;

        Whilst griping tongs turn round the glowing ball.

        With puffing bellows some the flames increase,

        And some in waters dip the hissing mass;

        Their beaten anvils dreadfully resound,

        And Ætna shakes all o'er, and thunders under-ground.

           Thus, if great things we may with small compare,

        The busy swarms their different labours share.

        Desire of profit urges all degrees;

        The aged insects, by experience wise,

        Attend the comb, and fashion every part,

        And shape the waxen fret-work out with art:

        The young at night, returning from their toils,

        Bring home their thighs clogged with the meadows' spoils.

        On lavender and saffron buds they feed,

        On bending osiers and the balmy reed,

        From purple violets and the teile they bring

        Their gathered sweets, and rifle all the spring.

           All work together, all together rest,

        The

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