LITMIR.BIZ

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      Lest weeds arise, or dust a passage win

      Splitting the surface, then a thousand plagues

      Make sport of it: oft builds the tiny mouse

      Her home, and plants her granary, underground,

      Or burrow for their bed the purblind moles,

      Or toad is found in hollows, and all the swarm

      Of earth's unsightly creatures; or a huge

      Corn-heap the weevil plunders, and the ant,

      Fearful of coming age and penury.

      Mark too, what time the walnut in the woods

      With ample bloom shall clothe her, and bow down

      Her odorous branches, if the fruit prevail,

      Like store of grain will follow, and there shall come

      A mighty winnowing-time with mighty heat;

      But if the shade with wealth of leaves abound,

      Vainly your threshing-floor will bruise the stalks

      Rich but in chaff. Many myself have seen

      Steep, as they sow, their pulse-seeds, drenching them

      With nitre and black oil-lees, that the fruit

      Might swell within the treacherous pods, and they

      Make speed to boil at howso small a fire.

      Yet, culled with caution, proved with patient toil,

      These have I seen degenerate, did not man

      Put forth his hand with power, and year by year

      Choose out the largest. So, by fate impelled,

      Speed all things to the worse, and backward borne

      Glide from us; even as who with struggling oars

      Up stream scarce pulls a shallop, if he chance

      His arms to slacken, lo! with headlong force

      The current sweeps him down the hurrying tide.

      Us too behoves Arcturus' sign observe,

      And the Kids' seasons and the shining Snake,

      No less than those who o'er the windy main

      Borne homeward tempt the Pontic, and the jaws

      Of oyster-rife Abydos. When the Scales

      Now poising fair the hours of sleep and day

      Give half the world to sunshine, half to shade,

      Then urge your bulls, my masters; sow the plain

      Even to the verge of tameless winter's showers

      With barley: then, too, time it is to hide

      Your flax in earth, and poppy, Ceres' joy,

      Aye, more than time to bend above the plough,

      While earth, yet dry, forbids not, and the clouds

      Are buoyant. With the spring comes bean-sowing;

      Thee, too, Lucerne, the crumbling furrows then

      Receive, and millet's annual care returns,

      What time the white bull with his gilded horns

      Opens the year, before whose threatening front,

      Routed the dog-star sinks. But if it be

      For wheaten harvest and the hardy spelt,

      Thou tax the soil, to corn-ears wholly given,

      Let Atlas' daughters hide them in the dawn,

      The Cretan star, a crown of fire, depart,

      Or e'er the furrow's claim of seed thou quit,

      Or haste thee to entrust the whole year's hope

      To earth that would not. Many have begun

      Ere Maia's star be setting; these, I trow,

      Their looked-for harvest fools with empty ears.

      But if the vetch and common kidney-bean

      Thou'rt fain to sow, nor scorn to make thy care

      Pelusiac lentil, no uncertain sign

      Bootes' fall will send thee; then begin,

      Pursue thy sowing till half the frosts be done.

      Therefore it is the golden sun, his course

      Into fixed parts dividing, rules his way

      Through the twelve constellations of the world.

      Five zones the heavens contain; whereof is one

      Aye red with flashing sunlight, fervent aye

      From fire; on either side to left and right

      Are traced the utmost twain, stiff with blue ice,

      And black with scowling storm-clouds, and betwixt

      These and the midmost, other twain there lie,

      By the Gods' grace to heart-sick mortals given,

      And a path cleft between them, where might wheel

      On sloping plane the system of the Signs.

      And as toward Scythia and Rhipaean heights

      The world mounts upward, likewise sinks it down

      Toward Libya and the south, this pole of ours

      Still towering high, that other, 'neath their feet,

      By dark Styx frowned on, and the abysmal shades.

      Here glides the huge Snake forth with sinuous coils

      'Twixt the two Bears and round them river-wise-

      The Bears that fear 'neath Ocean's brim to dip.

      There either, say they, reigns the eternal hush

      Of night that knows no seasons, her black pall

      Thick-mantling fold on fold; or thitherward

      From us returning Dawn brings back the day;

      And when the first breath of his panting steeds

      On us the Orient flings, that hour with them

      Red Vesper 'gins to trim his his 'lated fires.

      Hence under doubtful skies forebode we can

      The coming tempests, hence both harvest-day

      And seed-time, when to smite the treacherous main

      With driving oars, when launch the fair-rigged fleet,

      Or in ripe hour to fell the forest-pine.

      Hence, too, not idly do we watch the stars-

      Their rising and their setting-and the year,

      Four varying seasons to one law conformed.

      If chilly showers e'er shut the farmer's door,

      Much that had soon with sunshine cried for haste,

      He may forestall; the ploughman batters keen

      His blunted share's hard tooth, scoops from a tree

      His troughs, or on the cattle stamps a brand,

      Or numbers on the corn-heaps; some make sharp

      The stakes and two-pronged forks, and willow-bands

      Amerian for the bending vine prepare.

      Now let the pliant basket plaited be

      Of bramble-twigs; now set your corn to parch

      Before the fire; now bruise it with the stone.

      Nay even on holy days some tasks to ply

      Is right and lawful: this no ban forbids,

      To turn the runnel's course, fence corn-fields in,

      Make springes for the birds, burn up the briars,

      And plunge in wholesome

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