LITMIR.BIZ

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      Oft too with oil or apples plenty-cheap

      The creeping ass's ribs his driver packs,

      And home from town returning brings instead

      A dented mill-stone or black lump of pitch.

      The moon herself in various rank assigns

      The days for labour lucky: fly the fifth;

      Then sprang pale Orcus and the Eumenides;

      Earth then in awful labour brought to light

      Coeus, Iapetus, and Typhoeus fell,

      And those sworn brethren banded to break down

      The gates of heaven; thrice, sooth to say, they strove

      Ossa on Pelion's top to heave and heap,

      Aye, and on Ossa to up-roll amain

      Leafy Olympus; thrice with thunderbolt

      Their mountain-stair the Sire asunder smote.

      Seventh after tenth is lucky both to set

      The vine in earth, and take and tame the steer,

      And fix the leashes to the warp; the ninth

      To runagates is kinder, cross to thieves.

      Many the tasks that lightlier lend themselves

      In chilly night, or when the sun is young,

      And Dawn bedews the world. By night 'tis best

      To reap light stubble, and parched fields by night;

      For nights the suppling moisture never fails.

      And one will sit the long late watches out

      By winter fire-light, shaping with keen blade

      The torches to a point; his wife the while,

      Her tedious labour soothing with a song,

      Speeds the shrill comb along the warp, or else

      With Vulcan's aid boils the sweet must-juice down,

      And skims with leaves the quivering cauldron's wave.

      But ruddy Ceres in mid heat is mown,

      And in mid heat the parched ears are bruised

      Upon the floor; to plough strip, strip to sow;

      Winter's the lazy time for husbandmen.

      In the cold season farmers wont to taste

      The increase of their toil, and yield themselves

      To mutual interchange of festal cheer.

      Boon winter bids them, and unbinds their cares,

      As laden keels, when now the port they touch,

      And happy sailors crown the sterns with flowers.

      Nathless then also time it is to strip

      Acorns from oaks, and berries from the bay,

      Olives, and bleeding myrtles, then to set

      Snares for the crane, and meshes for the stag,

      And hunt the long-eared hares, then pierce the doe

      With whirl of hempen-thonged Balearic sling,

      While snow lies deep, and streams are drifting ice.

      What need to tell of autumn's storms and stars,

      And wherefore men must watch, when now the day

      Grows shorter, and more soft the summer's heat?

      When Spring the rain-bringer comes rushing down,

      Or when the beards of harvest on the plain

      Bristle already, and the milky corn

      On its green stalk is swelling? Many a time,

      When now the farmer to his yellow fields

      The reaping-hind came bringing, even in act

      To lop the brittle barley stems, have I

      Seen all the windy legions clash in war

      Together, as to rend up far and wide

      The heavy corn-crop from its lowest roots,

      And toss it skyward: so might winter's flaw,

      Dark-eddying, whirl light stalks and flying straws.

      Oft too comes looming vast along the sky

      A march of waters; mustering from above,

      The clouds roll up the tempest, heaped and grim

      With angry showers: down falls the height of heaven,

      And with a great rain floods the smiling crops,

      The oxen's labour: now the dikes fill fast,

      And the void river-beds swell thunderously,

      And all the panting firths of Ocean boil.

      The Sire himself in midnight of the clouds

      Wields with red hand the levin; through all her bulk

      Earth at the hurly quakes; the beasts are fled,

      And mortal hearts of every kindred sunk

      In cowering terror; he with flaming brand

      Athos, or Rhodope, or Ceraunian crags

      Precipitates: then doubly raves the South

      With shower on blinding shower, and woods and coasts

      Wail fitfully beneath the mighty blast.

      This fearing, mark the months and Signs of heaven,

      Whither retires him Saturn's icy star,

      And through what heavenly cycles wandereth

      The glowing orb Cyllenian. Before all

      Worship the Gods, and to great Ceres pay

      Her yearly dues upon the happy sward

      With sacrifice, anigh the utmost end

      Of winter, and when Spring begins to smile.

      Then lambs are fat, and wines are mellowest then;

      Then sleep is sweet, and dark the shadows fall

      Upon the mountains. Let your rustic youth

      To Ceres do obeisance, one and all;

      And for her pleasure thou mix honeycombs

      With milk and the ripe wine-god; thrice for luck

      Around the young corn let the victim go,

      And all the choir, a joyful company,

      Attend it, and with shouts bid Ceres come

      To be their house-mate; and let no man dare

      Put sickle to the ripened ears until,

      With woven oak his temples chapleted,

      He foot the rugged dance and chant the lay.

      Aye, and that these things we might win to know

      By certain tokens, heats, and showers, and winds

      That bring the frost, the Sire of all himself

      Ordained what warnings in her monthly round

      The moon should give, what bodes the south wind's fall,

      What oft-repeated sights the herdsman seeing

      Should keep his cattle closer to their stalls.

      No sooner are the winds at point to rise,

      Than either Ocean's firths begin to toss

      And swell, and a dry crackling sound is heard

      Upon the heights, or one loud ferment booms

      The beach afar, and through the forest goes

      A murmur multitudinous. By this

      Scarce can the billow spare the curved keels,

      When swift the sea-gulls from the middle

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