WORKS.
73
And goat's milk, stinted from the kid, to slake
Thy thirst, and eat the shepherd's creamy cake;
The flesh of new-dropt kids and youngling cows,
That, never teeming, cropp'd the forest browse.
With dainty food so saturate thy soul,
And drink the wine dark-mantling in the bowl:
While in the cool and breezy gloom reclined
Thy face is turn'd to catch the breathing wind;
And feel the freshening brook, whose living stream
Glides at thy foot with clear and sparkling gleam:
Three parts its waters in thy cup should flow,
The fourth with brimming wine may mingled glow.
When first Orion's beamy strength[1] is born,
Let then thy labourers thresh the sacred corn:
Smooth be the level floor, on gusty ground,[2]
Where winnowing gales may sweep in eddies round.
Hoard in thy ample bins the meted grain:
And now, as I advise, thy hireling swain[3]
Thy thirst, and eat the shepherd's creamy cake;
The flesh of new-dropt kids and youngling cows,
That, never teeming, cropp'd the forest browse.
With dainty food so saturate thy soul,
And drink the wine dark-mantling in the bowl:
While in the cool and breezy gloom reclined
Thy face is turn'd to catch the breathing wind;
And feel the freshening brook, whose living stream
Glides at thy foot with clear and sparkling gleam:
Three parts its waters in thy cup should flow,
The fourth with brimming wine may mingled glow.
When first Orion's beamy strength[1] is born,
Let then thy labourers thresh the sacred corn:
Smooth be the level floor, on gusty ground,[2]
Where winnowing gales may sweep in eddies round.
Hoard in thy ample bins the meted grain:
And now, as I advise, thy hireling swain[3]
- ↑ Orion's beamy strength.] In the table of Petavius the bright star of the foot of Orion makes its heliacal rise in the 18th degree of Cancer: that is, on the 12th of July. Le Clerc.
- ↑ On gusty ground.] So Varro, de Re Rusticâ, lib. i. c. 51. "The threshing-floor should be in a field, on higher ground, where the wind might blow over it." See also Columella, lib. xi. c. 20.
- ↑ Thy hireling swain
From forth thy house dismiss.———] Θητα αοικον ποιεισθαι
