Georgics

Survives within them, loose the males: be first

To speed thy herds of cattle to their loves,

Breed stock with stock, and keep the race supplied.

Ah! life's best hours are ever first to fly

From hapless mortals; in their place succeed

Disease and dolorous eld; till travail sore

And death unpitying sweep them from the scene.

Still will be some, whose form thou fain wouldst change;

Renew them still; with yearly choice of young

Preventing losses, lest too late thou rue.

Nor steeds crave less selection; but on those

Thou think'st to rear, the promise of their line,

From earliest youth thy chiefest pains bestow.

See from the first yon high-bred colt afield,

His lofty step, his limbs' elastic tread:

Dauntless he leads the herd, still first to try

The threatening flood, or brave the unknown bridge,

By no vain noise affrighted; lofty-necked,

With clean-cut head, short belly, and stout back;

His sprightly breast exuberant with brawn.

Chestnut and grey are good; the worst-hued white

And sorrel. Then lo! if arms are clashed afar,

Bide still he cannot: ears stiffen and limbs quake;

His nostrils snort and roll out wreaths of fire.

Dense is his mane, that when uplifted falls

On his right shoulder; betwixt either loin

The spine runs double; his earth-dinting hoof

Rings with the ponderous beat of solid horn.

Even such a horse was Cyllarus, reined and tamed

By Pollux of Amyclae; such the pair

In Grecian song renowned, those steeds of Mars,

And famed Achilles' team: in such-like form

Great Saturn's self with mane flung loose on neck

Sped at his wife's approach, and flying filled

The heights of Pelion with his piercing neigh.

Even him, when sore disease or sluggish eld

Now saps his strength, pen fast at home, and spare

His not inglorious age. A horse grown old

Slow kindling unto love in vain prolongs

The fruitless task, and, to the encounter come,

As fire in stubble blusters without strength,

He rages idly. Therefore mark thou first

Their age and mettle, other points anon,

As breed and lineage, or what pain was theirs

To lose the race, what pride the palm to win.

Seest how the chariots in mad rivalry

Poured from the barrier grip the course and go,

When youthful hope is highest, and every heart

Drained with each wild pulsation? How they ply

The circling lash, and reaching forward let

The reins hang free! Swift spins the glowing wheel;

And now they stoop, and now erect in air

Seem borne through space and towering to the sky:

No stop, no stay; the dun sand whirls aloft;

They reek with foam-flakes and pursuing breath;

So sweet is fame, so prized the victor's palm.

'Twas Ericthonius first took heart to yoke

Four horses to his car, and rode above

The whirling wheels to victory: but the ring

And bridle-reins, mounted on horses' backs,

The Pelethronian Lapithae bequeathed,

And taught the knight in arms to spurn the ground,

And arch the upgathered footsteps of his pride.

Each task alike is arduous, and for each

A horse young, fiery, swift of foot, they seek;

How oft so-e'er yon rival may have chased

The flying foe, or boast his native plain

Epirus, or Mycenae's stubborn hold,

And trace his lineage back to Neptune's birth.

These points regarded, as the time draws nigh,

With instant zeal they lavish all their care

To plump with solid fat the chosen chief

And designated husband of the herd:

And flowery herbs they cut, and serve him well

With corn and running water, that his strength

Not fail him for that labour of delight,

Nor puny colts betray the feeble sire.

The herd itself of purpose they reduce

To leanness, and when love's sweet longing first

Provokes them, they forbid the leafy food,

And pen them from the springs, and oft beside

With running shake, and tire them in the sun,

What time the threshing-floor groans heavily

With pounding of the corn-ears, and light chaff

Is whirled on high to catch the rising west.

This do they that the soil's prolific powers

May not be dulled by surfeiting, nor choke

The sluggish furrows, but eagerly absorb

Their fill of love, and deeply entertain.

To care of sire the mother's care succeeds.

When great with young they wander nigh their time,

Let no man suffer them to drag the yoke

In heavy wains, nor leap across the way,

Nor scour the meads, nor swim the rushing flood.

In lonely lawns they feed them, by the course

Of brimming streams, where moss is, and the banks

With grass are greenest, where are sheltering caves,

And far outstretched the rock-flung shadow lies.

Round wooded Silarus and the ilex-bowers

Of green Alburnus swarms a winged pest—