Chapter 5

‘Dear Lycidas,’ I answered him, ‘they all say that thou among herdsmen, yea, and reapers art far the chiefest flute-player. In sooth this greatly rejoices our hearts, and yet, to my conceit, meseems I can vie with thee. But as to this journey, we are going to the harvest-feast, for, look you some friends of ours are paying a festival to fair-robed Demeter, out of the first-fruits of their increase, for verily in rich measure has the goddess filled their threshing-floor with barley grain. But come, for the way and the day are thine alike and mine, come, let us vie in pastoral song, perchance each will make the other delight. For I, too, am a clear-voiced mouth of the Muses, and they all call me the best of minstrels, but I am not so credulous; no, by Earth, for to my mind I cannot as yet conquer in song that great Sicelidas—the Samian—nay, nor yet Philetas. ’Tis a match of frog against cicala!’

So I spoke, to win my end, and the goatherd with his sweet laugh, said, ‘I give thee this staff, because thou art a sapling of Zeus, and in thee is no guile. For as I hate your builders that try to raise a house as high as the mountain summit of Oromedon, {40} so I hate all birds of the Muses that vainly toil with their cackling notes against the Minstrel of Chios! But come, Simichidas, without more ado let us begin the pastoral song. And I—nay, see friend—if it please thee at all, this ditty that I lately fashioned on the mountain side!’

_The Song of Lycidas_.

Fair voyaging befall Ageanax to Mytilene, both when the _Kids_ are westering, and the south wind the wet waves chases, and when Orion holds his feet above the Ocean! Fair voyaging betide him, if he saves Lycidas from the fire of Aphrodite, for hot is the love that consumes me.

The halcyons will lull the waves, and lull the deep, and the south wind, and the east, that stirs the sea-weeds on the farthest shores, {41} the halcyons that are dearest to the green-haired mermaids, of all the birds that take their prey from the salt sea. Let all things smile on Ageanax to Mytilene sailing, and may he come to a friendly haven. And I, on that day, will go crowned with anise, or with a rosy wreath, or a garland of white violets, and the fine wine of Ptelea I will dip from the bowl as I lie by the fire, while one shall roast beans for me, in the embers. And elbow-deep shall the flowery bed be thickly strewn, with fragrant leaves and with asphodel, and with curled parsley; and softly will I drink, toasting Ageanax with lips clinging fast to the cup, and draining it even to the lees.

Two shepherds shall be my flute-players, one from Acharnae, one from Lycope, and hard by Tityrus shall sing, how the herdsman Daphnis once loved a strange maiden, and how on the hill he wandered, and how the oak trees sang his dirge—the oaks that grow by the banks of the river Himeras—while he was wasting like any snow under high Haemus, or Athos, or Rhodope, or Caucasus at the world’s end.

And he shall sing how, once upon a time, the great chest prisoned the living goatherd, by his lord’s infatuate and evil will, and how the blunt-faced bees, as they came up from the meadow to the fragrant cedar chest, fed him with food of tender flowers, because the Muse still dropped sweet nectar on his lips. {42}

O blessed Comatas, surely these joyful things befell thee, and thou wast enclosed within the chest, and feeding on the honeycomb through the springtime didst thou serve out thy bondage. Ah, would that in my days thou hadst been numbered with the living, how gladly on the hills would I have herded thy pretty she-goats, and listened to thy voice, whilst thou, under oaks or pine trees lying, didst sweetly sing, divine Comatas!

When he had chanted thus much he ceased, and I followed after him again, with some such words as these:—

‘Dear Lycidas, many another song the Nymphs have taught me also, as I followed my herds upon the hillside, bright songs that Rumour, perchance, has brought even to the throne of Zeus. But of them all this is far the most excellent, wherewith I will begin to do thee honour: nay listen as thou art dear to the Muses.’

_The Song of Simichidas_.

For Simichidas the Loves have sneezed, for truly the wretch loves Myrto as dearly as goats love the spring. {43} But Aratus, far the dearest of my friends, deep, deep his heart he keeps Desire,—and Aratus’s love is young! Aristis knows it, an honourable man, nay of men the best, whom even Phoebus would permit to stand and sing lyre in hand, by his tripods. Aristis knows how deeply love is burning Aratus to the bone. Ah, Pan, thou lord of the beautiful plain of Homole, bring, I pray thee, the darling of Aratus unbidden to his arms, whosoe’er it be that he loves. If this thou dost, dear Pan, then never may the boys of Arcady flog thy sides and shoulders with stinging herbs, when scanty meats are left them on thine altar. But if thou shouldst otherwise decree, then may all thy skin be frayed and torn with thy nails, yea, and in nettles mayst thou couch! In the hills of the Edonians mayst thou dwell in mid-winter time, by the river Hebrus, close neighbour to the Polar star! But in summer mayst thou range with the uttermost Æthiopians beneath the rock of the Blemyes, whence Nile no more is seen.

And you, leave ye the sweet fountain of Hyetis and Byblis, and ye that dwell in the steep home of golden Dione, ye Loves as rosy as red apples, strike me with your arrows, the desired, the beloved; strike, for that ill-starred one pities not my friend, my host! And yet assuredly the pear is over-ripe, and the maidens cry ‘alas, alas, thy fair bloom fades away!’

Come, no more let us mount guard by these gates, Aratus, nor wear our feet away with knocking there. Nay, let the crowing of the morning cock give others over to the bitter cold of dawn. Let Molon alone, my friend, bear the torment at that school of passion! For us, let us secure a quiet life, and some old crone to spit on us for luck, and so keep all unlovely things away.

Thus I sang, and sweetly smiling, as before, he gave me the staff, a pledge of brotherhood in the Muses. Then he bent his way to the left, and took the road to Pyxa, while I and Eucritus, with beautiful Amyntas, turned to the farm of Phrasidemus. There we reclined on deep beds of fragrant lentisk, lowly strown, and rejoicing we lay in new stript leaves of the vine. And high above our heads waved many a poplar, many an elm tree, while close at hand the sacred water from the nymphs’ own cave welled forth with murmurs musical. On shadowy boughs the burnt cicalas kept their chattering toil, far off the little owl cried in the thick thorn brake, the larks and finches were singing, the ring-dove moaned, the yellow bees were flitting about the springs. All breathed the scent of the opulent summer, of the season of fruits; pears at our feet and apples by our sides were rolling plentiful, the tender branches, with wild plums laden, were earthward bowed, and the four-year-old pitch seal was loosened from the mouth of the wine-jars.

Ye nymphs of Castaly that hold the steep of Parnassus, say, was it ever a bowl like this that old Chiron set before Heracles in the rocky cave of Pholus? Was it nectar like this that beguiled the shepherd to dance and foot it about his folds, the shepherd that dwelt by Anapus, on a time, the strong Polyphemus who hurled at ships with mountains? Had these ever such a draught as ye nymphs bade flow for us by the altar of Demeter of the threshing-floor?

Ah, once again may I plant the great fan on her corn-heap, while she stands smiling by, with sheaves and poppies in her hands.

IDYL VIII

_The scene is among the high mountain pastures of Sicily_:—

‘_On the sward_, _at the cliff top_ _Lie strewn the white flocks_;’

_and far below shines and murmurs the Sicilian sea_. _Here Daphnis and Menalcas_, _two herdsmen of the golden age_, _meet_, _while still in their earliest youth_, _and contend for the prize of pastoral_. _Their songs_, _in elegiac measure_, _are variations on the themes of love and friendship_ (_for Menalcas sings of Milon_, _Daphnis of Nais_), _and of nature_. _Daphnis is the winner_; _it is his earliest victory_, _and the prelude to his great renown among nymphs and shepherds_. _In this version the strophes are arranged as in Fritzsche’s text_. _Some critics take the poem to be a patchwork by various hands_.

* * * * *

AS beautiful Daphnis was following his kine, and Menalcas shepherding his flock, they met, as men tell, on the long ranges of the hills. The beards of both had still the first golden bloom, both were in their earliest youth, both were pipe-players skilled, both skilled in song. Then first Menalcas, looking at Daphnis, thus bespoke him.

‘Daphnis, thou herdsman of the lowing kine, art thou minded to sing a match with me? Methinks I shall vanquish thee, when I sing in turn, as readily as I please.’

Then Daphnis answered him again in this wise, ‘Thou shepherd of the fleecy sheep, Menalcas, the pipe-player, never wilt thou vanquish me in song, not thou, if thou shouldst sing till some evil thing befall thee!’

_Menalcas_. Dost thou care then, to try this and see, dost thou care to risk a stake?

_Daphnis_. I do care to try this and see, a stake I am ready to risk.

_Menalcas_. But what shall we stake, what pledge shall we find equal and sufficient?

_Daphnis_. I will pledge a calf, and do thou put down a lamb, one that has grown to his mother’s height.

_Menalcas_. Nay, never will I stake a lamb, for stern is my father, and stern my mother, and they number all the sheep at evening.

_Daphnis_. But what, then, wilt thou lay, and where is to be the victor’s gain?

_Menalcas_. The pipe, the fair pipe with nine stops, that I made myself, fitted with white wax, and smoothed evenly, above as below. This would I readily wager, but never will I stake aught that is my father’s.

_Daphnis_. See then, I too, in truth, have a pipe with nine stops, fitted with white wax, and smoothed evenly, above as below. But lately I put it together, and this finger still aches, where the reed split, and cut it deeply.

_Menalcas_. But who is to judge between us, who will listen to our singing?

_Daphnis_. That goatherd yonder, he will do, if we call him hither, the man for whom that dog, a black hound with a white patch, is barking among the kids.

Then the boys called aloud, and the goatherd gave ear, and came, and the boys began to sing, and the goatherd was willing to be their umpire. And first Menalcas sang (for he drew the lot) the sweet-voiced Menalcas, and Daphnis took up the answering strain of pastoral song—and ’twas thus Menalcas began:

_Menalcas_. Ye glades, ye rivers, issue of the Gods, if ever Menalcas the flute-player sang a song ye loved, to please him, feed his lambs; and if ever Daphnis come hither with his calves, nay he have no less a boon.

_Daphnis_. Ye wells and pastures, sweet growth o’ the world, if Daphnis sings like the nightingales, do ye fatten this herd of his, and if Menalcas hither lead a flock, may he too have pasture ungrudging to his full desire!

_Menalcas_. There doth the ewe bear twins, and there the goats; there the bees fill the hives, and there oaks grow loftier than common, wheresoever beautiful Milon’s feet walk wandering; ah, if he depart, then withered and lean is the shepherd, and lean the pastures

_Daphnis_. Everywhere is spring, and pastures everywhere, and everywhere the cows’ udders are swollen with milk, and the younglings are fostered, wheresoever fair Nais roams; ah, if she depart, then parched are the kine, and he that feeds them!

_Menalcas_. O bearded goat, thou mate of the white herd, and O ye blunt-faced kids, where are the manifold deeps of the forest, thither get ye to the water, for thereby is Milon; go, thou hornless goat, and say to him, ‘Milon, Proteus was a herdsman, and that of seals, though he was a god.’

_Daphnis_. . . .

_Menalcas_. Not mine be the land of Pelops, not mine to own talents of gold, nay, nor mine to outrun the speed of the winds! Nay, but beneath this rock will I sing, with thee in mine arms, and watch our flocks feeding together, and, before us, the Sicilian sea.

_Daphnis_ . . . .

_Menalcas_ . . . .

_Daphnis_. Tempest is the dread pest of the trees, drought of the waters, snares of the birds, and the hunter’s net of the wild beasts, but ruinous to man is the love of a delicate maiden. O father, O Zeus, I have not been the only lover, thou too hast longed for a mortal woman.

Thus the boys sang in verses amoebaean, and thus Menalcas began the crowning lay:

_Menalcas_. Wolf, spare the kids, spare the mothers of my herd, and harm not me, so young as I am to tend so great a flock. Ah, Lampurus, my dog, dost thou then sleep so soundly? a dog should not sleep so sound, that helps a boyish shepherd. Ewes of mine, spare ye not to take your fill of the tender herb, ye shall not weary, ’ere all this grass grows again. Hist, feed on, feed on, fill, all of you, your udders, that there may be milk for the lambs, and somewhat for me to store away in the cheese-crates.

Then Daphnis followed again, and sweetly preluded to his singing:

_Daphnis_. Me, even me, from the cave, the girl with meeting eyebrows spied yesterday as I was driving past my calves, and she cried, ‘How fair, how fair he is!’ But I answered her never the word of railing, but cast down my eyes, and plodded on my way.

Sweet is the voice of the heifer, sweet her breath, {50} sweet to lie beneath the sky in summer, by running water.

Acorns are the pride of the oak, apples of the apple tree, the calf of the heifer, and the neatherd glories in his kine.

So sang the lads; and the goatherd thus bespoke them, ‘Sweet is thy mouth, O Daphnis, and delectable thy song! Better is it to listen to thy singing, than to taste the honeycomb. Take thou the pipe, for thou hast conquered in the singing match. Ah, if thou wilt but teach some lay, even to me, as I tend the goats beside thee, this blunt-horned she-goat will I give thee, for the price of thy teaching, this she-goat that ever fills the milking pail above the brim.’

Then was the boy as glad,—and leaped high, and clapped his hands over his victory,—as a young fawn leaps about his mother. But the heart of the other was wasted with grief, and desolate, even as a maiden sorrows that is newly wed.

From this time Daphnis became the foremost among the shepherds, and while yet in his earliest youth, he wedded the nymph Nais.

IDYL IX

_Daphnis and Menalcas_, _at the bidding of the poet_, _sing the joys of the neatherds and of the shepherds life_. _Both receive the thanks of the poet_, _and rustic prizes_—_a staff and a horn_, _made of a spiral shell_. _Doubts have been expressed as to the authenticity of the prelude and concluding verses_. _The latter breathe all Theocritus’s enthusiastic love of song_.

* * * * *

SING, Daphnis, a pastoral lay, do thou first begin the song, the song begin, O Daphnis; but let Menalcas join in the strain, when ye have mated the heifers and their calves, the barren kine and the bulls. Let them all pasture together, let them wander in the coppice, but never leave the herd. Chant thou for me, first, and on the other side let Menalcas reply.

_Daphnis_. Ah, sweetly lows the calf, and sweetly the heifer, sweetly sounds the neatherd with his pipe, and sweetly also I! My bed of leaves is strown by the cool water, and thereon are heaped fair skins from the white calves that were all browsing upon the arbutus, on a time, when the south-west wind dashed me them from the height.

And thus I heed no more the scorching summer, than a lover cares to heed the words of father or of mother.

So Daphnis sang to me, and thus, in turn, did Menalcas sing.

_Menalcas_. Aetna, mother mine, I too dwell in a beautiful cavern in the chamber of the rock, and, lo, all the wealth have I that we behold in dreams; ewes in plenty and she-goats abundant, their fleeces are strown beneath my head and feet. In the fire of oak-faggots puddings are hissing-hot, and dry beech-nuts roast therein, in the wintry weather, and, truly, for the winter season I care not even so much as a toothless man does for walnuts, when rich pottage is beside him.

Then I clapped my hands in their honour, and instantly gave each a gift, to Daphnis a staff that grew in my father’s close, self-shapen, yet so straight, that perchance even a craftsman could have found no fault in it. To the other I gave a goodly spiral shell, the meat that filled it once I had eaten after stalking the fish on the Icarian rocks (I cut it into five shares for five of us),—and Menalcas blew a blast on the shell.

Ye pastoral Muses, farewell! Bring ye into the light the song that I sang there to these shepherds on that day! Never let the pimple grow on my tongue-tip. {53}

Cicala to cicala is dear, and ant to ant, and hawks to hawks, but to me the Muse and song. Of song may all my dwelling be full, for sleep is not more sweet, nor sudden spring, nor flowers are more delicious to the bees—so dear to me are the Muses. {54} Whom they look on in happy hour, Circe hath never harmed with her enchanted potion.

IDYL X THE REAPERS

_This is an idyl of the same genre as Idyl IV_. _The sturdy reaper_, _Milon_, _as he levels the swathes of corn_, _derides his languid and love-worn companion_, _Buttus_. _The latter defends his gipsy love in verses which have been the keynote of much later poetry_, _and which echo in the fourth book of Lucretius_, _and in the Misanthrope of Molière_. _Milon replies with the song of Lityerses_—_a string_, _apparently_, _of popular rural couplets_, _such as Theocritus may have heard chanted in the fields_.

* * * * *

_Milan_. Thou toilsome clod; what ails thee now, thou wretched fellow? Canst thou neither cut thy swathe straight, as thou wert wont to do, nor keep time with thy neighbour in thy reaping, but thou must fall out, like an ewe that is foot-pricked with a thorn and straggles from the herd? What manner of man wilt thou prove after mid-noon, and at evening, thou that dost not prosper with thy swathe when thou art fresh begun?

_Battus_. Milon, thou that canst toil till late, thou chip of the stubborn stone, has it never befallen thee to long for one that was not with thee?

_Milan_. Never! What has a labouring man to do with hankering after what he has not got?

_Battus_. Then it never befell thee to lie awake for love?

_Milan_. Forbid it; ’tis an ill thing to let the dog once taste of pudding.

_Battus_. But I, Milon, am in love for almost eleven days!

_Milan_. ’Tis easily seen that thou drawest from a wine-cask, while even vinegar is scarce with me.

_Battus_. And for Love’s sake, the fields before my doors are untilled since seed-time.

_Milan_. But which of the girls afflicts thee so?

_Battus_. The daughter of Polybotas, she that of late was wont to pipe to the reapers on Hippocoon’s farm.

_Milan_. God has found out the guilty! Thou hast what thou’st long been seeking, that grasshopper of a girl will lie by thee the night long!

_Battus_. Thou art beginning thy mocks of me, but Plutus is not the only blind god; he too is blind, the heedless Love! Beware of talking big.

_Milan_. Talk big I do not! Only see that thou dust level the corn, and strike up some love-ditty in the wench’s praise. More pleasantly thus wilt thou labour, and, indeed, of old thou wert a melodist.

_Battus_. Ye Muses Pierian, sing ye with me the slender maiden, for whatsoever ye do but touch, ye goddesses, ye make wholly fair.

They all call thee a _gipsy_, gracious Bombyca, and _lean_, and _sunburnt_, ’tis only I that call thee _honey-pale_.

Yea, and the violet is swart, and swart the lettered hyacinth, but yet these flowers are chosen the first in garlands.

The goat runs after cytisus, the wolf pursues the goat, the crane follows the plough, but I am wild for love of thee.

Would it were mine, all the wealth whereof once Croesus was lord, as men tell! Then images of us twain, all in gold, should be dedicated to Aphrodite, thou with thy flute, and a rose, yea, or an apple, and I in fair attire, and new shoon of Amyclae on both my feet.

Ah gracious Bombyca, thy feet are fashioned like carven ivory, thy voice is drowsy sweet, and thy ways, I cannot tell of them! {57}

_Milan_. Verily our clown was a maker of lovely songs, and we knew it not! How well he meted out and shaped his harmony; woe is me for the beard that I have grown, all in vain! Come, mark thou too these lines of godlike Lityerses

THE LITYERSES SONG.

_Demeter_, _rich in fruit_, _and rich in grain_, _may this corn be easy to win_, _and fruitful exceedingly_!

_Bind_, _ye bandsters_, _the sheaves_, _lest the wayfarer __should cry_, ‘_Men of straw were the workers here_, _ay_, _and their hire was wasted_!’

_See that the cut stubble faces the North wind_, _or the West_, _’tis thus the grain waxes richest_.

_They that thresh corn should shun the noon-day steep_; _at noon the chaff parts easiest from the straw_.

_As for the reapers_, _let them begin when the crested lark is waking_, _and cease when he sleeps_, _but take holiday in the heat_.

_Lads_, _the frog has a jolly life_, _he is not cumbered about a butler to his drink_, _for he has liquor by him unstinted_!

_Boil the lentils better_, _thou miserly steward_; _take heed lest thou chop thy fingers_, _when thou’rt splitting cumin-seed_.

’Tis thus that men should sing who labour i’ the sun, but thy starveling love, thou clod, ’twere fit to tell to thy mother when she stirs in bed at dawning.

IDYL XI THE CYCLOPS IN LOVE

_Nicias_, _the physician and poet_, _being in love_, _Theocritus reminds him that in song lies the only remedy_. _It was by song_, _he says_, _that the Cyclops_, _Polyphemus_, _got him some ease_, _when he was in love with Galatea_, _the sea-nymph_.

_The idyl displays_, _in the most graceful manner_, _the Alexandrian taste for turning Greek mythology into love stories_. _No creature could be more remote from love than the original Polyphemus_, _the cannibal giant of the Odyssey_.

* * * * *

THERE is none other medicine, Nicias, against Love, neither unguent, methinks, nor salve to sprinkle,—none, save the Muses of Pieria! Now a delicate thing is their minstrelsy in man’s life, and a sweet, but hard to procure. Methinks thou know’st this well, who art thyself a leech, and beyond all men art plainly dear to the Muses nine.

’Twas surely thus the Cyclops fleeted his life most easily, he that dwelt among us,—Polyphemus of old time,—when the beard was yet young on his cheek and chin; and he loved Galatea. He loved, not with apples, not roses, nor locks of hair, but with fatal frenzy, and all things else he held but trifles by the way. Many a time from the green pastures would his ewes stray back, self-shepherded, to the fold. But he was singing of Galatea, and pining in his place he sat by the sea-weed of the beach, from the dawn of day, with the direst hurt beneath his breast of mighty Cypris’s sending,—the wound of her arrow in his heart!

Yet this remedy he found, and sitting on the crest of the tall cliff, and looking to the deep, ’twas thus he would sing:—

_Song of the Cyclops_.

O milk-white Galatea, why cast off him that loves thee? More white than is pressed milk to look upon, more delicate than the lamb art thou, than the young calf wantoner, more sleek than the unripened grape! Here dust thou resort, even so, when sweet sleep possesses me, and home straightway dost thou depart when sweet sleep lets me go, fleeing me like an ewe that has seen the grey wolf.