 | The eclogues and georgics of Virgil (1753) |  |
ECLOGUE the Ninth. MOERIS.
ARGUMENT.
We are told by Servius that Moeris is the person who had the care of Virgil's farm, was his procurator, or bailiff, as we speak at present; and that when Virgil had from Augustus received a grant of his lands, one Arrius a centurion refused to admit him into possession, and would certainly have killed him if Virgil had not saved his life by swimming over the Mincius.
Lycidas.
Say, Moeris, to the city dost thou haste?
Moeris.
O Lycidas, the day's arriv'd at last,
When the fierce stranger, breathing rage shall say,
These fields are mine, ye veteran hinds, away!
To whom, by fortune crush'd, o'ercome by fear,
These kids (a curse attend them!) must I bear.
Lycidas.
Sure I had heard, that were yon' hills descend,
And to the vale their sloping summits bend,
Down to the stream and ancient broken beech,
Far as the confines of his pastures reach,
Menalcas sav'd his all by skilful strains:
Moeris.
Such was the tale among the Mantuan swains;
But verse 'mid dreadful war's mad tumults, proves
As weak and powerless, as Dodona's doves,
When the fierce, hungry eagle first they spy,
Full on their heads impetuous dart from high.
The boding raven from an hollow tree,
Warn'd us to cease the strife, and quick agree;
Else of our liberty, nay life, depriv'd,
Nor Moeris nor Menalcas had surviv'd.
Lycidas.
What rage the ruthless soldier could induce
To hurt the sweetest favourite of the muse?
With thee had all our choicest pleasures fled!
Who then could strew sweet flow'rs, the nymphs could sing
Who shade with verdant boughs the crystal spring?
Or chant those lays which privately I read,
When late we visited my fav'rite maid:
“Watch, Tityrus, watch, and see my goats receive
“At morn fresh pasture, and cool streams at eve;
“Soon I'll return; but as the flock you lead,
“Beware the wanton ridg'ling's butting head.”
Moeris.
Or those to Varus, tho' unfinish'd strains—
“Varus, should we preserve our Mantuan plains,
“(Obnoxious by Cremona's neighbouring crime)
“The swans thy name shall bear to heav'n sublime.
Lycidas.
Begin, if verse thou hast, my tuneful friend;
On trefoil fed so may thy cows distend
Their copious udders; so thy bees refuse
The baneful juices of Cyrnaean yews.
Me too the muses love, and give me lays,
Swains call me bard, but I deny their praise;
I reach not Varus' voice, nor Cinna's song,
But scream like gabbling geese sweet swans among.
Moeris.
Those strains am I revolving in my mind,
Nor are they verses of a vulgar kind.
“For what delight affords the wat'ry waste?
“Here purple spring her gifts profusely pours,
“And paints the river-banks with balmy flow'rs;
“Here, o'er the grotto the pale poplar weaves
“With blushing vines a canopy of leaves;
“Then quit the seas! against the sounding shore
“Let the vext ocean's billows idly roar!
Lycidas.
What's that you sung alone, one cloudless night?
Its air I know, could I the words recite.
Moeris.
“Why still consult, for ancient signs, the skies?
“Daphnis! behold the Julian star arise!
“Whose power the fields with copious corn shall fill,
“And cloath with richer grapes each sunny hill;
“Now, Daphnis, for thy grandsons plant thy pears,
“Who luscious fruits shall crop in distant years.”—
Alas! by stealing time how things decay!
Once could I sing whole summer-suns away;
Hath stopt my voice and look'd on Moeris first:
But oft Menalcas will repeat these lays.
Lycidas.
My strong desires such slight excuses raise;
Behold no whisp'ring winds the branches shake;
Smooth is the surface of the neighb'ring lake;
Besides, to our mid-journey are we come,
I see the top of old Bianor's tomb;
Here, Moeris, where the swains thick branches prune,
And strew their leaves, our voices let us tune;
Here rest awhile, and lay your kidlings down,
Remains full time to reach the destin'd town;
But if you tempests fear and gathering rain,
Still let us sooth our travel with a strain;
The ways seem shorter by a warbled song,
I'll ease your burden as we pass along.
Moeris.
Cease your request; proceed we o'er the plain;
When he returns we'll sing a sweeter strain.
Ver. 14 Doves.] Species pro genere. Two doves were said to sit on the tops of the oracular oaks at Dodona, in Epirus; and Epirus was often called Chaonia.
25. Who then could strew.] Virgil certainly alludes to his eclogue, entitled Daphnis, composed on the death of Julius Caesar.
35. Cremona's.] Augustus divided the lands of Cremona amongst his soldiers, because they sided with Antony. But that country not affording sufficient quantities of land for all the soldiers, part of the territory of Mantua was added and given away in that manner.
40. Cyrnaean.] Corsica was called Cyrnus by the Greeks. The honey of this island was most remarkably bad.
43. Cinna's, &c.] This undoubtedly was not Helvius Cinna the poet who was murdered, by mistaking him for Cornelius Cinna, and an enemy of Julius Caesar, at that emperor's funeral. But it seems to have been Lucius Cinna, the grandson of Pompey, and a great favourite of Augustus. Others think the words relate to two writers.
47. O lovely Galatea.] These verses in the original, assemble together some of the loveliest objects of wild unadorned nature. They are a copy of a beautiful passage in Theocritus, but greatly excel the Greek poet's description.
52. Leaves.] Observe how judiciously Virgil mentions only the shades of the vines; it being yet only spring, there could be no grapes.
58. Daphnis! behold] Virgil, says La Cerda, seems to have contended with himself in this place for victory. He opposes these five verses to those which went before, Huc ades o Galatea, in which having excelled Theocritus, he now endeavours to excel himself. In the former he aimed only at the sweetness of expression, as became one who addressed himself to Caesar, who was then admitted among the gods. There he describes the delights of the spring, flowers, rivers, shades, such objects as tend to pleasure; here, he produces the fruits of summer, corn, grapes, and pears, all which are useful to man. Who can say that Virgil speaks idly, or to no purpose?
58. Behold the Julian.] The Julian star, according to Doctor Halley was a comet; and the same that appeared (for the third time after) in 1680. He says that the tail of that comet in its nearest approach to the sun, was sixty degrees long. So that it must have made a very considerable figure in the heavens, as Horace says the Julian star did. After Caesar's death a comet happened to appear, which the superstitious vulgar thought was the soul of Julius Caesar placed among the gods. Augustus' his courtiers propagated this notion.
63. Alas! by stealing.] Here the shepherd breaks off abruptly, as if he had forgot the rest of the poem.
65. My memory fails.] Observe two things, says Ruaeus, 1. That oblita is used in a passive signification. 2. That mihi is put for me. So in the Aeneid, Nulla tuarum, accedita mihi neque vis a sororum.
65. Some wolf accurs'd.] The ancients imagined, that if a a wolf happened to look on any man first, the person was instantly deprived of his voice. Λυκον ειδες, επαιε τις, ως σοφος ειπεν, says Theocritus.
68. Causando signifies by pretending to make excuses.
Stultus uterque locum immeritum causatur iniquiHorace.
70. The neighb'ring lake.] The original says, stratum silet acquor. By acquor cannot possibly be understood the sea, as some translators have imagined. Catrou's observation is very ingenious. Our shepherds were already arrived at the edge of the lake of Mantua, which is formed round the city by the Mincio. Is not a lake a sea in the eyes of shepherds?
72. Bianor's tomb.] Bianor, son of the river Tiber, by the daughter of Tiresias, named Manto, is fabled to have first of all fortified the city of Mantua, and to have given it the name of his mother. His tomb, as ancient ones usually were, was placed by the way-side. Hence the expression, abi viatur, siste viator—absurdly introduced into modern epitaphs, not placed in such situations.
| The eclogues and georgics of Virgil (1753) | |