Page:Virgil's Pastorals, Georgics and Aeneis - Dryden (1709) - volume 1.pdf/228

86 more of the Husbandman than the Poet in his Temper: He was wonderfully Grave, Discreet, and Frugal, he liv'd altogether in the Country, and was probably for his great Prudence the Oracle of the whole Neighbourhood. These Principles of good Husbandry ran through his Works, and directed him to the choice of Tillage and Merchandise, for the Subject of that which is the most Celebrated of them. He is every where bent on Instruction, avoids all manner of Digressions, and does not stir out of the Field once in the whole Georgic. His Method in describing Month after Month with its proper Seasons and Employments, is too grave and simple; it takes off from the surprize and variety of the Poem, and makes the whole look but like a modern Almanack in Verse. The Reader is carried through a course of Weather, and may beforehand guess whether he is to meet with Snow or Rain, Clouds or Sunshine in the next Description. His Descriptions indeed have abundance of Nature in them, but then it is Nature in her simplicity and undress. Thus when he speaks of January; the Wild-Beasts, says he, run shivering through the Woods with their Heads stooping to the ground, and their Tails clapt between their Legs; the Goats and Oxen are almost flead with Cold; but