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Rh

And know what Honour means: then shall the plains

Glow with the yellow harvest silently,

The grape hang blushing from the tangled brier,

And the rough oak drip honey like a dew.

Yet shall some evil leaven of the old strain

Lurk still unpurged; still men shall tempt the deep

With restless oar, gird cities with new walls,

And cleave the soil with ploughshares; yet again

Another Argo bear her hero-crew,

Another Tiphys steer: still wars shall be,

A new Achilles for a second Troy.

So, when the years shall seal thy manhood's strength,

The busy merchant shall forsake the seas—

Barter there shall not need; the soil shall bear

For all men's use all products of all climes.

The glebe shall need no harrow, nor the vine

The searching knife, the oxen bear no yoke;

The wool no longer shall be schooled to lie,

Dyed in false hues; but, colouring as he feeds,

The ram himself in the rich pasture-lands

Shall wear a fleece now purple and now gold,

And the lambs grow in scarlet. So the Fates

Who know not change have bid their spindles run,

And weave for this blest age the web of doom.

Come, claim thine honours, for the time draws nigh,

Babe of immortal race, the wondrous seed of Jove!

Lo, at thy coming how the starry spheres

Are moved to trembling, and the earth below,

And widespread seas, and the blue vault of heaven!

How all things joy to greet the rising Age!

If but my span of life be stretched to see

Thy birth, and breath remain to sing thy praise,

Not Thracian Orpheus should o'ermatch my strain,

Nor Linus,—though each parent helped the son,

Phœbus Apollo and the Muse of Song:

Though in Arcadia Pan my rival stood,