Page:Virgil - The Georgics, Thomas Nevile, 1767.djvu/117

 Book IV. By swains 'tis gather'd in the close-cropt meads,

Where Mella his meand'ring current leads:

Let the roots, boil'd in odorous wine, be plac'd

Heap'd near the door, to bees a rich repast.

But on a sudden should your stock decline,

No hopes remaining of a future line,

Hear now th' invention of Arcadia's Swain;

How oft from putrid gore of bullocks slain

Bees were produc'd: the whole in order told,

Trac'd from the source it's glory, I'll unfold.

Where in Canopus' happy realms reside

A people, custom'd o'er their fields to glide

In painted skiffs, what time, above his shores

Rising, Nile empties his redundant stores;

And where, descending from Ind's tawny sons,

The River near the quiver'd Persians runs,

And feeds green Ægypt with black, oozy tides,

And rushing diverse in sev'n mouths divides,

All in this art's success, the region round,

Constant confide: hence first a spot of ground,

Small and contracted, they select; the place

With straiten'd walls, and narrow roof, embrace:

Four windows from each quarter of the sky

With rays of glancing light the room supply:

This