Page:Virgil - The Georgics, Thomas Nevile, 1767.djvu/129

 Book IV. No love, no joys connubial touch'd his soul;

Forlorn he roam'd, where Tanais' white waves roll,

O'er Hyperborean ice, o'er tracts of ground

Throughout the year in frosts Riphæan bound,

Mourning Dis' fruitless boon, and his lost Bride:

When, stung with rage at his disdainful pride

The Thracian matrons, 'mid the rites divine,

And midnight orgies of the God of wine,

Spread o'er the fields the Poet, piecemeal torn:

Then as his head by Hebrus' flood was born,

Rent from the marble neck, ev'n the cold tongue

And fault'ring voice Eurydice still sung;

Ah poor Eurydice! with last breath cry'd;

Eurydice the distant banks reply'd.

This said, the Prophet in his wat'ry bed

Plung'd; and the waves curl'd foamy o'er his head:

Not so Cyrene; to her trembling son

Uncall'd the Goddess came, and thus begun:

Be ev'ry care now banish'd from your breast;

See the sad source of this devouring pest!

Hence have the Nymphs, with whom she playful wove

The social dance in the sequestered grove,

Pour'd on your bees this plague: but haste, and gain

By gifts and pray'r the mild Napæan train; Won