Page:Virgil - The Georgics, Thomas Nevile, 1767.djvu/78

 66 Him, of the herd, whom leader they ordain,

The titled husband of the softer train.

For him the juiciest grass they cut with care;

Fresh water minister, and corn prepare,

Lest his strength languish in the lax embrace,

And the frail offspring speak the sire's disgrace.

The females, when lust prompts them first to taste

The well-known bliss, with abstinence they waste,

Refuse them fodder, drive from springs by force,

Oft shake, and tire them in the midday course,

When the floor groans beneath the thresher's flail,

And light chaff flits before the rising gale:

With this intent, lest luxury should spoil

The fatt'ning furrows of the genial soil;

But that with thirsty fervours it may feel

The joy, and in it's last recess conceal.

The time approaches, when, once more the sire

Forgot, the mothers all thy care require;

Some months past o'er, as big they roam the plain,

Beware to yoke them to the weighty wain,

O'er the broad path permit them not to leap,

Float in the flood, or o'er the meadows sweep:

Let them in op'ning glades near streams be seen,

Where moss and herbage clothe the banks with green, Where