Where glens and vales are thickest overgrown
With tangled boughs, I wander now alone,

Till night descend, while blust'ring wind and show'r Beat on my temples through the shatter'd bow'r.

"Go, seek your home, my lambs; my thoughts are due

To other cares, than those of feeding you.
Alas! my rampant weeds now shame my fields,
And what a mildew'd crop the furrow yields!
My rambling vines, unwedded to the trees,
Bear shrivell'd grapes, my myrtles fail to please,

Nor please me more my flocks; they, slighted,

turn

Their unavailing looks on me, and mourn.

"Go, seek your home, my lambs; my thoughts are due

To other cares, than those of feeding you.

Ægon invites me to the hazel grove,
Amyntas, on the river's bank to rove,
And young Alphesiboeus to a seat

Where branching elms exclude the mid-day heat.
"Here fountains spring-here mossy hillocks rise:"
"Here Zephyr whispers, and the stream replies.”-
Thus each persuades, but, deaf to ev'ry call,
I gain the thickets, and escape them all.

"Go, seek your home, my lambs; my thoughts are due

To other cares, than those of feeding you.

Then Mopsus said, (the same who reads so well
The voice of birds, and what the stars foretell,
For he by chance has notic'd my return)
"What means thy sullen mood, this deep concern?
Ah Thyrsis! thou art either craz'd with love,
Or some sinister influence from above;
Dull Saturn's influence oft the shepherds rue;
His leaden shaft oblique has pierc'd thee through.”

"Go, go, my lambs, unpastur'd as ye are, My thoughts are all now due to other care. The nymphs amaz'd, my melancholy see,

And, "Thyrsis!" cry-" what will become of thee? What would'st thou, Thyrsis? such should not

appear

The brow of youth, stern, gloomy, and severe; Brisk youth should laugh, and love-ah shun the fate Of those, twice wretched mopes! who love too late!"

"Go, go, my lambs, unpastur'd as ye are,
My thoughts are all now due to other care.
Ægle with Hyas came, to sooth my pain,
And Baucis' daughter, Dryope the vain,
Fair Dryope, for voice and finger neat
Known far and near, and for her self-conceit;

Chloris too came, whose cottage on the lands,
That skirt the Idumanian current, stands;
But all in vain they came, and but to see
Kind words, and comfortable, lost on me.

“Go, go, my lambs, unpastur'd as ye are,
My thoughts are all now due to other care.
Ah blest indiff'rence of the playful herd,
None by his fellow chosen, or preferr❜d!
No bonds of amity the flocks enthrall,
But each associates, and is pleas'd with all;
So graze the dappl'd deer in num'rous droves,
And all his kind alike the zebra loves;
The same law governs, where the billows roar,
And Proteus' shoals o'erspread the desert shore;
The
sparrow, meanest of the feather'd race,

His fit companion finds in ev'ry place,

With whom he picks the grain, that suits him best,
Flirts here and there, and late returns to rest,
And whom if chance the falcon make his prey,

Or hedger with his well aim'd arrow slay,
For no such loss the gay survivor grieves;
New love he seeks, and new delight receives.
We only, an obdurate kind, rejoice,
Scorning all others, in a single choice,

We scarce in thousands meet one kindred mind,
And if the long-sought good at last we find,
When least we fear it, Death our treasure steals,
And gives our heart a wound, that nothing heals.

"Go, go, my lambs, unpastur'd as ye are, My thoughts are all now due to other care. Ah, what delusion lur'd me from my flocks, To traverse Alpine snows, and rugged rocks! What need so great had I to visit Rome, Now sunk in ruins, and herself a tomb? Or, had she flourish'd still as when, of old, For her sake Tityrus forsook his fold, What need so great had I t' incur a pause Of thy sweet intercourse for such a cause, For such a cause to place the roaring sea, Rocks, mountains, woods, between my friend and me?

Else, had I grasp'd thy feeble hand, compos'd Thy decent limbs, thy drooping eye-lids clos'd, And, at the last, had said-" Farewell-ascendNor even in the skies forget thy friend!"

"Go, go, my lambs, untended homeward fare, My thoughts are all now due to other care. Although well-pleas'd, ye tuneful Tuscan swains! My mind the mem'ry of your worth retains, Yet not your worth can teach me less to mourn My Damon lost.-He too was Tuscan born, Born in your Lucca, city of renown! And wit possess'd, and genius, like your own. Oh how elate was I, when stretch'd beside The murm'ring course of Arno's breezy tide,

Beneath the poplar grove I pass'd my hours,
Now cropping myrtles, and now vernal flow'rs,
And hearing, as I lay at ease along,

Your swains contending for the prize of song!
I also dar'd attempt (and, as it seems,

Not much displeas'd attempting) various themes,
For even I can presents boast from you,
The shepherd's pipe, and ozier basket too,
And Dati, and Francini, both have made
My name familiar to the beechen shade,
And they are learn'd, and each in ev'ry place
Renown'd for song, and both of Lydian race.

"Go, go, my lambs, untended homeward fare, My thoughts are all now due to other care, While bright the dewy grass with moon-beams shone, And I stood hurdling in my kids alone,

How often have I said (but thou had'st found

Ere then thy dark cold lodgment under ground) ·
Now Damon sings, or springes sets for hares,
Or wicker work for various use prepares!
How oft, indulging fancy, have I plann'd
New scenes of pleasure, that I hop'd at hand,
Call'd thee abroad as I was wont, and cried—
What hoa! my friend-come, lay thy task aside,
Haste, let us forth together, and beguile

The heat, beneath you whisp'ring shades awhile,