IDYL IV.

THE SWAINS.

ARGUMENT.

Corydon tends the herd of one Ægon, who had gone as an athlete to the Olympian games. His companion, Battus, tries to provoke him with coarse jests. Corydon answers him gently. Battus, while driving off the calves, which are eating the olive branches, is wounded near the ankle by a thorn, which Corydon extracts for him.

IDYL IV.

THE SWAINS.

BATTUS AND CORYDON.

BATTUS.

WHOSE are these kine? Philondases, my friend?

CORYDON.

No-Ægon's, and he gave them me to tend.

BATTUS.

Do you not milk them privily at eve?

CORYDON.

I could not the old man's quick eyes deceive;
And her own calf he puts to every one.

BATTUS.

But whither has the master cowherd gone?

CORYDON.

Have you not heard? with Ægon by his side, Milon has gone where Alpheus loves to glide.

BATTUS.

When did e'er Egon see th' Olympian oil?

CORYDON.

In strength for every feat of manly toil,
They say he is a match for Hercules.

BATTUS.

My mother said, believe her if you please,
That I surpassed e'en Pollux.

CORYDON.

Hence he hied,

Taking a spade, and twenty sheep beside.

BATTUS.

Nor needed much persuasion, I engage,
Ægon to wrestle—and the wolf to rage.

CORYDON.

His lowing heifers for their master pine.

BATTUS.

They have a worthless keeper-wretched kine!

CORYDON.

Poor creatures! they no longer wish to feed.

BATTUS.

Here is a calf but skin and bones indeed

Like a cicada does she feed on dew?

CORYDON.

Not she, by Earth! but whiles the fodder new
Eats from my hand; or else with us she goes,
Cropping the verdant bank, where Æsar flows;
Or up Latymnus bounds away at will,
Frisking along the thickly wooded hill.

BATTUS.

How lean that red bull is! just such another

May Lampra have to offer to the mother

Of Mars! it is a tribe compact of ill.

E