_Battus and Corydon_, _two rustic fellows_, _meeting in a glade_, _gossip
about their neighbour_, _Aegon_, _who has gone to try his fortune at the
Olympic games_. _After some random banter_, _the talk turns on the death
of Amaryllis_, _and the grief of Battus is disturbed by the roaming of
his cattle_. _Corydon removes a thorn that has run into his friend’s
foot_, _and the conversation comes back to matters of rural scandal_.
_The scene is in Southern Italy_.
* * * * *
_Battus_. Tell me, Corydon, whose kine are these,—the cattle of
Philondas?
_Corydon_. Nay, they are Aegon’s, he gave me them to pasture.
_Battus_. Dost thou ever find a way to milk them all, on the sly, just
before evening?
_Corydon_. No chance of that, for the old man puts the calves beneath
their dams, and keeps watch on me.
_Battus_. But the neatherd himself,—to what land has he passed out of
sight?
_Corydon_. Hast thou not heard? Milon went and carried him off to the
Alpheus.
_Battus_. And when, pray, did _he_ ever set eyes on the wrestlers’ oil?
_Corydon_. They say he is a match for Heracles, in strength and
hardihood.
_Battus_. And I, so mother says, am a better man than Polydeuces.
_Corydon_. Well, off he has gone, with a shovel, and with twenty sheep
from his flock here. {24}
_Battus_. Milo, thou’lt see, will soon be coaxing the wolves to rave!
_Corydon_. But Aegon’s heifers here are lowing pitifully, and miss their
master.
_Battus_. Yes, wretched beasts that they are, how false a neatherd was
theirs!
_Corydon_. Wretched enough in truth, and they have no more care to
pasture.
_Battus_. Nothing is left, now, of that heifer, look you, bones, that’s
all. She does not live on dewdrops, does she, like the grasshopper?
_Corydon_. No, by Earth, for sometimes I take her to graze by the banks
of Aesarus, fair handfuls of fresh grass I give her too, and otherwhiles
she wantons in the deep shade round Latymnus.
_Battus_. How lean is the red bull too! May the sons of Lampriades, the
burghers to wit, get such another for their sacrifice to Hera, for the
township is an ill neighbour.
_Corydon_. And yet that bull is driven to the mere’s mouth, and to the
meadows of Physcus, and to the Neaethus, where all fair herbs bloom, red
goat-wort, and endive, and fragrant bees-wort.
_Battus_. Ah, wretched Aegon, thy very kine will go to Hades, while thou
too art in love with a luckless victory, and thy pipe is flecked with
mildew, the pipe that once thou madest for thyself!
_Corydon_. Not the pipe, by the nymphs, not so, for when he went to
Pisa, he left the same as a gift to me, and I am something of a player.
Well can I strike up the air of _Glaucé_ and well the strain of
_Pyrrhus_, and _the praise of Croton I sing_, and _Zacynthus is a goodly
town_, and _Lacinium that fronts the dawn_! There Aegon the boxer,
unaided, devoured eighty cakes to his own share, and there he caught the
bull by the hoof, and brought him from the mountain, and gave him to
Amaryllis. Thereon the women shrieked aloud, and the neatherd,—he burst
out laughing.
_Battus_. Ah, gracious Amaryllis! Thee alone even in death will we
ne’er forget. Dear to me as my goats wert thou, and thou art dead!
Alas, too cruel a spirit hath my lot in his keeping.
_Corydon_. Dear Battus, thou must needs be comforted. The morrow
perchance will bring better fortune. The living may hope, the dead alone
are hopeless. Zeus now shows bright and clear, and anon he rains.
_Battus_. Enough of thy comforting! Drive the calves from the lower
ground, the cursed beasts are grazing on the olive-shoots. Hie on, white
face.
_Corydon_. Out, Cymaetha, get thee to the hill! Dost thou not hear? By
Pan, I will soon come and be the death of you, if you stay there! Look,
here she is creeping back again! Would I had my crook for hare killing:
how I would cudgel thee.
_Battus_. In the name of Zeus, prithee look here, Corydon! A thorn has
just run into my foot under the ankle. How deep they grow, the
arrow-headed thorns. An ill end befall the heifer; I was pricked when I
was gaping after her. Prithee dost see it?
_Corydon_. Yes, yes, and I have caught it in my nails, see, here it is.
_Battus_. How tiny is the wound, and how tall a man it masters!
_Corydon_. When thou goest to the hill, go not barefoot, Battus, for on
the hillside flourish thorns and brambles plenty.
_Battus_. Come, tell me, Corydon, the old man now, does he still run
after that little black-browed darling whom he used to dote on?
_Corydon_. He is after her still, my lad; but yesterday I came upon
them, by the very byre, and right loving were they.
_Battus_. Well done, thou ancient lover! Sure, thou art near akin to
the satyrs, or a rival of the slim-shanked Pans! {26}