7
CORYDON
if aught for Corydon thou carest, come.”
THYRSIS
“Now may I seem more bitter to your taste
than herb Sardinian, rougher than the broom,
more worthless than strewn sea-weed, if to-day
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hath not a year out-lasted! Fie for shame!
Go home, my cattle, from your grazing go!”
CORYDON
“Ye mossy springs, and grass more soft than sleep,
and arbute green with thin shade sheltering you,
ward off the solstice from my flock, for now
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comes on the burning summer, now the buds
upon the limber vine-shoot 'gin to swell.”
THYRSIS
“Here is a hearth, and resinous logs, here fire
unstinted, and doors black with ceaseless smoke.
Here heed we Boreas' icy breath as much
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as the wolf heeds the number of the flock,
or furious rivers their restraining banks.”
CORYDON
“The junipers and prickly chestnuts stand,
and 'neath each tree lie strewn their several fruits,
now the whole world is smiling, but if fair
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alexis from these hill-slopes should away,