The Georgics

GEORGIC II

Thus far the tilth of fields and stars of heaven;Now will I sing thee, Bacchus, and, with thee,The forest's young plantations and the fruitOf slow-maturing olive. Hither haste,O Father of the wine-press; all things hereTeem with the bounties of thy hand; for theeWith viny autumn laden blooms the field,And foams the vintage high with brimming vats;Hither, O Father of the wine-press, come,And stripped of buskin stain thy bared limbsIn the new must with me.First, nature's lawFor generating trees is manifold;For some of their own force spontaneous spring,No hand of man compelling, and possessThe plains and river-windings far and wide,As pliant osier and the bending broom,Poplar, and willows in wan companiesWith green leaf glimmering gray; and some there beFrom chance-dropped seed that rear them, as the tallChestnuts, and, mightiest of the branching wood,Jove's Aesculus, and oaks, oracularDeemed by the Greeks of old. With some sprouts forthA forest of dense suckers from the root,As elms and cherries; so, too, a pigmy plant,Beneath its mother's mighty shade upshootsThe bay-tree of Parnassus. Such the modesNature imparted first; hence all the raceOf forest-trees and shrubs and sacred grovesSprings into verdure.Other means there are,Which use by method for itself acquired.One, sliving suckers from the tender frameOf the tree-mother, plants them in the trench;One buries the bare stumps within his field,Truncheons cleft four-wise, or sharp-pointed stakes;Some forest-trees the layer's bent arch await,

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