A COUNTRY LIFE.
FROM THE LATIN OF AVIENUS, A.D. 380.
Safe-roof’d my cottage; swelling rich with wine
Hangs from the twisted elm my cluster’d vine.
Boughs glow with cherries, apples bend my wood;
And the crush’d olive foams with juicy flood.
Where my light beds the scattering rivulet drink,
My simple pot-herbs flourish on the brink;
And poppies smiling wave the rosy head,
That yield no opiate to a restless bed.
If for the birds I weave the limed snare,
Or for the startlish deer the net prepare,
Or with a slender thread the fish delude,
No other wiles disturb these woodlands rude.
Go now, and barter life’s calm stealing days
For pompous suppers, that with luxury blaze!
Pray Heaven! for me the lot may thus be cast,
And future time glide peaceful as the past.
Translation of Sir C. A. Elton.