Alone in the heat of the day am I left with the screaming cicalas,
While patient in tracking thy path, I ever pursue thee, Belovéd.”
Trans. by J. W. Baylis.
Corydon and Alexis
There is a translation of this same 2nd Eclogue, by Abraham Fraunce (1591) which is interesting not only on account of its felicity of phrase, but because, as in the case of some other Elizabethan hexameters, the metre is ruled by quantity, i.e., length of syllables, instead of by accent. The following are the first five lines of Fraunce’s translation:—
“Silly shepherd Corydon lov’d hartyly fayre lad Alexis,
His master’s dearling, but saw noe matter of hoping;
Only amydst darck groves thickset with broade-shadoe beech-trees
Dayly resort did he make, thus alone to the woods, to the mountayns,
With broken speeches fond thoughts there vainly revealing.”