The Herdsmen
BATTUS.
Who owns these cattle, Corydon? Philondas? Prythee say.
CORYDON.
No, AEgon: and he gave them me to tend while he's away.
BATTUS.
Dost milk them in the gloaming, when none is nigh to see?
CORYDON.
The old man brings the calves to suck, and keeps an eye on me.
BATTUS.
And to what region then hath flown the cattle's rightful lord?
CORYDON.
Hast thou not heard? With Milo he vanished Elis-ward.
BATTUS.
How! was the wrestler's oil e'er yet so much as seen by him?
CORYDON.
Men say he rivals Heracles in lustiness of limb.
BATTUS.
I'm Polydeuces' match (or so my mother says) and more.
CORYDON.
-So off he started; with a spade, and of these ewes a score.
BATTUS.
This Milo will be teaching wolves how they should raven next.
CORYDON.
-And by these bellowings his kine proclaim how sore they're vexed.
BATTUS.
Poor kine! they've found their master a sorry knave indeed.
CORYDON.
They're poor enough, I grant you: they have not heart to feed.
BATTUS.
Look at that heifer! sure there's naught, save bare bones, left of her.
Pray, does she browse on dewdrops, as doth the grasshopper?
CORYDON.
Not she, by heaven! She pastures now by AEsarus' glades,
And handfuls fair I pluck her there of young and green grass-blades;
Now bounds about Latymnus, that gathering-place of shades.
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poem by Theocritus
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