Idyll 8

8. The Singing-Match: Daphnis and Menalcas With the graceful Daphnis, as he herded his cattle,

Menalcas met, pasturing his sheep, they say, on the long hills.

Both of them were red-haired, both still beardless,

both skilled in piping, both in singing.

And Menalcas, looking at Daphnis, was the first to speak:

Daphnis, guardian of the lowing cattle, will you sing against me?

I say I will beat you, singing as long as I choose.

And Daphnis answered him with these words:

Menalcas, shepherd of the woolly sheep, you piper,

you will never beat me, however you may strain at singing.

Menalcas

Then do you care to put it to the test? Do you care to set up a prize?

Daphnis

I care to put it to the test; I care to set up a prize.

Menalcas

And what shall we stake that would be worthy of us?

Daphnis

I will stake a calf; do you stake a lamb as big as its mother.

Menalcas

I will never stake a lamb, for my father is harsh,

and my mother too, and they count all the sheep at evening.

Daphnis

But what then will you stake? What more shall the winner have?

Menalcas

A pipe that I made, a fair one of nine reeds,

set with white wax, even below and even above—

this I will stake; but I will not stake my father's goods.

Daphnis

Why, I too have a pipe of nine reeds,

set with white wax, even below and even above.

I fitted it together the other day; and I still feel a pain

in this finger, where a reed split and cut me.

Menalcas

But who shall judge between us? Who shall hear us?

Daphnis

What if we call that goatherd over here,

the one at whose kids the white-spotted dog is barking?

So the boys shouted, and the goatherd came to listen.

The boys sang, and the goatherd was willing to judge.

And first, having drawn the lot, the loud-voiced Menalcas sang,

then Daphnis took up the answering song.

Menalcas

You glens and rivers, race divine, if ever Menalcas

the piper sang you a song you loved,

graze his ewe-lambs with a good will; and if ever Daphnis

come with his heifers, may he have no less.

Daphnis

You springs and pastures, sweet growth, if Daphnis

makes music like the nightingales,

fatten this herd of mine; and if Menalcas

brings any here, may he too feed all in plenty, and rejoice.

Menalcas

Here are the ewes, here the goats that bear twins, here the bees

fill their hives, and here the oaks grow taller,

here the fair Milon sets his feet; but if he goes away,

then dry are both the shepherd and the pastures there.

Daphnis

Spring everywhere, everywhere the meadows, everywhere with milk

the udders swell, and the young are reared,

wherever the fair girl walks; but if she goes away,

then withered are both the cowherd and his cattle.

Menalcas

O he-goat, husband of the white she-goats, O depth of the woodland

without end—(O snub-nosed kids, come here to the water)—

for there he is; go, you stub-horned one, and say: Milon,

even Proteus, though a god, pastured his seals.

Daphnis

May I not have the land of Pelops, nor talents of gold

to possess, nor to outrun the winds;

but under this rock will I sing, holding you in my arms,

watching the flocks graze together, toward the Sicilian sea.

Daphnis

For the trees winter is a dread evil, for the waters drought,

for the birds the snare, for the wild beasts the net,

for a man the longing for a tender maiden. O father, O Zeus,

I am not the only one to have loved; you too love women.

So the boys sang in answering strains;

and Menalcas led off the last song in this way.

Spare my kids, wolf, spare my mothers,

and do me no wrong, though I am small and tend so many.

O Lampurus, my dog, are you held by so deep a sleep?

You should not sleep deeply when you herd with a boy.

And you, my ewes, do not be slow to feed your fill on the soft

grass; you will not tire, for it will grow again.

Hsst, graze, graze, and fill your udders, all of you,

that the lambs may have part, and part I may lay by in the baskets.

Then Daphnis in his turn struck up clear-voiced to sing:

And me too, the other day, a girl with meeting brows, looking from the cave

as I drove my heifers past, called fair, fair;

but I gave her no answer back, not even a bitter one,

but looking down I went on my own way.

Sweet is the heifer's voice, sweet her breath;

and sweet in summer to lie in the open air by running water.

For the oak the acorns are an ornament, for the apple-tree the apples,

for the cow the calf, for the cowherd the cattle themselves.

So the boys sang, and the goatherd spoke thus:

Sweet is your mouth, Daphnis, and lovely your voice.

Better to hear you singing than to lick honey.

Take the pipes; for you have won in the singing.

And if you are willing to teach me too, who herd goats beside you,

I will give you that hornless goat as your teaching-fee,

who always fills the pail above the brim.

As the boy rejoiced and leaped and clapped his hands,

having won, so might a fawn leap to its mother;

and as the other smoldered and was overturned in his heart with grief,

so might a bride be grieved when she is wed against her will.

And from that time Daphnis was first among the shepherds,

and, while still in his early youth, he wed the Naiad nymph.