And in the forests was a highland oxherd, hale and fresh, his figure stout-built, tall and upright, beyond the youths of his age. His name was Hymnos, and in the midst of the wild wood he tended his lovely cattle where the nymph was his neighbour : he flourished the herdsman’s truncheon in lovely hands. But he fell deep in love, and no more took joy of his herd, like rosy Anchises, whose white string of mountainranging bulls Cypris once tended, swinging her girdle to shoo the cattle on. When the herdsman saw the snowy-white girl hunting about the woods, he cared not for his herd of cattle ; the calf strayed into the marsh at its own will and grazed alone, wandering from its ancient herdsman now sick in love, and the heifer scampered capering over the hills in search of her keeper. But the young oxherd was wandering, for he saw the rosy round of a maiden’s face […] and as the hair was lifted the neck bared in the midst gleamed shining white. And the young man often haunted the mountains following the girl, now touching the shafts or feeling at her bow, now watching the rosy-tinted fingers of the lovely girl, when she aimed the lance he loved ; if ever in shooting she drew the horn round with the bowstring, her hand was bared, unseen the young man with furtive eye surveyed the girl’s white archer-arm, bringing round again and again the eye, love’s conduit, wondering if Hera’s arm were as white as Nicaia’s: and stretched his gaze towards the evening, to see if the maiden were more white, or Selene.
So the young man, cherishing under his heart the wound of love, whether near or whether far, kept his mind on the girl : how she drew the arrow for a shot against a mountain bear; how she fastened hand on the lion’s neck, circling about it her two arms in a betraying noose ; how again, after toil and sweat, she washed her in the flow of a brook, half-showing, ever more careful of her kirtle, when the breeze would shake it and lift it up to the […] and shoot out the flower of the beauty laid bare. Keeping this in memory, he conjured again the sweet winds, to raise again the deep-folded robe.
And the young man, restless beside his horned herd, saw the girl in high head hunting hard by ;
and he shouted out these words with envious voice :
O O O that I were a shaft, or a net, or a quiver !
O that I were a beast-hitting lance, that she might carry me in her bare hands! Would that I could become much rather the ox-gut of the back-bent bow, that she might press me to that snowy breast free of the modest stomacher! Aye, heifer ; aye, he-calf, free of the modest stomacher ! Maiden, you bear a happy lance; your arrows are more blest than shepherd Hymnos, because they touch your palms that breed love. I envy your sweet voiceless net-stakes. Not only do I long for your stakes; your very bow I envy, and your quiver that breathes not. O that she would refresh her limbs at midday by the amorous fount, and may see the high-headed girl, aye heifer, aye he-calf, without the envious tunic! Have you not yet pitied me, Cythereia, for this cruel necessity ? I know not Thrinacia, I know not its horned herd, no oxen of the Sun are these I tend in the mountains, no father of mine told the secret bed of Ares.
Maiden, do not chase me away, if I do take oxen to pasture! There are herdsmen that lie in heavenly beds. Rosy Tithonos was a bridegroom for whom because of his fine figure lightbringer Eos stayed her car, and caught him up; and he that pours wine for Zeus was an oxherd, whom high-soaring Zeus for his beauty carried off with tender hands. Come hither, tend the kine, and I will call you a younger Selene with another Endymion, this time an oxherd : throw down the lance, take hold of the herdsman’s staff, that one may say—” Cythereia tending the kine of shepherd […] […] […]
He spoke and prayed, and tore at his knees with womanmad hands, and followed, and trembled to tell her love’s frenzy, yet blamed his own silence.
[…] […] […] day, taking courage to further an honour-able love, he carried away Nicaia’s gear of the chase where it lay, and took her valiant lance, and under a greater sting of longing, angry though the girl was, took also her sweet quiver ; he kissed the sense- Jess nets and the arrows that had no breath, and pressing a murderous arrow to his delighted lips, squeezed it with violent hand and put it to his breast ; and he said these words with a noiseless voice :
“In the Paphian’s name, utter voice again, you trees as in Pyrrha’s time, as in Deucalion’s […], reprove this mad girl! And you, Daphne beloved, break into arboreal speech! Would that fair Nicaia had been in former times Apollo would have pursued the more dainty, and Daphne would not have become a bush.”
So he spoke ; and beside the modest girl, he played on his pipes a wedding tune, witness of his […]. But the maiden spoke out in mockery of the […] : A pretty thing, your Pan piping the Paphian’s tune! Often he chanted Eros, and never became Peitho’s bridegroom. Ah, how many a song sang Daphnis the oxherd ; but with his chanting the maiden hid all the more in untrodden ravines, to escape the tune of the shepherd’s call. Ah, how many a song sang Phoibos while Daphne heard him but felt no pleasure at heart.
Cite This Text