diss T M /4-ai Book . ( i ^5"& I'UESFNTKO BY •., • ».\*v- ;-. THE GEORGIC A CONTRIBUTION TO THE STUDY OF THE VERGILIAN TYPE OP DIDACTIC POETRY BY MARIE LORETTO LILLY & HDtstfertation SUBMITTED TO THE BOARD OF UNIVERSITY STUDIES OP THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY IN CONFORMITY WITH THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 19 16 BALTIMORE J. H. FURST COMPANY 1917 ' THE GEORGIC A CONTRIBUTION TO THE STUDY OF THE VERGILIAN TYPE OP DIDACTIC POETRY ! BY T/ MAEIE LOKETTO LILLY a Dissertation SUBMITTED TO THE BOARD OF UNIVERSITY STUDIES OF THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY IN CONFORMITY WITH THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY X 6 BALTIMORE J. H. FURST COMPANY 1917 j This monograph comprises chapters one, two, and three of a study to be published in Hesperia, Supplementary Series, No. 5. Gottin- gen, Vanderhoeck and Ruprecht; Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins Press. tft. . >ersity 1OT *3 IN GKATEFUL MEMORY OF SISTER MARY MELETIA TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER I page INTRODUCTION! 1"8 CHAPTER II The Creation of the Georgic Type 9-18 1. Vergil's Georgics, their relation to the Works and Days of Hesiod 9 2. Subject matter of the Georgics 13 CHAPTER III The Relation of the Georgic to the Pastoral .... 19 1 . Distinction between the Georgic and the Pastoral . . 19 2. The Pastoral, a literary type of frequent occur- rence, made famous by great poets; the Georgic, a literary type coincidental!)' neglected 26 3. Variations in the development of the Georgic com- pared with variations in the development of the Eclogue 37 4. Variations of the Georgic classified 47 THE GEORGIC CHAPTER I Introduction In 1697, Addison in his " Essay on the Georgics " 1 complains of the neglect of these poems and of their confusion with the pastoral. " There has been abundance of criticism spent on Virgil's Pastorals and Aeneids" he writes, " but the Georgics are a subject which none of the critics have sufficiently taken into their consideration, most of them passing it over in silence, or casting it under the same head with Pastoral — a division by no means proper, unless we suppose the style of a Husbandman ought to be imitated in a Georgic, as that of a shepherd is in Pastoral. But though the scene of both these Poems lies in the same place ; the speakers in them are of a quite different char- acter, since the precepts of husbandry are not to be delivered with the simplicity of a Plowman, but with the address of a Poet. No rules therefore that relate to Pastoral, can any way affect the Georgics, since they fall under that class of Poetry, which consists in giving plain and direct instructions to the reader; whether they be Moral duties, as those of Theognis and Pythagoras; or Philosophical Speculations, as those of Ara- tus and Lucretius; or Rules of practice, as those of Hesiod and Virgil" One can hardly agree with Addison that the critics have ne- glected Vergil's Georgics; and there is evidence that from their first appearance the didactics that rival the De Rerum Natura were not denied due honor. The long list of translations, and the various editions of the Georgics annotated in many lan- 1 This essay was contributed anonymously as an introduction to Dryden's translation of the Georgics. It was written as early as 1693. See Hurd's note, The Works of Addison, ed. Bohn, London, 1862, p. 154. 1 y 2 The Georgia guages bear witness to the devoted labor spent on Vergil's agri- cultural treatises. Various recent publications, 2 moreover, testify to the living interest in the poems that have been pro- nounced the most finished product of antiquity. But, so far as I am able to discover, of the georgic as a type, closely related to the pastoral, although essentially different from it, nothing definite or detailed has been written in English since Addison's complaint in 1697. As for French critics, they seem also to have neglected the subject of the georgic as a type. Collections of Italian georgics have been edited 3 and there is some Italian criticism on the georgic poetry of Italy, 4 but unfortunately neither these collections of " Italian Georgics," nor the critical essays have so far been accessible to me: of the latter I know only what is conveyed by the titles. One cannot say that, like the georgic, the pastoral has been neglected. With finer understanding of the subject than that which is manifest in the age of Addison, the critics have con- tinued to discuss the imitations of Vergil and of Theocritus. Symonds, 5 with justice, refers to "the whole hackneyed ques- tion of Bucolic poetry." Certainly no student can remain igno- rant of the pastoral as a type, of its origin, of its characteristics, of its developments as a literary genre, of the recurring periods of favor and disfavor through which it has passed. But if, incidentally, the critics touch upon the difference in type be- tween the Eclogues and the Georgics of Vergil, it is usually to 2 Meta Glass, The Fusion of Stylistic Elements in YergiVs Georgics, N« Y., Columbia Univ., 1913; T. F. Royd, The Beasts, Birds, and Bees of Ver- gil: a naturalist's handbook to the Georgics, with a preface by W. Warde Fowler, Oxford, B. H. Blackwell, 1914; T. C. Williams, The Georgics and Eclogues of Vergil, with an introd. by G. H. Palmer, Harvard Univ. Press, 1915; Les Georgiques, Texte Latin, par Paul Lejay, Paris, 1915. 3 1 Poemi Georgici, Francesco Bonsignori, Lucca, 1785; Giovanni Silves- tri, Milano, 1826. 4 Felippo Re, Delia poesia georgica degli Italiani, Bologna, 1809; L. Gi- rardelli, Dei poemi georgici nostrali, Goriza, 1900; D. Merlini's Saggio di ricerche sulla satira contro il villano, Torino, Loscher, 1894, probably treats of poems that fall under the head of mock-georgics. 5 J. A. Symonds, Studies of the Greek Poets, London, 1902, Vol. n, p. 245. Introduction 3 notice the superiority of workmanship in the latter, or to con- trast the general character of the two series of poems. Sellar, 6 for example, observes that Vergil was marked among his con- temporaries as the poet of Nature and rural life. The Eclogues, he observes, are of a light type; the general Eoman spirit de- manded of its highest literature that it should have either some direct practical use or contribute in some way to the sense of national greatness. Glover 7 discusses the difference in spirit between the Eclogues and the Georgics: " the great note " of the Eclogues, youthful happiness, the life of the Shepherd, an easy life, touched sometimes by youthful grief that is never incon- solable ; in the Georgics, " the grim realization that life involves a great deal more work than Menalcas and the rest had thought, hard work all the year round, vigilance never to be remitted, and labor which it is ruin to relax." In general, however, the commentators seem to take it for granted that the reader will perceive of necessity the essential difference between the two types. Yet one continually finds that, in spite of Addison's emphatic protest, students confuse the georgic with the pastoral. Of the few writings that I have been able to discover on the imitations of the Georgics there is almost nothing that is of any value as a study of the type. In Conington's edition of Vergil, 8 there is a section on the " Later Didactic Poets of Rome," an essay that is valuable in the history of the georgic, and that gives a general idea of the manner in which the Vergilian model was imitated from the earliest period. A piece of work en- titled Virgilio nella storia della Poesia Didascalica Latina, by D. Renzi, 9 promises valuable information ; but I have been unable to consult it. Dunlop 10 has some comments on a few of the 6 W. Y. Sellar, The Roman Poets of the Augustan Age, Virgil, Oxford, 1908, pp. 174 ff. T T. R. Glover, Studies in Vergil, London, Methuen and Co., 1904, pp. 30 ff. 8 J. Conington, The Works of Vergil, London, 1872, Vol. i, p. 389. •Avella, 1907. 10 J. Dunlop, History of Roman Lit. during the Augustan Age. London, 1828. Vol. m, pp. 138 ff. 4 The Georgic imitations of the Georgics, but his remarks are even more gen- eral respecting the type than those of Conington. For example, he observes that " The Rusticus of Politian l in Virgilii Georgi- con enarratione pronunciata ' is an abridgement of the subject of that poem and several passages are nearly copied from it." After having briefly considered several other imitations, he comments on the great debt of Thomson to Yergil and points out passages in the Seasons, imitated, or almost translated, from the Georgics. Ginguene u has a valuable chapter on the Italian didactics of the sixteenth century. He sketches briefly the contents of most of the Italian georgics of the period, but altho he com- ments generally on the fact that these poems follow Vergil as a model, he says nothing of their particular adaptations of the features peculiar to the georgic type. Incidentally, he shows that other writers, who have considered imitations of the Geor- gics, have done so carelessly. An enthusiastic admirer of Luigi Alamanni's Coltivazione, Ginguene protests against the French neglect of this important poem, a work written and first pub- lished in France. In particular he reproaches Jacques Delille. Saint-Lambert, and a certain de Eosset. Delille is scored, be- cause, in the introduction to his translation of the Georgics, he announces that he cannot refrain from speaking of the poems for which Vergil has furnished the idea and the model, after which announcement, he considers Vaniere's Praedium Rusti- cum, Hapin's Jardins, Thomson's Seasons, and Saint-Lambert's Saisons, without mentioning Luigi Alamanni. Saint-Lambert is reproached, because, in his discours preliminaire, 12 he writes of the Georgics of Vergil and of les Georgiques plus detailles de Vaniere, and neglects the opportunity of speaking of the georgics of Alamanni. De Rosset is complained against, because, in an 11 P. L. Ginguene, Hist. Lit. d'ltalie, Paris, 1824, 2e ed. T. 9, ch. xxxv, pp. Iff. " Ginguene" assumes that the reader is familiar with this work : he does not state where it is to be found. See J. F. Saint-Lambert, Les Saisons, " Dis- cours Preliminaire," Paris, 1795. Introduction 5 introductory discourse on georgic poetry prefixed to a poem on agriculture, 13 lie writes at length on Hesiod and at still greater length on Vergil, after which he passes abruptly to Kapin and Vaniere, without seeming to know that another georgic poet (Alamanni) had existed in the meantime. Saint-Lambert's discussion 14 is of no value as a study of the georgic type as a whole, but it is important in the history of the development of the eighteenth century variation of the type due to Thomson's Seasons. Delille's introduction 15 is of interest, since he makes a defense of the georgic, He also considers Vaniere's Praedium Rusticum very briefly and compares it with Vergil's Georgics, not, however, with any reference to Vaniere's use of the distinctive features of the Vergilian type. This is followed by some general criticism of Rapin's Gardens, and Thomson's Seasons, and mention is made of the existence of two other poems on the seasons by French writers who are not named. Delille's preface to L : 'Homme des Champs 16 is of interest with respect to the broad meaning of the word " georgic " in French poems of this class, but the French critic is no more detailed in his discussion of this type than he is in the introduction to his translation of the Georgics. Whether Rosset's discourse is of value or not, I am unable to say, for his work is 'naccessible to me. In histories of Italian literature, 17 there occur brief notices of Italian didactics, and of Italian georgics, among the latter 13 The reader's familiarity with de Eosset, as with Saint-Lambert, is as- sumed. For a notice of the life of Pierre Fulcrand de Eosset, who died at Paris, in 1788, the author of a poem on agriculture in nine books, the first six of which appeared at Paris in 1744, the complete edition at Lausanne, in 1806, cp. Pierre Larousse, Diet. Univ. de la XIXe Steele, T. 13, p. 1302. 1A Op. ait. 15 J. Delille, (Euvres, Les Georgiques, Vol. i, " Discours Preliminaire," ed. P. F. Tissot, Paris, 1832-33. 18 J. Delille, L'Homme des Champs, oil Les Georgiques Francoises, Paris, 1805, p. 18. 17 See, for example, G. Tiraboschi, Stor. della Lett. Ital. Milano, 1822-26. T. v., p. 864, T. vi, p. 1428, T. yh, pp. 1780, 1786 ff., T. xm, pp. 2119, 2136, 2137 ff. Stor. Lett, d'ltal, Milano, F. Flamini, " II Cinquecento," pp. 6 The Georgic being considered only poems that treat of agricultural subjects. Concerning the relation of these poems to Vergil's didactics, we are told at most, however, that they are written in imitation of the Georgics. Flamini cites a study of Valvasone's Caccia 18 that is probably of value ; but I have been unable to see it. Cavicchi 19 shows definitely the relations between Vergil and Rucellai, but he does not consider Rucellai's use of the chief features of the georgic type. Altho Ginguene complains of the French neglect of Ala- manni, more appears to have been written on La Coltivazione than on any other Italian didactic. In a valuable Verona edition of Alamanni's Coltivazione and Rucellai's Api, pub- lished 1745, the Vergilian borrowings and imitations are cited in the annotations of Giuseppe Bianchini da Prato on La Colti- vazione and of Roberto Tito on Le Api. Gaspary mentions several studies of La Coltivazione 20 that I have been unable to see. Hauvette 21 considers the poem in detail, commenting on its relation to Vergil's Georgics, but beyond remarking that Alamanni scorns the digressions which are so important a part of Vergil's poems, he does not discuss the conventions of the georgic. Most historians of French literature are silent concerning French georgics; histories of English literature have almost nothing to say of English georgics. Prefaces to English 110, 440-2, 538, 574; T. Concari, "II Settecento," 272, 237, 277, 278; G. Mazzoni, " L'Ottocento," 78, 774. A. Gaspary, Stor. della Lett. Ital., tr. dal Tedesco da Nicdlo Zingarelli, Torino, 1887, V, n, pt. n, pp. 142 ff., 197, 319. 18 L. Pizzio, La poesia didascalica e la " Caccia " di E. da Valvasone, Udine, 1892. M F. Cavicchi, II Libro IV delle Georgiche di Virgilio e " Le Api " di G. Rucellai, Teramo, 1900. 20 F. Caccialanza, Le Georgiche di VvrgiUo e la " Coltivazione " di Luigi Alamanni,, Susa, 1892; G. Naro, V Alamanni e la Coltivazione, Siracusa, 1897; L. Girardelli, Dei poemi georgici nostrali ed in particolare della Coltivazione di L. Alamanni, Gorizia, 1900, cp. above, p. 2. 21 H. Hauvette, Luigi Alamanni (1495-1566), sa vie et son ceuvre, Paris, 1903, pp. 263 ff. Introduction 1 imitations of the Georgics sometimes contain more or less general references to Vergil 22 as the model followed ; occa- sionally British borrowings from Vergil are noted by the bor- rowers themselves. 23 ]STo critic can pass over Thomson's debt to Vergil in The Seasons. Logie Robertson 24 has some important comments on it. Macanlay 25 dwells upon it at greater length ; and Otto Zippel 26 in his variorum edition of The Seasons notes the resemblances and borrowings with all their changes, line for line. Lejay 27 discussing French imitations of the Georgics writes suggestively of the influence of Thomson's Seasons in helping to make agriculture a mode in French literature. He remarks briefly on the translations and poems of Delille, on Les Saisons of Saint-Lambert, and on Les Mois of Roucher. But no one has studied Thomson's Seasons as a development of the georgic type, the chief model of those eighteenth century " geor- giques francaises " that represent no attempt to convey practical instructions, but still illustrate almost all the motives of Vergil's Georgics. Professor W. P. Mustard has contributed an article on " Vergil's Georgics and the British Poets," 28 in which he points out definitely almost every passage in British literature echoing or imitating the Georgics, gives a list of Eng- lish poems " professedly or manifestly " imitations of the Ver- gilian didactics, and notes a number of the favorite Vergilian conventions; but it does not fall within his purpose to discuss the georgic as a literary type. It would require prolonged investigation to prepare one's self for a complete treatise on the georgic as a type. In my re- stricted study of the subject I shall attempt, first, to define the 22 Cp. Somerville, Preface to The Chase; Akenside, The Pleasures of the Imagination. 23 Cp. Cowper, footnote to The Task, ni, 429, a misquotation of Qeorg. n, 82; Gray's note on Ode to Spring. 24 Thomson's Seasons and Castle of Indolence, Oxford, 1891. 25 G. C. Macaulay, James Thomson, London, Macmillan & Co., 1908. 26 Palaestra, lxvi. 27 Op. cit., Introd., p. xxxvii. 28 Am. J. Phil., xxix, 1 ff. ^ S The Georgic georgic as a type and to study it with special reference to its relation to the pastoral; second, to sketch the most prominent features of the historical development of the georgic; third, to write in detail, so far as my material permits, the history of English georgics that treat of general agriculture, of gardens and of field sports, discussing also to some extent the didactics on these themes that occur in French and in Italian. 29 29 My information concerning the subject in Spanish and German is casual, since I have excluded both literatures from the range of my study. I am not aware of any georgics in Spanish; and the type, except as it is developed in Thomson's Seasons, seems to have found little favor among German writers. For the influence of Thompson's Seasons on German literature, cp. K. Gjerset, Der Einfluss von James Thomson's " Jahres- zeiten " auf die deutsche Literatur des achzehnten Jahrhunderts. Heidel- berg, 1898. < V The Creation of the Georgic Type CHAPTER II The Creation of the Georgic Type 1. Vergil's Georgics: Their Relation to the Works and Days of Hesiod. The pastoral has come down to us from Theocritus, largely t/ thru Vergil. The georgic, also, originated with the Greeks. Varro * names many writers among the Greeks who wrote of agriculture. Some, he says, treated the same subject in verse, as for example, Hesiod of Ascra, and Menecrates of Ephesus. The verses of Menecrates however, remain mere tradition. Of Meander's Georgics, 2 there are left only fragments that in no way confirm the suggestion of Quintilian, 3 that Vergil followed him ; nor do any other critics point out that Vergil owes more to Elcander than the borrowings from the Theriaca* The georgic may be said to have originated with the Works and Days of Hesiod, but it has come down to us as a literary form thru Vergil, whose Georgics owe far less to Hesiod than his Eclogues owe to Theocritus. The Eclogues are little more than artificial copies, often mere translations, of Theocritus; yet the world does not fail to acknowledge the charm with which Vergil has invested them as his own. Names as great as those / of Horace, Milton, Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Macaulay, are found in the list of their admirers ; but none the less, not only the literary conventions, but also much that is best in them, 1 Varro on Farmmg. Translated by Lloyd Storr-Best, London, G. Bell & Sons, 1912, p. 5. 2 Nicander lived in the 2nd c. B. C. The fragments of his lost works are edited with a Latin translation by A. F. Didot, Poetae Bucolici et Didactici. Graece et Latine. Paris, 1862, p. 1(? 7 . z Instit. Orat., x, 1, 56. 4 Cp. T. E. Page, P Yergili Maronis Bucolica et Georgica, Macmillan and Co., 1910, notes on Georg. in, 425, 430, 513. 10 The Georgic Vergil owes to Theocritus. Even the landscape portrayed in them may sometimes he recognized as that of Sicily. Many influences were at work in the poems that Sellar de- clares to he ' almost the only specimens of didactic poetry that the world cares to read.' And there is much of Hesiod in Ver- gil ; hut it is Vergil, not Hesiod, who created the literary form of the georgic. Some idea of the Works and Days may he had from the title page of Chapman's Translation, 5 " The G-eorgicks of Hesiod, hy George Chapman: Translated elaborately out of the Greek. Containing Doctrine of Husbandrie, Morality and Piety, with a perpetual calendar of Good and Bad Daies ; Not Superstitious, hut necessary (as far as natural causes compell) for all men to observe, and difference in following their affaires." More tersely, Aristophanes sums up the matter {The Frogs, 1033, translated by Hookham Frere) : Next came old Hesiod, teaching us husbandry, Ploughing, and sowing, and rural affairs, Rural economy, rural astronomy, Homely morality, labor and thrift. Hesiod does not purport to write a systematic treatise on agriculture. He begins by invoking the Muses, and continues with a personal address to Perses, his brother, who has wronged him, and seems in need of advice. Here ensues a moralization on strife ;. then the story of Pandora is told, in explanation of the necessity of toil, and of the difficulties of life. From this, arises an account of the Golden Age, and the evil days that followed thereafter. Perses is exhorted to justice and work, and is given various wise counsels. Then the poet cries, " Now if thy heart in thy breast is set on wealth, do thou thus and work one work upon another " ; an interesting introduction to what may be called the only purely georgic part of the Works and Days, for the labors that are to bring Perses wealth are the labors of the husbandman. Hesiod follows his exhortation by "London, 1618. The Creation of the Georgic Type 11 a series of desultory precepts concerning husbandry; when to plow and how to plow, what signs to follow, what evils to avoid. After this, he proceeds with advice concerning seafaring, the time to marry, the pouring of libations to the gods, and other miscellaneous matters. Then follows a calendar of lucky and unlucky days, and the poem concludes, " Therein happy and blessed is he, who knowing all these things, worketh his work, blameless before the deathless gods, reading omens and avoid- ing sin." From this sketch it may be seen that Hesiod's poem is not a carefully planned, artistically perfect structure. Even through the medium of a prose translation, 6 nevertheless, the work has a singular charm. In Chapman's couplets, much of this is inevitably lost; but in Professor Mair's prose, the freshness, the vigor of style, the personality of the poet, carry the reader back to earlier ages when philosophy walked in homely garb, and the world learned as yet little from libraries, much from life. Hesiod is counsellor, husbandman, and poet. Stories of gods and men he knows, superstitions, perhaps for all his scorn of women, old wives' tales. He has lived in the fields, has learned the signs that Nature has set for man to read, and he is at home with the winds and the stars. Vergil grew up among the woods and plains of Italy, a coun- try boy with a poet's soul, a poet's clear-sighted eyes, and finely attuned hearing. But he became conversant with the learning of his day. He absorbed the teaching of generations of poets and philosophers ; and at the beginning of his poetic career the glory of Lucretius was still new. He professes to sing the song of Hesiod, 7 and he builds upon the model of Lucretius. He enriches his poems with wisdom gleaned from writers on natu- ral history and astronomy, and makes them practical by sound precepts, drawn not only from his own experience, but from the tested writings of authorities such as the Carthaginian Mago, the Greeks Democritus and Xenophon, the Latins Cato 6 Hesiod, translated by A. W. Mair, Oxford, 1908. 7 Ascraeumque cano Romana per oppida carmen, Georg. n, 176. s 1 12 The Georgia and Varro. And he writes steeped in the inspiration of Lucre- tius. But the life that he depicts is the life that he knew, Italian life against a background of Italian landscape. In the making of his poems he reveals himself a reader of books, a lover of philosophy, but a greater lover of his native land; a good husbandman, and a wise giver of advice, but over and above everything a great poet. An account of the sources of the Georgics may be read in any important history of Koman literature, and in most of the de- tailed studies of Vergil's work. His indebtedness may be traced in detail, thru various scholarly editions of the Georgics. Sellar's book is particularly valuable with regard to the rela- tions between Vergil and Lucretius, and to the part that Maece- nas played in the composition of the poems. Maecenas probably had some influence in Vergil's choice of a subject peculiarly suited to the policy of the times, a policy begun with the ill- fated efforts of the Gracchi. Luxury and vice had inevitably followed in the wake of Roman conquest. Long civil wars had torn the country, and men loved the soldier's life of daring and adventure better than steady quiet, the routine of the farmer's toil. The city's lure was probably very much then what it is now. Moreover, during the long wars, there had been times when the regular government was almost suspended. ' Right had become wrong, and wrong right ; the fields lay waste, their cultivators being taken away, and the crooked scythes forged into swords ' (Georg. i, 505-8). Only a revival of the ancient Roman principles could restore the ancient Roman greatness. A new theme was offered to the poet. ' Others that in song might have held frivolous minds were now all grown common- place ' {Georg. m, 2-4). Vergil felt the inspiration, and so composed the poems that were to celebrate the arts of peace, the glorification of honest toil, the praises of his native land. Naturally, the didactic was the form selected for the poem. It has been suggested that Vergil was fired by a desire to be- come the Hesiod, 8 as he was already the Theocritus, of the 8 Cp. Sellar, op. cit., p. 175. The Creation of the Georgic Type 13 Komans. And in the Be Berum Natura, Lucretius had shown the great possibilities of didactic poetry. With utmost reverence for the work of Lucretius, but with fine understanding of his own powers, Vergil gave himself to the writing of the Georgics, perfecting the meter that Lucretius had suggested to him, and adapting Lucretius' plan to his own needs. 2. Subject Matter of the Georgics The Georgics are written in four books, each a complete poem, dealing, as the name implies, with a subject connected with agricultural pursuits. The first book treats of the preparation of the soil;, the second of planting, grafting and pruning; the third of cattle ; the fourth of bees. The subject matter of the poems may be analyzed as follows: Book I 1-5. Address to Maecenas, announcing the subjects of the four poems. 5-42. Address to the rural deities; Augustus eulogized, named as one of the gods. 43-63. Of preparing soils; the time to sow; of winds and other variations of the weather. Products pecu- liar to different soils. Digression on foreign countries and their products. Allusion to the story of Deucalion. 63-70. The time to plow. 71—117. Of alternating crops; treatment of poor lands. 117-159. Annoyances that harass the farmer, due to Father Jove's desire to strengthen men by teaching them the use of their powers. Of the Golden Age. 9 Necessity of constant work, warfare and prayer. 9 In his treatment of the Golden Age, Vergil partly follows Hesiod in accepting it as a former age, carefree and happy. But Hesiod regards the passing of the Golden Age as a punishment of the gods for the theft of Prometheus; just as the Biblical tradition makes the loss of Eden a 14 The Georgic 160-175. Farm implements described. 176-230. Precepts concerning precautions against various an- noyances ; the signs of a good season ; the prepara- tion of seeds; necessity for observation of the constellations. 231-259. Episode of the five zones. 259-275. Labors that may be done in wet weather; on holy days. 276-286. Of favorable and unfavorable days. 287-310. Winter relaxations and occupations. 311-334. Of autumn tempests; a storm described. 335-350. Fearing the elements, observe the skies, venerate the gods; offer the annual rites to Ceres; Ceres' rites 10 described. 351—464. Weather signs; warnings of the sun and moon. 465-497. Signs and omens attending Caesar's death. Horrors of the resulting civil war. 498-514. Prayer to the gods to preserve Caesar to save a lost and ruined age, wherein the plow has none of its due honor, and mad Mars rages over all the globe. Book II 1-8. Preceding subject stated; new subject announced. Bacchus invoked. 9-90. Varieties of trees ; best method of cultivating differ- ent varieties. 91-109. Great variety of vines; impossibility of naming all. 110-135. Products peculiar to different regions; to foreign lands. punishment for the eating of the forbidden apple. Vergil's conception is nobler, his practical philosophy bears a curious analogy to the apostolic teaching of the strengthening power of tribulation. This may or may not be the core of Vergil's religious belief, but it is the most characteristic passage of the Georgics, emphasizing the central theme of the poem, — the necessity and the value of hardships and continual labor. 10 The Ambarvalia. The Creation of the Georgic Type 15 136-176. 177-258. 259-314. 315-345. 346-370. 371-379. 380-396. 397-419. 420-458. 459-474. 475-494. 495-540. 541-542. Panegyric of Italy, blessed above all other lands. Of soils ; different qualities adapted to different pro- ducts; of testing soils. Methods and time of planting and pruning. Descriptive episode — of Spring. Further precepts concerning the care of vines and trees. Of protecting the vine from cattle, especially from the wild goat. Digression — of the sacrifice of the goat to Bacchus ; rural feasts in Bacchus' honor. Of the husbandman's recurring labor. Gifts that earth supplies of herself, or in return for little care. Various uses of trees, gifts better than those of Bacchus. Allusion to the battle of the Centaurs. The blessings of country life contrasted with the troubled luxuries of cities. Prayer to the Muses — first, that the poet be granted to know the causes of things. This denied, the love of woods and streams and fields. He is blest who has cast aside superstition and the fear of death, but he is blest also who knows the rural gods. Continuation of the praise of country life; the life led by the Romans of old, whereby their country became the greatest of the earth. Conclusion, — But we have travelled over an immense space ; it is time to loosen the reeking necks of our steeds. Book III 1-9. Subject stated, cattle and their guardian deities; necessity of choosing a new theme. 10-39. A future poem allegorically described. 40-48. Meanwhile the subject requested by Maecenas (no light task), must be pursued. 16 The Georgic 49-102. 103-145. 146-156. 157-208. 209-283. 284-285. 286-288. 289-293. 294-321. 322-338. 339-383. 384-403. 404-413. 414-439. 440-469. 470-532. Of breeding cattle. (66-68, A mournful reflection interposed on the quick passing of the best in human life.) A chariot race described; of chariot racing. Of the gadfly; allusion to the story of Ino. Of training calves and colts. Ill effects of blind love on man and beast. But meanwhile time flies, as beguiled by love of the subject we linger upon each detail. Enough of flocks, the task remains to treat of woolly sheep and shaggy goats. The poet realizes the difficulty of his subject, but his cherished desire leads him to the neglected heights of Parnassus, where no poet has trodden before. The care of sheep and goats, especially in winter. A shepherd's summer day, from the first appearance of the morning star to the rising of cool Vesper and the dewy moon. Shepherd life in foreign lands, in the tropics and in the arctic regions. Precautions in the securing of wool; of milk. Advice not to neglect the care of dogs; the value of dogs as protectors and in the chase. The care of folds; pests that must be destroyed. Causes and signs of distress among sheep; preven- tives and remedies. Frequency of plagues among cattle; description of a cattle plague. Book IV 1-7. Subject announced ; " The divine gift of aerial honey.'' 8-32. Of sites for hives. 33-50. Of hives. 51-66. Of hiving swarms. 67-87. Battles among the bees; how to check such contests. The Creation of the Georgic Type 17 88-102. Of choosing the victorious leader, and the better subjects. 103-115. Of plucking the King's wings to prevent battle; of inviting the bees with gardens. 116-148. Were the work not so nearly ended the poet might sing of gardens, for he remembers the wonders wrought by a poor old man of Tarentum, with his garden and his hives; but prevented by limited space he must leave the task to others. 11 149-218. Natural qualities and instincts of bees. Their com- munity life; their customs. 219-227. Beliefs in pantheism and immortality held by some as a result of the intelligence observed in bees. 228-250. Of collecting honey. 251-280. Care of sick bees. 281-558. Of recovering the loss of a whole stock of bees. Epi- sode of Aristaeus, whose bees were destroyed in punishment of his crime against Eurydice. 559-566. Conclusion. Reference to composition of the Ec- logues. The foregoing outline may give some idea of the difficulties and of the possibilities of the georgic. Eor me to attempt a criticism of Vergil's work would be alike unnecessary and un- profitable; the world has too long justified the truth of the poet's words (Georg. iv, 5-6): in tenui labor; at tenuis non gloria, si quern numina laeva sinunt auditque vocatus Apollo. The arguments for and against didactic poetry need no re- petition. Even those most prejudiced can not deny Vergil's success. The heaviest charge brought against him is that he is not concerned to make his teachings practical, but that he uses homely details only as a foil to poetic situations and de- u " A graceful interpolation, sketching what might have been a fifth Georgic." — Conington, op. cit. 18 The Georgic scriptions. 12 There is testimony, however, that even Vergil's most prosaic teachings have been read with delight; and Page 13 notes a curious proof of the neglect of the valuable matter con- tained in the Georgics. According to the Encyclopedia Bri- tannica/ 4 at the beginning of the eighteenth century the alter- nation of crops was just becoming a common practice in Eng- land, a great improvement upon the previous and common us- age of exhausting the land and then letting it recover its strength by lying fallow. In Georg. i, 7-83, this improved sys- tem had been recommended by Vergil eighteen centuries before. It is probably true that no peasant ever drew material pro- fit from the Georgics, and it is certainly true that Vergil's poems are not addressed to the uneducated. But a proof that the Georgics have been of influence in life as well as literature may be had from the statement of Pierre Larousse 15 that the lean- ing towards agriculture of the learned Italian scientific farmer, Felippo Re, was decided by the reading of Vergil's Georgics. 12 Cp. T. DeQuincey, "The Poetry of Pope," The Collected Writings, ed. D. Masson, Edinburgh, 1890, vol. xi, p. 91. 13 Op. cit., Introd., xxxvn. 14 S. v., Agriculture, c. 2, § I. 15 Grand. Diet. Univ. du XI Xe Sieele, T. 13. The Relation of the' Georgic to the Pastoral 19 CHAPTER III The Relation of the Georgic to the Pastoral 1. Distinction between the Georgic and the Pastoral The etymology of the term pastoral is a guide to the narrower meaning of the word, a meaning still given in the Century Dictionary, — " Pastoral, a poem describing the life and man- %f ners of shepherds." But pastoral is used also to characterize any literature that describes a simple rural life, such as Burns' Cotter s Saturday Night, or Walton's Compleat Angler, which Hazlitt x calls " the best pastoral in our language." Eclogue, ' a selection,' and idyll, ( a little picture,' or ' sl little poem,' would seem broader in meaning than pastoral. But thruout English literature all three terms have been gener- ally used as synonyms ; hence the development of the incon- gruous types of so-called pastorals, and eclogues, and idylls, such for example as the pastoral elegy, the allegorical eclogue or pastoral, the piscatory eclogue, and the town eclogue. 2 Theo- critus' poems are named Idylls. But Cowley 3 in his essay Of Agriculture, writes, " Theocritus (a very ancient poet, but he was one of our tribe, for he wrote nothing but Pastorals)," altho as Mr. Kerlin says, half the idylls of Theocritus are not poems of rural life. Vergil, presumably, called his imitations of Theocritus Bu- colics, 4 and in Georg. iv, 565, he alludes to them as " carmina pastorum." According to Page, the grammarians probably gave them the name eclogues. The indiscriminate use as syno- 1 W. Hazlitt, " On John Buncle." The Bound Table; a Collection of Essays on Literature, Men, and Manners, 3rd ed., London, 1841. 2 Cf. R. T. Kerlin, Theocritus in Eng. Lit., Lynchburg, Va., 1910, App. 2, p. 181. 3 A. Cowley, Essays and Other Prose Writings, ed. by Alfred B. Gough, Oxford, 1915, p. 141. 4 Cf . Page, op. cit., Introd., x, n. 1 and n. 2. 20 The Georgic nyms of the four terms, Idyll, Bucolic, Eclogue, and Pastoral, seems therefore based on Roman authority, a fact which Mr. Kerlin fails to mention. Vergil's " carmina pastorwm " and his Georgics are usually edited together, either as Bucolics and Georgics, or as Eclogues and Georgics. This may be one reason why the pastoral and the georgic are still so frequently con- fused ; another reason may be due to the fact that the fashions of the pastoral, as of the georgic, owe so much to Vergil. Georgic 5 means literally ' earth-work,' or ' field-work/ hence a poem that treats of work in the fields, of husbandry, or more broadly, of rural occupations. According to Addison, 6 " the Georgic deals with rules of practice. A kind of poetry that addresses itself wholly to the imagination; it is altogether con- versant among the fields and woods, and has the most delightful part of Nature for its province. It raises in our minds a pleas- ing variety of scenes and landscapes, while it teaches us, and makes the dryest of its precepts look like a description. A Georgic therefore is some part of the science of husbandry, put into a pleasing dress, and set off with all the beauties and em- bellishments of poetry." In noting that the georgic deals with rural occupations its agreement with the pastoral is seen at once. Both have the same background, and shepherd life may be depicted in both. In both one finds the element of delight in country life. But in Addison's definition the words " science " and " rules of prac- tice," strike at once a vital difference. The georgic, as Vergil planned it, purports to instruct scientifically by means of tech- nical terms and a use of practical details. The writer, speak- ing in the first person, recounts his experience for the reader's benefit, incidentally making use of various ornamental devices. The pastoral, as Theocritus and Vergil left the form, never 5 Gk. 777, the earth, root epy of epyov work. It is interesting to note that altho Vergil goes to the Greeks for the names of his poems, he does not owe them either to Hesiod or Theocritus. Chapman called his trans- lation " The Georgicks of Hesiod," after Vergil. Vergil probably owes the name to Nicander. e Op. cit. J The Relation of the Georgic to the Pastoral 21 assumes directly the purpose of instructing. It is most often dramatic in nature, and the characters are frequently repre- sented as speaking, or singing, often in dialogue. The shepherd / of Vergil's pastoral does not suggest the idea of toil. Neither is he bowed under the weight of responsibility, troubled unduly by the doubtful blessing of ownership and family cares. He does not scruple to neglect his sheep for love of some scornful maid ; often he watches over the possessions of another, and ho does not dare even to wager a fat lamb, if an inconvenient step- mother waits at home to take count of the returning flocks. He has his share of grievances, but his occupation is one wherein he may pass joyous and comparatively idle hours, in which, like Tityrus reclining under the shade of a spreading beech, he meditates the woodland muse on his slender reed. The pastoral themes are few, the singing match, the dirge, t / the love lay, the conventional forms fixed by Theocritus and imitated by Vergil, who " by including among his Bucolic pieces the famous ' Pollio ' " 7 added thereto the panegyric, so marked a feature of the georgic, and with his " freer use " of the pas- toral disguise is accredited with having given rise to the pasto- ral allegory. But no matter what the theme, there is always in the setting of the poem an atmosphere of golden days, a re- moteness from the practical business of life. Daphnis is dead, but he " delights in restful peace," and his companions are happy in erecting an altar to him. Meliboeus is driven from his fatherland, a mournful exile, but his grief only serves to heighten the effect of the idle joys of the fortunate Tityrus, Tityrus who is allowed to remain piping under the beeches' shade. Shadows fall from the mountains as the sun declines, but of storm clouds and devastating rains one hears almost nothing. The tragedies, as well as the petty ills that mark the constant struggle of life, are left aside. The shepherd sings 7 Cf. C. H. Herford, ed. of the Shepheards Calendar, London, Macmillan & Co., 1907, Introd., xxx. Herford does not note the fact that Vergil found both the panegyric and the Pollio motive of pastoral peace in Theocritus. Cp. Idylls, xvi and xvn. 22 The Georgic untroubled by the swift and cruel passing of time. What sor- rows he has are the sweet sorrows of youth ; he experiences no foreshadowing of the weight of responsibility and the bitter coming of old age. And so, the pastoral that Vergil left as a model for future generations has come down to us signifying * almost always the dream of Arcadian life. Little wonder that a frivolous queen and her short-sighted court should have for- gotten a starving peasantry while playing at the pastoral. True, there are pastorals of the conventional type that dwell more or less upon the petty ills of life; for example, in the eclogue of Severus Sanctus, De Mortibus Bourn, 8 two herds- men converse on the subject of a cattle plague; the evils of life seem largely responsible for the bitter tongues of Mantuan's shepherds ; Spenser not only satirizes the failings of church and state, but he shows the discomfort of the shepherd's life, draw- ing a bleak picture of " rancke Winter's rage." Thus the old Thenot rebukes the suffering Cuddie (" Februarie," 9-24) : Lewdly complainest thou, laesie ladde, Of Winters wracke for making thee sadde. From good to badd, and from badde to worse, From worse unto that is worst of all, And then returne to his former fall? Who will not suffer the stormy time, Where will he live tyll the lusty prime? Selfe have I worn out thrise threttie yeares, Some in much joy, many in many teares, Yet never complained of cold nor heate, Of Sommers flame, nor of Winters threat, Ne ever was to Fortune foeman, But gently took that ungently came; And ever my flocke was my chief care, Winter or Sommer they mought well fare. Thirsis, in Eclogue i, of Sabie's Pans Pipe, 9 complains of the death of a ewe, and the loss of a " tidie lamb " that the ' Fox did eate,' while the shepherd slept under a thicket, Ty- 8 Anthologia Latina, ed. A. Eiese, Leipzig, 1906, n, 334. 9 Reprinted by J. W. Bright and W. P. Mustard, Modern Philology, vn, 433 ff., April, 1910. For Sabie's debt to Mantuan, see pp. 436 ff. / The Relation of the Georgic to the Pastoral 23 terus seeks to console him with proverbial wisdom, but Thirsis, paraphrasing Mantuan, bitterly replies: Good counsell Tyterus, but not so easily followed, Man is born in griefe, and grieueth at euery mishap. I think we shepheards take greatest paines of all others, Sustaine greatest losses, we be tryed with daylie labour, With colde in winter, with heat in summer oppressed, To manie harmes our tender flockes, to manie diseases Our sheep are subject, the thiefe praies ouer our heardlings, And worse then the thief, the Fox praies ouer our heardlings, Thus we poor heardsmen are pinched and plagu'd aboue other. But Spenser's Thenot finds time to discourse at length to the unhappie Cuddie, and ends by telling his willing listener a long fable ; Sabie's Thirsis, who refuses to be comforted by pro- verbial wisdom, allows himself to be kept awake, and even diverted, by Tyterus' account of an " ancient love." And the great bulk of pastoral literature hardly touches upon the rugged ways of life ; it depicts the shepherd of Arcadia, whether Arca- dia be England, or Italy, or Trance. Repeating the first line of the Eclogues with a slight varia- tion, Vergil ends his fourth Georgic: illo Vergilium me tempore dulcis alebat Parthenope, studiis florentem ignobilis oti, carmina qui lusi pastorum audaxque iuventa, Tityre, te patulae cecini sub tegmine fagi 10 The traditional date of composition of the Eclogues is from 42 to 37 b. c. According to Vergil's own words he was ' bold thru youth when he lightly made these songs of shepherds ' ; 11 it is natural enough that they should be mainly concerned with love and happiness. The Georgics were composed later, between the years 37 and 30 b. a, when the poet was no longer bold, but courageous with the experience and wisdom of later years. If the phrase omnia vincit Amor 12 is characteristic of the eclogue, the phrase labor omnia vicit 13 is even more character- 10 Eel. i. 1. Tityre, tu patulae recubans sub tegmine fagi. 11 Georg. iv, 565. " Eel. x, 69. M Georg. i, 145. J 24 The Georgic istic of the georgic; for the georgic is concerned mostly with work, little with leisure, altho it depicts the farmer's life thru all seasons of the year. It shows glimpses of rural festivities, as in i, 299 fL, n, 385 fL, n, 527 fL, and idyllically peaceful scenes that have the golden age quality of the pastoral, as in the closing passages of the second book. But thruout these scenes, upheld by a noble ideal, the poet writes in a far higher key than in the pastoral. Unlike the shepherd lad, the husbandman bears the responsibility of ownership, the weight of family cares. Tilling his soil, or in moments of enforced leisure, making ready the " arms " with which to conquer the difficulties in his way, he takes earnest thought how he may get the best from that which is his own, and provide for the family that depends upon him. He wastes no time lamenting scorned affection, nor does he spend words vaunting the beauty of his love. He rejoices calmly in the happiness of wedded life, — his sweet children hang on his neck, his ' chaste house keeps its purity.' 14 The greatness of Kome depends upon a virtuous family life, upon ' a youth enduring in labour, accustomed to frugality.' 14a But while in the Georgics Vergil shows glimpses of a golden age and the gifts that Earth offers of herself, he never lets his reader quite forget the necessity of constant labor. And there is realism enough in the often quoted lines, in, 66-68, Optima quaeque dies miseris mortalibus aevi prima fugit; subeunt morbi tristisque senectus et labor, et durae rapit inclementia mortis, and in the account of the evils and dangers that threaten men daily, from the small annoyances of the insatiable goose and the Strymonian crane to the splendid fury of devasting storms. With respect to their treatment of rural life, Vergil's Bucolics are fittingly called Eclogues, ' selections.' In the Georgics the poet attempts to deal broadly with the whole. With respect to its conventional form, the georgic may be analyzed as follows: 14 Georg. n, 524. Wa Georg. n, 472. The Relation of the Georgic to the Pastoral 25 Subject matter : A rural occupation. Central theme: The glorification of labor; the praise of simple country life in contrast with the troubled luxury of palaces. Treatment: Didactic, with precepts varied by digres- sions arising from the theme, or related to the subject matter. Chief features: Formal opening, a statement of the sub- ject: this followed by an invocation to the Muses or other guiding spirits. v/ Address to the poet's patron. Panegyrics of great men. Mythological allusions. ^References to foreign lands, [their pro- ducts, climate, customs. Time marked by the position of the con- stellations. Proverbial sayings. Moralizations and philosophical reflections. Discussion of the Golden Age. Discussion of weather signs. Description of country pastimes. Descriptions of Nature. Love of peace;, horror of war. A lament over present day evils, which are contrasted with the virtues and glories of the past. Ehapsody on the poet's native land. A long narrative episode, — in Vergil, the story of Aristaeus. / 26 The Georgic 2. The Pastoral, a literary type of frequent occurrence, made famous by great poets; the Georgic, a literary type coincidentally neglected. The " abundance of criticism " spent on the pastoral, and the coincident neglect of the georgic is easily explained; in part, by the frequent occurrence of the former type, the com- parative rarity of the latter; in part, by the great beauty of certain pastoral compositions, the tediousness of almost all georgic poetry. A type of poetry of frequent occurrence neces- sarily excites critical interest. If, at its first appearance, a literary product is justly condemned, criticism, like the unfor- tunate effort itself, is apt to die soon ; but if for any reason worth considering a composition takes a strong hold on the public, tho only temporarily, it is assured a certain importance in literary history; and if a work may be rightly judged a classic, younger critics will constantly arise, inspired to discuss it from different points of view. A type of poetry, difficult in form, infrequent of occurrence, and seldom successful as litera- ture, naturally excites scant comment, and that rarely of a kind to beget new critical effort. Many poets, among them the greatest and the least, have written pastorals. It requires no especial courage to take up the oaten reed. The poet has little to lose by failure; if he succeed, he knows that the world will listen in spite of itself. /But no great poet since Vergil has written a georgic, and comparatively few of the minor poets have attempted the task. Burns, who, as far as practical experience goes, was best fitted to appreciate a georgic, or to attempt to write one, declares upon reading " Dryden's Virgil " that he considers the Georgics " by far the best of Virgil," and that " this species of writing " has filled him with " a thousand fancies of emulation." 15 But when he compared his powers with Vergil's, his courage failed. Robert Anderson 16 expresses the opinion that to write a truly u Letter to Mrs. Dunlop, May 4, 1778. 16 British Poets, Vol. xi. Preface to Dodsley's "Agriculture." The Relation of the Georgic to the Pastoral 27 excellent georgic is one of the greatest efforts of the human mind. And the frequent attacks upon didactic poetry in gen- eral, upon georgic poetry in particular, indeed the occasional defenses of the georgic, emphasize the fact, that, to attempt this form of writing, one must have the courage that leads to an undertaking which promises almost certain defeat. In the period immediately following Vergil, the pastoral as a genre had apparently lost popular favor. Earlier than Calpurnius 1T there appear to have been no imitators of either Theocritus or Vergil whose work survived. 18 Of the writers following Calpurnius, only JSTemesianus is named as worthy of any regard. Boccaccio, however, in a summary of the history of pastoral verse, includes both Calpurnius and Nemesianus in his contemptuous utterances concerning pastoral writers. He names i the Syracusan Theocritus ' and ' Vergil, who wrote in Latin,' then adds: " Post hunc autem scripserunt et alii, sed ignobiles, de quibus nil curandum est, excepto inclyto Praeceptore meo Francisco Petrarca ". 19 Of the stream of pastoral poetry during the Middle Ages, Greg observes 20 that " though it nowhere actually disappears, it is reduced to the merest trickle." From the fourth to the tenth century, isolated examples occur that served to preserve the classical memory of the pastoral, reworked, however, with new meanings and new associations under the influence of Chris- tianity. With the fourteenth century, a new and brilliant epoch be- gins in the history of the pastoral. In the sixteenth century, Spenser found the genre " a literary mode that beyond all others lent itself to the expression of his complex emotions." 21 17 Calpurnius' dates are uncertain. He is sometimes supposed to have lived at the end of the third century. For a clear discussion of the subject, cp. C. H. Keene, The Eclogues of Calpurnius and Nemesianus, London, 1887. 18 Cp. Conington on " The Later Bucolic Poets of Rome," op. cit., Vol. i, p. 114. 19 Lettere di G. Boccaccio, ed. Corrazini, p. 267. See Walter W. Greg, Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama, London, 1906, p. 18. 20 Op. cit., p. 18. » Herford, op. cit. Introd., p. xxvi. J 28 The Georgic E. K. counts among Spenser's predecessors, Theocritus, Ver- gil, Mantuan, Boccaccio, Marot, Sannazaro, " and also divers other excellent both Italian and French poets, whose footing this author every where followeth." Spenser was the chief British influence in the popularizing of the conventional pas- toral; but the form occurs in British verse as early as the fifteenth century, in Henryson's Robin and Makene; and be- fore that the shepherd stories of the Bible had been made fa- miliar to English audiences in the vernacular drama, and in the liturgical plays of the Nativity. From Spenser's time on, the pastoral is found in England, as on the continent, in more or less closely related groups, and in varying types of varying worth. The georgic, a type of poetry that except in some of its eighteenth-century developments cannot be said ever to have made a truly popular appeal, is in its recurrences compara- tively rare. While Vergil was yet living, parts of his Georgics appear to have been parodied. 22 Gratius, who was contempo- rary with Vergil, wrote a treatise on hunting, evidently imi- tating the model of the Georgics. In the first century after Christ, Columella felt it a sacred duty to develop Vergil's sketch of gardens, Georg. iv. 116-148. In the second century, Op- pian of Cilicia wrote his so-called golden verses on the " Fisher- man's Art," the H&lieutica, and somewhat later another Op- pian (of Apamea) wrote a poetic treatise on hunting, five books of which are extant. In the third century, RTemesianus composed a poem on hunting, more like the treatise of Gratius than that of Oppian of Apamea. In the fourth century, Pal- ladius, imitating Columella, wrote in elegiac verse, on the cultivation of trees (Bk. xiv of his Husbandry). How much poetry in imitation of the Vergilian didactics may have seen the light from the fourth to the thirteenth century, only to be buried sooner or later in obscurity, I cannot say. I know of nothing in the nature of a georgic during this period, except 22 Cp. Addison : Essay on the Georgics. The Relation of the Georgic to the Pastoral 29 the poem that Biese 23 calls " the much-read Hortulus," Walah- frid Strabo's De Cultura Hortorum, " an idyll of the cloister garden," written about 820. In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, there occur in France a number of treatises in verse on the noble arts of hunt- ing and hawking ; 24 and a poetical treatise on fishing, entitled De Vetula, is said to have been written by Richard de Fourni- val at this period. 25 In the fourteenth century, in Italy, Paganino Bonafede wrote some verse precepts on agriculture, entitled II Tesoro dei Rusticij 26 but no one seems to have con- sidered the effort worth publication. In the fifteenth century, very little is found ; Halliwell and Wright 27 print a Fragment of a Poem on Falconry, written in French at the beginning of the period. Dame Juliana Berner's verse treatise on " Ve- nerie " made part of the famous Bolce of St. Albans, which appeared in 1486. To the year 1420, is referred the curious old English poem by Piers of Fulham, entitled " Yayne con- seytes of folysche love undyr colour of fyscheng and fowl- yng," 28 a composition less interesting as an attempt at an alle- gory than for its information concerning fish and fowlT Some- time in the period following Chaucer, an unknown English writer put the treatise of Palladius on Husbandry into Chau- cerian stanzas, with original prologues and epilogues, and occa- sional moralizations of his own; and one original English pro- 23 A. Biese, The Development of the Feeling for Nature in the Middle A.ges and Modern Times, translated from the German. London, 1905, p. 61. 24 Cp. E. Jullien, La Chasse. Son Histoire et sa Legislation. Paris. Aubertin, Hist, de la Langue et de la Litt. Francaises an Moyen Age d'apres les Travaux les plus recents. Paris, 1878, T. n, pp. 64 ff. 25 See "The Angler's Library," The Edinburgh Review, Vol. 158, 1883, p. 160. The writer states that the De Vetula was formerly attributed to Ovid. I have been unable to identify R. de Fournival. 26 Cp. Tiraboschi, op. cit., T. V, n, 864. 27 t Wright and J. 0. Halliwell, Reliquae Antiquae, London, 1841. Vol. I, p. 310. 28 Reprinted by W. C. Hazlitt, in Remains of the Early Popular poetry of England, Vol. h. London, 1866. For the date of the poem, see J. J. Man- ley, " Literature of Sea and River Fishing," Internat. Fisheries Exhibi- tion, 1833, The Fisheries Exhibition Literature, Vol. m, p. 563. J 80 The Georgic duction, georgic tho not Vergilian, belongs to the fifteenth century, a treatise in verse by " Mayster John Gardener " en- titled the Feate of Gardening. 2 ® In Italy, Poliziano's Rusticus appeared in 1483, a Latin poem still highly praised, which Dunlop 30 describes as " an abridgement of the Georgics." Be- fore 1500, Gioviano Pontano imitated certain features of the Georgics in his Urania, and in his didactic poem Meteora; and he produced a true Yergilian georgic in the De Hortis Hesper- idum. In the sixteenth century, the pastoral is a favorite type of poetry in Italy and France. With the publication of the Shep- heards Calendar the genre in England enters upon a golden age. Until the end of the century the pastoral holds its vogue. Critics may scorn the type as they will, but they cannot disre- gard the instrument that Spenser and Ben Jonson and Shake- speare saw fit to adapt to their needs. The pastoral conven- tions lend themselves readily to affectations and artificialities, but they are forms in which the poet may express lyric joy and sorrow, romantic emotion, dramatic passion. The georgic, pri- marily didactic, purporting to treat of practical arts, offered little appeal to an age in which life seemed a great adventure. Represent ative Elizabethans seem to have found no possibili- ties in the Vergilian type of didactic poetry. So far as I have been able to discover, Thomas Tusser and Thomas Moffat are the only sixteenth-century Englishmen who regarded georgic precepts as matter fit for verse. In 1557, appeared Tusser's Hundreth Pointes of Goode Husbandry, later augmented to Five Hundred Pointes, a " profitable, and not unpleasant " georgic, which, however, owes nothing to the Vergilian conven- tions. Moffat's poem. was not printed until 1599. Collier 31 quotes the title page as follows, " The Silkewormes and Their Flies: Lively described in verse by T. M. a Countrie Farmar, 29 Archaeologia, London, 1894. 30 Op. cit., p. 138. 31 J. P. Collier, A Bibliographical Account of the Rarest Books in the English Language. London, 1865, Vol. I, p. 539. The Relation of the Georgic to the Pastoral 31 and an apprentice in Physicke. For the great benefit and en- riching of England. Printed at London by V. S. for Nicholas Ling, and are to be sold at his shop at the West End of Paules. 1599. 4to., 41 leaves" Collier informs the reader that near the close of the first book, the poet mentions having been in Italy, adding in a marginal note that this was twenty years before he published his poem. Moffat's Italian visit is a simple explanation of this late sixteenth-century English georgic. The art of raising silkworms is among the favorite themes of Italian didactic poets, particularly in the sixteenth century. 32 In France during this period a few treatises on hunting are found. 33 From Jullien's account they appear to be written more or less according to the model of the georgic. Among them is Claude Gauchet's Plaisir des Champs, an interesting poem in which pastoral love songs, descriptions of the chase, and georgic eclogues are mingled at the poet's fancy. In Italy, during the sixteenth century, so great was the ven- eration for the classics, that not only was the pastoral a favorite fashion, but the georgic too, for the first time in its history, received notable appreciation as a genre. The georgic themes, and the georgic plan are adapted to many subjects treated both in Latin and in Italian verse: didactics on general agriculture, as Luigi Alamanni's Coltivazione and Tansillo's Podere; on special branches of farming, as Pierio Yaleriano's De Milacis Cultura, and the poems of Giustolo da Spoleto, Yida, and Te- sauro on silkworms ; on rural sports, as Valvasone's Caccia; on seafaring, as Baldi's Nautica. In Tansillo's Balia noble ladies are exhorted to nurse their own children, and the same writer's V endemmiatore, characterized by Greg 34 as " one of those ob- scene debauches of fancy which throw a lurid light on the lux- urious imagination of the age," may be considered as a bur- lesque of a noble georgic theme. 32 Cp. the following list: Lodovico Lazzarelli, II Bombyx, 1493; P. Gius- tolo da Spoleto, De Sere, 1510 ; Girolamo Vida, Bombyces, 1527 ; Alessandro Tesauro, La Bcreide. 1585; Zaccaria Betti, II Baco da Seta, 1756. 33 See Jullien, op. cit., ch. x and xi. M Op. cit., p. 32. 32 The Georgic In the seven teen tli century, the golden age of pastoral is ended; nevertheless, the genre persists, chiefly in the forms of the lyric and of the drama. John Donne and Herrick are found among English writers of pastoral lyrics ; Milton reaches the " high water mark of poetry " in Lycidas, and immortalizes the pastoral masque in Comus. The period furnishes little material for the history of the georgic. I know of nothing of the type in Italy, except ISTicolo Partenio Giannettasio's Ha- lieutica, a work that I have been unable to see. In 1613, John Dennys' Secrets of Angling, a poem based manifestly, if not professedly, on the model of the Vergilian didactics, was pub- lished at London. 35 In 1665, Rene Rapin's Horti was pub- lished at Paris. Dennys' Secrets probably set other English writers scribbling verses on the gentle craft. 36 Rapin's Horti may have incited Richard Richardson to write a Carmen de Cultu Hortorvm, published at London, 1669. It is safe to say that if the seventeenth century begot many other georgics, they /have either perished or become lost in obscurity. One must look to the eighteenth century for the culmination of the type. s j In the early years of the eighteenth century, a great deal is heard about the pastoral. English critics, influenced by the French views of Fontenelle and Rapin 37 are pleased to dis- course upon the true nature of pastoral poetry; English poets continue to write pastorals. The story of the Philips-Pope controversy is not a highly edifying chapter in the history of English literature, but because of it John Gay wrote the Shep- herd's Week. The pastorals of Pope and Philips are artificial specimens of the genre; and it is generally agreed that in the eighteenth century the type is brought to be a thing of scorn. 35 The date of composition of this poem is uncertain. John Dennys died in 1609. 36 See, for example, Thomas Barker, Bwrker's Delight : or the Art of Angling, 1657; S. Ford, Piscatio, or Angling, a poem written originally in Latin, 1692, translated by Tipping Sylvester, 1732; The Innocent Epi- cure, or The Art of Angling, A Poem (attributed to Nahum Tate), Lon- don, 1697. 37 Cp. Greg. Op. cit., p. 415. y J The Relation of the Georgic to the Pastoral 33 Yet, even among eighteenth-century pastorals there are found compositions of undeniable charm; in the Shepherd's Week, Gay proved himself truly a poet; Shenstone has nowhere so light and delicate a touch as in his Pastoral Ballad; and Allan Kamsay's Gentle Shepherd can still be read with delight. In 1697, Addison made his complaint about the critics' ne- glect of Vergil's Georgics* 8 Up to that time, unless Moffat's Silkwormes be excepted, no true English georgic of the Ver- gilian type seems to have appeared. John Gardener's verses are rudely made precepts ; Tussers's Husbandry though less rude is no more Vergilian than John Gardener's effort. John Den- nys wrote not of husbandry, but of angling, 39 and Dennys is not concerned with the pursuit of the sport as a means of sup- plying the larder, but rather with the exercise of gentlemanly virtues and gentlemanly skill. Dennys' seventeenth-century followers probably wrote in much the same vein. John Barker, to be sure, gives recipes in verse for the cooking of fish, but altho his verses are a shade more skilfull than those of John Gardener, his worst enemy could hardly have accused him of having tried to imitate Vergil. In 1700, there is found an angling poem, entitled The Gentle Recreation, or the Pleasures of Angling, a slight work, written rather pleasantly, by John Whitney, " a Lover of the Angle," and, from the testimony of his verses, a lover of Vergil. In 1706, appeared the first English poem of any importance, in which a true georgic theme is treated in the manner and spirit *S of Vergil's Georgics, John Philips' Cyder. The influence of this didactic on English poetry of the eighteenth century was considerable. No one has ever suggested that it had any in- fluence on French and Italian poetry. Perry, 40 however, states 38 Cp. above, p. 1. 39 It is interesting to note, however, that in the Epitome of the Art of Husbandry, by I. B. Gent, London, 1669, there are "brief Experimental Directions for the right use of the Angle." See W. B. Daniel, Rural Sports, London, 1812. Supplement, p. 16. *"T. S. Perry, English Literature in the Eighteenth Century, N. Y., Harper and Brothers, 1883, p. 139. 3 34 The Georgic that Cyder was much admired in Italy, and that it was trans- lated into Italian. In 1749, the Abbe Yart translated Philips' georgic into French. Whether or not it had been put into French before then, I am not able to say. It is hazardous to suggest that Italian interest in georgic poetry needed to be revived thru England's example. Yet the fashion of the georgic seems to have sprung into European favor along with the Anglomania manifested in the passion for English gardens. In Italy, as in France, I know of nothing in the nature of an eighteenth-century Vergilian didactic, previous to the publication of Thomson's Seasons in 1744. Philips' geor- gic may or may not have aroused interest in a type of poetry never before held in much favor by the French, and, apparently, neglected by the Italians for more than a hundred years. There is no doubt, however, of the great influence of Thomson on European poetry in general. It is well known that the Seasons were read, translated and imitated by almost all the civilized nations of Europe. Thomson has been called " the father of the landscape garden;" certainly he made nature poetry a literary fashion. Suddenly, thru him, the world-old course of the months and the seasons seemed to reveal to the poets sen- sations as enchantingly new as the emotions of love. The hus- bandman's life was to be sung once more as the ideal existence. Saint Lambert 41 writes thus : " La poesie champetre s'est en- richie dans ce siecle d'un genre qui a ete inconnu aux anciennes. .... Les Anglois et les Allemands ont cree le genre de la poesie descriptive: les anciens aimoient et chantoient la cam- pagne, nous admirons et nous chantons la nature." Further on in his preliminary discourse, the poet speaks of his Saisons as georgies made for those who possess the fields, not for those who cultivate them. Other poets, imitating the Vergilian model, as Thomson adapts it to his use in the Seasons, give their efforts the sub-title