“I nunc, devotus aratris scinde solum positoque tuos mucrone sodales 195 ad rastros sudare doce. bene rura Gruthungus excolet et certo disponet sidere vites. felices aliae, quas debellata maritis oppida, quas magnis quaesitae viribus ornant exuviae, quibus Argivae pulchraeque ministrant 200 Thessalides, famulas et quae meruere Lacaenas. me nimium timido, nimium iunxere remisso fata viro, totum qui degener exuit Histrum, qui refugit patriae ritus, quem detinet aequi gloria concessoque cupit vixisse colonus 205 quam dominus rapto. quid pulchra vocabula pigris * * * * * Page 199 the gentlest heart to crime, inflamed his savage breast. Taking upon her the similitude of his wife she comes to meet him; proudly she steps forth like the barbarian queen, clothed in linen raiment. Close to her breast a brooch fastened her dress that trailed behind her; she had bound her locks into a coil that a polished circlet confined, and bidden her green snakes turn to gold. She hastens to greet him on his return and throws her snowy arms about his neck, instilling the poison of the furies into his soul by her kisses. Guilefully to stir his rage she asks if the great man has been generous to him; if he brings back rich presents. With tears he recounts his profitless journey, his useless toil, the pride and insults, moreover, which he had to bear at the eunuch’s hands. At once she seized the favourable moment, and tearing her cheek with her nails, discloses her complaints. “Go then, busy thyself with the plough, cleave the soil, bid thy followers lay aside their swords and sweat o’er the harrow. The Gruthungi will make good farmers and will plant their vines in due season. Happy those other women whose glory is seen in the towns their husbands have conquered, they whose adornment is the spoils so hardly won from an enemy, whose servants are fair captives of Argos or Thessaly, and who have won them slaves from Sparta. Fate has mated me with too timid, too indolent a husband, a degenerate who has forgotten the valour of Ister’s tribes, who deserts his country’s ways, whom a vain reputation for justice attracts, while he longs to live as a husbandman by favour rather than as a prince by plunder. Why give fair names to shameful weakness? * * * * * Page 200 praetentas vitiis? probitatis inertia nomen, iustitiae formido subit. tolerabis iniquam pauperiem, cum tela geras? et flebis inultus, cum pateant tantae nullis custodibus urbes? 210