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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=537903" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>The Salad. By Virgil</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">The winter night now well nigh worn away,<br>The wakeful cock proclaimed approaching day,<br>When Simulus, poor tenant of a farm<br>Of narrowest limits, heard the shrill alarm, <br>Yawned, stretched his limbs, and anxious to provide<br>Against the pangs of hunger unsupplied,<br>By slow degrees his tattered bed forsook,<br>And poking in the dark, explored the nook<br>Where embers slept with ashes heaped around,<br>And with burnt fingers'-ends the treasure found.<br>It chanced that from a brand beneath his nose<br>Sure proof of latent fire, some smoke arose;<br>When trimming with a pin the incrusted tow,<br>And stooping it towards the coals below,<br>He toils, with cheeks distended, to excite<br>The lingering flame, and gains at length a light.<br>With prudent heed he spreads his hand before<br>The quivering lamp, and opes his granary door.<br>Small was his stock, but taking for the day,<br>A measured stint of twice eight pounds away,<br>With these his mill he seeks. A shelf at hand,<br>Fixt in the wall, affords his lamp a stand:<br>Then baring both his arms, a sleeveless coat<br>He girds, the rough exuviae of a goat;<br>And with a rubber, for that use designed <br>Cleansing his mill within, begins to grind;<br>Each hand has its employ; labouring amain,<br>This turns the winch, while that supplies the grain.<br>The stone revolving rapidly, now glows,<br>And the bruised corn a mealy current flows;<br>While he, to make his heavy labour light,<br>Tasks oft his left hand to relieve his right;<br>And chants with rudest accent, to beguile<br>His ceaseless toil, as rude a strain the while. <br>And now, 'Dame Cybale, come forth!' he cries;<br>But Cybale, still slumbering, nought replies.<br>From Afric she, the swain's sole serving maid,<br>Whose face and form alike her birth betrayed;<br>With woolly locks, lips tumid, sable skin, <br>Wide bosom, udders flaccid, belly thin,<br>Legs slender, broad and most misshapen feet,<br>Chapped into chinks, and parched with solar heat,<br>Such, summoned oft, she came; at his command<br>Fresh fuel heaped, the sleeping embers fanned,<br>And made in haste her simmering skillet steam,<br>Replenished newly from the neighbouring stream.<br>The labours of the mill performed, a sieve<br>The mingled flour and bran must next receive,<br>Which shaken oft, shoots Ceres through refined,<br>And better dressed, her husks all left behind.<br>This done, at once, his future plain repast,<br>Unleavened, on a shaven board he cast,<br>The tepid lymph, first largely soaked it all,<br>Then gathered it with both hands to a ball,<br>And spreading it again with both hands wide,<br>With sprinkled salt the stiffened mass supplied;<br>At length, the stubborn substance, duly wrought,<br>Takes from his palms impressed the shape it ought,<br>Becomes an orb, and quartered into shares,<br>The faithful mark of just division bears.<br>Last, on his hearth it finds convenient space,<br>For Cybale before had swept the place,<br>And there, with tiles and embers overspread,<br>She leaves it -- reeking in its sultry bed.<br>Nor Similus, while Vulcan thus, alone,<br>His part performed, proves heedless of his own,<br>But sedulous, not merely to subdue<br>His hunger, but to please his palate too,<br>Prepares more savoury food. His chimney-side<br>Could boast no gammon, salted well, and dried,<br>And hooked behind him; but sufficient store<br>Of bundled anise, and a cheese it bore;<br>A broad round cheese, which, through its centre strung<br>With a tough broom-twig, in the corner hung;<br>The prudent hero therefore with address,<br>And quick despatch, now seeks another mess.<br>Close to his cottage lay a garden-ground,<br>With reeds and osiers sparely girt around;<br>Small was the spot, but liberal to produce,<br>Nor wanted aught that serves a peasant's use;<br>And sometimes even the rich would borrow thence,<br>Although its tillage was his sole expense.<br>For oft, as from his toils abroad he ceased,<br>Home-bound by weather or some stated feast,<br>His debt of culture here he duly paid,<br>And only left the plough to wield the spade.<br>He knew to give each plant the soil it needs,<br>To drill the ground, and cover close the seeds;<br>And could with ease compel the wanton rill<br>To turn, and wind, obedient to his will.<br>There flourished star-wort, and the branching beet,<br>The sorrel acid, and the mallow sweet, <br>The skirret, and the leek's aspiring kind,<br>The noxious poppy -- quencher of the mind!<br>Salubrious sequel of a sumptuous board,<br>The lettuce, and the long huge-bellied gourd;<br>But these (for none his appetite controlled <br>With stricter sway) the thrifty rustic sold;<br>With broom-twigs neatly bound, each kind apart,<br>He bore them ever to the public mart;<br>Whence, laden still, but with a lighter load,<br>Of each well earned, he took his homeward road,<br>Expending seldom, ere he quitted Rome,<br>His gains, in flesh-meat for a feast at home.<br>There, at no cost, on onions, rank and red,<br>Or the curled endive's bitter leaf, he fed;<br>On scallions sliced, or with a sensual gust <br>On rockets -- foul provocatives of lust;<br>Nor even shunned, with smarting gums, to press<br>Nasturtium, pungent face-distorting mess!<br>Some such regale now also in his thought,<br>With hasty steps his garden-ground he sought;<br>There delving with his hands, he first displaced<br>Four plants of garlick, large, and rooted fast;<br>The tender tops of parsley next he culls,<br>Then the old rue-bush shudders as he pulls,<br>And Coriander last to these succeeds,<br>That hands on slightest threads her trembling seeds.<br>Placed near his sprightly fire, he now demands<br>The mortar at his sable servant's hands;<br>When stripping all his garlick first, he tore<br>The exterior coats, and cast them on the floor,<br>Then cast away with like contempt the skin,<br>Flimsier concealment of the cloves within.<br>These searched, and perfect found, he one by one<br>Rinsed and disposed within the hollow stone;<br>Salt added, and a lump of salted cheese,<br>With his injected herbs he covered these,<br>And tucking with his left his tunic tight,<br>The garlick bruising first he soon expressed,<br>And mixed the various juices of the rest.<br>He grinds, and by degrees his herbs below<br>Lost in each other their own powers forego,<br>Nor wholly green appear, nor wholly white.<br>His nostrils oft the forceful fume resent;<br>He cursed full oft his dinner for its scent,<br>Or with wry faces, wiping as he spoke<br>The trickling tears, cried -- 'Vengeance on the smoke!'<br>The work proceeds: not roughly turns he now<br>The pestle, but in circles smoothe and slow;<br>With cautious hand that grudges what it spills,<br>Some drops of olive-oil he next instils;<br>Then vinegar with caution scarcely less;<br>And gathering to a ball the medley mess,<br>Last, with two fingers frugally applied,<br>Sweeps the small remnant from the mortar's side:<br>And thus complete in figure and in kind,<br>Obtains at length the Salad he designed.<br>And now black Cybale before him stands,<br>The cake drawn newly glowing in her hands;<br>He glad receives it, chasing far away <br>All fears of famine for the passing day;<br>His legs enclosed in buskins, and his head<br>In its tough casque of leather, forth he led,<br>And yoked his steers, a dull obedient pair,<br>Then drove afield, and plunged the pointed share.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=William+Cowper">William Cowper</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=537903" data-title="The Salad. By Virgil de William Cowper" data-description="The winter night now well nigh worn away,
The wakeful cock proclaimed approaching day,
When Simulus, poor tenant of a farm
Of narrowest limits, heard the shrill alarm, 
Yawned, stretched his limbs, and anxious to provide
Against the pangs of hunge..."></div>
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