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There are no meadows where the cows lie lazily, no fields where the red and purple kerchiefs of the reapers overtop the high corn; no orchards, no hayfields; nothing like those hill slopes where the wild herbs encroach upon the vines, and the goats of Corydon and Damoetas require to be kept from mischief; where, a little lower down, the Athenian shopkeeper of Aristophanes goes daily to look whether yesterday's hard figs may not have ripened, or the vine wreaths pruned last week grown too lushly.
Damoetas fluted, and Daphnis piped; the herdsmen, and anon the calves, were dancing in the soft green grass. Neither won the victory, but both were invincible."
That in the manner of Spenser is very sweet, particularly at the close; the thirty-fifth effusion is most exquisite, that line in particular, "And, tranquil, muse upon tranquillity." It is the very reflex pleasure that distinguishes the tranquillity of a thinking being from that of a shepherd, a modern one I would be understood to mean, a Damoetas; one that keeps other people's sheep.
Daphnis and Damoetas, two herdsmen of the golden age, meet by a well- side, and sing a match, their topic is the Cyclops, Polyphemus, and his love for the sea-nymph, Galatea. The scene is in Sicily. Damoetas, and Daphnis the herdsman, once on a time, Aratus, led the flock together into one place.
Then Damoetas kissed Daphnis, as he ended his song, and he gave Daphnis a pipe, and Daphnis gave him a beautiful flute. Damoetas fluted, and Daphnis piped, the herdsman, and anon the calves were dancing in the soft green grass. Neither won the victory, but both were invincible. The poet making his way through the noonday heat, with two friends, to a harvest feast, meets the goatherd, Lycidas.
Sweet was his flute's first triumph over Menaleas: "Then was the boy glad, and leaped high, and clapped his hands over his victory, as a young fawn leaps about his mother"; but sweeter was the unwon victory when he strove with Damoetas: "Then Damoetas kissed Daphnis, as he ended his song, and he gave Daphnis a pipe, and Daphnis gave him a beautiful flute.
In the sixth idyl of Theocritus, Damoetas makes the Cyclops say that Galatea 'will send him many a messenger. The mere idea of describing the monstrous cannibal Polyphemus in love, is artificial and Alexandrian. But who were the 'messengers' of the sea-nymph Galatea?
For truly to Love, Polyphemus, many a time doth foul seem fair! He ended and Damoetas touched a prelude to his sweet song. I saw her, by Pan, I saw her when she was pelting my flock. Nay, she escaped not me, escaped not my one dear eye, wherewith I shall see to my life's end, let Telemus the soothsayer, that prophesies hateful things, hateful things take home, to keep them for his children!
And what if my ancestor at that date was some Damoetas feeding flocks, not his own, upon the hills of Lincoln did I in less earnest vindicate to myself the family trappings of this once proud Ægon? repaying by a backward triumph the insults he might possibly have heaped in his life-time upon my poor pastoral progenitor.
By easy stages, I came to Virgil and was very much smitten with Meliboeus, Corydon, Menalcas, Damoetas and the rest of them. The scandals of the ancient shepherds fortunately passed unnoticed; and within the frame in which the characters moved were exquisite details concerning the bee, the cicada, the turtle dove, the crow, the nanny goat and the golden broom.
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