THE RESTING-PLACE OF THE KINE.
They rested in the shadow of great oaks.
Near them arrived, where moss the small flowers chokes,
We stopped awhile to contemplate the group,
The tableau of the quiet slumbering troop;
Athwart the thickness of the verdant crest
Darted the sun, filtering the lustre prest
Huge gnarled trunks, and branches stretched out wide,
And tipped with gold, horn mouth, or glossy side;
Then brought the wind in gusts, by fits intense,
The odours of fresh milk that charm the sense.
A hundred kine were there, and for their guard
One herdsman and a dog,—sole watch and ward.
The man upon a small mound peeled a branch,
The dog lay close beside, alert and staunch,
With ear attentive ever, and his eye
Fixed on his loving master, anxiously.
Kind salutations and some kind words past;
We to the herdsman said, 'To lead so vast
A herd, one dog seems scarce sufficient.'—'True,'
Replied the herdsman, 'but the dogs are few
That equal mine; in forests such as these,
Labyrinthine, dense with brushwood as with trees,
Three dogs would scarcely be too many: mine
Alone can manage and control the kine.
But hold—the sun goes down—the herd must feed
