Complete Poetical Works, Volume 2: Forest Poems

Impatient of delay (the scent brought familiar breezes),
the hand Likely referring to the hunter holding the dogs' leashes. tries to break the restraints.
The signals sound. Soon, a madness freed from every bridle
breathes forth festive battles:
The keen accuracy of the nostrils is carried
into the tracks recently marked upon the soil.
Behold, through the winding paths, the stag, driven by shouts,
raises his branched horns.
To the one seeking flight through open spaces, the woven net stands in the way,
and pulls him back, entangled.
He flies, leaving even the winds behind his back,
and seeks the fountain of the birds.
His back is wet with fear. The trembling thickets are broken
far and wide, resounding all around.
But now the prey will fall. White Leucon A name for a hunting dog meaning "White." and black Asbolus A name for a hunting dog meaning "Sooty."
press him closely.
Immediately the entrails are released by the Arcadian knife.

Harmonious feasts and cups of harmony
fatten the rest with rich luxury.

ANTITHESIS

I wish these were the joys that I hear spoken of so boldly;
and that these revels original: "Orgia." While this often means "orgies" today, in this context it refers to the wild, ritualized festivities of the hunt., equal to those of the ancients,
were free for happiness.
Yet these revels cost a great deal, unless I am mistaken.
Forgetting at what price,
how much metal they squander!
Silver is consumed by iron, and gold by lead:
This was the exchange of Diomedes
and Glaucus A reference to a famous scene in Homer's Iliad where Glaucus foolishly trades his gold armor for Diomedes' bronze armor. It is a proverb for a very bad trade..
How small a thing it is to see animals known to all
throb as they are pierced
by a javelin-throwing hand!
You owe so much to your Eye, that you are forced
to feed this Apicius A famous Roman gourmet and glutton. Balde uses him here as a metaphor for the hunter's excessive appetite for spectacle.
with an entire forest at immoderate expense!