Page:Mistral - Mirèio. A Provençal poem.djvu/207

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"Let blow the trumpet!" Then the ploughmen twain
In two unswerving lines upturn the plain,
Making for the chosen goal,—two poplars high.
The sun-rays gild the ridges equally,
And all the laborers call out, "Well done!
Thy furrow, chieftain, is a noble one;

"Yet, sooth to say, so straight the other is,
One might an arrow shoot the length of this."
And Lou Marran was winner,—he who here
Before the baffled council doth appear,
All pale, to bear his bitter evidence:
"Comrades, as I was whistling, not long since,

"Over my share, methought the land was rough,
And we would stretch, the day to finish off;
When, lo! my beasts with fear began to quake,
Bristled their hairy sides, their ears lay back.
They stopped; and, with dazed eyes, I saw all round
The field-herbs fade, and wither to the ground.

"I touch my pair. Baiardo sadly eyes
His master, but stirs not. Falet applies
His nostril to the furrow. Then I lash
Their shins; and, all in terror, off they dash,
So that the ash-wood beam—the beam, I say—
Is rent, and yoke and tackle borne away.