315Let no adviser, however wise, persuade you to stir the earth stiff with frost when Boreas blows. 317Then winter locks the countryside with frost, and does not let the planted shoot fix its frozen root in the earth. 319Planting is best for vineyards when, in blushing spring, the white bird comes, hated by long snakes, or towards the first colds of autumn, when the swift Sun has not yet touched winter with his horses, and summer is now passing. 323Spring, indeed, is good for the foliage of groves, spring for forests; 324in spring the lands swell and demand the life-giving seeds. 325Then the almighty father Aether comes down in fruitful showers into the lap of his glad wife, and, mighty, mingled with her mighty body, nourishes all her offspring.
328Then the pathless thickets ring with tuneful birds, and the herds seek love again on their appointed days; 330the bountiful field gives birth, and under the warm breezes of the west wind the fields loosen their bosoms; 331tender moisture abounds in all things; 332and the shoots dare to trust themselves safely to the new suns, nor does the vine-tendril fear the rising south winds, or the rain driven from the sky by great north winds, but pushes out its buds and unfolds all its leaves. 336No other days, I would believe, shone at the first beginning of the growing world, nor did they hold another course: that was spring, the great world was keeping spring, and the east winds spared their wintry blasts, when the first cattle drank in the light, and the earthborn race of men raised its head from the hard fields, and wild beasts were let loose into the woods and stars into the sky.
343Nor could tender things endure this hardship, if so long a rest did not come between cold and heat, and the indulgence of heaven did not welcome the lands.