I am not shaped from the fragile elm, nor is this column of mine which stands extended with rigid vein [made] from wood taken at random, but produced from the evergreen cypress which neither a hundred full-told generations nor the decay of a lengthy senility fears. This do thou, whoever thou mayst be, O ill-doer, dread; for if with greedy hand but the smallest dusters of grapes on this vine thou dost injure, there shall be born on thee, however much thou mayst wish to oppose it, a fig tree grafted from this cypress.