Translated by John Dryden [1697]
When Turnus had assembled all his pow'rs,
His standard planted
on Laurentum's tow'rs;
When now the sprightly trumpet, from
afar,
Had giv'n the signal of approaching war,
Had rous'd the
neighing steeds to scour the fields,
While the fierce riders
clatter'd on their shields;
Trembling with rage, the Latian youth
prepare
To join th' allies, and headlong rush to war.
Fierce
Ufens, and Messapus, led the crowd,
With bold Mezentius, who
blasphem'd aloud.
These thro' the country took their wasteful
course,
The fields to forage, and to gather force.
Then Venulus
to Diomede they send,
To beg his aid Ausonia to defend,
Declare
the common danger, and inform
The Grecian leader of the growing
storm:
Aeneas, landed on the Latian coast,
With banish'd gods,
and with a baffled host,
Yet now aspir'd to conquest of the
state,
And claim'd a title from the gods and fate;
What
num'rous nations in his quarrel came,
And how they spread his
formidable name.
What he design'd, what mischief might arise,
If
fortune favor'd his first enterprise,
Was left for him to weigh,
whose equal fears,
And common interest, was involv'd in theirs.
While Turnus and th' allies thus urge the war,
The Trojan,
floating in a flood of care,
Beholds the tempest which his foes
prepare.
This way and that he turns his anxious mind;
Thinks,
and rejects the counsels he design'd;
Explores himself in vain, in
ev'ry part,
And gives no rest to his distracted heart.
So, when
the sun by day, or moon by night,
Strike on the polish'd brass
their trembling light,
The glitt'ring species here and there
divide,
And cast their dubious beams from side to side;
Now on
the walls, now on the pavement play,
And to the ceiling flash the
glaring day.
'T was night; and weary nature lull'd asleep
The birds of air,
and fishes of the deep,
And beasts, and mortal men. The Trojan
chief
Was laid on Tiber's banks, oppress'd with grief,
And
found in silent slumber late relief.
Then, thro' the shadows of
the poplar wood,
Arose the father of the Roman flood;
An azure
robe was o'er his body spread,
A wreath of shady reeds adorn'd his
head:
Thus, manifest to sight, the god appear'd,
And with these
pleasing words his sorrow cheer'd:
"Undoubted offspring of
ethereal race,
O long expected in this promis'd place!
Who
thro' the foes hast borne thy banish'd gods,
Restor'd them to
their hearths, and old abodes;
This is thy happy home, the clime
where fate
Ordains thee to restore the Trojan state.
Fear not!
The war shall end in lasting peace,
And all the rage of haughty
Juno cease.
And that this nightly vision may not seem
Th'
effect of fancy, or an idle dream,
A sow beneath an oak shall lie
along,
All white herself, and white her thirty young.
When
thirty rolling years have run their race,
Thy son Ascanius, on
this empty space,
Shall build a royal town, of lasting fame,
Which
from this omen shall receive the name.
Time shall approve the
truth. For what remains,
And how with sure success to crown thy
pains,
With patience next attend. A banish'd band,
Driv'n with
Evander from th' Arcadian land,
Have planted here, and plac'd on
high their walls;
Their town the founder Pallanteum calls,
Deriv'd
from Pallas, his great-grandsire's name:
But the fierce Latians
old possession claim,
With war infesting the new colony.
These
make thy friends, and on their aid rely.
To thy free passage I
submit my streams.
Wake, son of Venus, from thy pleasing
dreams;
And, when the setting stars are lost in day,
To Juno's
pow'r thy just devotion pay;
With sacrifice the wrathful queen
appease:
Her pride at length shall fall, her fury cease.
When
thou return'st victorious from the war,
Perform thy vows to me
with grateful care.
The god am I, whose yellow water flows
Around
these fields, and fattens as it goes:
Tiber my name; among the
rolling floods
Renown'd on earth, esteem'd among the gods.
This
is my certain seat. In times to come,
My waves shall wash the
walls of mighty Rome."
He said, and plung'd below. While yet he spoke,
His dream
Aeneas and his sleep forsook.
He rose, and looking up, beheld the
skies
With purple blushing, and the day arise.
Then water in
his hollow palm he took
From Tiber's flood, and thus the pow'rs
bespoke:
"Laurentian nymphs, by whom the streams are fed,
And
Father Tiber, in thy sacred bed
Receive Aeneas, and from danger
keep.
Whatever fount, whatever holy deep,
Conceals thy wat'ry
stores; where'er they rise,
And, bubbling from below, salute the
skies;
Thou, king of horned floods, whose plenteous urn
Suffices
fatness to the fruitful corn,
For this thy kind compassion of our
woes,
Shalt share my morning song and ev'ning vows.
But, O be
present to thy people's aid,
And firm the gracious promise thou
hast made!"
Thus having said, two galleys from his
stores,
With care he chooses, mans, and fits with oars.
Now on
the shore the fatal swine is found.
Wondrous to tell!- She lay
along the ground:
Her well-fed offspring at her udders hung;
She
white herself, and white her thirty young.
Aeneas takes the mother
and her brood,
And all on Juno's altar are bestow'd.
The foll'wing night, and the succeeding day,
Propitious Tiber
smooth'd his wat'ry way:
He roll'd his river back, and pois'd he
stood,
A gentle swelling, and a peaceful flood.
The Trojans
mount their ships; they put from shore,
Borne on the waves, and
scarcely dip an oar.
Shouts from the land give omen to their
course,
And the pitch'd vessels glide with easy force.
The
woods and waters wonder at the gleam
Of shields, and painted ships
that stem the stream.
One summer's night and one whole day they
pass
Betwixt the greenwood shades, and cut the liquid glass.
The
fiery sun had finish'd half his race,
Look'd back, and doubted in
the middle space,
When they from far beheld the rising tow'rs,
The
tops of sheds, and shepherds' lowly bow'rs,
Thin as they stood,
which, then of homely clay,
Now rise in marble, from the Roman
sway.
These cots (Evander's kingdom, mean and poor)
The Trojan
saw, and turn'd his ships to shore.
'T was on a solemn day: th'
Arcadian states,
The king and prince, without the city gates,
Then
paid their off'rings in a sacred grove
To Hercules, the warrior
son of Jove.
Thick clouds of rolling smoke involve the skies,
And
fat of entrails on his altar fries.
But, when they saw the ships that stemm'd the flood,
And
glitter'd thro' the covert of the wood,
They rose with fear, and
left th' unfinish'd feast,
Till dauntless Pallas reassur'd the
rest
To pay the rites. Himself without delay
A jav'lin seiz'd,
and singly took his way;
Then gain'd a rising ground, and call'd
from far:
"Resolve me, strangers, whence, and what you
are;
Your bus'ness here; and bring you peace or war?"
High
on the stern Aeneas his stand,
And held a branch of olive in his
hand,
While thus he spoke: "The Phrygians' arms you
see,
Expell'd from Troy, provok'd in Italy
By Latian foes, with
war unjustly made;
At first affianc'd, and at last betray'd.
This
message bear: 'The Trojans and their chief
Bring holy peace, and
beg the king's relief.'
Struck with so great a name, and all on
fire,
The youth replies: "Whatever you require,
Your fame
exacts. Upon our shores descend.
A welcome guest, and, what you
wish, a friend."
He said, and, downward hasting to the
strand,
Embrac'd the stranger prince, and join'd his hand.
Conducted to the grove, Aeneas broke
The silence first, and
thus the king bespoke:
"Best of the Greeks, to whom, by
fate's command,
I bear these peaceful branches in my
hand,
Undaunted I approach you, tho' I know
Your birth is
Grecian, and your land my foe;
From Atreus tho' your ancient
lineage came,
And both the brother kings your kindred claim;
Yet,
my self-conscious worth, your high renown,
Your virtue, thro' the
neighb'ring nations blown,
Our fathers' mingled blood, Apollo's
voice,
Have led me hither, less by need than choice.
Our
founder Dardanus, as fame has sung,
And Greeks acknowledge, from
Electra sprung:
Electra from the loins of Atlas came;
Atlas,
whose head sustains the starry frame.
Your sire is Mercury, whom
long before
On cold Cyllene's top fair Maia bore.
Maia the
fair, on fame if we rely,
Was Atlas' daughter, who sustains the
sky.
Thus from one common source our streams divide;
Ours is
the Trojan, yours th' Areadian side.
Rais'd by these hopes, I sent
no news before,
Nor ask'd your leave, nor did your faith
implore;
But come, without a pledge, my own ambassador.
The
same Rutulians, who with arms pursue
The Trojan race, are equal
foes to you.
Our host expell'd, what farther force can stay
The
victor troops from universal sway?
Then will they stretch their
pow'r athwart the land,
And either sea from side to side
command.
Receive our offer'd faith, and give us thine;
Ours is
a gen'rous and experienc'd line:
We want not hearts nor bodies for
the war;
In council cautious, and in fields we dare."
He said; and while spoke, with piercing eyes
Evander view'd the
man with vast surprise,
Pleas'd with his action, ravish'd with his
face:
Then answer'd briefly, with a royal grace:
"O
valiant leader of the Trojan line,
In whom the features of thy
father shine,
How I recall Anchises! how I see
His motions,
mien, and all my friend, in thee!
Long tho' it be, 't is fresh
within my mind,
When Priam to his sister's court design'd
A
welcome visit, with a friendly stay,
And thro' th' Arcadian
kingdom took his way.
Then, past a boy, the callow down began
To
shade my chin, and call me first a man.
I saw the shining train
with vast delight,
And Priam's goodly person pleas'd my sight:
But
great Anchises, far above the rest,
With awful wonder fir'd my
youthful breast.
I long'd to join in friendship's holy bands
Our
mutual hearts, and plight our mutual hands.
I first accosted him:
I sued, I sought,
And, with a loving force, to Pheneus brought.
He
gave me, when at length constrain'd to go,
A Lycian quiver and a
Gnossian bow,
A vest embroider'd, glorious to behold,
And two
rich bridles, with their bits of gold,
Which my son's coursers in
obedience hold.
The league you ask, I offer, as your right;
And,
when to-morrow's sun reveals the light,
With swift supplies you
shall be sent away.
Now celebrate with us this solemn day,
Whose
holy rites admit no long delay.
Honor our annual feast; and take
your seat,
With friendly welcome, at a homely treat."
Thus
having said, the bowls (remov'd for fear)
The youths replac'd, and
soon restor'd the cheer.
On sods of turf he set the soldiers
round:
A maple throne, rais'd higher from the ground,
Receiv'd
the Trojan chief; and, o'er the bed,
A lion's shaggy hide for
ornament they spread.
The loaves were serv'd in canisters; the
wine
In bowls; the priest renew'd the rites divine:
Broil'd
entrails are their food, and beef's continued chine.
But when the rage of hunger was repress'd,
Thus spoke Evander
to his royal guest:
"These rites, these altars, and this
feast, O king,
From no vain fears or superstition spring,
Or
blind devotion, or from blinder chance,
Or heady zeal, or brutal
ignorance;
But, sav'd from danger, with a grateful sense,
The
labors of a god we recompense.
See, from afar, yon rock that mates
the sky,
About whose feet such heaps of rubbish lie;
Such
indigested ruin; bleak and bare,
How desart now it stands, expos'd
in air!
'T was once a robber's den, inclos'd around
With living
stone, and deep beneath the ground.
The monster Cacus, more than
half a beast,
This hold, impervious to the sun, possess'd.
The
pavement ever foul with human gore;
Heads, and their mangled
members, hung the door.
Vulcan this plague begot; and, like his
sire,
Black clouds he belch'd, and flakes of livid fire.
Time,
long expected, eas'd us of our load,
And brought the needful
presence of a god.
Th' avenging force of Hercules, from
Spain,
Arriv'd in triumph, from Geryon slain:
Thrice liv'd the
giant, and thrice liv'd in vain.
His prize, the lowing herds,
Alcides drove
Near Tiber's bank, to graze the shady grove.
Allur'd
with hope of plunder, and intent
By force to rob, by fraud to
circumvent,
The brutal Cacus, as by chance they stray'd,
Four
oxen thence, and four fair kine convey'd;
And, lest the printed
footsteps might be seen,
He dragg'd 'em backwards to his rocky
den.
The tracks averse a lying notice gave,
And led the
searcher backward from the cave.
"Meantime the herdsman hero shifts his place,
To find
fresh pasture and untrodden grass.
The beasts, who miss'd their
mates, fill'd all around
With bellowings, and the rocks restor'd
the sound.
One heifer, who had heard her love complain,
Roar'd
from the cave, and made the project vain.
Alcides found the fraud;
with rage he shook,
And toss'd about his head his knotted
oak.
Swift as the winds, or Scythian arrows' flight,
He clomb,
with eager haste, th' aerial height.
Then first we saw the monster
mend his pace;
Fear his eyes, and paleness in his face,
Confess'd
the god's approach. Trembling he springs,
As terror had increas'd
his feet with wings;
Nor stay'd for stairs; but down the depth he
threw
His body, on his back the door he drew
(The door, a rib
of living rock; with pains
His father hew'd it out, and bound with
iron chains):
He broke the heavy links, the mountain clos'd,
And
bars and levers to his foe oppos'd.
The wretch had hardly made his
dungeon fast;
The fierce avenger came with bounding
haste;
Survey'd the mouth of the forbidden hold,
And here and
there his raging eyes he roll'd.
He gnash'd his teeth; and thrice
he compass'd round
With winged speed the circuit of the
ground.
Thrice at the cavern's mouth he pull'd in vain,
And,
panting, thrice desisted from his pain.
A pointed flinty rock, all
bare and black,
Grew gibbous from behind the mountain's
back;
Owls, ravens, all ill omens of the night,
Here built
their nests, and hither wing'd their flight.
The leaning head hung
threat'ning o'er the flood,
And nodded to the left. The hero
stood
Adverse, with planted feet, and, from the right,
Tugg'd
at the solid stone with all his might.
Thus heav'd, the fix'd
foundations of the rock
Gave way; heav'n echo'd at the rattling
shock.
Tumbling, it chok'd the flood: on either side
The banks
leap backward, and the streams divide;
The sky shrunk upward with
unusual dread,
And trembling Tiber div'd beneath his bed.
The
court of Cacus stands reveal'd to sight;
The cavern glares with
new-admitted light.
So the pent vapors, with a rumbling
sound,
Heave from below, and rend the hollow ground;
A sounding
flaw succeeds; and, from on high,
The gods with hate beheld the
nether sky:
The ghosts repine at violated night,
And curse th'
invading sun, and sicken at the sight.
The graceless monster,
caught in open day,
Inclos'd, and in despair to fly away,
Howls
horrible from underneath, and fills
His hollow palace with unmanly
yells.
The hero stands above, and from afar
Plies him with
darts, and stones, and distant war.
He, from his nostrils huge
mouth, expires
Black clouds of smoke, amidst his father's
fires,
Gath'ring, with each repeated blast, the night,
To make
uncertain aim, and erring sight.
The wrathful god then plunges
from above,
And, where in thickest waves the sparkles drove,
There
lights; and wades thro' fumes, and gropes his way,
Half sing'd,
half stifled, till he grasps his prey.
The monster, spewing
fruitless flames, he found;
He squeez'd his throat; he writh'd his
neck around,
And in a knot his crippled members bound;
Then
from their sockets tore his burning eyes:
Roll'd on a heap, the
breathless robber lies.
The doors, unbarr'd, receive the rushing
day,
And thoro' lights disclose the ravish'd prey.
The bulls,
redeem'd, breathe open air again.
Next, by the feet, they drag him
from his den.
The wond'ring neighborhood, with glad
surprise,
Behold his shagged breast, his giant size,
His mouth
that flames no more, and his extinguish'd eyes.
From that
auspicious day, with rites divine,
We worship at the hero's holy
shrine.
Potitius first ordain'd these annual vows:
As priests,
were added the Pinarian house,
Who rais'd this altar in the sacred
shade,
Where honors, ever due, for ever shall be paid.
For
these deserts, and this high virtue shown,
Ye warlike youths, your
heads with garlands crown:
Fill high the goblets with a sparkling
flood,
And with deep draughts invoke our common god."
This said, a double wreath Evander twin'd,
And poplars black
and white his temples bind.
Then brims his ample bowl. With like
design
The rest invoke the gods, with sprinkled wine.
Meantime
the sun descended from the skies,
And the bright evening star
began to rise.
And now the priests, Potitius at their head,
In
skins of beasts involv'd, the long procession led;
Held high the
flaming tapers in their hands,
As custom had prescrib'd their holy
bands;
Then with a second course the tables load,
And with full
chargers offer to the god.
The Salii sing, and cense his altars
round
With Saban smoke, their heads with poplar bound-
One
choir of old, another of the young,
To dance, and bear the burthen
of the song.
The lay records the labors, and the praise,
And
all th' immortal acts of Hercules:
First, how the mighty babe,
when swath'd in bands,
The serpents strangled with his infant
hands;
Then, as in years and matchless force he grew,
Th'
Oechalian walls, and Trojan, overthrew.
Besides, a thousand
hazards they relate,
Procur'd by Juno's and Eurystheus' hate:
"Thy
hands, unconquer'd hero, could subdue
The cloud-born Centaurs, and
the monster crew:
Nor thy resistless arm the bull withstood,
Nor
he, the roaring terror of the wood.
The triple porter of the
Stygian seat,
With lolling tongue, lay fawning at thy feet,
And,
seiz'd with fear, forgot his mangled meat.
Th' infernal waters
trembled at thy sight;
Thee, god, no face of danger could
affright;
Not huge Typhoeus, nor th' unnumber'd snake,
Increas'd
with hissing heads, in Lerna's lake.
Hail, Jove's undoubted son!
an added grace
To heav'n and the great author of thy race!
Receive
the grateful off'rings which we pay,
And smile propitious on thy
solemn day!"
In numbers thus they sung; above the rest,
The
den and death of Cacus crown the feast.
The woods to hollow vales
convey the sound,
The vales to hills, and hills the notes
rebound.
The rites perform'd, the cheerful train retire.
Betwixt young Pallas and his aged sire,
The Trojan pass'd, the
city to survey,
And pleasing talk beguil'd the tedious way.
The
stranger cast around his curious eyes,
New objects viewing still,
with new surprise;
With greedy joy enquires of various things,
And
acts and monuments of ancient kings.
Then thus the founder of the
Roman tow'rs:
"These woods were first the seat of sylvan
pow'rs,
Of Nymphs and Fauns, and salvage men, who took
Their
birth from trunks of trees and stubborn oak.
Nor laws they knew,
nor manners, nor the care
Of lab'ring oxen, or the shining
share,
Nor arts of gain, nor what they gain'd to spare.
Their
exercise the chase; the running flood
Supplied their thirst, the
trees supplied their food.
Then Saturn came, who fled the pow'r of
Jove,
Robb'd of his realms, and banish'd from above.
The men,
dispers'd on hills, to towns he brought,
And laws ordain'd, and
civil customs taught,
And Latium call'd the land where safe he
lay
From his unduteous son, and his usurping sway.
With his
mild empire, peace and plenty came;
And hence the golden times
deriv'd their name.
A more degenerate and discolor'd age
Succeeded
this, with avarice and rage.
Th' Ausonians then, and bold
Sicanians came;
And Saturn's empire often chang'd the name.
Then
kings, gigantic Tybris, and the rest,
With arbitrary sway the land
oppress'd:
For Tiber's flood was Albula before,
Till, from the
tyrant's fate, his name it bore.
I last arriv'd, driv'n from my
native home
By fortune's pow'r, and fate's resistless doom.
Long
toss'd on seas, I sought this happy land,
Warn'd by my mother
nymph, and call'd by Heav'n's command."
Thus, walking on, he spoke, and shew'd the gate,
Since call'd
Carmental by the Roman state;
Where stood an altar, sacred to the
name
Of old Carmenta, the prophetic dame,
Who to her son
foretold th' Aenean race,
Sublime in fame, and Rome's imperial
place:
Then shews the forest, which, in after times,
Fierce
Romulus for perpetrated crimes
A sacred refuge made; with this,
the shrine
Where Pan below the rock had rites divine:
Then
tells of Argus' death, his murder'd guest,
Whose grave and tomb
his innocence attest.
Thence, to the steep Tarpeian rock he
leads;
Now roof'd with gold, then thatch'd with homely reeds.
A
reverent fear (such superstition reigns
Among the rude) ev'n then
possess'd the swains.
Some god, they knew- what god, they could
not tell-
Did there amidst the sacred horror dwell.
Th'
Arcadians thought him Jove; and said they saw
The mighty Thund'rer
with majestic awe,
Who took his shield, and dealt his bolts
around,
And scatter'd tempests on the teeming ground.
Then saw
two heaps of ruins, (once they stood
Two stately towns, on either
side the flood,)
Saturnia's and Janicula's remains;
And either
place the founder's name retains.
Discoursing thus together, they
resort
Where poor Evander kept his country court.
They view'd
the ground of Rome's litigious hall;
(Once oxen low'd, where now
the lawyers bawl;)
Then, stooping, thro' the narrow gate they
press'd,
When thus the king bespoke his Trojan guest:
"Mean
as it is, this palace, and this door,
Receiv'd Alcides, then a
conqueror.
Dare to be poor; accept our homely food,
Which
feasted him, and emulate a god."
Then underneath a lowly roof
he led
The weary prince, and laid him on a bed;
The stuffing
leaves, with hides of bears o'erspread.
Now Night had shed her
silver dews around,
And with her sable wings embrac'd the
ground,
When love's fair goddess, anxious for her son,
(New
tumults rising, and new wars begun,)
Couch'd with her husband in
his golden bed,
With these alluring words invokes his aid;
And,
that her pleasing speech his mind may move,
Inspires each accent
with the charms of love:
"While cruel fate conspir'd with
Grecian pow'rs,
To level with the ground the Trojan tow'rs,
I
ask'd not aid th' unhappy to restore,
Nor did the succor of thy
skill implore;
Nor urg'd the labors of my lord in vain,
A
sinking empire longer to sustain,
Tho'much I ow'd to Priam's
house, and more
The dangers of Aeneas did deplore.
But now, by
Jove's command, and fate's decree,
His race is doom'd to reign in
Italy:
With humble suit I beg thy needful art,
O still
propitious pow'r, that rules my heart!
A mother kneels a suppliant
for her son.
By Thetis and Aurora thou wert won
To forge
impenetrable shields, and grace
With fated arms a less illustrious
race.
Behold, what haughty nations are combin'd
Against the
relics of the Phrygian kind,
With fire and sword my people to
destroy,
And conquer Venus twice, in conqu'ring Troy."
She
said; and straight her arms, of snowy hue,
About her unresolving
husband threw.
Her soft embraces soon infuse desire;
His bones
and marrow sudden warmth inspire;
And all the godhead feels the
wonted fire.
Not half so swift the rattling thunder flies,
Or
forky lightnings flash along the skies.
The goddess, proud of her
successful wiles,
And conscious of her form, in secret smiles.
Then thus the pow'r, obnoxious to her charms,
Panting, and half
dissolving in her arms:
"Why seek you reasons for a cause so
just,
Or your own beauties or my love distrust?
Long since, had
you requir'd my helpful hand,
Th' artificer and art you might
command,
To labor arms for Troy: nor Jove, nor fate,
Confin'd
their empire to so short a date.
And, if you now desire new wars
to wage,
My skill I promise, and my pains engage.
Whatever
melting metals can conspire,
Or breathing bellows, or the forming
fire,
Is freely yours: your anxious fears remove,
And think no
task is difficult to love."
Trembling he spoke; and, eager of
her charms,
He snatch'd the willing goddess to his arms;
Till
in her lap infus'd, he lay possess'd
Of full desire, and sunk to
pleasing rest.
Now when the Night her middle race had rode,
And
his first slumber had refresh'd the god-
The time when early
housewives leave the bed;
When living embers on the hearth they
spread,
Supply the lamp, and call the maids to rise-
With
yawning mouths, and with half-open'd eyes,
They ply the distaff by
the winking light,
And to their daily labor add the night:
Thus
frugally they earn their children's bread,
And uncorrupted keep
the nuptial bed-
Not less concern'd, nor at a later hour,
Rose
from his downy couch the forging pow'r.
Sacred to Vulcan's name, an isle there lay,
Betwixt Sicilia's
coasts and Lipare,
Rais'd high on smoking rocks; and, deep
below,
In hollow caves the fires of Aetna glow.
The Cyclops
here their heavy hammers deal;
Loud strokes, and hissings of
tormented steel,
Are heard around; the boiling waters roar,
And
smoky flames thro' fuming tunnels soar.
Hether the Father of the
Fire, by night,
Thro' the brown air precipitates his flight.
On
their eternal anvils here he found
The brethren beating, and the
blows go round.
A load of pointless thunder now there lies
Before
their hands, to ripen for the skies:
These darts, for angry Jove,
they daily cast;
Consum'd on mortals with prodigious waste.
Three
rays of writhen rain, of fire three more,
Of winged southern winds
and cloudy store
As many parts, the dreadful mixture frame;
And
fears are added, and avenging flame.
Inferior ministers, for Mars,
repair
His broken axletrees and blunted war,
And send him forth
again with furbish'd arms,
To wake the lazy war with trumpets'
loud alarms.
The rest refresh the scaly snakes that fold
The
shield of Pallas, and renew their gold.
Full on the crest the
Gorgon's head they place,
With eyes that roll in death, and with
distorted face.
"My sons," said Vulcan, "set your tasks aside;
Your
strength and master-skill must now be tried.
Arms for a hero
forge; arms that require
Your force, your speed, and all your
forming fire."
He said. They set their former work aside,
And
their new toils with eager haste divide.
A flood of molten silver,
brass, and gold,
And deadly steel, in the large furnace roll'd;
Of
this, their artful hands a shield prepare,
Alone sufficient to
sustain the war.
Sev'n orbs within a spacious round they
close:
One stirs the fire, and one the bellows blows.
The
hissing steel is in the smithy drown'd;
The grot with beaten
anvils groans around.
By turns their arms advance, in equal
time;
By turns their hands descend, and hammers chime.
They
turn the glowing mass with crooked tongs;
The fiery work proceeds,
with rustic songs.
While, at the Lemnian god's command, they urge
Their labors
thus, and ply th' Aeolian forge,
The cheerful morn salutes
Evander's eyes,
And songs of chirping birds invite to rise.
He
leaves his lowly bed: his buskins meet
Above his ankles; sandals
sheathe his feet:
He sets his trusty sword upon his side,
And
o'er his shoulder throws a panther's hide.
Two menial dogs before
their master press'd.
Thus clad, and guarded thus, he seeks his
kingly guest.
Mindful of promis'd aid, he mends his pace,
But
meets Aeneas in the middle space.
Young Pallas did his father's
steps attend,
And true Achates waited on his friend.
They join
their hands; a secret seat they choose;
Th' Arcadian first their
former talk renews:
"Undaunted prince, I never can
believe
The Trojan empire lost, while you survive.
Command th'
assistance of a faithful friend;
But feeble are the succors I can
send.
Our narrow kingdom here the Tiber bounds;
That other side
the Latian state surrounds,
Insults our walls, and wastes our
fruitful grounds.
But mighty nations I prepare, to join
Their
arms with yours, and aid your just design.
You come, as by your
better genius sent,
And fortune seems to favor your intent.
Not
far from hence there stands a hilly town,
Of ancient building, and
of high renown,
Torn from the Tuscans by the Lydian race,
Who
gave the name of Caere to the place,
Once Agyllina call'd. It
flourish'd long,
In pride of wealth and warlike people
strong,
Till curs'd Mezentius, in a fatal hour,
Assum'd the
crown, with arbitrary pow'r.
What words can paint those execrable
times,
The subjects' suff'rings, and the tyrant's crimes!
That
blood, those murthers, O ye gods, replace
On his own head, and on
his impious race!
The living and the dead at his command
Were
coupled, face to face, and hand to hand,
Till, chok'd with stench,
in loath'd embraces tied,
The ling'ring wretches pin'd away and
died.
Thus plung'd in ills, and meditating more-
The people's
patience, tir'd, no longer bore
The raging monster; but with arms
beset
His house, and vengeance and destruction threat.
They
fire his palace: while the flame ascends,
They force his guards,
and execute his friends.
He cleaves the crowd, and, favor'd by the
night,
To Turnus' friendly court directs his flight.
By just
revenge the Tuscans set on fire,
With arms, their king to
punishment require:
Their num'rous troops, now muster'd on the
strand,
My counsel shall submit to your command.
Their navy
swarms upon the coasts; they cry
To hoist their anchors, but the
gods deny.
An ancient augur, skill'd in future fate,
With these
foreboding words restrains their hate:
'Ye brave in arms, ye
Lydian blood, the flow'r
Of Tuscan youth, and choice of all their
pow'r,
Whom just revenge against Mezentius arms,
To seek your
tyrant's death by lawful arms;
Know this: no native of our land
may lead
This pow'rful people; seek a foreign head.'
Aw'd with
these words, in camps they still abide,
And wait with longing
looks their promis'd guide.
Tarchon, the Tuscan chief, to me has
sent
Their crown, and ev'ry regal ornament:
The people join
their own with his desire;
And all my conduct, as their king,
require.
But the chill blood that creeps within my veins,
And
age, and listless limbs unfit for pains,
And a soul conscious of
its own decay,
Have forc'd me to refuse imperial sway.
My
Pallas were more fit to mount the throne,
And should, but he's a
Sabine mother's son,
And half a native; but, in you, combine
A
manly vigor, and a foreign line.
Where Fate and smiling Fortune
shew the way,
Pursue the ready path to sov'reign sway.
The
staff of my declining days, my son,
Shall make your good or ill
success his own;
In fighting fields from you shall learn to
dare,
And serve the hard apprenticeship of war;
Your matchless
courage and your conduct view,
And early shall begin t' admire and
copy you.
Besides, two hundred horse he shall command;
Tho'
few, a warlike and well-chosen band.
These in my name are listed;
and my son
As many more has added in his own."
Scarce had he said; Achates and his guest,
With downcast eyes,
their silent grief express'd;
Who, short of succors, and in deep
despair,
Shook at the dismal prospect of the war.
But his
bright mother, from a breaking cloud,
To cheer her issue,
thunder'd thrice aloud;
Thrice forky lightning flash'd along the
sky,
And Tyrrhene trumpets thrice were heard on high.
Then,
gazing up, repeated peals they hear;
And, in a heav'n serene,
refulgent arms appear:
Redd'ning the skies, and glitt'ring all
around,
The temper'd metals clash, and yield a silver sound.
The
rest stood trembling, struck with awe divine;
Aeneas only,
conscious to the sign,
Presag'd th' event, and joyful view'd,
above,
Th' accomplish'd promise of the Queen of Love.
Then, to
th' Arcadian king: "This prodigy
(Dismiss your fear) belongs
alone to me.
Heav'n calls me to the war: th' expected sign
Is
giv'n of promis'd aid, and arms divine.
My goddess mother, whose
indulgent care
Foresaw the dangers of the growing war,
This
omen gave, when bright Vulcanian arms,
Fated from force of steel
by Stygian charms,
Suspended, shone on high: she then
foreshow'd
Approaching fights, and fields to float in
blood.
Turnus shall dearly pay for faith forsworn;
And corps,
and swords, and shields, on Tiber borne,
Shall choke his flood:
now sound the loud alarms;
And, Latian troops, prepare your
perjur'd arms."
He said, and, rising from his homely throne,
The solemn rites
of Hercules begun,
And on his altars wak'd the sleeping
fires;
Then cheerful to his household gods retires;
There
offers chosen sheep. Th' Arcadian king
And Trojan youth the same
oblations bring.
Next, of his men and ships he makes review;
Draws
out the best and ablest of the crew.
Down with the falling stream
the refuse run,
To raise with joyful news his drooping son.
Steeds
are prepar'd to mount the Trojan band,
Who wait their leader to
the Tyrrhene land.
A sprightly courser, fairer than the rest,
The
king himself presents his royal guest:
A lion's hide his back and
limbs infold,
Precious with studded work, and paws of gold.
Fame
thro' the little city spreads aloud
Th' intended march, amid the
fearful crowd:
The matrons beat their breasts, dissolve in
tears,
And double their devotion in their fears.
The war at
hand appears with more affright,
And rises ev'ry moment to the
sight.
Then old Evander, with a close embrace,
Strain'd his departing
friend; and tears o'erflow his face.
"Would Heav'n,"
said he, "my strength and youth recall,
Such as I was beneath
Praeneste's wall;
Then when I made the foremost foes retire,
And
set whole heaps of conquer'd shields on fire;
When Herilus in
single fight I slew,
Whom with three lives Feronia did endue;
And
thrice I sent him to the Stygian shore,
Till the last ebbing soul
return'd no more-
Such if I stood renew'd, not these alarms,
Nor
death, should rend me from my Pallas' arms;
Nor proud Mezentius,
thus unpunish'd, boast
His rapes and murthers on the Tuscan
coast.
Ye gods, and mighty Jove, in pity bring
Relief, and hear
a father and a king!
If fate and you reserve these eyes, to see
My
son return with peace and victory;
If the lov'd boy shall bless
his father's sight;
If we shall meet again with more delight;
Then
draw my life in length; let me sustain,
In hopes of his embrace,
the worst of pain.
But if your hard decrees- which, O! I
dread-
Have doom'd to death his undeserving head;
This, O this
very moment, let me die!
While hopes and fears in equal balance
lie;
While, yet possess'd of all his youthful charms,
I strain
him close within these aged arms;
Before that fatal news my soul
shall wound!"
He said, and, swooning, sunk upon the
ground.
His servants bore him off, and softly laid
His
languish'd limbs upon his homely bed.
The horsemen march; the gates are open'd wide;
Aeneas at their
head, Achates by his side.
Next these, the Trojan leaders rode
along;
Last follows in the rear th' Arcadian throng.
Young
Pallas shone conspicuous o'er the rest;
Gilded his arms,
embroider'd was his vest.
So, from the seas, exerts his radiant
head
The star by whom the lights of heav'n are led;
Shakes from
his rosy locks the pearly dews,
Dispels the darkness, and the day
renews.
The trembling wives the walls and turrets crowd,
And
follow, with their eyes, the dusty cloud,
Which winds disperse by
fits, and shew from far
The blaze of arms, and shields, and
shining war.
The troops, drawn up in beautiful array,
O'er
heathy plains pursue the ready way.
Repeated peals of shouts are
heard around;
The neighing coursers answer to the sound,
And
shake with horny hoofs the solid ground.
A greenwood shade, for long religion known,
Stands by the
streams that wash the Tuscan town,
Incompass'd round with gloomy
hills above,
Which add a holy horror to the grove.
The first
inhabitants of Grecian blood,
That sacred forest to Silvanus
vow'd,
The guardian of their flocks and fields; and pay
Their
due devotions on his annual day.
Not far from hence, along the
river's side,
In tents secure, the Tuscan troops abide,
By
Tarchon led. Now, from a rising ground,
Aeneas cast his wond'ring
eyes around,
And all the Tyrrhene army had in sight,
Stretch'd
on the spacious plain from left to right.
Thether his warlike
train the Trojan led,
Refresh'd his men, and wearied horses fed.
Meantime the mother goddess, crown'd with charms,
Breaks thro'
the clouds, and brings the fated arms.
Within a winding vale she
finds her son,
On the cool river's banks, retir'd alone.
She
shews her heav'nly form without disguise,
And gives herself to his
desiring eyes.
"Behold," she said, "perform'd in
ev'ry part,
My promise made, and Vulcan's labor'd art.
Now
seek, secure, the Latian enemy,
And haughty Turnus to the field
defy."
She said; and, having first her son embrac'd,
The
radiant arms beneath an oak she plac'd,
Proud of the gift, he
roll'd his greedy sight
Around the work, and gaz'd with vast
delight.
He lifts, he turns, he poises, and admires
The crested
helm, that vomits radiant fires:
His hands the fatal sword and
corslet hold,
One keen with temper'd steel, one stiff with
gold:
Both ample, flaming both, and beamy bright;
So shines a
cloud, when edg'd with adverse light.
He shakes the pointed spear,
and longs to try
The plated cuishes on his manly thigh;
But
most admires the shield's mysterious mold,
And Roman triumphs
rising on the gold:
For these, emboss'd, the heav'nly smith had
wrought
(Not in the rolls of future fate untaught)
The wars in
order, and the race divine
Of warriors issuing from the Julian
line.
The cave of Mars was dress'd with mossy greens:
There, by
the wolf, were laid the martial twins.
Intrepid on her swelling
dugs they hung;
The foster dam loll'd out her fawning tongue:
They
suck'd secure, while, bending back her head,
She lick'd their
tender limbs, and form'd them as they fed.
Not far from thence new
Rome appears, with games
Projected for the rape of Sabine
dames.
The pit resounds with shrieks; a war succeeds,
For
breach of public faith, and unexampled deeds.
Here for revenge the
Sabine troops contend;
The Romans there with arms the prey
defend.
Wearied with tedious war, at length they cease;
And
both the kings and kingdoms plight the peace.
The friendly chiefs
before Jove's altar stand,
Both arm'd, with each a charger in his
hand:
A fatted sow for sacrifice is led,
With imprecations on
the perjur'd head.
Near this, the traitor Metius, stretch'd
between
Four fiery steeds, is dragg'd along the green,
By
Tullus' doom: the brambles drink his blood,
And his torn limbs are
left the vulture's food.
There, Porsena to Rome proud Tarquin
brings,
And would by force restore the banish'd kings.
One
tyrant for his fellow-tyrant fights;
The Roman youth assert their
native rights.
Before the town the Tuscan army lies,
To win by
famine, or by fraud surprise.
Their king, half-threat'ning,
half-disdaining stood,
While Cocles broke the bridge, and stemm'd
the flood.
The captive maids there tempt the raging tide,
Scap'd
from their chains, with Cloelia for their guide.
High on a rock
heroic Manlius stood,
To guard the temple, and the temple's
god.
Then Rome was poor; and there you might behold
The palace
thatch'd with straw, now roof'd with gold.
The silver goose before
the shining gate
There flew, and, by her cackle, sav'd the
state.
She told the Gauls' approach; th' approaching
Gauls,
Obscure in night, ascend, and seize the walls.
The gold
dissembled well their yellow hair,
And golden chains on their
white necks they wear.
Gold are their vests; long Alpine spears
they wield,
And their left arm sustains a length of shield.
Hard
by, the leaping Salian priests advance;
And naked thro' the
streets the mad Luperci dance,
In caps of wool; the targets
dropp'd from heav'n.
Here modest matrons, in soft litters
driv'n,
To pay their vows in solemn pomp appear,
And odorous
gums in their chaste hands they bear.
Far hence remov'd, the
Stygian seats are seen;
Pains of the damn'd, and punish'd
Catiline
Hung on a rock- the traitor; and, around,
The Furies
hissing from the nether ground.
Apart from these, the happy souls
he draws,
And Cato's holy ghost dispensing laws.
Betwixt the quarters flows a golden sea;
But foaming surges
there in silver play.
The dancing dolphins with their tails
divide
The glitt'ring waves, and cut the precious tide.
Amid
the main, two mighty fleets engage
Their brazen beaks, oppos'd
with equal rage.
Actium surveys the well-disputed prize;
Leucate's
wat'ry plain with foamy billows fries.
Young Caesar, on the stern,
in armor bright,
Here leads the Romans and their gods to
fight:
His beamy temples shoot their flames afar,
And o'er his
head is hung the Julian star.
Agrippa seconds him, with prosp'rous
gales,
And, with propitious gods, his foes assails:
A naval
crown, that binds his manly brows,
The happy fortune of the fight
foreshows.
Rang'd on the line oppos'd, Antonius brings
Barbarian
aids, and troops of Eastern kings;
Th' Arabians near, and
Bactrians from afar,
Of tongues discordant, and a mingled
war:
And, rich in gaudy robes, amidst the strife,
His ill fate
follows him- th' Egyptian wife.
Moving they fight; with oars and
forky prows
The froth is gather'd, and the water glows.
It
seems, as if the Cyclades again
Were rooted up, and justled in the
main;
Or floating mountains floating mountains meet;
Such is
the fierce encounter of the fleet.
Fireballs are thrown, and
pointed jav'lins fly;
The fields of Neptune take a purple dye.
The
queen herself, amidst the loud alarms,
With cymbals toss'd her
fainting soldiers warms-
Fool as she was! who had not yet
divin'd
Her cruel fate, nor saw the snakes behind.
Her country
gods, the monsters of the sky,
Great Neptune, Pallas, and Love's
Queen defy:
The dog Anubis barks, but barks in vain,
Nor longer
dares oppose th' ethereal train.
Mars in the middle of the shining
shield
Is grav'd, and strides along the liquid field.
The Dirae
souse from heav'n with swift descent;
And Discord, dyed in blood,
with garments rent,
Divides the prease: her steps Bellona
treads,
And shakes her iron rod above their heads.
This seen,
Apollo, from his Actian height,
Pours down his arrows; at whose
winged flight
The trembling Indians and Egyptians yield,
And
soft Sabaeans quit the wat'ry field.
The fatal mistress hoists her
silken sails,
And, shrinking from the fight, invokes the
gales.
Aghast she looks, and heaves her breast for
breath,
Panting, and pale with fear of future death.
The god
had figur'd her as driv'n along
By winds and waves, and scudding
thro' the throng.
Just opposite, sad Nilus opens wide
His arms
and ample bosom to the tide,
And spreads his mantle o'er the
winding coast,
In which he wraps his queen, and hides the flying
host.
The victor to the gods his thanks express'd,
And Rome,
triumphant, with his presence bless'd.
Three hundred temples in
the town he plac'd;
With spoils and altars ev'ry temple
grac'd.
Three shining nights, and three succeeding days,
The
fields resound with shouts, the streets with praise,
The domes
with songs, the theaters with plays.
All altars flame: before each
altar lies,
Drench'd in his gore, the destin'd sacrifice.
Great
Caesar sits sublime upon his throne,
Before Apollo's porch of
Parian stone;
Accepts the presents vow'd for victory,
And hangs
the monumental crowns on high.
Vast crowds of vanquish'd nations
march along,
Various in arms, in habit, and in tongue.
Here,
Mulciber assigns the proper place
For Carians, and th' ungirt
Numidian race;
Then ranks the Thracians in the second row,
With
Scythians, expert in the dart and bow.
And here the tam'd
Euphrates humbly glides,
And there the Rhine submits her swelling
tides,
And proud Araxes, whom no bridge could bind;
The Danes'
unconquer'd offspring march behind,
And Morini, the last of
humankind.
These figures, on the shield divinely wrought,
By Vulcan
labor'd, and by Venus brought,
With joy and wonder fill the hero's
thought.
Unknown the names, he yet admires the grace,
And bears
aloft the fame and fortune of his race.