Aeneid

to Saturn's Ioins ascends. O heavenly sire,

from thee the stem began! But Fate had given

to King Latinus' body no heirs male:

for taken in the dawning of his day

his only son had been; and now his home

and spacious palace one sole daughter kept,

who was grown ripe to wed and of full age

to take a husband. Many suitors tried

from all Ausonia and Latium's bounds;

but comeliest in all their princely throng

came Turnus, of a line of mighty sires.

Him the queen mother chiefly loved, and yearned

to call him soon her son. But omens dire

and menaces from Heaven withstood her will.

A laurel-tree grew in the royal close,

of sacred leaf and venerated age,

which, when he builded there his wall and tower,

Father Latinus found, and hallowed it

to Phoebus' grace and power, wherefrom the name

Laurentian, which his realm and people bear.

Unto this tree-top, wonderful to tell,

came hosts of bees, with audible acclaim

voyaging the stream of air, and seized a place

on the proud, pointing crest, where the swift swarm,

with interlacement of close-clinging feet,

swung from the leafy bough. “Behold, there comes,”

the prophet cried, “a husband from afar!

To the same region by the self-same path

behold an arm'd host taking lordly sway

upon our city's crown!” Soon after this,

when, coming to the shrine with torches pure,

Lavinia kindled at her father's side

the sacrifice, swift seemed the flame to burn

along her flowing hair—O sight of woe!

Over her broidered snood it sparkling flew,

lighting her queenly tresses and her crown

of jewels rare: then, wrapt in flaming cloud,

from hall to hall the fire-god's gift she flung.

This omen dread and wonder terrible

was rumored far: for prophet-voices told

bright honors on the virgin's head to fall

by Fate's decree, but on her people, war.

The King, sore troubled by these portents, sought

oracular wisdom of his sacred sire,

Faunus, the fate-revealer, where the groves

stretch under high Albunea, and her stream

roars from its haunted well, exhaling through

vast, gloomful woods its pestilential air.

Here all Oenotria's tribes ask oracles

in dark and doubtful days: here, when the priest

has brought his gifts, and in the night so still,

couched on spread fleeces of the offered flock,

awaiting slumber lies, then wondrously

a host of flitting shapes he sees, and hears

voices that come and go: with gods he holds

high converse, or in deep Avernian gloom

parleys with Acheron. Thither drew near

Father Latinus, seeking truth divine.

Obedient to the olden rite, he slew

a hundred fleecy sheep, and pillowed lay

upon their outstretched skins. Straightway a voice

out of the lofty forest met his prayer.

“Seek not in wedlock with a Latin lord

to join thy daughter, O my son and seed!

Beware this purposed marriage! There shall come

sons from afar, whose blood shall bear our name

starward; the children of their mighty loins,

as far as eve and morn enfold the seas,

shall see a subject world beneath their feet

submissive lie.” This admonition given

Latinus hid not. But on restless wing

rumor had spread it, when the men of Troy

along the river-bank of mounded green

their fleet made fast.Aeneas and his chiefs,

with fair Iulus, under spreading boughs

of one great tree made resting-place, and set

the banquet on. Thin loaves of altar-bread

along the sward to bear their meats were laid

(such was the will of Jove), and wilding fruits

rose heaping high, with Ceres' gift below.

Soon, all things else devoured, their hunger turned

to taste the scanty bread, which they attacked

with tooth and nail audacious, and consumed

both round and square of that predestined leaven.

“Look, how we eat our tables even!” cried

Iulus, in a jest. Such was the word

which bade their burdens fall. From his boy's lip

the father caught this utterance of Fate,

silent with wonder at the ways of Heaven;

then swift he spoke: “Hail! O my destined shore,

protecting deities of Ilium, hail!

Here is our home, our country here! This day

I publish the mysterious prophecy

by Sire Anchises given: ‘My son,’ said he,

‘When hunger in strange lands shall bid devour

the tables of thy banquet gone, then hope

for home, though weary, and take thought to build

a dwelling and a battlement.’ Behold!

This was our fated hunger! This last proof

will end our evil days. Up, then! For now