Aeneid

These now (for in the silent forest couched

the cruel Fury) swift to battle flew.

One brandished a charred stake, another swung

a knotted cudgel, as rude anger shapes

its weapon of whate'er the searching eye

first haps to fall on. Tyrrhus roused his clans,

just when by chance he split with blows of wedge

an oak in four; and, panting giant breath,

shouldered his woodman's axe. Alecto then,

prompt to the stroke of mischief, soared aloft

from where she spying sate, to the steep roof

of a tall byre, and from its peak of straw

blew a wild signal on a shepherd's horn,

outflinging her infernal note so far

that all the forest shuddered, and the grove

throbbed to its deepest glen. Cold Trivia's lake

from end to end gave ear, and every wave

of the white stream of Nar, the lonely pools

of still Velinus heard: while at the sound

pale mothers to their breasts their children drew.

Swift to the signal of the dreadful horn,

snatching their weapons rude, the freeborn swains

assembled for the fray; the Trojan bands

poured from their bivouac with instant aid

for young Ascanius. In array of war

both stand confronting. Not mere rustic brawl

with charred oak-staff and cudgel is the fight,

but with the two-edged steel; the naked swords

wave like dark-bladed harvest-field, while far

the brazen arms flash in the smiting sun,

and skyward fling their beam: so some wide sea,

at first but whitened in the rising wind,

swells its slow-rolling mass and ever higher

its billows rears, until the utmost deep

lifts in one surge to heaven. The first to fall

was Almo, eldest-born of Tyrrhus' sons,

whom, striding in the van, a loud-winged shaft

laid low in death; deep in his throat it clung,

and silenced with his blood the dying cry

of his frail life. Around him fell the forms

of many a brave and strong; among them died

gray-haired Galaesus pleading for a truce:

righteous he was, and of Ausonian fields

a prosperous master; five full flocks had he

of bleating sheep, and from his pastures came

five herds of cattle home; his busy churls

turned with a hundred ploughs his fruitful glebe.

While o'er the battle-field thus doubtful swung

the scales of war, the Fury (to her task

now equal proven) having dyed the day

a deep-ensanguined hue, and opened fight

with death and slaughter, made no tarrying

within Hesperia, but skyward soared,

and, Ioud in triumph, insolently thus

to Juno called: “See, at thy will, their strife

full-blown to war and woe! Could even thyself

command them now to truce and amity?

But I, that with Ausonia's blood befoul

their Trojan hands, yet more can do, if thou

shift not thy purpose. For with dire alarms

I will awake the bordering states to war

enkindling in their souls the frenzied lust

the war-god breathes; till from th' horizon round

the reinforcement pours—I scattering seeds

of carnage through the land.” In answer spoke

juno: “Enough of artifice and fear!

Thy provocation works. Now have they joined

in close and deadly combat, and warm blood

those sudden-leaping swords incarnadines,

which chance put in their hands. Such nuptial joys,

such feast of wedlock, let the famous son

of Venus with the King Latinus share!

But yon Olympian Sire and King no more

permits thee freely in our skies to roam.

Go, quit the field! Myself will take control

of hazards and of labors yet to be.”

Thus Saturn's daughter spoke. Alecto then,

unfolding far her hissing, viperous wings,

turned toward her Stygian home, and took farewell

of upper air. Deep in Italia lies

a region mountain-girded, widely famed,

and known in olden songs from land to land:

the valley of Amsanctus; deep, dark shades

enclose it between forest-walls, whereby

through thunderous stony channel serpentines

a roaring fall. Here in a monstrous cave

are breathing-holes of hell, a vast abyss

where Acheron opes wide its noisome jaws:

in this Alecto plunged, concealing so

her execrable godhead, while the air

of earth and heaven felt the curse removed.

Forthwith the sovereign hands of Juno haste

to consummate the war. The shepherds bear

back from the field of battle to the town

the bodies of the slain: young Almo's corse

and gray Galaesus' bleeding head. They call

just gods in heaven to Iook upon their wrong,

and bid Latinus see it. Turnus comes,

and, while the angry mob surveys the slain,

adds fury to the hour. “Shall the land