Aeneid

two hundred horsemen of Arcadia,

our choicest men-at-arms, shall ride; and he

in his own name an equal band shall bring

to follow only thee.” Such the discourse.

With meditative brows and downcast eyes

Aeneas and Achates, sad at heart,

mused on unnumbered perils yet to come.

But out of cloudless sky Cythera's Queen

gave sudden signal: from th' ethereal dome

a thunder-peal and flash of quivering fire

tumultuous broke, as if the world would fall,

and bellowing Tuscan trumpets shook the air.

All eyes look up. Again and yet again

crashed the terrible din, and where the sky

looked clearest hung a visionary cloud,

whence through the brightness blazed resounding arms.

All hearts stood still. But Troy's heroic son

knew that his mother in the skies redeemed

her pledge in sound of thunder: so he cried,

“Seek not, my friend, seek not thyself to read

the meaning of the omen. 'T is to me

Olympus calls. My goddess-mother gave

long since her promise of a heavenly sign

if war should burst; and that her power would bring

a panoply from Vulcan through the air,

to help us at our need. Alas, what deaths

over Laurentum's ill-starred host impend!

O Turnus, what a reckoning thou shalt pay

to me in arms! O Tiber, in thy wave

what helms and shields and mighty soldiers slain

shall in confusion roll! Yea, let them lead

their lines to battle, and our league abjure!”

He said: and from the lofty throne uprose.

Straightway he roused anew the slumbering fire

sacred to Hercules, and glad at heart

adored, as yesterday, the household gods

revered by good Evander, at whose side

the Trojan company made sacrifice

of chosen lambs, with fitting rites and true.

Then to his ships he tried him, and rejoined

his trusty followers, of whom he took

the best for valor known, to lend him aid

in deeds of war. Others he bade return

down stream in easy course, and tidings bear

to young Ascanius of the new event,

and of his father. Horses then were brought

for all the Teucrians to Etruria bound;

and for Aeneas one of rarest breed,

o'er whom a tawny robe descended low,

of lion-skin, with claws of gleaming gold.

Noised swiftly through the little town it flies

that to the precinct of the Tuscan King

armed horsemen speed. Pale mothers in great fear

unceasing pray; for panic closely runs

in danger's steps; the war-god drawing nigh

looms larger; and good sire Evander now

clings to the hand of his departing son

and, weeping without stay, makes sad farewell:

“O, that great Jove would give me once again

my vanished years! O, if such man I were,

as when beneath Praeneste's wall I slew

the front ranks of her sons, and burned for spoil

their gathered shields on my triumph day;

or when this right hand hurled king Erulus

to shades below, though—terrible to tell —

Feronia bore him with three lives, that thrice

he might arise from deadly strife o'erthrown,

and thrice be slain—yet all these lives took I,

and of his arms despoiled him o'er and o'er:

not now, sweet son (if such lost might were mine),

should I from thy beloved embrace be torn;

nor could Mezentius with insulting sword

do murder in my sight and make my land

depopulate and forlorn. O gods in Heaven,

and chiefly thou whom all the gods obey,

have pity, Jove, upon Arcadia's King,

and hear a father's prayer: if your intent

be for my Pallas a defence secure,

if it be writ that long as I shall live,

my eyes may see him, and my arms enfold,

I pray for life, and all its ills I bear.

But if some curse, too dark to tell, impend

from thee, O Fortune blind! I pray thee break

my thread of miserable life to-day;

to-day, while fear still doubts and hope still smiles

on the unknown to-morrow, as I hold

thee to my bosom, dearest child, who art

my last and only joy; to-day, before

th' intolerable tidings smite my ears.”

Such grief the royal father's heart outpoured

at this last parting; the strong arms of slaves

lifted him, fallen in swoon, and bore him home.

Now forth beneath the wide-swung city-gates

the mounted squadron poured; Aeneas rode,

companioned of Achates, in the van;

then other lords of Troy. There Pallas shone

conspicuous in the midmost line, with cloak

and blazoned arms, as when the Morning-star

(To Venus dearest of all orbs that burn),

out of his lucent bath in ocean wave