No More Learning

_The war being now begun, both the generals make all possible
preparations. Turnus sends to Diomedes. Æneas goes in person to
beg succours from Evander and the Tuscans. Evander receives him
kindly, furnishes him with men, and sends his son Pallas with him.
Vulcan, at the request of Venus, makes arms for her son Æneas, and
draws on his shield the most memorable actions of his posterity. _


When Turnus had assembled all his powers,
His standard planted on Laurentum's towers,
When now the sprightly trumpet, from afar,
Had given the signal of approaching war,
Had roused the neighing steeds to scour the fields,
While the fierce riders clattered on their shields,
Trembling with rage, the Latian youth prepare
To join the allies, and headlong rush to war.
Fierce Ufens, and Messapus, led the crowd,
With bold Mezentius, who blasphemed aloud.
These through 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:
"Æneas, landed on the Latian coast,
With banished gods, and with a baffled host,
Yet now aspired to conquest of the state,
And claimed a title from the gods and fate;
What numerous nations in his quarrel came,
And how they spread his formidable name.
What he designed, what mischiefs might arise,
If fortune favoured his first enterprize,
Was left for him to weigh, whose equal fears,
And common interest, was involved in theirs. "
While Turnus and the 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 designed;
Explores himself in vain, in every part,
And gives no rest to his distracted heart.
So, when the sun by day, or moon by night,
Strike on the polished brass their trembling light,[1]
The glittering 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 cieling flash the glaring day.
'Twas night; and weary nature lulled asleep
The birds of air, and fishes of the deep,
And beasts, and mortal men. The Trojan chief }
Was laid on Tyber's banks, oppressed with grief, }
And found, in silent slumber, late relief. }
Then, through 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 adorned his head:
Thus, manifest to sight, the god appeared,
And with these pleasing words his sorrow cheered:--
"Undoubted offspring of etherial race,
O long expected in this promised place!
Who, through the foes, hast borne thy banished gods,
Restored 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
The 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 banished band,
Driven with Evander from the Arcadian land,
Have planted here, and placed on high their walls;
Their town the founder Pallanteum calls,
Derived 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 power 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:
Tyber my name--among the rolling floods,
Renowned on earth, esteemed among the gods.
This is my certain seat. In times to come,
My waves shall wash the walls of mighty Rome. "
He said; and plunged below. While yet he spoke,
His dream Æneas 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 Tyber's flood, and thus the powers bespoke:--
"Laurentian nymphs, by whom the streams are fed,
And father Tyber, in thy sacred bed
Receive Æneas, and from danger keep.
Whatever fount, whatever holy deep,
Conceals thy watery 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 evening vows.
But, oh! 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 chuses, mans, and fits with oars.
Now on the shore the fatal swine is found--
Wonderous to tell! --She lay along the ground:
Her well-fed offspring at her udders hung;
She white herself, and white her thirty young.
Æneas takes the mother and her brood,
And all on Juno's altar are bestowed. [2]
The following night, and the succeeding day,
Propitious Tyber smoothed his watery way:
He rolled his river back, and poised 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 pitched 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 finished half his race,
Looked back, and doubted in the middle space,
When they from far beheld the rising towers,
The tops of sheds, and shepherds' lowly bowers,
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 turned his ships to shore.
'Twas on a solemn day: the Arcadian states,
The king and prince, without the city gates,
Then paid their offerings 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 stemmed the flood,
And glittered through the covert of the wood,
They rose with fear, and left the unfinished feast,
Till dauntless Pallas re-assured the rest
To pay the rites. Himself without delay
A javelin seized, and singly took his way,
Then gained a rising ground, and called from far:-- }
"Resolve me, strangers, whence, and what you are; }
Your business here; and bring you peace or war? " }
High on the stern Æneas took his stand,
And held a branch of olive in his hand,
While thus he spoke:--"The Phrygians' arms you see,
Expelled from Troy, provoked in Italy
By Latian foes, with war unjustly made--
At first affianced, and at last betrayed.
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,
Embraced the stranger prince, and joined his hand.
Conducted to the grove, Æneas 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, though I know
Your birth is Grecian, and your land my foe;
From Atreus though your ancient lineage came,
And both the brother kings your kindred claim;
Yet, my self-conscious worth, your high renown,
Your virtue, through the neighbouring nations blown,
Our fathers' mingled blood, Apollo's voice,
Have led me hither, less by need than choice.
Our father 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 the Arcadian side.
Raised by these hopes, I sent no news before, }
Nor asked 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 expelled, what farther force can stay
The victor troops from universal sway?
Then will they stretch their power athwart the land,
And either sea from side to side command.
Receive our offered faith, and give us thine;
Ours is a generous and experienced line:
We want not hearts nor bodies for the war;
In council cautious, and in fields we dare. "
He said; and, while he spoke, with piercing eyes
Evander viewed the man with vast surprise--
Pleased with his action, ravished with his face;
Then answered 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 though it be, 'tis fresh within my mind,
When Priam to his sister's court designed
A welcome visit, with a friendly stay,
And through the 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 pleased my sight:
But great Anchises, far above the rest,
With awful wonder fired my youthful breast.
I longed 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 constrained to go,
A Lycian quiver and a Gnossian bow,
A vest embroidered, 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. }
Honour our annual feast; and take your seat,
With friendly welcome, at a homely treat. "
Thus having said, the bowls (removed for fear)
The youths replaced, and soon restored the cheer.
On sods of turf he set the soldiers round:
A maple throne, raised higher from the ground,
Received the Trojan chief; and, o'er the bed,
A lion's shaggy hide, for ornament, they spread.
The loaves were served in canisters; the wine }
In bowls; the priest renewed the rites divine: }
Broiled entrails are their food, and beef's continued chine. }
But, when the rage of hunger was repressed,
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, saved from danger, with a grateful sense,
The labours 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 desert now it stands, exposed in air!
'Twas once a robber's den, inclosed around
With living stone, and deep beneath the ground,
The monster Cacus, more than half a beast,
This hold, impervious to the sun, possessed.
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 belched, and flakes of livid fire.
Time, long expected, eased us of our load,
And brought the needful presence of a god.
The avenging force of Hercules, from Spain, }
Arrived in triumph, from Geryon slain:-- }
Thrice lived the giant, and thrice lived in vain. }
His prize, the lowing herds, Alcides drove
Near Tyber's banks, to graze the shady grove.
Allured with hope of plunder, and intent
By force to rob, by fraud to circumvent,
The brutal Cacus, as by chance they strayed,
Four oxen thence, and four fair kine, conveyed.
And, lest the printed footsteps might be seen,
He dragged them 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 missed their mates, filled all around
With bellowings, and the rocks restored the sound.
One heifer, who had heard her love complain,
Roared from the cave, and made the project vain.
Alcides found the fraud; with rage he shook,
And tossed about his head his knotted oak.
Swift as the winds, or Scythian arrows' flight,
He clomb, with eager haste, the aërial height.
Then first we saw the monster mend his pace;
Fear in his eyes, and paleness in his face,
Confessed the god's approach. Trembling he springs,
As terror had increased his feet with wings;
Nor stayed 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 hewed it out, and bound with iron chains,)
He broke the heavy links, the mountain closed,
And bars and levers to his foe opposed.
The wretch had hardly made his dungeon fast;
The fierce avenger came with bounding haste;
Surveyed the mouth of the forbidden hold,
And here and there his raging eyes he rolled.
He gnashed his teeth; and thrice he compassed round
With winged speed the circuit of the ground.
Thrice at the cavern's mouth he pulled 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 winged their flight.
The leaning head hung threatening o'er the flood,
And nodded to the left. The hero stood
Averse, with planted feet, and, from the right,
Tugged at the solid stone with all his might.
Thus heaved, the fixed foundations of the rock
Gave way; heaven echoed at the rattling shock.
Tumbling, it choked the flood: on either side
The banks leap backward, and the streams divide;
The sky shrunk upward with unusual dread,
And trembling Tyber dived beneath his bed.
The court of Cacus stands revealed to sight;
The cavern glares with new-admitted light.
So the pent vapours, with a rumbling sound,
Heave from below, and rend the hollow ground;
A sounding flaw succeeds; and, from on high,
The gods with hate behold[3] the nether sky:
The ghosts repine at violated night,
And curse the invading sun, and sicken at the sight.
The graceless monster, caught in open day,
Inclosed, 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 and huge mouth, expires
Black clouds of smoke, amidst his father's fires,
Gathering, 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 through fumes, and gropes his way,
Half singed, half stifled, till he grasps his prey.
The monster, spewing fruitless flames, he found; }
He squeezed his throat; he writhed his neck around, }
And in a knot his crippled members bound; }
Then, from their sockets, tore his burning eyes.
Rolled on a heap, the breathless robber lies.
The doors, unbarred, receive the rushing day,
And thorough lights disclose the ravished prey.
The bulls, redeemed, breathe open air agen.
Next, by the feet, they drag him from his den.
The wondering neighbourhood, with glad surprise, }
Beheld his shagged breast, his giant size, }
His mouth that flames no more, and his extinguished eyes. }
From that auspicious day, with rites divine,
We worship at the hero's holy shrine.
Potitius first ordained these annual vows:
As priests, were added the Pinarian house,
Who raised this altar in the sacred shade,
Where honours, 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 twined,
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 involved, the long procession led;
Held high the flaming tapers in their hands,
As custom had prescribed 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 burden of the song.
The lay records the labours, and the praise,
And all the immortal acts of Hercules:
First, how the mighty babe, when swathed in bands,
The serpents strangled with his infant hands;
Then, as in years and matchless force he grew,
The Œchalian walls, and Trojan, overthrew.
Besides, a thousand hazards they relate,
Procured by Juno's and Eurystheus' hate.
"Thy hands, unconquered 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, seized with fear, forgot his mangled meat. }
The infernal waters trembled at thy sight;
Thee, god! no face of danger could affright;
Not huge Typhöeus, nor the unnumbered snake,
Increased with hissing heads, in Lerna's lake.
Hail, Jove's undoubted son! an added grace
To heaven and the great author of thy race!
Receive the grateful offerings 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 performed, the cheerful train retire.
Betwixt young Pallas and his aged sire,
The Trojan passed, the city to survey,
And pleasing talk beguiled the tedious way.
The stranger cast around his curious eyes,
New objects viewing still with new surprise;
With greedy joy inquires of various things,
And acts and monuments of ancient kings.
Then thus the founder of the Roman towers:--
"These woods were first the seat of sylvan powers,
Of Nymphs and Fauns, and savage men, who took
Their birth from trunks of trees and stubborn oak.
Nor laws they knew, nor manners, nor the care }
Of labouring oxen, nor the shining share, }
Nor arts of gain, nor what they gained to spare. }
Their exercise the chase; the running flood
Supplied their thirst, the trees supplied their food.
Then Saturn came, who fled the power of Jove,
Robbed of his realms, and banished from above.
The men, dispersed on hills, to towns he brought,
And laws ordained, and civil customs taught,
And Latium called 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 derived their name.
A more degenerate and discoloured age
Succeeded this, with avarice and rage.
The Ausonians then, and bold Sicanians, came;
And Saturn's empire often changed the name.
Then kings--gigantic Tybris, and the rest--
With arbitrary sway the land oppressed:
For Tyber's flood was Albula before,
Till, from the tyrant's fate, his name it bore.
I last arrived, driven from my native home,
By fortune's power, and fate's resistless doom.
Long tossed on seas, I sought this happy land,
Warned by my mother nymph, and called by heaven's command. "
Thus, walking on, he spoke, and shewed the gate,
Since called Carmental by the Roman state;
Where stood an altar, sacred to the name
Of old Carmenta, the prophetic dame,
Who to her son foretold the Ænean race,
Sublime in fame, and Rome's imperial place;--
Then shews the forests, 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 murdered guest,
Whose grave and tomb his innocence attest.
Thence, to the steep Tarpeian rock he leads--
Now roofed with gold, then thatched with homely reeds.
A reverent fear (such superstition reigns
Among the rude) even then possessed the swains.
Some god, they knew--what god, they could not tell--
Did there amidst the sacred horror dwell.
The Arcadians thought him Jove; and said they saw
The mighty Thunderer with majestic awe,
Who shook his shield, and dealt his bolts around,
And scattered 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 Janiculum's remains;
And either place the founder's name retains.
Discoursing thus together, they resort
Where poor Evander kept his country court.
They viewed the ground of Rome's litigious hall;
(Once oxen lowed, where now the lawyers bawl,)
Then, stooping, through the narrow gate they pressed,
When thus the king bespoke his Trojan guest:--
"Mean as it is, this palace, and this door,
Received 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 embraced the ground,
When love's fair goddess, anxious for her son,
(New tumults rising, and new wars begun,)
Couched 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 conspired with Grecian powers,
To level with the ground the Trojan towers,
I asked not aid the unhappy to restore,
Nor did the succour of thy skill implore;
Nor urged the labours of my lord in vain,
A sinking empire longer to sustain,
Though much I owed to Priam's house, and more
The danger of Æneas did deplore.
But now, by Jove's command, and fate's decree,
His race is doomed to reign in Italy;
With humble suit I beg thy needful art,
O still propitious power, that rul'st 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 combined
Against the reliques of the Phrygian kind,
With fire and sword my people to destroy,
And conquer Venus twice, in conquering Troy. "
She said; and strait 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 power, 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 required my helpful hand,
The artificer and art you might command,
To labour arms for Troy: nor Jove, nor Fate,
Confined 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 snatched the willing goddess to his arms;
Till, in her lap infused, he lay possessed
Of full desire, and sunk to pleasing rest.
Now when the night her middle race had rode,
And his first slumber had refreshed 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-opened eyes,
They ply the distaff by the winking light,
And to their daily labour add the night:
Thus frugally they earn their children's bread,
And uncorrupted keep their nuptial bed--
Not less concerned, nor at a later hour,
Rose from his downy couch the forging power.
Sacred to Vulcan's name, an isle there lay,
Betwixt Sicilia's coasts and Lipare,
Raised high on smoking rocks: and, deep below,
In hollow caves the fires of Ætna 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 through fuming tunnels soar.
Hither the father of the fire, by night,
Through 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--
Consumed 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 axle-trees, and blunted war,
And send him forth again with furbished 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 rolled;
Of this, their artful hands a shield prepare,
Alone sufficient to sustain the war.
Seven orbs within a spacious round they close:
One stirs the fire, and one the bellows blows.
The hissing steel is in the smithy drowned;
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 labours thus, and ply the Æolian 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 sheath 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 promised aid, he mends his pace,
But meets Æneas 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 chuse;
The Arcadian first their former talk renews:
"Undaunted prince! I never can believe
The Trojan empire lost, while you survive.
Command the assistance of a faithful friend:
But feeble are the succours I can send.
Our narrow kingdom here the Tyber 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 favour 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 Cære to the place,
Once Agyllina called. It flourished long,
In pride of wealth and warlike people strong,
Till cursed Mezentius, in a fatal hour,
Assumed the crown, with arbitrary power.
What words can paint those execrable times,
The subjects' sufferings, and the tyrant's crimes?
That blood, those murders, 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, choked with stench, in loathed embraces tied,
The lingering wretches pined away and died.
Thus plunged in ills, and meditating more--
The people's patience, tried, 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, favoured 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 numerous troops, now mustered 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, skilled in future fate,
With these foreboding words restrains their hate:--
"Ye brave in arms, ye Lydian blood, the flower
Of Tuscan youth, and choice of all their power,
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 powerful people; seek a foreign head. "
Awed with these words, in camps they still abide,
And wait with longing looks their promised guide.
Tarchon, the Tuscan chief, to me has sent
Their crown, and every 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 forced 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 vigour, and a foreign line.
Where Fate and smiling Fortune shew the way,
Pursue the ready path to sovereign 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 to admire and copy you.
Besides, two hundred horse he shall command--
Though 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 expressed;
Who, short of succours, and in deep despair,
Shook at the dismal prospect of the war.
But his bright mother, from a breaking cloud,
To cheer her issue, thundered thrice aloud;
Thrice forky lightning flashed along the sky,
And Tyrrhene trumpets thrice were heard on high.
Then, gazing up, repeated peals they hear;
And in a heaven serene, refulgent arms appear:
Reddening the skies, and glittering all around,
The tempered metals clash, and yield a silver sound.
The rest stood trembling: struck with awe divine,
Æneas only, conscious to the sign,
Presaged the event, and joyful viewed, above,
The accomplished promise of the queen of love.
Then, to the Arcadian king:--"This prodigy
(Dismiss your fear) belongs alone to me.
Heaven calls me to the war: the expected sign
Is given of promised 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 foreshowed
Approaching fights, and fields to float in blood.
Turnus shall dearly pay for faith forsworn;
And corps, and swords, and shields, on Tyber borne,
Shall choke his flood: now sound the loud alarms;
And, Latian troops, prepare your perjured arms. "
He said, and, rising from his homely throne,
The solemn rites of Hercules begun,
And on his altars waked the sleeping fires;
Then cheerful to his household gods retires;
There offers chosen sheep. The 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 prepared 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 through the little city spreads aloud
The 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 every moment to the sight.
Then old Evander, with a close embrace,
Strained his departing friend; and tears o'erflow his face.
"Would heaven (said he) my strength and youth recal,
Such as I was beneath Præneste's wall--
Then when I made the foremost foes retire,
And set whole heaps of conquered 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 returned no more--
Such if I stood renewed, not these alarms,
Nor death, should rend me from my Pallas' arms;
Nor proud Mezentius thus, unpunished, boast
His rapes and murders 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 returned with peace and victory;
If the loved 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 doomed to death his undeserving head;
This, O! this very moment let me die,
While hopes and fears in equal balance lie;
While, yet possessed 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 languished limbs upon his homely bed.
The horsemen march; the gates are opened wide;
Æneas at their head, Achates by his side.
Next these, the Trojan leaders rode along;
Last, follows in the rear the Arcadian throng.
Young Pallas shone conspicuous o'er the rest;
Gilded his arms, embroidered was his vest.
So, from the seas, exerts his radiant head
The star, by whom the lights of heaven 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,
Incompassed round with gloomy hills above,
Which add a holy horror to the grove.
The first inhabitants, of Grecian blood,
That sacred forest to Silvanus vowed,
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,
Æneas cast his wondering eyes around,
And all the Tyrrhene army had in sight,
Stretched on the spacious plain from left to right.
Thither his warlike train the Trojan led,
Refreshed his men, and wearied horses fed.
Meantime the mother goddess, crowned with charms,
Breaks through the clouds, and brings the fated arms.
Within a winding vale she finds her son,
On the cool river's banks, retired alone.
She shews her heavenly form without disguise,
And gives herself to his desiring eyes.
"Behold (she said) performed, in every part,
My promise made, and Vulcan's laboured art.
Now seek, secure, the Latian enemy,
And haughty Turnus to the field defy. "
She said: and, having first her son embraced,
The radiant arms beneath an oak she placed.
Proud of the gift, he rolled his greedy sight
Around the work, and gazed 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 tempered steel, one stiff with gold:
Both ample, flaming both, and beamy bright;
So shines a cloud, when edged with adverse light.
He shakes the pointed spear, and longs to try
The plaited cuishes on his manly thigh;
But most admires the shield's mysterious mould,
And Roman triumphs rising on the gold:
For there, embossed, the heavenly 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 dressed with mossy greens:
There, by the wolf, were laid the martial twins.
Intrepid on her swelling dugs they hung:
The foster-dam lolled out her fawning tongue:
They sucked secure, while, bending back her head,
She licked their tender limbs, and formed 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 armed, with each a charger in his hand:
A fatted sow for sacrifice is led,
With imprecations on the perjured head.
Near this, the traitor Metius, stretched between
Four fiery steeds, is dragged 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 banished 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 threatening, half disdaining, stood,
While Cocles broke the bridge, and stemmed the flood.
The captive maids there tempt the raging tide,
'Scaped from their chains, with Clœlia 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 thatched with straw, now roofed with gold.
The silver goose before the shining gate
There flew, and, by her cackle, saved the state.
She told the Gauls' approach: the 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 through the streets the mad Luperci dance:
In caps of wool; the targets dropt from heaven.
Here modest matrons, in soft litters driven,
To pay their vows in solemn pomp appear,
And odorous gums in their chaste hands they bear.
Far hence removed, the Stygian seats are seen;
Pains of the damned, and punished 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 glittering waves, and cut the precious tide.
Amid the main, two mighty fleets engage--
Their brazen beaks opposed with equal rage.
Actium surveys the well-disputed prize:
Leucate's watery plain with foamy billows fries.
Young Cæsar, on the stern, in armour 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 prosperous gales,
And, with propitious gods, his foes assails.
A naval crown, that binds his manly brows,
The happy fortune of the fight foreshows.
Ranged on the line opposed, Antonius brings
Barbarian aids, and troops of eastern kings,
The 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--the Egyptian wife.
Moving they fight: with oars and forky prows,
The froth is gathered, and the water glows.
It seems, as if the Cyclades again
Were rooted up, and jostled in the main;
Or floating mountains floating mountains meet;
Such is the fierce encounter of the fleet.
Fire-balls are thrown, and pointed javelins fly;
The fields of Neptune take a purple dye.
The queen herself, amidst the loud alarms,
With cymbals tossed, her fainting soldiers warms--
Fool as she was! who had not yet divined
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 the etherial train.
Mars, in the middle of the shining shield,
Is graved, and strides along the liquid field.
The Diræ sowse from heaven 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 Sabæans quit the watery 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 figured her, as driven along
By winds and waves, and scudding through 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 expressed,
And Rome triumphant with his presence blessed.
Three hundred temples in the town he placed;
With spoils and altars every temple graced.
Three shining nights, and three succeeding days, }
The fields resound with shouts, the streets with praise, }
The domes with songs, the theatres with plays. }
All altars flame: before each altar lies,
Drenched in his gore, the destined sacrifice,
Great Cæsar sits sublime upon his throne,
Before Apollo's porch of Parian stone;
Accepts the presents vowed for victory,
And hangs the monumental crowns on high.
Vast crowds of vanquished nations march along,
Various in arms, in habit, and in tongue.
Here, Mulciber assigns the proper place
For Carians, and the ungirt Numidian race;
Then ranks the Tracians in the second row,
With Scythians, expert in the dart and bow.
And here the tamed Euphrates humbly glides,
And there the Rhine submits her swelling tides,
And proud Araxes, whom no bridge could bind. }
The Danes' unconquered offspring march behind; }
And Morini, the last of human kind. }
These figures, on the shield divinely wrought, }
By Vulcan laboured, 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.




NOTES

ON

ÆNEÏS, BOOK VIII.


Note I.

_So, when the sun by day, or moon by night,
Strike on the polished brass their trembling light. _--P. 2.

This similitude is literally taken from Apollonius Rhodius; and it is
hard to say whether the original or the translation excels. But, in
the shield which he describes afterwards in this Æneïd, he as much
transcends his master Homer, as the arms of Glaucus were richer than
those of Diomedes--Χρυσεα χαλχειων.


Note II.

_Æneas takes the mother and her brood,
And all on Juno's altar are bestowed. _--P. 4.

The translation is infinitely short of Virgil, whose words are these:

----_Tibi_ enim, _tibi maxima Juno,
Mactat, sacra ferens, et cum grege sistit ad aram_--

for I could not turn the word _enim_ into English with any grace,
though it was of such necessity in the Roman rites, that a sacrifice
could not be performed without it. It is of the same nature, (if I may
presume to name that sacred mystery,) in our words of consecration at
the altar.




Æ N E Ï S,


BOOK IX.

ARGUMENT.

_Turnus takes advantage of Æneas's absence, fires some of his
ships, (which are transformed into sea-nymphs,) and assaults
his camp. The Trojans, reduced to the last extremities, send
Nisus and Euryalus to recal Æneas; which furnishes the poet with
that admirable episode of their friendship, generosity, and the
conclusion of their adventures. _


While these affairs in distant places passed,
The various Iris Juno sends with haste,
To find bold Turnus, who, with anxious thought,
The secret shade of his great grandsire sought.
Retired alone she found the daring man,
And oped her rosy lips, and thus began:--
"What none of all the gods could grant thy vows--
That, Turnus, this auspicious day bestows.
Æneas, gone to seek the Arcadian prince,
Has left the Trojan camp without defence;
And, short of succours there, employs his pains
In parts remote to raise the Tuscan swains.
Now snatch an hour that favours thy designs;
Unite thy forces, and attack their lines. "
This said, on equal wings she poised her weight,
And formed a radiant rainbow in her flight.
The Daunian hero lifts his hands and eyes,
And thus invokes the goddess as she flies:--
"Iris, the grace of heaven! what power divine
Has sent thee down, through dusky clouds to shine?
See, they divide: immortal day appears,
And glittering planets dancing in their spheres!
With joy, these happy omens I obey,
And follow, to the war, the god that leads the way. "
Thus having said, as by the brook he stood,
He scooped the water from the crystal flood;
Then with his hands the drops to heaven he throws,
And loads the powers above with offered vows.
Now march the bold confederates through the plain,
Well horsed, well clad--a rich and shining train.
Messapus leads the van; and, in the rear,
The sons of Tyrrheus in bright arms appear.
In the main battle, with his flaming crest,
The mighty Turnus towers above the rest,
Silent they move, majestically slow,
Like ebbing Nile, or Ganges in his flow.
The Trojans view the dusty cloud from far,
And the dark menace of the distant war.
Caïcus from the rampire saw it rise,
Blackening the fields, and thickening through the skies.
Then to his fellows thus aloud he calls:--
"What rolling clouds, my friends, approach the walls?
Arm! arm! and man the works! prepare your spears,
And pointed darts! the Latian host appears. "
Thus warned, they shut their gates; with shouts ascend
The bulwarks, and, secure, their foes attend:
For their wise general, with foreseeing care,
Had charged them not to tempt the doubtful war,
Nor, though provoked, in opens fields advance,
But close within their lines attend their chance.
Unwilling, yet they keep the strict command,
And sourly wait in arms the hostile band.
The fiery Turnus flew before the rest: }
A piebald steed of Thracian strain he pressed; }
His helm of massy gold; and crimson was his crest. }
With twenty horse to second his designs,
An unexpected foe, he faced the lines. --
"Is there, (he said,) in arms, who bravely dare
His leader's honour and his dangers share? "
Then spurring on, his brandished dart he threw,
In sign of war: applauding shouts ensue.
Amazed to find a dastard race, that run
Behind the rampires, and the battle shun,
He rides around the camp, with rolling eyes,
And stops at every post, and every passage tries.
So roams the nightly wolf about the fold:
Wet with descending showers, and stiff with cold,
He howls for hunger, and he grins for pain,
(His gnashing teeth are exercised in vain,)
And, impotent of anger, finds no way
In his distended paws to grasp the prey.
The mothers listen; but the bleating lambs
Securely swig the dug, beneath the dams.
Thus ranges eager Turnus o'er the plain,
Sharp with desire, and furious with disdain;
Surveys each passage with a piercing sight,
To force his foes in equal field to fight.
Thus while he gazes round, at length he spies,
Where, fenced with strong redoubts, their navy lies.
Close underneath the walls: the washing tide
Secures from all approach this weaker side.
He takes the wished occasion, fills his hand
With ready fires, and shakes a flaming brand.
Urged by his presence, every soul is warmed,
And every hand with kindled fires is armed.
From the fired pines the scattering sparkles fly;
Fat vapours, mixed with flames, involve the sky.
What power, O Muses, could avert the flame,
Which threatened, in the fleet, the Trojan name?
Tell: for the fact, through length of time obscure,
Is hard to faith; yet shall the fame endure.
'Tis said, that, when the chief prepared his flight,
And felled his timber from mount Ida's height,
The Grandame goddess then approached her son,
And with a mother's majesty begun:--
"Grant me (she said) the sole request I bring,
Since conquered heaven has owned you for its king.
On Ida's brows, for ages past, there stood,
With firs and maples filled, a shady wood;
And on the summit rose a sacred grove,
Where I was worshipped with religious love.
These woods, that holy grove, my long delight,
I gave the Trojan prince, to speed his flight.
Now, filled with fear, on their behalf I come;
Let neither winds o'erset, nor waves intomb,
The floating forests of the sacred pine;
But let it be their safety to be mine. "
Then thus replied her awful son, who rolls
The radiant stars, and heaven and earth controuls:--
"How dare you, mother, endless date demand
For vessels moulded by a mortal hand?
What then is fate? Shall bold Æneas ride,
Of safety certain, on the uncertain tide?
Yet, what I can, I grant: when, wafted o'er,
The chief is landed on the Latian shore,
Whatever ships escape the raging storms,
At my command shall change their fading forms
To nymphs divine, and plough the watery way,
Like Doto and the daughters of the sea. "
To seal his sacred vow, by Styx he swore,
The lake of liquid pitch, the dreary shore,
And Phlegethon's innavigable flood, }
And the black regions of his brother god. }
He said; and shook the skies with his imperial nod.