No More Learning

Likewise they lead
forth the chariot bathed in Rutulian blood; behind goes weeping Aethon
the war-horse, his trappings laid away, and big drops wet his face.
Others bear his spear and helmet, for all else is Turnus' prize. Then
follow in mourning array the Teucrians and all the Tyrrhenians, and the
Arcadians with arms reversed. When the whole long escorting file had
taken its way, Aeneas stopped, and sighing deep, pursued thus: 'Once
again war's dreadful destiny calls us hence to other tears:
[97-129]hail thou for evermore, O princely Pallas, and for evermore
farewell. ' And without more words he bent his way to the high walls and
advanced towards his camp.

And now envoys were there from the Latin city with wreathed boughs of
olive, praying him of his grace to restore the dead that lay strewn by
the sword over the plain, and let them go to their earthy grave: no war
lasts with men conquered and bereft of breath; let this indulgence be
given to men once called friends and fathers of their brides. To them
Aeneas grants leave in kind and courteous wise, spurning not their
prayer, and goes on in these words: 'What spite of fortune, O Latins,
hath entangled you in the toils of war, and made you fly our friendship?
Plead you for peace to the lifeless bodies that the battle-lot hath
slain? I would fain grant it even to the living. Neither have I come but
because destiny had given me this place to dwell in; nor wage I war with
your people; your king it is who hath broken our covenant and preferred
to trust himself to Turnus' arms. Fitter it were Turnus had faced death
to-day. If he will fight out the war and expel the Teucrians, it had
been well to meet me here in arms; so had he lived to whom life were
granted of heaven or his own right hand. Now go, and kindle the fire
beneath your hapless countrymen. ' Aeneas ended: they stood dumb in
silence, with faces bent steadfastly in mutual gaze. Then aged Drances,
ever young Turnus' assailant in hatred and accusation, with the words of
his mouth thus answers him again:

'O Trojan, great in renown, yet greater in arms, with what praises may I
extol thy divine goodness? Shall thy righteousness first wake my wonder,
or thy toils in war? We indeed will gratefully carry these words to our
fathers' city, and, if fortune grant a way, will make thee at one with
King Latinus. Let Turnus seek his own alliances. Nay, [130-163]it will
be our delight to rear the massy walls of destiny and stoop our
shoulders under the stones of Troy. '

He ended thus, and all with one voice murmured assent. Twelve days'
truce is struck, and in mediation of the peace Teucrians and Latins
stray mingling unharmed on the forest heights. The tall ash echoes to
the axe's strokes; they overturn pines that soar into the sky, and
busily cleave oaken logs and scented cedar with wedges, and drag
mountain-ashes on their groaning waggons.

And now flying Rumour, harbinger of the heavy woe, fills Evander and
Evander's house and city with the same voice that but now told of Pallas
victorious over Latium. The Arcadians stream to the gates, snatching
funeral torches after their ancient use; the road gleams with the long
line of flame, and parts the fields with a broad pathway of light; the
arriving crowd of Phrygians meets them and mingles in mourning array.
When the matrons saw all the train approach their dwellings they kindle
the town with loud wailing. But no force may withhold Evander; he comes
amid them; the bier is set down; he flings himself on Pallas, and clasps
him with tears and sighs, and scarcely at last does grief leave his
voice's utterance free. 'Other than this, O Pallas! was thy promise to
thy father, that thou wouldst not plunge recklessly into the fury of
battle. I knew well how strong was the fresh pride of arms and the
sweetness of honour in a first battle. Ah, unhappy first-fruits of his
youth and bitter prelude of the war upon our borders! ah, vows and
prayers of mine that no god heard! and thou, pure crown of wifehood,
happy that thou art dead and not spared for this sorrow! But I have
outgone my destiny in living, to stay here the survivor of my child.
Would I had followed the allied arms of Troy, to be overwhelmed by
Rutulian weapons! Would my life had been given, and I and not my Pallas
were borne home in this [164-198]procession! I would not blame you, O
Teucrians, nor our treaty and the friendly hands we clasped: our old age
had that appointed debt to pay. Yet if untimely death awaited my son, it
will be good to think he fell leading the Teucrians into Latium, and
slew his Volscian thousands before he fell. Nay, no other funeral than
this would I deem thy due, my Pallas, than good Aeneas does, than the
mighty Phrygians, than the Tyrrhene captains and all the army of
Tyrrhenia. Great are the trophies they bring on whom thine hand deals
death; thou also, Turnus, wert standing now a great trunk dressed in
arms, had his age and his strength of years equalled thine. But why,
unhappy, do I delay the Trojan arms? Go, and forget not to carry this
message to your king: Thine hand it is that keeps me lingering in a life
that is hateful since Pallas fell, and Turnus is the debt thou seest son
and father claim: for thy virtue and thy fortune this scope alone is
left. I ask not joy in life; I may not; but to carry this to my son deep
in the under world. '

Meanwhile Dawn had raised her gracious light on weary men, bringing back
task and toil: now lord Aeneas, how Tarchon, have built the pyres on the
winding shore. Hither in ancestral fashion hath each borne the bodies of
his kin; the dark fire is lit beneath, and the vapour hides high heaven
in gloom. Thrice, girt in glittering arms, they have marched about the
blazing piles, thrice compassed on horseback the sad fire of death, and
uttered their wail. Tears fall fast upon earth and armour; cries of men
and blare of trumpets roll skyward. Then some fling on the fire Latin
spoils stripped from the slain, helmets and shapely swords, bridles and
glowing chariot wheels; others familiar gifts, the very shields and
luckless weapons of the dead. Around are slain in sacrifice oxen many in
number, and bristly swine and cattle gathered out of all the country
[199-234]are slaughtered over the flames. Then, crowding the shore,
they gaze on their burning comrades, and guard the embers of the pyres,
and cannot tear themselves away till dewy Night wheels on the
star-spangled glittering sky.

Therewithal the unhappy Latins far apart build countless pyres and bury
many bodies of men in the ground; and many more they lift and bear away
to the neighbouring country, or send them back to the city; the rest, a
vast heap of undistinguishable slaughter, they burn uncounted and
unhonoured; on all sides the broad fields gleam with crowded rivalry of
fires. The third Dawn had rolled away the chill shadow from the sky;
mournfully they piled high the ashes and mingled bones from the embers,
and heaped a load of warm earth above them. Now in the dwellings of rich
Latinus' city the noise is loudest and most the long wail. Here mothers
and their sons' unhappy brides, here beloved sisters sad-hearted and
orphaned boys curse the disastrous war and Turnus' bridal, and bid him
his own self arm and decide the issue with the sword, since he claims
for himself the first rank and the lordship of Italy. Drances fiercely
embitters their cry, and vouches that Turnus alone is called, alone is
claimed for battle. Yet therewith many a diverse-worded counsel is for
Turnus, and the great name of the queen overshadows him, and he rises
high in renown of trophies fitly won.

Among their stir, and while confusion is fiercest, lo! to crown all, the
envoys from great Diomede's city bring their gloomy message: nothing is
come of all the toil and labour spent; gifts and gold and strong
entreaties have been of no avail; Latium must seek other arms, or sue
for peace to the Trojan king. For heavy grief King Latinus himself
swoons away. The wrath of heaven and the fresh graves before his eyes
warn him that Aeneas is borne on by fate's evident will. So he sends
imperial summons to [235-269]his high council, the foremost of his
people, and gathers them within his lofty courts. They assemble, and
stream up the crowded streets to the royal dwelling. Latinus, eldest in
years and first in royalty, sits amid them with cheerless brow, and bids
the envoys sent back from the Aetolian city tell the news they bring,
and demands a full and ordered reply. Then tongues are hushed; and
Venulus, obeying his word, thus begins to speak:

'We have seen, O citizens, Diomede in his Argive camp, and outsped our
way and passed all its dangers, and touched the hand whereunder the land
of Ilium fell. He was founding a town, named Argyripa after his
ancestral people, on the conquered fields of Iapygian Garganus. After we
entered in, and licence of open speech was given, we lay forth our
gifts, we instruct him of our name and country, who are its invaders,
and why we are drawn to Arpi. He heard us, and replied thus with face
unstirred:

'"O fortunate races, realm of Saturn, Ausonians of old, how doth fortune
vex your quiet and woo you to tempt wars you know not? We that have
drawn sword on the fields of Ilium--I forbear to tell the drains of war
beneath her high walls, the men sunken in yonder Simois--have all over
the world paid to the full our punishment and the reward of guilt, a
crew Priam's self might pity; as Minerva's baleful star knows, and the
Euboic reefs and Caphereus' revenge. From that warfaring driven to alien
shores, Menelaus son of Atreus is in exile far as Proteus' Pillars,
Ulysses hath seen the Cyclopes of Aetna. Shall I make mention of the
realm of Neoptolemus, and Idomeneus' household gods overthrown? or of
the Locrians who dwell on the Libyan beach? Even the lord of Mycenae,
the mighty Achaeans' general, sank on his own threshold edge under his
accursed wife's hand, where the adulterer crouched over conquered Asia.
Aye, or that the gods grudged it me to return to [270-301]my ancestral
altars, to see the bride of my desire, and lovely Calydon! Now likewise
sights of appalling presage pursue me; my comrades, lost to me, have
soared winging into the sky, and flit birds about the rivers--ah me,
dread punishment of my people! --and fill the cliffs with their
melancholy cries. This it was I had to look for even from the time when
I madly assailed celestial limbs with steel, and sullied the hand of
Venus with a wound. Do not, ah, do not urge me to such battles. Neither
have I any war with Troy since her towers are overthrown, nor do I
remember with delight the woes of old. Turn to Aeneas with the gifts you
bear to me from your ancestral borders. We have stood to face his grim
weapons, and met him hand to hand; believe one who hath proved it, how
mightily he rises over his shield, in what a whirlwind he hurls his
spear. Had the land of Ida borne two more like him, Dardanus had marched
to attack the towns of Inachus, and Greece were mourning fate's reverse.
In all our delay before that obstinate Trojan city, it was Hector and
Aeneas whose hand stayed the Grecian victory and bore back its advance
to the tenth year. Both were splendid in courage, both eminent in arms;
Aeneas was first in duty. Let your hands join in treaty as they may; but
beware that your weapons close not with his. "

'Thou hast heard, most gracious king, at once what is the king's answer,
and what his counsel for our great struggle. '

Scarcely thus the envoys, when a diverse murmur ran through the troubled
lips of the Ausonians; even as, when rocks delay some running river, it
plashes in the barred pool, and the banks murmur nigh to the babbling
wave. So soon as their minds were quieted, and their hurrying lips
hushed, the king, first calling on the gods, begins from his lofty
throne:

[302-336]'Ere now could I wish, O Latins, we had determined our course
of state, and it had been better thus; not to meet in council at such a
time as now, with the enemy seated before our walls. We wage an
ill-timed war, fellow-citizens, with a divine race, invincible, unbroken
in battle, who brook not even when conquered to drop the sword. If you
had hope in appeal to Aetolian arms, abandon it; though each man's hope
is his own, you discern how narrow a path it is. Beyond that you see
with your eyes and handle with your hands the total ruin of our
fortunes. I blame no one; what valour's utmost could do is done; we have
fought with our whole kingdom's strength. Now I will unfold what I
doubtfully advise and purpose, and with your attention instruct you of
it in brief. There is an ancient land of mine bordering the Tuscan
river, stretching far westward beyond the Sicanian borders. Auruncans
and Rutulians sow on it, work the stiff hills with the ploughshare, and
pasture them where they are roughest. Let all this tract, with a
pine-clad belt of mountain height, pass to the Teucrians in friendship;
let us name fair terms of treaty, and invite them as allies to our
realm; let them settle, if they desire it so, and found a city. But if
they have a mind to try other coasts and another people, and can abide
to leave our soil, let us build twice ten ships of Italian oak, or as
many more as they can man; timber lies at the water's edge for all; let
them assign the number and fashion of the vessels, and we will supply
brass, labour, dockyards. Further, it is our will that an hundred
ambassadors of the highest rank in Latium shall go to bear our words and
ratify the treaty, holding forth in their hands the boughs of peace, and
carrying for gifts weight of gold and ivory, and the chair and striped
robe, our royal array. Give counsel openly, and succour our exhausted
state. '

Then Drances again, he whose jealous ill-will was [337-370]wrought to
anger and stung with bitterness by Turnus' fame, lavish of wealth and
quick of tongue though his hand was cold in war, held no empty
counsellor and potent in faction--his mother's rank ennobled a lineage
whose paternal source was obscure--rises, and with these words heaps and
heightens their passion:

'Dark to no man and needing no voice of ours, O gracious king, is that
whereon thou takest counsel. All confess they know how our nation's
fortune sways; but their words are choked. Let him grant freedom of
speech and abate his breath, he by whose disastrous government and
perverse way (I will speak out, though he menace me with arms and death)
we see so many stars of battle gone down and all our city sunk in
mourning; while he, confident in flight, assails the Trojan camp and
makes heaven quail before his arms. Add yet one to those gifts of thine,
to all the riches thou bidst us send or promise to the Dardanians, most
gracious of kings, but one; let no man's passion overbear thee from
giving thine own daughter to an illustrious son and a worthy marriage,
and binding this peace by perpetual treaty. Yet if we are thus
terror-stricken heart and soul, let us implore him in person, in person
plead him of his grace to give way, to restore king and country their
proper right. Why again and again hurlest thou these unhappy citizens on
peril so evident, O source and spring of Latium's woes? In war is no
safety; peace we all implore of thee, O Turnus, and the one pledge that
makes peace inviolable. I the first, I whom thou picturest thine enemy,
as I care not if I am, see, I bow at thy feet. Pity thine allies;
relent, and retire before thy conqueror. Enough have we seen of rout and
death, and desolation over our broad lands. Or if glory stir thee, if
such strength kindle in thy breast, and if a palace so delight thee for
thy dower, be bold, and advance stout-hearted upon the foe. We verily,
that Turnus [371-406]may have his royal bride, must lie scattered on
the plains, worthless lives, a crowd unburied and unwept. Do thou also,
if thou hast aught of might, if the War-god be in thee as in thy
fathers, look him in the face who challenges. . . . '

At these words Turnus' passion blazed out. He utters a groan, and breaks
forth thus in deep accents:

'Copious indeed, Drances, and fluent is ever thy speech at the moment
war calls for action; and when the fathers are summoned thou art there
the first. But we need no words to fill our senate-house, safely as thou
wingest them while the mounded walls keep off the enemy, and the
trenches swim not yet with blood. Thunder on in rhetoric, thy wonted
way: accuse thou me of fear, Drances, since thine hand hath heaped so
many Teucrians in slaughter, and thy glorious trophies dot the fields.
Trial is open of what live valour can do; nor indeed is our foe far to
seek; on all sides they surround our walls. Are we going to meet them?
Why linger? Will thy bravery ever be in that windy tongue and those
timorous feet of thine? . . . _My conqueror? _ Shall any justly flout me
as conquered, who sees Tiber swoln fuller with Ilian blood, and all the
house and people of Evander laid low, and the Arcadians stripped of
their armour? Not such did Bitias and huge Pandarus prove me, and the
thousand men whom on one day my conquering hand sent down to hell, shut
as I was in their walls and closed in the enemy's ramparts. _In war is
no safety. _ Fool! be thy boding on the Dardanian's head and thine own
fortunes. Go on; cease not to throw all into confusion with thy terrors,
to exalt the strength of a twice vanquished race, and abase the arms of
Latinus before it. Now the princes of the Myrmidons tremble before
Phrygian arms, now Tydeus' son and Achilles of Larissa, and Aufidus
river recoils from the Adriatic wave. Or when the scheming villain
[407-443]pretends to shrink at my abuse, and sharpens calumny by
terror! never shall this hand--keep quiet! --rob thee of such a soul;
with thee let it abide, and dwell in that breast of thine. Now I return
to thee, my lord, and thy weighty resolves. If thou dost repose no
further hope in our arms, if all hath indeed left us, and one repulse
been our utter ruin, and our fortune is beyond recovery, let us plead
for peace and stretch forth unarmed hands. Yet ah! had we aught of our
wonted manhood, his toil beyond all other is blessed and his spirit
eminent, who rather than see it thus, hath fallen prone in death and
once bitten the ground. But if we have yet resources and an army still
unbroken, and cities and peoples of Italy remain for our aid; but if
even the Trojans have won their glory at great cost of blood (they too
have their deaths, and the storm fell equally on all), why do we
shamefully faint even on the threshold? Why does a shudder seize our
limbs before the trumpet sound? Often do the Days and the varying change
of toiling Time restore prosperity; often Fortune in broken visits makes
man her sport and again establishes him. The Aetolian of Arpi will not
help us; but Messapus will, and Tolumnius the fortunate, and the
captains sent by many a nation; nor will fame be scant to follow the
flower of Latium and the Laurentine land. Camilla the Volscian too is
with us, leading her train of cavalry, squadrons splendid in brass. But
if I only am claimed by the Teucrians for combat, if that is your
pleasure, and I am the barrier to the public good, Victory does not so
hate and shun my hands that I should renounce any enterprise for so
great a hope. I shall meet him in courage, did he outmatch great
Achilles and wear arms like his forged by Vulcan's hands. To you and to
my father Latinus I Turnus, unexcelled in bravery by any of old,
consecrate my life. _Aeneas calls on him alone_: let him, I implore: let
not Drances rather appease with his [444-480]life this wrath of heaven,
if such it be, or win the renown of valour. '

Thus they one with another strove together in uncertainty; Aeneas moved
from his camp to battle. Lo, a messenger rushes spreading confusion
through the royal house, and fills the town with great alarms: the
Teucrians, ranged in battle-line with the Tyrrhene forces, are marching
down by the Tiber river and filling the plain. Immediately spirits are
stirred and hearts shaken and wrath roused in fierce excitement among
the crowd. Hurrying hands grasp at arms; for arms their young men
clamour; the fathers shed tears and mutter gloomily. With that a great
noise rises aloft in diverse contention, even as when flocks of birds
haply settle on a lofty grove, or swans utter their hoarse cry among the
vocal pools on the fish-filled river of Padusa. 'Yes, citizens! ' cries
Turnus, seizing his time: 'gather in council and sit praising peace,
while they rush on dominion in arms! ' Without more words he sprung up
and issued swiftly from the high halls. 'Thou, Volusus,' he cries, 'bid
the Volscian battalions arm, and lead out the Rutulians. Messapus, and
Coras with thy brother, spread your armed cavalry widely over the plain.
Let a division entrench the city gates and man the towers: the rest of
our array attack with me where I command. ' The whole town goes rushing
to the walls; lord Latinus himself, dismayed by the woeful emergency,
quits the council and puts off his high designs, and chides himself
sorely for not having given Aeneas unasked welcome, and made him son and
bulwark of the city. Some entrench the gates, or bring up supply of
stones and poles. The hoarse clarion utters the ensanguined note of war.
A motley ring of boys and matrons girdle the walls. Therewithal the
queen with a crowd of mothers ascends bearing gifts to Pallas' towered
temple, and by her side goes maiden Lavinia, source of all that woe,
[481-514]her beautiful eyes cast down. The mothers enter in, and while
the temple steams with their incense, pour from the high doorway their
mournful cry: 'Maiden armipotent, Tritonian, sovereign of war, break
with thine hand the spear of the Phrygian plunderer, hurl him prone to
earth and dash him down beneath our lofty gates. ' Turnus arrays himself
in hot haste for battle, and even now hath done on his sparkling
breastplate with its flickering scales of brass, and clasped his golden
greaves, his brows yet bare and his sword buckled to his side; he runs
down from the fortress height glittering in gold, and exultantly
anticipates the foe. Thus when a horse snaps his tether, and, free at
last, rushes from the stalls and gains the open plain, he either darts
towards the pastures of the herded mares, or bathing, as is his wont, in
the familiar river waters, dashes out and neighs with neck stretched
high, glorying, and his mane tosses over collar and shoulder. Camilla
with her Volscian array meets him face to face in the gateway; the
princess leaps from her horse, and all her squadron at her example slide
from horseback to the ground. Then she speaks thus:

'Turnus, if bravery hath any just self-confidence, I dare and promise to
engage Aeneas' cavalry, and advance to meet the Tyrrhene horse. Permit
my hand to try war's first perils: do thou on foot keep by the walls and
guard the city. '

To this Turnus, with eyes fixed on the terrible maiden: 'O maiden flower
of Italy, how may I essay to express, how to prove my gratitude? But
now, since that spirit of thine excels all praise, share thou the toil
with me. Aeneas, as the report of the scouts I sent assures, hath sent
on his light-armed horse to annoy us and scour the plains; himself he
marches on the city across the lonely ridge of the mountain steep. I am
arranging a stratagem of [515-550]war in his pathway on the wooded
slope, to block a gorge on the highroad with armed troops. Do thou
receive and join battle with the Tyrrhene cavalry; with thee shall be
gallant Messapus, the Latin squadrons, and Tiburtus' division: do thou
likewise assume a captain's charge. '

So speaks he, and with like words heartens Messapus and the allied
captains to battle, and advances towards the enemy. There is a sweeping
curve of glen, made for ambushes and devices of arms. Dark thick foliage
hems it in on either hand, and into it a bare footpath leads by a narrow
gorge and difficult entrance. Right above it on the watch-towers of the
hill-top lies an unexpected level, hidden away in shelter, whether one
would charge from right and left or stand on the ridge and roll down
heavy stones. Hither he passes by a line of way he knew, and, seizing
his ground, occupies the treacherous woods.

Meanwhile in the heavenly dwellings Latona's daughter addressed fleet
Opis, one of her maiden fellowship and sacred band, and sadly uttered
these accents: 'Camilla moves to fierce war, O maiden, and vainly girds
on our arms, dear as she is beyond others to me. For her love of Diana
is not newly born, nor her spirit stirred by sudden affection. Driven
from his kingdom through jealousy of his haughty power, Metabus left
ancient Privernum town, and bore his infant with him in his flight
through war and battle, the companion of his exile, and called her by
her mother Casmilla's name, with a little change, Camilla. Carrying her
before him on his breast, he sought a long ridge of lonely woodland; on
all sides angry weapons pressed on him, and Volscian soldiery spread
hurrying round about. Lo, in mid flight swoln Amasenus ran foaming with
banks abrim, so heavily had the clouds burst in rain. He would swim it;
but love of the infant holds him back in alarm for so dear a burden.
Inly revolving [551-586]all, he settled reluctantly on a sudden
resolve: the great spear that the warrior haply carried in his stout
hand, of hard-knotted and seasoned oak, to it he ties his daughter
swathed in cork-tree bark of the woodland, and binds her balanced round
the middle of the spear; poising it in his great right hand he thus
cries aloft: "Gracious one, haunter of the woodland, maiden daughter of
Latona, a father devotes this babe to thy service; thine is this weapon
she holds, thine infant suppliant, flying through the air from her
enemies. Accept her, I implore, O goddess, for thine own, whom now I
entrust to the chance of air. " He spoke, and drawing back his arm, darts
the spinning spear-shaft: the waters roar: over the racing river poor
Camilla shoots on the whistling weapon. But Metabus, as a strong band
now presses nigher, plunges into the river, and triumphantly pulls spear
and girl, his gift to Trivia, from the grassy turf. No cities ever
received him within house or rampart, nor had his savagery submitted to
it; he led his life on the lonely pastoral hills. Here he nursed his
daughter in the underwood among tangled coverts, on the milk of a wild
brood-mare's teats, squeezing the udder into her tender lips. And so
soon as the baby stood and went straight on her feet, he armed her hands
with a sharp javelin, and hung quiver and bow from her little shoulders.
Instead of gold to clasp her tresses, instead of the long skirted gown,
a tiger's spoils hang down her back. Even then her tender hand hurled
childish darts, and whirled about her head the twisted thong of her
sling, and struck down the crane from Strymon or the milk-white swan.
Many a mother among Tyrrhenian towns destined her for their sons in
vain; content with Diana alone, she keeps unsoiled for ever the love of
her darts and maidenhood. Would she had not plunged thus into warfare
and provoked the Trojans by attack! so were she now dear to me and one
of my [587-620]company. But since bitter doom is upon her, up, glide
from heaven, O Nymph, and seek the Latin borders, where under evil omen
they join in baleful battle. Take these, and draw from the quiver an
avenging shaft; by it shall he pay me forfeit of his blood, whoso,
Trojan or Italian alike, shall sully her sacred body with a wound.
Thereafter will I in a sheltering cloud bear body and armour of the
hapless girl unspoiled to the tomb, and lay them in her native land. '
She spoke; but the other sped lightly down the aery sky, girt about with
dark whirlwind on her echoing way.

But meanwhile the Trojan force nears the walls, with the Etruscan
captains and their whole cavalry arrayed in ordered squadrons. Their
horses' trampling hoofs thunder on all the field, as, swerving this way
and that, they chafe at the reins' pressure; the iron field bristles
wide with spears, and the plain is aflame with uplifted arms. Likewise
Messapus and the Latin horse, and Coras and his brother, and maiden
Camilla's squadron, come forth against them on the plain, and draw back
their hands and level the flickering points of their long lances, in a
fire of neighing horses and advancing men. And now each had drawn within
javelin-cast of each, and drew up; with a sudden shout they dart forth,
and urge on their furious horses; from all sides at once weapons shower
thick like snow, and veil the sky with their shadow. In a moment
Tyrrhenus and fiery Aconteus charge violently with crossing spears, and
are the first to fall; they go down with a heavy crash, and their beasts
break and shatter chest upon chest. Aconteus, hurled off like a
thunderbolt or some mass slung from an engine, is dashed away, and
scatters his life in air. Immediately the lines waver, and the Latins
wheeling about throw their shields behind them and turn their horses
towards the town. The Trojans pursue; Asilas heads and leads on
[621-653]their squadrons. And now they drew nigh the gates, and again
the Latins raise a shout and wheel their supple necks about; the
pursuers fly, and gallop right back with loosened rein: as when the sea,
running up in ebb and flow, now rushes shoreward and strikes over the
cliffs in a wave of foam, drenching the edge of the sand in its curving
sweep; now runs swirling back, and the surge sucks the rolling stones
away. Twice the Tuscans turn and drive the Rutulians towards the town;
twice they are repelled, and look back behind them from cover of their
shields. But when now meeting in a third encounter, the lines are locked
together all their length, and man singles out his man; then indeed,
amid groans of the dying, deep in blood roll armour and bodies, and
horses half slain mixed up with slaughtered men. The battle swells
fierce. Orsilochus hurled his spear at the horse of Remulus, whom
himself he shrank to meet, and left the steel in it under the ear; at
the stroke the charger rears madly, and, mastered by the wound, lifts
his chest and flings up his legs: the rider is thrown and rolls over on
the ground. Catillus strikes down Iollas, and Herminius mighty in
courage, mighty in limbs and arms, bareheaded, tawny-haired,
bare-shouldered; undismayed by wounds, he leaves his vast body open
against arms. Through his broad shoulders the quivering spear runs
piercing him through, and doubles him up with pain. Everywhere the dark
blood flows; they deal death with the sword in battle, and seek a noble
death by wounds.

But amid the slaughter Camilla rages, a quivered Amazon, with one side
stripped for battle, and now sends tough javelins showering from her
hand, now snatches the strong battle-axe in her unwearying grasp; the
golden bow, the armour of Diana, clashes on her shoulders; and even when
forced backward in retreat, she turns in flight and [654-691]aims darts
from her bow. But around her are her chosen comrades, maiden Larina,
Tulla, Tarpeia brandishing an axe inlaid with bronze, girls of Italy,
whom Camilla the bright chose for her own escort, good at service in
peace and war: even as Thracian Amazons when the streams of Thermodon
clash beneath them as they go to war in painted arms, whether around
Hippolyte, or while martial Penthesilea returns in her chariot, and the
crescent-shielded columns of women dance with loud confused cry. Whom
first, whom last, fierce maiden, does thy dart strike down? First
Euneus, son of Clytius; for as he meets her the long fir shaft crashes
through his open breast. He falls spouting streams of blood, and bites
the gory ground, and dying writhes himself upon his wound. Then Liris
and Pagasus above him; who fall headlong and together, the one thrown as
he reins up his horse stabbed under him, the other while he runs forward
and stretches his unarmed hand to stay his fall. To these she joins
Amastrus, son of Hippotas, and follows from far with her spear Tereus
and Harpalycus and Demophoon and Chromis: and as many darts as the
maiden sends whirling from her hand, so many Phrygians fall. Ornytus the
hunter rides near in strange arms on his Iapygian horse, his broad
warrior's shoulders swathed in the hide stripped from a bullock, his
head covered by a wolf's wide-grinning mouth and white-tusked jaws; a
rustic pike arms his hand; himself he moves amid the squadrons a full
head over all. Catching him up (for that was easy amid the rout), she
runs him through, and thus cries above her enemy: 'Thou wert hunting
wild beasts in the forest, thoughtest thou, Tyrrhenian? the day is come
for a woman's arms to refute thy words. Yet no light fame shalt thou
carry to thy fathers' ghosts, to have fallen under the weapon of
Camilla. ' Next Orsilochus and Butes, the two mightiest of mould among
the Teucrians; Butes she pierces in the [692-725]back with her
spear-point between corslet and helmet, where the neck shews as he sits,
and the shield hangs from his left shoulder; Orsilochus she flies, and
darting in a wide circle, slips into the inner ring and pursues her
pursuer; then rising her full height, she drives the strong axe deep
through armour and bone, as he pleads and makes much entreaty; warm
brain from the wound splashes his face. One met her thus and hung
startled by the sudden sight, the warrior son of Aunus haunter of the
Apennine, not the meanest in Liguria while fate allowed him to deceive.
And he, when he discerns that no fleetness of foot may now save him from
battle or turn the princess from pursuit, essays to wind a subtle device
of treachery, and thus begins: 'How hast thou glory, if a woman trust in
her horse's strength? Debar retreat; trust thyself to level ground at
close quarters with me, and prepare to fight on foot. Soon wilt thou
know how windy boasting brings one to harm. ' He spoke; but she, furious
and stung with fiery indignation, hands her horse to an attendant, and
takes her stand in equal arms on foot and undismayed, with naked sword
and shield unemblazoned. But he, thinking his craft had won the day,
himself flies off on the instant, and turning his rein, darts off in
flight, pricking his beast to speed with iron-armed heel. 'False
Ligurian, in vain elated in thy pride! for naught hast thou attempted
thy slippery native arts, nor will thy craft bring thee home unhurt to
treacherous Aunus. ' So speaks the maiden, and with running feet swift as
fire crosses his horse, and catching the bridle, meets him in front and
takes her vengeance in her enemy's blood: as lightly as the falcon, bird
of bale, swoops down from aloft on a pigeon high in a cloud, and pounces
on and holds her, and disembowels her with taloned feet, while blood and
torn feathers flutter down the sky.

But the creator of men and gods sits high on Olympus' [726-759]summit
watching this, not with eyes unseeing: he kindles Tyrrhenian Tarchon to
the fierce battle, and sharply goads him on to wrath. So Tarchon gallops
amid the slaughter where his squadrons retreat, and urges his troops in
changing tones, calling man on man by name, and rallies the fliers to
fight. 'What terror, what utter cowardice hath fallen on your spirits, O
never to be stung to shame, O slack alway? a woman drives you in
disorder and routs our ranks! Why wear we steel? for what are these idle
weapons in our hands? Yet not slack in Venus' service and wars by night,
or, when the curving flute proclaims Bacchus' revels, to look forward to
the feast and the cups on the loaded board (this your passion, this your
desire! ) till the soothsayer pronounce the offering favourable, and the
fatted victim invite you to the deep groves. ' So speaking, he spurs his
horse into the midmost, ready himself to die, and bears violently down
full on Venulus; and tearing him from horseback, grasps his enemy and
carries him away with him on the saddle-bow by main force. A cry rises
up, and all the Latins turn their eyes. Tarchon flies like fire over the
plain, carrying the armed man, and breaks off the steel head from his
own spear and searches the uncovered places, trying where he may deal
the mortal blow; the other struggling against him keeps his hand off his
throat, and strongly parries his attack. And, as when a golden eagle
snatches and soars with a serpent in his clutch, and his feet are fast
in it, and his talons cling; but the wounded snake writhes in coiling
spires, and its scales rise and roughen, and its mouth hisses as it
towers upward; the bird none the less attacks his struggling prize with
crooked beak, while his vans beat the air: even so Tarchon carries
Tiburtus out of the ranks, triumphant in his prize. Following their
captain's example and issue the men of Maeonia charge in. Then Arruns,
due to his [760-796]doom, circles in advance of fleet Camilla with
artful javelin, and tries how fortune may be easiest. Where the maiden
darts furious amid the ranks, there Arruns slips up and silently tracks
her footsteps; where she returns victorious and retires from amid the
enemy, there he stealthily bends his rapid reins. Here he approaches,
and here again he approaches, and strays all round and about, and
untiringly shakes his certain spear. Haply Chloreus, sacred to Cybele
and once her priest, glittered afar, splendid in Phrygian armour; a skin
feathered with brazen scales and clasped with gold clothed the horse
that foamed under his spur; himself he shone in foreign blue and
scarlet, with fleet Gortynian shafts and a Lycian horn; a golden bow was
on his shoulder, and the soothsayer's helmet was of gold; red gold
knotted up his yellow scarf with its rustling lawny folds; his tunics
and barbarian trousers were wrought in needlework. Him, whether that she
might nail armour of Troy on her temples, or herself move in captive
gold, the maiden pursued in blind chase alone of all the battle
conflict, and down the whole line, reckless and fired by a woman's
passion for spoils and plunder: when at last out of his ambush Arruns
chooses his time and darts his javelin, praying thus aloud to heaven:
'Apollo, most high of gods, holy Soracte's warder, to whom we beyond all
do worship, for whom the blaze of the pinewood heap is fed, where we thy
worshippers in pious faith print our steps amid the deep embers of the
fire, grant, O Lord omnipotent, that our arms wipe off this disgrace. I
seek not the dress the maiden wore, nor trophy or any spoil of victory;
other deeds shall bring me praise; let but this dread scourge fall
stricken beneath my wound, I will return inglorious to my native towns. '
Phoebus heard, and inly granted half his vow to prosper, half he shred
into the flying breezes. To surprise and strike down Camilla in sudden
death, this he [797-831]yielded to his prayer; that his high home might
see his return he gave not, and a gust swept off his accents on the
gale. So, when the spear sped from his hand hurtled through the air, all
the Volscians marked it well and turned their eyes on the queen; and she
alone knew not wind or sound of the weapon on its aery path, till the
spear passed home and sank where her breast met it, and, driven deep,
drank her maiden blood. Her companions run hastily up and catch their
sinking mistress. Arruns takes to flight more alarmed than all, in
mingled fear and exultation, and no longer dares to trust his spear or
face the maiden's weapons. And as the wolf, some shepherd or great
bullock slain, plunges at once among the trackless mountain heights ere
hostile darts are in pursuit, and knows how reckless he hath been, and
drooping his tail lays it quivering under his belly, and seeks the
woods; even so does Arruns withdraw from sight in dismay, and, satisfied
to escape, mingles in the throng of arms. The dying woman pulls at the
weapon with her hand; but the iron head is fixed deep in the wound up
between the rib-bones. She swoons away with loss of blood; chilling in
death her eyes swoon away; the once lustrous colour leaves her face.
Then gasping, she thus accosts Acca, one of her birthmates, who alone
before all was true to Camilla, with whom her cares were divided; and
even so she speaks: 'Thus far, Acca my sister, have I availed; now the
bitter wound overmasters me, and all about me darkens in haze. Haste
away, and carry to Turnus my last message; to take my place in battle,
and repel the Trojans from the town. And now goodbye. ' Even with the
words she dropped the reins and slid to ground unconscious. Then the
unnerving chill overspread her, her neck slackened, her head sank
overpowered by death, and her arms fell, and with a moan the life fled
indignant into the dark. Then indeed an [832-867]infinite cry rises and
smites the golden stars; the battle grows bloodier now Camilla is down;
at once in serried rants all the Teucrian forces pour in, with the
Tyrrhene captains and Evander's Arcadian squadrons.

But Opis, Trivia's sentinel, long ere now sits high on the hill-tops,
gazing on the battle undismayed. And when afar amid the din of angry men
she espied Camilla done woefully to death, she sighed and uttered forth
a deep cry: 'Ah too, too cruel, O maiden, the forfeit thou hast paid for
daring armed attack on the Teucrians! and nothing hath availed thee thy
lonely following of Diana in the woodlands, nor wearing our quiver on
thy shoulder. Yet thy Queen hath not left thee unhonoured now thy latter
end is come; nor will this thy death be unnamed among the nations, nor
shalt thou bear the fame of one unavenged; for whosoever hath sullied
thy body with a wound shall pay death for due. ' Under the mountain
height was a great earthen mound, tomb of Dercennus, a Laurentine king
of old, shrouded in shadowy ilex. Hither the goddess most beautiful
first swoops down, and marks Arruns from the mounded height. As she saw
him glittering in arms and idly exultant: 'Why,' she cries, 'wanderest
thou away? hitherward direct thy steps; come hither to thy doom, to
receive thy fit reward for Camilla. Shalt thou die, and by Diana's
weapons? ' The Thracian spoke, and slid out a fleet arrow from her gilded
quiver, and stretched it level on the bow, and drew it far, till the
curving tips met one another, and now her hands touched in counterpoise,
the left the steel edge, the string in the right her breast. At once and
in a moment Arruns heard the whistle of the dart and the resounding air,
as the steel sank in his body. His comrades leave him forgotten on the
unknown dust of the plain, moaning his last and gasping his life away;
Opis wings her flight to the skyey heaven.

[868-901]At once the light squadron of Camilla retreat now they have
lost their mistress; the Rutulians retreat in confusion, brave Atinas
retreats. Scattered captains and thinned companies make for safety, and
turn their horses backward to the town. Nor does any avail to make stand
against the swarming death-dealing Teucrians, or bear their shock in
arms; but their unstrung bows droop on their shoulders, and the
four-footed galloping horse-hoof shakes the crumbling plain. The eddying
dust rolls up thick and black towards the walls, and on the watch-towers
mothers beat their breasts and the cries of women rise up to heaven. On
such as first in the rout broke in at the open gates the mingling
hostile throng follows hard; nor do they escape death, alas! but in the
very gateway, within their native city and amid their sheltering homes,
they are pierced through and gasp out their life. Some shut the gates,
and dare not open to their pleading comrades nor receive them in the
town; and a most pitiful slaughter begins between armed men who guard
the entry and others who rush upon their arms. Barred out before their
weeping parents' eyes and faces, some, swept on by the rout, roll
headlong into the trenches; some, blindly rushing with loosened rein,
batter at the gates and stiffly-bolted doorway. The very mothers from
the walls in eager heat (true love of country points the way, when they
see Camilla) dart weapons with shaking hand, and eagerly make hard
stocks of wood and fire-hardened poles serve for steel, and burn to die
among the foremost for their city's sake.

Meanwhile among the forests the terrible news pours in on Turnus, and
Acca brings him news of the mighty invasion; the Volscian lines are
destroyed; Camilla is fallen; the enemy thicken and press on, and have
swept all before them down the tide of battle. Raging he leaves the
hills he had beset--Jove's stern will ordains it [902-915]so--and quits
the rough woodland. Scarcely had he marched out of sight and gained the
plain when lord Aeneas enters the open defiles, surmounts the ridge, and
issues from the dim forest. So both advance swiftly to the town with all
their columns, no long march apart, and at once Aeneas descried afar the
plains all smoking with dust, and saw the Laurentine columns, and Turnus
knew Aeneas terrible in arms, and heard the advancing feet and the
neighing of the horses. And straightway would they join battle and essay
the conflict, but that ruddy Phoebus even now dips his weary coursers in
the Iberian flood, and night draws on over the fading day. They encamp
before the city, and draw their trenches round the walls.




BOOK TWELFTH

THE SLAYING OF TURNUS


When Turnus sees the Latins broken and fainting in the thwart issue of
war, his promise claimed for fulfilment, and men's eyes pointed on him,
his own spirit rises in unappeasable flame. As the lion in Phoenician
fields, his breast heavily wounded by the huntsmen, at last starts into
arms, and shakes out the shaggy masses from his exultant neck, and
undismayed snaps the brigand's planted weapon, roaring with
blood-stained mouth; even so Turnus kindles and swells in passion. Then
he thus addresses the king, and so furiously begins:

'Turnus stops not the way; there is no excuse for the coward Aeneadae to
take back their words or renounce their compact. I join battle; bring
the holy things, my lord, and swear the treaty. Either this hand shall
hurl to hell the Dardanian who skulks from Asia, and the Latins sit and
see my single sword wipe out the nation's reproach; or let him rule his
conquest, and Lavinia pass to his espousal. '

To him Latinus calmly replied: 'O excellent young man! the more thy hot
valour abounds, the more intently must I counsel, and weigh fearfully
what may befall. Thou hast thy father Daunus' realm, hast many towns
taken by [23-55]thine hand, nor is Latinus lacking in gold and
goodwill. There are other maidens unwedded in Latium and Laurentine
fields, and of no mean birth. Let me unfold this hard saying in all
sincerity: and do thou drink it into thy soul. I might not ally my
daughter to any of her old wooers; such was the universal oracle of gods
and men. Overborne by love for thee, overborne by kinship of blood and
my weeping wife's complaint, I broke all fetters, I severed the maiden
from her promised husband, I took up unrighteous arms. Since then,
Turnus, thou seest what calamities, what wars pursue me, what woes
thyself before all dost suffer. Twice vanquished in pitched battle, we
scarce guard in our city walls the hopes of Italy: the streams of Tiber
yet run warm with our blood, and our bones whiten the boundless plain.
Why fall I away again and again? what madness bends my purpose? if I am
ready to take them into alliance after Turnus' destruction, why do I not
rather bar the strife while he lives? What will thy Rutulian kinsmen,
will all Italy say, if thy death--Fortune make void the word! --comes by
my betrayal, while thou suest for our daughter in marriage? Cast a
glance on war's changing fortune; pity thine aged father, who now far
away sits sad in his native Ardea. '

In nowise do the words bend Turnus' passion: he rages the more fiercely,
and sickens of the cure. So soon as he found speech he thus made
utterance:

'The care thou hast for me, most gracious lord, for me lay down, I
implore thee, and let me purchase honour with death. Our hand too rains
weapons, our steel is strong; and our wounds too draw blood. The goddess
his mother will be far from him to cover his flight, woman-like, in a
cloud and an empty phantom's hiding. '

But the queen, dismayed by the new terms of battle, wept, and clung to
her fiery son as one ready to die: [56-89]'Turnus, by these tears, by
Amata's regard, if that touches thee at all--thou art now the one hope,
the repose of mine unhappy age; in thine hand is Latinus' honour and
empire, on thee is the weight of all our sinking house--one thing I
beseech thee; forbear to join battle with the Teucrians. What fate
soever awaits thee in the strife thou seekest, it awaits me, Turnus,
too: with thee will I leave the hateful light, nor shall my captive eyes
see Aeneas my daughter's lord. ' Lavinia tearfully heard her mother's
words with cheeks all aflame, as deep blushes set her face on fire and
ran hotly over it. Even as Indian ivory, if one stain it with sanguine
dye, or where white lilies are red with many a rose amid: such colour
came on the maiden's face. Love throws him into tumult, and stays his
countenance on the girl: he burns fiercer for arms, and briefly answers
Amata:

'Do not, I pray thee, do not weep for me, neither pursue me thus
ominously as I go to the stern shock of war. Turnus is not free to dally
with death. Thou, Idmon, bear my message to the Phrygian monarch in this
harsh wording: So soon as to-morrow's Dawn rises in the sky blushing on
her crimson wheels, let him not loose Teucrian or Rutulian: let Teucrian
and Rutulian arms have rest, and our blood decide the war; on that field
let Lavinia be sought in marriage. '

These words uttered, withdrawing swiftly homeward, he orders out his
horses, and rejoicingly beholds them snorting before his face: those
that Orithyia's self gave to grace Pilumnus, such as would excel the
snows in whiteness and the gales in speed. The eager charioteers stand
round and pat their chests with clapping hollowed hands, and comb their
tressed manes. Himself next he girds on his shoulders the corslet stiff
with gold and pale mountain-bronze, and buckles on the sword and shield
and scarlet-plumed [90-124]helmet-spikes: that sword the divine Lord of
Fire had himself forged for his father Daunus and dipped glowing in the
Stygian wave. Next, where it stood amid his dwelling leaning on a massy
pillar, he strongly seizes his stout spear, the spoil of Actor the
Auruncan, and brandishes it quivering, and cries aloud: 'Now, O spear
that never hast failed at my call, now the time is come; thee princely
Actor once, thee Turnus now wields in his grasp. Grant this strong hand
to strike down the effeminate Phrygian, to rend and shatter the corslet,
and defile in dust the locks curled with hot iron and wet with myrrh. '
Thus madly he runs on: sparkles leap out from all his blazing face, and
his keen eyes flash fire: even as the bull when before his first fight
he bellows awfully, and drives against a tree's trunk to make trial of
his angry horns, and buffets the air with blows or scatters the sand in
prelude of battle.

And therewithal Aeneas, terrible in his mother's armour, kindles for
warfare and awakes into wrath, rejoicing that offer of treaty stays the
war. Comforting his comrades and sorrowing Iulus' fear, he instructs
them of destiny, and bids bear answer of assurance to King Latinus, and
name the laws of peace.

Scarcely did the morrow shed on the mountain-tops the beams of risen
day, as the horses of the sun begin to rise from the deep flood and
breathe light from their lifted nostrils; Rutulian and Teucrian men
measured out and made ready a field of battle under the great city's
ramparts, and midway in it hearth-fires and grassy altars to the gods of
both peoples; while others bore spring water and fire, draped in
priestly dress and their brows bound with grass of the field. The
Ausonian army issue forth, and crowd through the gates in streaming
serried columns. On this side all the Trojan and Tyrrhenian host pour in
diverse armament, girt with iron even as though the harsh battle-strife
[125-158]called them forth. Therewith amid their thousands the captains
dart up and down, splendid in gold and purple, Mnestheus, seed of
Assaracus, and brave Asilas, and Messapus, tamer of horses, brood of
Neptune: then each on signal given retired to his own ground; they plant
their spears in the earth and lean their shields against them. Mothers
in eager abandonment, and the unarmed crowd and feeble elders beset
towers and house-roofs, or stand at the lofty gates.

But Juno, on the summit that is now called the Alban--then the mountain
had neither name nor fame or honour--looked forth from the hill and
surveyed the plain and double lines of Laurentine and Trojan, and
Latinus' town. Straightway spoke she thus to Turnus' sister, goddess to
goddess, lady of pools and noisy rivers: such worship did Jupiter the
high king of air consecrate to her for her stolen virginity:

'Nymph, grace of rivers, best beloved of our soul, thou knowest how out
of all the Latin women that ever rose to high-hearted Jove's thankless
bed, thee only have I preferred and gladly given part and place in
heaven. Learn thy woe, that thou blame not me for it, Juturna. Where
fortune seemed to allow and the Destinies granted Latinus' estate to
prosper, I shielded Turnus and thy city. Now I see him joining battle
with unequal fates, and the day of doom and deadly force draws nigh.
Mine eyes cannot look on this battle and treaty: thou, if thou darest
aught of more present help for the brother of thy blood, go on; it
befits thee. Haply relief shall follow misery. '

Scarcely thus: when Juturna's eyes overbrimmed with tears, and thrice
and again she smote her hand on her gracious breast. 'This is not time
for tears,' cries Juno, daughter of Saturn: 'hasten and snatch thy
brother, if it may be, from his death; or do thou waken war, and make
[159-191]the treaty abortive. I encourage thee to dare. ' With such
urgence she left her, doubting and dismayed, and grievously wounded in
soul.

Meanwhile the kings go forth; Latinus in mighty pomp rides in his
four-horse chariot; twelve gilded rays go glittering round his brows,
symbol of the Sun his ancestor; Turnus moves behind a white pair,
clenching in his hand two broad-headed spears. On this side lord Aeneas,
fount of the Roman race, ablaze in starlike shield and celestial arms,
and close by Ascanius, second hope of mighty Rome, issue from the camp;
and the priest, in spotless raiment, hath brought the young of a bristly
sow and an unshorn sheep of two years old, and set his beasts by the
blazing altars. They, turning their eyes towards the sunrising, scatter
salted corn from their hands and clip the beasts with steel over the
temples, and pour cups on the altars. Then Aeneas the good, with sword
drawn, thus makes invocation:

'Be the Sun now witness, and this Earth to my call, for whose sake I
have borne to suffer so sore travail, and the Lord omnipotent, and thou
his wife, at last, divine daughter of Saturn, at last I pray more
favourable; and thou, mighty Mavors, who wieldest all warfare in
lordship beneath thy sway; and on the Springs and Rivers I call, and the
Dread of high heaven, and the divinities of the blue seas: if haply
victory fall to Turnus the Ausonian, the vanquished make covenant to
withdraw to Evander's city; Iulus shall quit the soil; nor ever
hereafter shall the Aeneadae return in arms to renew warfare, or attack
this realm with the sword. But if Victory grant battle to us and ours
(as I think the rather, and so the rather may the gods seal their will),
I will not bid Italy obey my Teucrians, nor do I claim the realm for
mine; let both nations, unconquered, join treaty for ever under equal
law. Gods [192-225]and worship shall be of my giving: my father Latinus
shall bear the sword, and have a father's prescribed command. For me my
Teucrians shall establish a city, and Lavinia give the town her name. '

Thus Aeneas first: thereon Latinus thus follows:

'By these same I swear, O Aeneas, by Earth, Sea, Sky, and the twin brood
of Latona and Janus the double-facing, and the might of nether gods and
grim Pluto's shrine; this let our Father hear, who seals treaties with
his thunderbolt. I touch the altars, I take to witness the fires and the
gods between us; no time shall break this peace and truce in Italy,
howsoever fortune fall; nor shall any force turn my will aside, not if
it dissolve land into water in turmoil of deluge, or melt heaven in
hell: so surely as this sceptre' (for haply he bore a sceptre in his
hand) 'shall never burgeon into thin leafage and shady shoot, since once
in the forest cut down right to the stem it lost its mother, and the
steel lopped away its tressed arms: a tree of old: now the craftsman's
hand hath bound it in adornment of brass and given it to our Latin
fathers' bearing. '

With such words they sealed mutual treaty midway in sight of the
princes. Then they duly slay the consecrated beasts over the flames, and
tear out their live entrails, and pile the altars with laden chargers.

But long ere this the Rutulians deemed the battle unequal, and their
hearts are stirred in changeful motion; and now the more, as they
discern nigher that in ill-matched strength . . . . heightened by
Turnus, as advancing with noiseless pace he humbly worships at the altar
with downcast eye, by his wasted cheeks and the pallor on his youthful
frame. Soon as Juturna his sister saw this talk spread, and the people's
mind waver in uncertainty, into the mid ranks, in feigned form of
Camertus--his family was high in long ancestry, and his father's name
[226-260]for valour renowned, and himself most valiant in arms--into
the mid ranks she glides, not ignorant of her task, and scatters diverse
rumours, saying thus: 'Shame, O Rutulians! shall we set one life in the
breach for so many such as these? are we unequal in numbers or bravery?
See, Troy and Arcadia is all they bring, and those fate-bound bands that
Etruria hurls on Turnus. Scarce is there an enemy to meet every other
man of ours. He indeed will ascend to the gods for whose altars he
devotes himself, and move living in the lips of men: we, our country
lost, shall bow to the haughty rigour of our lords, if we now sit
slackly on the field. '

By such words the soldiers' counsel was kindled yet higher and higher,
and a murmur crept through their columns; the very Laurentines, the very
Latins are changed; and they who but now hoped for rest from battle and
rescue of fortune now desire arms and pray the treaty were undone, and
pity Turnus' cruel lot. To this Juturna adds a yet stronger impulse, and
high in heaven shews a sign more potent than any to confuse Italian
souls with delusive augury. For on the crimsoned sky Jove's tawny bird
flew chasing, in a screaming crowd, fowl of the shore that winged their
column; then suddenly stooping to the water, pounces on a noble swan
with merciless crooked talons. The startled Italians watch, while all
the birds together clamorously wheel round from flight, wonderful to
see, and dim the sky with their pinions, and in thickening cloud urge
their foe through air, till, conquered by their attack and his heavy
prey, he yielded and dropped it from his talons into the river, and
winged his way deep into the clouds. Then indeed the Rutulians
clamorously greet the omen, and their hands flash out. And Tolumnius the
augur cries before them all: 'This it was, this, that my vows often have
sought; I welcome and know a deity; [261-294]follow me, follow, snatch
up the sword, O hapless people whom the greedy alien frightens with his
arms like silly birds, and with strong hand ravages your shores. He too
will take to flight, and spread his sails afar over ocean. Do you with
one heart close up your squadrons, and defend in battle your lost king. '
He spoke, and darting forward, hurled a weapon full on the enemy; the
whistling cornel-shaft sings, and unerringly cleaves the air. At once
and with it a vast shout goes up, and all their rows are amazed, and
their hearts hotly stirred. The spear flies on; where haply stood
opposite in ninefold brotherhood all the beautiful sons of one faithful
Tyrrhene wife, borne of her to Gylippus the Arcadian, one of them,
midway where the sewn belt rubs on the flank and the clasp bites the
fastenings of the side, one of them, excellent in beauty and glittering
in arms, it pierces clean through the ribs and stretches on the yellow
sand. But of his banded brethren, their courage fired by grief, some
grasp and draw their swords, some snatch weapons to throw, and rush
blindly forward. The Laurentine columns rush forth against them; again
from the other side Trojans and Agyllines and Arcadians in painted
armour flood thickly in: so hath one passion seized all to make decision
by the sword. They pull the altars to pieces; through all the air goes a
thick storm of weapons, and faster falls the iron rain. Bowls and
hearth-fires are carried off; Latinus himself retreats, bearing the
outraged gods of the broken treaty. The others harness their chariots,
or vault upon their horses and come up with swords drawn. Messapus,
eager to shatter the treaty, rides menacingly down on Aulestes the
Tyrrhenian, a king in a king's array. Retreating hastily, and tripped on
the altars that meet him behind, the hapless man goes down on his head
and shoulders. But Messapus flies up with wrathful spear, and strikes
him, as he pleads sore, a deep downward [295-330]blow from horseback
with his beam-like spear, saying thus: _That for him: the high gods take
this better victim. _ The Italians crowd in and strip his warm limbs.
Corynaeus seizes a charred brand from the altar, and meeting Ebysus as
he advances to strike, darts the flame in his face; his heavy beard
flamed up, and gave out a scorched smell. Following up his enemy's
confusion, the other seizes him with his left hand by the hair, and
bears him to earth with a thrust of his planted knee, and there drives
the unyielding sword into his side. Podalirius pursues and overhangs
with naked sword the shepherd Alsus as he rushes amid the foremost line
of weapons; Alsus swings back his axe, and severs brow and chin full in
front, wetting his armour all over with spattered blood. Grim rest and
iron slumber seal his eyes; his lids close on everlasting night.

But good Aeneas, his head bared, kept stretching his unarmed hand and
calling loudly to his men: 'Whither run you?