No More Learning

Occasion offers, and I stand prepared;
There lies our way: be thou upon the guard,
And look around, while I securely go,
And hew a passage through the sleeping foe. "
Softly he spoke; then, striding, took his way,
With his drawn sword, where haughty Rhamnes lay;
His head raised high on tapestry beneath,
And heaving from his breast, he drew his breath--
A king and prophet, by king Turnus loved;
But fate by prescience cannot be removed.
Him and his sleeping slaves he slew; then spies
Where Remus, with his rich retinue, lies.
His armour-bearer first, and next he kills
His charioteer, intrenched betwixt the wheels
And his loved horses; last invades their lord;
Full on his neck he drives the fatal sword:
The gasping head flies off; a purple flood
Flows from the trunk, that welters in the blood,
Which, by the spurning heels dispersed around,
The bed besprinkles, and bedews the ground.
Lamus the bold, and Lamyrus the strong,
He slew, and then Sarranus fair and young.
From dice and wine the youth retired to rest,
And puffed the fumy god from out his breast:
Even then he dreamt of drink and lucky play--
More lucky, had it lasted till the day.
The famished lion thus, with hunger bold,
O'erleaps the fences of the nightly fold,
And tears the peaceful flocks: with silent awe
Trembling they lie, and pant beneath his paw.
Nor with less rage Euryalus employs
The wrathful sword, or fewer foes destroys:
But on the ignoble crowd his fury flew;
He Fadus, Hebesus, and Rhoetus slew.
Oppressed with heavy sleep the former fall,
But Rhoetus wakeful, and observing all:
Behind a spacious jar he slinked for fear;
The fatal iron found and reached him there;
For, as he rose, it pierced his naked side,
And, reeking, thence returned in crimson dyed.
The wound pours out a stream of wine and blood;
The purple soul comes floating in the flood.
Now, where Messapus quartered, they arrive.
The fires were fainting there, and just alive:
The warrior-horses, tied in order, fed;
Nisus observed the discipline, and said:--
"Our eager thirst of blood may both betray;
And see the scattered streaks of dawning day,
Foe to nocturnal thefts. No more, my friend;
Here let our glutted execution end.
A lane through slaughtered bodies we have made. "
The bold Euryalus, though loth, obeyed.
Of arms, and arras, and of plate, they find
A precious load; but these they leave behind.
Yet, fond of gaudy spoils, the boy would stay }
To make the rich caparison his prey, }
Which on the steed of conquered Rhamnes lay. }
Nor did his eyes less longingly behold
The girdle-belt, with nails of burnished gold.
This present Cædicus the rich bestowed
On Remulus, when friendship first they vowed,
And, absent, joined in hospitable ties:
He, dying, to his heir bequeathed the prize;
Till, by the conquering Ardean troops oppressed,
He fell; and they the glorious gift possessed.
These glittering spoils (now made the victor's gain)
He to his body suits, but suits in vain.
Messapus' helm he finds among the rest,
And laces on, and wears the waving crest.
Proud of their conquest, prouder of their prey,
They leave the camp, and take the ready way.
But far they had not passed, before they spied
Three hundred horse, with Volscens for their guide.
The queen a legion to king Turnus sent; }
But the swift horse the slower foot prevent, }
And now, advancing, sought the leader's tent. }
They saw the pair; for, through the doubtful shade, }
His shining helm Euryalus betrayed, }
On which the moon with full reflexion played. }
"'Tis not for nought," cried Volscens from the crowd,
"These men go there;" then raised his voice aloud:
"Stand! stand! why thus in arms? and whither bent?
From whence, to whom, and on what errand sent? "
Silent they scud away, and haste their flight
To neighbouring woods, and trust themselves to night.
The speedy horse all passages belay,
And spur their smoking steeds to cross their way;
And watch each entrance of the winding wood.
Black was the forest: thick with beech it stood,
Horrid with fern, and intricate with thorn;
Few paths of human feet, or tracks of beasts, were worn.
The darkness of the shades, his heavy prey,
And fear, misled the younger from his way.
But Nisus hit the turns with happier haste,
And, thoughtless of his friend, the forest passed,
And Alban plains (from Alba's name so called)
Where king Latinus then his oxen stalled;
Till, turning at the length, he stood his ground,
And missed his friend, and cast his eyes around:--
"Ah wretch! " he cried--"where have I left behind
The unhappy youth? where shall I hope to find?
Or what way take? " Again he ventures back,
And treads the mazes of his former track.
He winds the wood, and, listening, hears the noise
Of trampling coursers, and the riders' voice.
The sound approached; and suddenly he viewed
The foes inclosing, and his friend pursued,
Forelaid and taken, while he strove in vain
The shelter of the friendly shades to gain.
What should he next attempt? what arms employ,
What fruitless force, to free the captive boy?
Or desperate should he rush and lose his life,
With odds oppressed, in such unequal strife?
Resolved at length, his pointed spear he shook;
And, casting on the moon a mournful look,--
"Guardian of groves, and goddess of the night!
Fair queen! " he said, "direct my dart aright.
If e'er my pious father, for my sake,
Did grateful offerings on thy altars make,
Or I increased them with my sylvan toils,
And hung thy holy roofs with savage spoils,
Give me to scatter these. " Then from his ear
He poised, and aimed, and launched the trembling spear.
The deadly weapon, hissing from the grove,
Impetuous on the back of Sulmo drove;
Pierced his thin armour, drank his vital blood,
And in his body left the broken wood.
He staggers round; his eyeballs roll in death,
And with short sobs he gasps away his breath.
All stand amazed:--a second javelin flies
With equal strength, and quivers through the skies.
This through thy temples, Tagus, forced the way,
And in the brain-pan warmly buried lay.
Fierce Volscens foams with rage, and, gazing round,
Descried not him who gave the fatal wound,
Nor knew to fix revenge:--"But thou," he cries,
"Shalt pay for both," and at the prisoner flies
With his drawn sword. Then, struck with deep despair,
That cruel sight the lover could not bear;
But from his covert rushed in open view,
And sent his voice before him as he flew:--
"Me! me! " he cried--"turn all your swords alone
On me--the fact confessed, the fault my own.
He neither could nor durst, the guiltless youth--
Ye moon and stars, bear witness to the truth!
His only crime (if friendship can offend)
Is too much love to his unhappy friend. "
Too late he speaks:--the sword, which fury guides,
Driven with full force, had pierced his tender sides.
Down fell the beauteous youth: the yawning wound
Gushed out a purple stream, and stained the ground.
His snowy neck reclines upon his breast,
Like a fair flower by the keen share oppressed--
Like a white poppy sinking on the plain,
Whose heavy head is overcharged with rain.
Despair, and rage, and vengeance justly vowed,
Drove Nisus headlong on the hostile crowd.
Volscens he seeks; on him alone he bends:
Borne back and bored by his surrounding friends,
Onward he pressed, and kept him still in sight,
Then whirled aloft his sword with all his might:
The unerring steel descended while he spoke,
Pierced his wide mouth, and through his weazon broke.
Dying, he slew; and, staggering on the plain,
With swimming eyes he sought his lover slain;
Then quiet on his bleeding bosom fell,
Content, in death, to be revenged so well.
O happy friends! for, if my verse can give
Immortal life, your fame shall ever live,
Fixed as the Capitol's foundation lies,
And spread, where'er the Roman eagle flies!
The conquering party first divide the prey,
Then their slain leader to the camp convey.
With wonder, as they went, the troops were filled,
To see such numbers whom so few had killed.
Saranus, Rhamnes, and the rest, they found; }
Vast crowds the dying and the dead surround; }
And the yet reeking blood o'erflows the ground. }
All knew the helmet which Messapus lost,
But mourned a purchase that so dear had cost.
Now rose the ruddy morn from Tithon's bed,
And with the dawn of day the skies o'erspread:
Nor long the sun his daily course with-held,
But added colours to the world revealed:
When early Turnus, wakening with the light,
All clad in armour, calls his troops to fight.
His martial men with fierce harangues he fired,
And his own ardour in their souls inspired.
This done--to give new terror to his foes,
The heads of Nisus and his friend he shows,
Raised high on pointed spears--a ghastly sight!
Loud peals of shouts ensue, and barbarous delight.
Meantime the Trojans run, where danger calls:
They line their trenches, and they man their walls.
In front extended to the left they stood:
Safe was the right, surrounded by the flood.
But, casting from their towers a frightful view,
They saw the faces, which too well they knew,
Though then disguised in death, and smeared all o'er
With filth obscene, and dropping putrid gore.
Soon hasty fame through the sad city bears
The mournful message to the mother's ears.
An icy cold benumbs her limbs; she shakes;
Her cheeks the blood, her hand the web forsakes.
She runs the rampires round amidst the war, }
Nor fears the flying darts: she rends her hair, }
And fills with loud laments the liquid air. }
"Thus, then, my loved Euryalus appears!
Thus looks the prop of my declining years!
Was't on this face my famished eyes I fed?
Ah! how unlike the living is the dead!
And could'st thou leave me, cruel, thus alone?
Not one kind kiss from a departing son!
No look, no last adieu before he went,
In an ill-boding hour to slaughter sent!
Cold on the ground, and pressing foreign clay,
To Latian dogs and fowls he lies a prey!
Nor was I near to close his dying eyes,
To wash his wounds, to weep his obsequies,
To call about his corpse his crying friends,
Or spread the mantle (made for other ends)
On his dear body, which I wove with care,
Nor did my daily pains or nightly labour spare.
Where shall I find his corpse? what earth sustains
His trunk dismembered, and his cold remains?
For this, alas! I left my needful ease,
Exposed my life to winds, and winter seas!
If any pity touch Rutulian hearts,
Here empty all your quivers, all your darts:
Or, if they fail, thou, Jove, conclude my woe,
And send me thunder-struck to shades below! "
Her shrieks and clamours pierce the Trojans' ears,
Unman their courage, and augment their fears:
Nor young Ascanius could the sight sustain,
Nor old Ilioneus his tears restrain,
But Actor and Idæus jointly sent,
To bear the madding mother to her tent.
And now the trumpets terribly, from far,
With rattling clangour, rouse the sleepy war.
The soldiers' shouts succeed the brazen sounds;
And heaven, from pole to pole, the noise rebounds.
The Volscians bear their shields upon their head,
And, rushing forward, form a moving shed.
These fill the ditch; those pull the bulwarks down;
Some raise the ladders; others scale the town.
But, where void spaces on the walls appear,
Or thin defence, they pour their forces there.
With poles and missive weapons, from afar,
The Trojans keep aloof the rising war.
Taught, by their ten years' siege, defensive fight,
They roll down ribs of rocks, an unresisted weight,
To break the penthouse with the ponderous blow,
Which yet the patient Volscians undergo--
But could not bear the unequal combat long;
For, where the Trojans find the thickest throng,
The ruin falls: their shattered shields give way,
And their crushed heads become an easy prey.
They shrink for fear, abated of their rage,
Nor longer dare in a blind fight engage--
Contented now to gall them from below
With darts and slings, and with the distant bow.
Elsewhere Mezentius, terrible to view,
A blazing pine within the trenches threw.
But brave Messapus, Neptune's warlike son, }
Broke down the palisades, the trenches won, }
And loud for ladders calls, to scale the town. }
Calliope, begin! Ye sacred Nine,
Inspire your poet in his high design,
To sing what slaughter manly Turnus made,
What souls he sent below the Stygian shade,
What fame the soldiers with their captain share,
And the vast circuit of the fatal war;
For you, in singing martial facts, excel;
You best remember, and alone can tell.
There stood a tower, amazing to the sight,
Built up of beams, and of stupendous height:
Art, and the nature of the place, conspired
To furnish all the strength that war required.
To level this, the bold Italians join;
The wary Trojans obviate their design;
With weighty stones o'erwhelm their troops below,
Shoot through the loopholes, and sharp javelins throw.
Turnus, the chief, tossed from his thundering hand,
Against the wooden walls, a flaming brand:
It stuck, the fiery plague; the winds were high;
The planks were seasoned, and the timber dry.
Contagion caught the posts; it spread along,
Scorched, and to distance drove, the scattered throng.
The Trojans fled; the fire pursued amain,
Still gathering fast upon the trembling train;
Till, crowding to the corners of the wall,
Down the defence and the defenders fall.
The mighty flaw makes heaven itself resound:
The dead and dying Trojans strew the ground.
The tower, that followed on the fallen crew,
Whelmed o'er their heads, and buried whom it slew:
Some stuck upon the darts themselves had sent;
All the same equal ruin underwent.
Young Lycus and Helenor only 'scape;
Saved--how, they know not--from the steepy leap.
Helenor, elder of the two: by birth,
On one side royal, one a son of earth,
Whom, to the Lydian king, Licymnia bare, }
And sent her boasted bastard to the war: }
(A privilege which none but freemen share. ) }
Slight were his arms, a sword and silver shield:
No marks of honour charged its empty field.
Light as he fell, so light the youth arose,
And rising, found himself amidst his foes;
Nor flight was left, nor hopes to force his way.
Emboldened by despair, he stood at bay;
And, like a stag, whom all the troop surrounds
Of eager huntsmen and invading hounds--
Resolved on death, he dissipates his fears,
And bounds aloft against the pointed spears:
So dares the youth, secure of death; and throws
His dying body on his thickest foes.
But Lycus, swifter of his feet by far,
Runs, doubles, winds, and turns, amidst the war;
Springs to the walls, and leaves his foes behind,
And snatches at the beam he first can find;
Looks up, and leaps aloft at all the stretch,
In hopes the helping hand of some kind friend to reach.
But Turnus followed hard his hunted prey,
(His spear had almost reached him in the way,
Short of his reins, and scarce a span behind,)
"Fool! " said the chief, "though fleeter than the wind,
Could'st thou presume to 'scape, when I pursue? "
He said, and downward by the feet he drew
The trembling dastard; at the tug he falls;
Vast ruins come along rent from the smoking walls.
Thus on some silver swan, or timorous hare,
Jove's bird comes sowsing down from upper air;
Her crooked talons truss the fearful prey:
Then out of sight she soars, and wings her way.
So seizes the grim wolf the tender lamb,
In vain lamented by the bleating dam.
Then rushing onward with a barbarous cry,
The troops of Turnus to the combat fly.
The ditch with faggots filled, the daring foe
Tossed firebrands to the steepy turrets throw.
Ilioneus, as bold Lucetius came
To force the gate, and feed the kindling flame,
Rolled down the fragment of a rock so right,
It crushed him double underneath the weight.
Two more young Liger and Asylas slew: }
To bend the bow young Liger better knew; }
Asylas best the pointed javelin threw. }
Brave Cæneus laid Ortygius on the plain;
The victor Cæneus was by Turnus slain.
By the same hand, Clonius and Itys fall,
Sagar, and Idas standing on the wall.
From Capys' arms his fate Privernus found:
Hurt by Temilla first--but slight the wound--
His shield thrown by, to mitigate the smart,
He clapped his hand upon the wounded part:
The second shaft came swift and unespied,
And pierced his hand, and nailed it to his side,
Transfixed his breathing lungs, and beating heart:
The soul came issuing out, and hissed against the dart.
The son of Arcens shone amid the rest,
In glittering armour and a purple vest,
(Fair was his face, his eyes inspiring love,)
Bred by his father in the Martian grove,
Where the fat altars of Palicus flame,
And sent in arms to purchase early fame.
Him when he spied from far, the Tuscan king
Laid by the lance, and took him to the sling,
Thrice whirled the thong around his head, and threw;
The heated lead half melted as it flew:
It pierced his hollow temples and his brain;
The youth came tumbling down, and spurned the plain.
Then young Ascanius, who, before this day,
Was wont in woods to shoot the savage prey,
First bent in martial strife the twanging bow,
And exercised against a human foe--
With this bereft Numanus of his life,
Who Turnus' younger sister took to wife.
Proud of his realm, and of his royal bride, }
Vaunting before his troops, and lengthened with a stride, }
In these insulting terms the Trojans he defied:-- }
"Twice-conquered cowards! now your shame is shown--
Cooped up a second time within your town!
Who dare not issue forth in open field,
But hold your walls before you for a shield.
Thus threat you war? thus our alliance force?
What gods, what madness, hither steered your course?
You shall not find the sons of Atreus here,
Nor need the frauds of sly Ulysses fear.
Strong from the cradle, of a sturdy brood,
We bear our new-born infants to the flood;
There bathed amid the stream, our boys we hold,
With winter hardened, and inured to cold.
They wake before the day to range the wood,
Kill ere they eat, nor taste unconquered food.
No sports, but what belong to war, they know--
To break the stubborn colt, to bend the bow.
Our youth, of labour patient, earn their bread;
Hardly they work, with frugal diet fed.
From ploughs and harrows sent to seek renown,
They fight in fields, and storm the shaken town.
No part of life from toils of war is free,
No change in age, or difference in degree.
We plough and till in arms: our oxen feel,
Instead of goads, the spur and pointed steel:
The inverted lance makes furrows in the plain.
Even time, that changes all, yet changes us in vain--
The body, not the mind--nor can controul
The immortal vigour, or abate the soul.
Our helms defend the young, disguise the grey:
We live by plunder, and delight in prey.
Your vests embroidered with rich purple shine;
In sloth you glory, and in dances join.
Your vests have sweeping sleeves: with female pride,
Your turbans underneath your chins are tied.
Go, Phrygians, to your Dindymus agen!
Go, less than women, in the shapes of men!
Go! mixed with eunuchs in the Mother's rites,
(Where with unequal sound the flute invites,)
Sing, dance, and howl, by turns, in Ida's shade:
Resign the war to men, who know the martial trade. "
This foul reproach Ascanius could not hear
With patience, or a vowed revenge forbear.
At the full stretch of both his hands, he drew,
And almost joined, the horns of the tough yew. [4]
But, first, before the throne of Jove he stood,
And thus with lifted hands invoked the god:--
"My first attempt, great Jupiter, succeed!
An annual offering in thy grove shall bleed,
A snow-white steer, before thy altar led,
Who, like his mother, bears aloft his head,
Butts with his threatening brows, and bellowing stands,
And dares the fight, and spurns the yellow sands. "
Jove bowed the heavens, and lent a gracious ear,
And thundered on the left, amidst the clear.
Sounded at once the bow; and swiftly flies
The feathered death, and hisses through the skies.
The steel through both his temples forced the way:
Extended on the ground, Numanus lay.
"Go now, vain boaster! and true valour scorn!
The Phrygians, twice subdued, yet make this third return. "
Ascanius said no more. The Trojans shake
The heavens with shouting, and new vigour take.
Apollo then bestrode a golden cloud, }
To view the feats of arms, and fighting crowd; }
And thus the beardless victor he bespoke aloud:-- }
"Advance, illustrious youth! increase in fame,
And wide from east to west extend thy name--
Offspring of gods thyself; and Rome shall owe
To thee a race of demigods below.
This is the way to heaven: the powers divine
From this beginning date the Julian line.
To thee, to them, and their victorious heirs,
The conquered war is due, and the vast world is theirs.
Troy is too narrow for thy name. " He said,
And plunging downward shot his radiant head;
Dispelled the breathing air, that broke his flight:
Shorn of his beams, a man to mortal sight,
Old Butes' form he took, Anchises' squire,
Now left, to rule Ascanius, by his sire:
His wrinkled visage, and his hoary hairs, }
His mien, his habit, and his arms, he wears, }
And thus salutes the boy, too forward for his years:-- }
"Suffice it thee, thy father's worthy son,
The warlike prize thou hast already won.
The god of archers gives thy youth a part
Of his own praise, nor envies equal art.
Now tempt the war no more. " He said, and flew
Obscure in air, and vanished from their view.
The Trojans, by his arms, their patron know,
And hear the twanging of his heavenly bow.
Then duteous force they use, and Phœbus' name,
To keep from fight the youth too fond of fame.
Undaunted, they themselves no danger shun;
From wall to wall, the shouts and clamours run;
They bend their bows; they whirl their slings around; }
Heaps of spent arrows fall, and strew the ground; }
And helms, and shields, and rattling arms, resound. }
The combat thickens, like the storm that flies
From westward, when the showery Kids arise;
Or pattering hail comes pouring on the main,
When Jupiter descends in hardened rain,
Or bellowing clouds burst with a stormy sound,
And with an armed winter strew the ground.
Pand'rus and Bitias, thunder-bolts of war,
Whom Hiera to bold Alcanor bare
On Ida's top--two youths of height and size
Like firs that on their mother mountain rise--
Presuming on their force, the gates unbar,
And of their own accord invite the war,
With fates averse, against their king's command.
Armed, on the right and on the left they stand,
And flank the passage: shining steel they wear,
And waving crests above their heads appear.
Thus two tall oaks, that Padus' banks adorn,
Lift up to heaven their leafy heads unshorn,
And, overpressed with nature's heavy load,
Dance to the whistling winds, and at each other nod.
In flows a tide of Latians, when they see
The gate set open, and the passage free;
Bold Quercens, with rash Tmarus, rushing on,
Aquicolus, that in bright armour shone,
And Hæmon first: but soon repulsed they fly,
Or in the well-defended pass they die.
These with success are fired, and those with rage,
And each on equal terms at length engage.
Drawn from their lines, and issuing on the plain,
The Trojans hand to hand the fight maintain.
Fierce Turnus in another quarter fought,
When suddenly the unhoped-for news was brought,
The foes had left the fastness of their place,
Prevailed in fight, and had his men in chase.
He quits the attack, and, to prevent their fate,
Runs, where the giant brothers guard the gate.
The first he met, Antiphates the brave,
(But base-begotten on a Theban slave--
Sarpedon's son) he slew: the deadly dart
Found passage through his breast, and pierced his heart.
Fixed in the wound the Italian cornel stood,
Warmed in his lungs, and in his vital blood.
Aphidnus next, and Erymanthus dies, }
And Meropes, and the gigantic size }
Of Bitias, threatening with his ardent eyes. }
Not by the feeble dart he fell oppressed,
(A dart were lost within that roomy breast,)
But from a knotted lance, large, heavy, strong,
Which roared like thunder as it whirled along:
Not two bull-hides the impetuous force withhold,
Nor coat of double mail, with scales of gold.
Down sunk the monster-bulk, and pressed the ground,
(His arms and clattering shield on the vast body sound,)
Not with less ruin than the Baian mole,
Raised on the seas, the surges to controul--
At once comes tumbling down the rocky wall;
Prone to the deep, the stones disjointed fall
Of the vast pile; the scattered ocean flies;
Black sands, discoloured froth, and mingled mud, arise:
The frighted billows roll, and seek the shores:
Then trembles Prochyta, then Ischia roars:
Typhöeus, thrown beneath by Jove's command,
Astonished at the flaw that shakes the land,
Soon shifts his weary side, and, scarce awake,
With wonder feels the weight press lighter on his back.
The warrior god the Latian troops inspired,
New strung their sinews, and their courage fired,
But chills the Trojan hearts with cold affright:
Then black despair precipitates their flight.
When Pandarus beheld his brother killed,
The town with fear and wild confusion filled,
He turns the hinges of the heavy gate
With both his hands, and adds his shoulders to the weight;
Some happier friends within the walls inclosed;
The rest shut out, to certain death exposed:
Fool as he was, and frantic in his care,
To admit young Turnus, and include the war!
He thrust amid the crowd, securely bold,
Like a fierce tyger pent amid the fold.
Too late his blazing buckler they descry,
And sparkling fires that shot from either eye,
His mighty members, and his ample breast,
His rattling armour, and his crimson crest.
Far from that hated face the Trojans fly,
All but the fool who sought his destiny.
Mad Pandarus steps forth, with vengeance vowed
For Bitias' death, and threatens thus aloud:--
"These are not Ardea's walls, nor this the town
Amata proffers with Lavinia's crown:
'Tis hostile earth you tread. Of hope bereft,
No means of safe return by flight are left. "
To whom, with countenance calm, and soul sedate,
Thus Turnus:--"Then begin, and try thy fate:
My message to the ghost of Priam bear;
Tell him a new Achilles sent thee there. "
A lance of tough ground-ash the Trojan threw,
Rough in the rind, and knotted as it grew:
With his full force he whirled it first around;
But the soft yielding air received the wound:
Imperial Juno turned the course before,
And fixed the wandering weapon in the door.
"But hope not thou," said Turnus, "when I strike,
To shun thy fate: our force is not alike,
Nor thy steel tempered by the Lemnian god. "
Then rising, on his utmost stretch he stood,
And aimed from high: the full descending blow
Cleaves the broad front and beardless cheeks in two.
Down sinks the giant with a thundering sound: }
His ponderous limbs oppress the trembling ground; }
Blood, brains, and foam, gush from the gaping wound. }
Scalp, face, and shoulders, the keen steel divides;
And the shared visage hangs on equal sides.
The Trojans fly from their approaching fate:
And, had the victor then secured the gate,
And, to his troops without, unclosed the bars,
One lucky day had ended all his wars.
But boiling youth, and blind desire of blood,
Push on his fury, to pursue the crowd.
Hamstringed behind, unhappy Gyges died;
Then Phalaris is added to his side.
The pointed javelins from the dead he drew,
And their friends' arms against their fellows threw.
Strong Halys stands in vain; weak Phegeus flies;
Saturnia, still at hand, new force and fire supplies.
Then Halius, Prytanis, Alcander fall--
Engaged against the foes who scaled the wall:
But, whom they feared without, they found within.
At last, though late, by Lynceus he was seen.
He calls new succours, and assaults the prince:
But weak his force, and vain is their defence.
Turned to the right, his sword the hero drew,
And at one blow the bold aggressor slew.
He joints the neck; and, with a stroke so strong,
The helm flies off, and bears the head along.
Next him, the huntsman Amycus he killed,
In darts envenomed and in poison skilled.
Then Clytius fell beneath his fatal spear,
And Cretheus, whom the Muses held so dear:
He fought with courage, and he sung the fight;
Arms were his business, verses his delight.
The Trojan chiefs behold, with rage and grief,
Their slaughtered friends, and hasten their relief.
Bold Mnestheus rallies first the broken train,
Whom brave Serestus and his troop sustain.
To save the living, and revenge the dead,
Against one warrior's arms all Troy they led.
"O, void of sense and courage! " Mnestheus cried,
"Where can you hope your coward heads to hide?
Ah! where beyond these rampires can you run?
One man, and in your camp inclosed, you shun!
Shall then a single sword such slaughter boast,
And pass unpunished from a numerous host?
Forsaking honour, and renouncing fame,
Your gods, your country, and your king, you shame! "
This just reproach their virtue does excite:
They stand, they join, they thicken to the fight.
Now Turnus doubts, and yet disdains to yield,
But with slow paces measures back the field,
And inches to the walls, where Tyber's tide,
Washing the camp, defends the weaker side.
The more he loses, they advance the more,
And tread in every step he trod before.
They shout; they bear him back; and, whom by might
They cannot conquer, they oppress with weight.
As, compassed with a wood of spears around,
The lordly lion still maintains his ground;
Grins horrible, retires, and turns again;
Threats his distended paws, and shakes his mane;
He loses while in vain he presses on,
Nor will his courage let him dare to run:
So Turnus fares, and, unresolved of flight,
Moves tardy back, and just recedes from fight.
Yet twice, enraged, the combat he renews,
Twice breaks, and twice his broken foes pursues.
But now they swarm, and, with fresh troops supplied,
Come rolling on, and rush from every side:
Nor Juno, who sustained his arms before,
Dares with new strength suffice the exhausted store;
For Jove, with sour commands, sent Iris down,
To force the invader from the frighted town.
With labour spent, no longer can he wield
The heavy faulchion, or sustain the shield,
O'erwhelmed with darts, which from afar they fling:
The weapons round his hollow temples ring:
His golden helm gives way, with stony blows
Battered, and flat, and beaten to his brows.
His crest is rashed away; his ample shield
Is falsified, and round with javelins filled. [5]
The foe, now faint, the Trojans overwhelm;
And Mnestheus lays hard load upon his helm.
Sick sweat succeeds; he drops at every pore;
With driving dust his cheeks are pasted o'er;
Shorter and shorter every gasp he takes;
And vain efforts and hurtless blows he makes.
Armed as he was, at length he leaped from high,
Plunged in the flood, and made the waters fly.
The yellow god the welcome burden bore,
And wiped the sweat, and washed away the gore;
Then gently wafts him to the farther coast,
And sends him safe to cheer his anxious host.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Note I. ]

[Footnote 2: Note II. ]

[Footnote 3: Early editions, _beheld_. ]

[Footnote 4: Note I. ]

[Footnote 5: Note II. ]




NOTES

ON

ÆNEÏS, BOOK IX.


Note I.

_At the full stretch of both his hands, he drew,
And almost joined, the horns of the tough yew. _--P. 54.

The first of these lines is all of monosyllables, and both verses are
very rough, but of choice; for it had been easy for me to have smoothed
them. But either my ear deceives me, or they express the thing which I
intended in their sound: for the stress of a bow, which is drawn to the
full extent, is expressed in the harshness of the first verse, clogged
not only with monosyllables, but with consonants; and these words, _the
tough yew_, which conclude the second line, seem as forceful, as they
are unharmonious. Homer and Virgil are both frequent in their adapting
sounds to the thing they signify. One example will serve for both;
because Virgil borrowed the following verses from Homer's Odysses.

_Una Eurusque Notusque ruunt, creberque procellis
Africus, et vastos volvunt ad litora fluctus. _

Συν δ' Ευροστε, Νοτοςτ' επεσεν.
Ζεφυροστε δυσαης,
Και Βορεης αιθρηγενετης,
μεγα κυμα κυλινδων.

Our language is not often capable of these beauties, though sometimes I
have copied them, of which these verses are an instance.


Note II.

---- ---- ---- ---- _His ample shield_
_Is falsified, and round with javelins filled. _--P. 61.

When I read this Æneïd to many of my friends in company together, most
of them quarrelled at the word _falsified_, as an innovation in our
language. The fact is confessed; for I remember not to have read it in
any English author, though perhaps it may be found in Spenser's "Fairy
Queen;" but, suppose it be not there, why am I forbidden to borrow
from the Italian (a polished language) the word which is wanting in my
native tongue? Terence has often Grecised; Lucretius has followed his
example, and pleaded for it--

_Sic quia me cogit patrii sermonis egestus. _

Virgil has confirmed it by his frequent practice; and even Cicero in
prose, wanting terms of philosophy in the Latin tongue, has taken them
from Aristotle's Greek. Horace has given us a rule for coining words,
_si Græco fonte cadant_; especially, when other words are joined with
them, which explain the sense. I use the word _falsify_ in this place,
to mean, that the shield of Turnus was not of proof against the spears
and javelins of the Trojans, which had pierced it through and through
(as we say) in many places. The words which accompany this new one,
make my meaning plain, according to the precept which Horace gave. But
I said I borrowed the word from the Italian. _Vide_ Ariosto, Cant. 26.

_Ma sì l'usbergo d'ambi era perfetto,
Che mai poter falsarlo in nessun canto. _

_Falsar_ cannot otherwise be turned, than by _falsified_; for _his
shield was falsed_, is not English. I might indeed have contented
myself with saying, his shield was pierced, and bored, and stuck with
javelins, _nec sufficit umbo ictibus_. They, who will not admit a new
word, may take the old; the matter is not worth dispute.




ÆNEÏS,

BOOK X.

ARGUMENT.

_Jupiter, calling a council of the gods, forbids them to engage
in either party. At Æneas's return there is a bloody battle:
Turnus killing Pallas; Æneas, Lausus and Mezentius. Mezentius is
described as an atheist; Lausus as a pious and virtuous youth.
The different actions and death of these two are the subject of a
noble episode. _


The gates of heaven unfold: Jove summons all
The gods to council in the common hall.
Sublimely seated, he surveys from far
The fields, the camp, the fortune of the war,
And all the inferior world. From first to last,
The sovereign senate in degrees are placed.
Then thus the almighty sire began:--"Ye gods,
Natives or denizens of blest abodes!
From whence these murmurs, and this change of mind,
This backward fate from what was first designed?
Why thus protracted war, when my commands
Pronounced a peace, and gave the Latian lands?
What fear or hope on either part divides
Our heavens, and arms our powers on different sides?
A lawful time of war at length will come,
(Nor need your haste anticipate the doom,)
When Carthage shall contend the world with Rome;
Shall force the rigid rocks and Alpine chains,
And, like a flood, come pouring on the plains.
Then is your time for faction and debate,
For partial favour, and permitted hate.
Let now your immature dissention cease;
Sit quiet, and compose your souls to peace. "
Thus Jupiter in few unfolds the charge;
But lovely Venus thus replies at large:--
"O power immense! eternal energy!
(For to what else protection can we fly? )
Seest thou the proud Rutulians, how they dare
In fields, unpunished, and insult my care?
How lofty Turnus vaunts amidst his train,
In shining arms triumphant on the plain?
Even in their lines and trenches they contend,
And scarce their walls the Trojan troops defend:
The town is filled with slaughter, and o'erfloats,
With a red deluge, their increasing moats.
Æneas, ignorant, and far from thence,
Has left a camp exposed, without defence.
This endless outrage shall they still sustain?
Shall Troy renewed be forced and fired again?
A second siege my banished issue fears,
And a new Diomede in arms appears.
One more audacious mortal will be found;
And I, thy daughter, wait another wound.
Yet, if, with fates averse, without thy leave,
The Latian lands my progeny receive,
Bear they the pains of violated law,
And thy protection from their aid withdraw.
But, if the gods their sure success foretell--
If those of heaven consent with those of hell,
To promise Italy; who dare debate
The power of Jove, or fix another fate?
What should I tell of tempests on the main,
Of Æolus usurping Neptune's reign?
Of Iris sent, with Bacchanalian heat
To inspire the matrons, and destroy the fleet?
Now Juno to the Stygian sky descends,
Solicits hell for aid, and arms the fiends.
That new example wanted yet above--
An act that well became the wife of Jove!
Alecto, raised by her, with rage inflames
The peaceful bosoms of the Latian dames.
Imperial sway no more exalts my mind;
(Such hopes I had indeed, while heaven was kind,)
Now let my happier foes possess my place, }
Whom Jove prefers before the Trojan race; }
And conquer they, whom you with conquest grace. }
Since you can spare, from all your wide command,
No spot of earth, no hospitable land,
Which may my wandering fugitives receive;
(Since haughty Juno will not give you leave,)
Then, father, (if I still may use that name,)
By ruined Troy, yet smoking from the flame,
I beg you, let Ascanius, by my care,
Be freed from danger, and dismissed the war:
Inglorious let him live, without a crown: }
The father may be cast on coasts unknown, }
Struggling with fate; but let me save the son. }
Mine is Cythera, mine the Cyprian towers:
In those recesses, and those sacred bowers,
Obscurely let him rest; his right resign
To promised empire, and his Julian line.
Then Carthage may the Ausonian towns destroy,
Nor fear the race of a rejected boy.
What profits it my son, to 'scape the fire,
Armed with his gods, and loaded with his sire;
To pass the perils of the seas and wind;
Evade the Greeks, and leave the war behind;
To reach the Italian shores; if, after all,
Our second Pergamus is doomed to fall?
Much better had he curbed his high desires,
And hovered o'er his ill-extinguished fires.
To Simoïs' banks the fugitives restore,
And give them back to war, and all the woes before. "
Deep indignation swelled Saturnia's heart:
"And must I own," she said, "my secret smart--
What with more decence were in silence kept,
And, but for this unjust reproach, had slept?
Did god or man your favourite son advise,
With war unhoped the Latians to surprise?
By fate, you boast, and by the gods' decree,
He left his native land for Italy!
Confess the truth; by mad Cassandra, more
Than heaven, inspired, he sought a foreign shore.
Did I persuade to trust his second Troy
To the raw conduct of a beardless boy,
With walls unfinished, which himself forsakes,
And through the waves a wandering voyage takes?
When have I urged him meanly to demand
The Tuscan aid, and arm a quiet land?
Did I or Iris give this mad advice?
Or made the fool himself the fatal choice?
You think it hard, the Latians should destroy
With swords your Trojans, and with fires your Troy!
Hard and unjust indeed, for men to draw
Their native air, nor take a foreign law!
That Turnus is permitted still to live,
To whom his birth a god and goddess give!
But yet 'tis just and lawful for your line
To drive their fields, and force with fraud to join;
Realms, not your own, among your clans divide,
And from the bridegroom tear the promised bride;
Petition, while you public arms prepare;
Pretend a peace, and yet provoke a war!
'Twas given to you, your darling son to shroud, }
To draw the dastard from the fighting crowd, }
And, for a man, obtend an empty cloud. }
From flaming fleets you turned the fire away,
And changed the ships to daughters of the sea.
But 'tis my crime--the queen of heaven offends,
If she presume to save her suffering friends!
Your son, not knowing what his foes decree,
You say, is absent: absent let him be.
Yours is Cythera, yours the Cyprian towers,
The soft recesses, and the sacred bowers.
Why do you then these needless arms prepare,
And thus provoke a people prone to war?
Did I with fire the Trojan town deface,
Or hinder from return your exiled race?
Was I the cause of mischief, or the man,
Whose lawless lust the fatal war began?
Think on whose faith the adulterous youth relied;
Who promised, who procured, the Spartan bride?
When all the united states of Greece combined,
To purge the world of the perfidious kind,
Then was your time to fear the Trojan fate:--
Your quarrels and complaints are now too late. "
Thus Juno. Murmurs rise, with mixed applause,
Just as they favour or dislike the cause.
So winds, when yet unfledged in woods they lie,
In whispers first their tender voices try,
Then issue on the main with bellowing rage,
And storms to trembling mariners presage.
Then thus to both replied the imperial god,
Who shakes heaven's axles with his awful nod.
(When he begins, the silent senate stand,
With reverence listening to the dread command:
The clouds dispel; the winds their breath restrain;
And the hushed waves lie flatted on the main. )
"Celestials! your attentive ears incline! }
Since (said the god) the Trojans must not join }
In wished alliance with the Latian line-- }
Since endless jarrings and immortal hate, }
Tend but to discompose our happy state-- }
The war henceforward be resigned to fate: }
Each to his proper fortune stand or fall;
Equal and unconcerned I look on all.
Rutulians, Trojans, are the same to me;
And both shall draw the lots their fates decree.
Let these assault, if Fortune be their friend;
And, if she favours those, let those defend:--
The fates will find their way. " The Thunderer said;
And shook the sacred honours of his head,
Attesting Styx, the inviolable flood, }
And the black regions of his brother god. }
Trembled the poles of heaven, and earth confessed the nod. }
This end the sessions had: the senate rise,
And to his palace wait their sovereign through the skies.
Meantime, intent upon their siege, the foes
Within their walls the Trojan host inclose:
They wound, they kill, they watch at every gate;
Renew the fires, and urge their happy fate.
The Æneans wish in vain their wanted chief,
Hopeless of flight, more hopeless of relief.
Thin on the towers they stand; and even those few,
A feeble, fainting, and dejected crew.
Yet in the face of danger some there stood:
The two bold brothers of Sarpedon's blood,
Asius, and Acmon: both the Assaraci;
Young Hæmon, and, though young, resolved to die.
With these were Clarus and Thymœtes joined;
Thymbris and Castor, both of Lycian kind.
From Acmon's hands a rolling stone there came,
So large, it half deserved a mountain's name!
Strong-sinewed was the youth, and big of bone: }
His brother Mnestheus could not more have done, }
Or the great father of the intrepid son. }
Some firebrands throw, some flights of arrows send;
And some with darts, and some with stones, defend.
Amid the press appears the beauteous boy,
The care of Venus, and the hope of Troy.
His lovely face unarmed, his head was bare;
In ringlets o'er his shoulders hung his hair.
His forehead circled with a diadem;
Distinguished from the crowd, he shines a gem,
Enchased in gold, or polished ivory set,
Amidst the meaner foil of sable jet.
Nor Ismarus was wanting to the war,
Directing ointed arrows from afar,
And death with poison armed--in Lydia born,
Where plenteous harvests the fat fields adorn;
Where proud Pactolus floats the fruitful lands,
And leaves a rich manure of golden sands.
There Capys, author of the Capuan name, }
And there was Mnestheus too, increased in fame, }
Since Turnus from the camp he cast with shame. }
Thus mortal war was waged on either side.
Meantime the hero cuts the nightly tide:
For, anxious, from Evander when he went,
He sought the Tyrrhene camp, and Tarchon's tent;
Exposed the cause of coming to the chief;
His name and country told, and asked relief;
Proposed the terms; his own small strength declared;
What vengeance proud Mezentius had prepared;
What Turnus, bold and violent, designed;
Then shewed the slippery state of human-kind,
And fickle fortune; warned him to beware,
And to his wholesome counsel added prayer.
Tarchon, without delay, the treaty signs,
And to the Trojan troops the Tuscan joins.
They soon set sail; nor now the Fates withstand;
Their forces trusted with a foreign hand.
Æneas leads; upon his stern appear }
Two lions carved, which rising Ida bear-- }
Ida, to wandering Trojans ever dear. }
Under their grateful shade Æneas sate,
Revolving war's events, and various fate.
His left young Pallas kept, fixed to his side,
And oft of winds inquired, and of the tide;
Oft of the stars, and of their watery way;
And what he suffered both by land and sea.
Now, sacred sisters, open all your spring!
The Tuscan leaders, and their army, sing,[6]
Which followed great Æneas to the war:
Their arms, their numbers, and their names, declare.
A thousand youths brave Massicus obey,
Borne in the Tiger through the foaming sea;
From Clusium[7] brought, and Cosa, by his care:
For arms, light quivers, bows and shafts, they bear.
Fierce Abas next: his men bright armour wore:
His stern Apollo's golden statue bore.
Six hundred Populonia sent along,
All skilled in martial exercise, and strong.
Three hundred more for battle Ilva joins,
An isle renowned for steel, and unexhausted mines.
Asylas on his prow the third appears,
Who heaven interprets, and the wandering stars;
From offered entrails, prodigies expounds,
And peals of thunder, with presaging sounds.
A thousand spears in warlike order stand,
Sent by the Pisans under his command.
Fair Astur follows in the watery field,
Proud of his managed horse, and painted shield.
Gravisca, noisome from the neighbouring fen,
And his own Cære, sent three hundred men,
With those which Minio's fields, and Pyrgi gave;
All bred in arms, unanimous, and brave.
Thou, Muse, the name of Cinyras renew,
And brave Cupavo followed but by few;
Whose helm confessed the lineage of the man,
And bore, with wings displayed, a silver swan.
Love was the fault of his famed ancestry,
Whose forms and fortunes in his ensign fly.
For Cycnus loved unhappy Phaëthon,
And sung his loss in poplar groves, alone,
Beneath the sister shades, to sooth his grief.
Heaven heard his song, and hastened his relief,
And changed to snowy plumes his hoary hair,
And winged his flight, to chant aloft in air.
His son Cupavo brushed the briny flood;
Upon his stern a brawny Centaur stood,
Who heaved a rock, and, threatening still to throw,
With lifted hands alarmed the seas below:
They seemed to fear the formidable sight,
And rolled their billows on, to speed his flight. [8]
Ocnus was next, who led his native train
Of hardy warriors through the watery plain--
The son of Manto, by the Tuscan stream,
From whence the Mantuan town derives the name--
An ancient city, but of mixed descent:
Three several tribes compose the government;
Four towns are under each; but all obey
The Mantuan laws, and own the Tuscan sway.
Hate to Mezentius armed five hundred more, }
Whom Mincius from his sire Benacus bore-- }
Mincius, with wreaths of reeds his forehead covered o'er. }
These grave Aulestes leads: a hundred sweep
With stretching oars at once the glassy deep.
Him, and his martial train, the Triton bears;
High on his poop the sea-green god appears:
Frowning he seems his crooked shell to sound,
And at the blast the billows dance around.
A hairy man above the waist he shows;
A porpoise-tail beneath his belly grows;
And ends a fish: his breast the waves divides,
And froth and foam augment the murmuring tides.
Full thirty ships transport the chosen train,
For Troy's relief, and scour the briny main.
Now was the world forsaken by the sun,
And Phoebe half her nightly race had run.
The careful chief, who never closed his eyes,
Himself the rudder holds, the sails supplies.
A choir of Nereids meet him on the flood,[9]
Once his own galleys, hewn from Ida's wood;
But now, as many nymphs, the sea they sweep,
As rode, before, tall vessels on the deep.