by Virgil
The mane from off his brawny neck, and fearless of his mood
Breaks off the clinging robber-spear, and roars from mouth of blood;
E’en so o’er Turnus’ fiery heart the tide of fury wins,
And thus he speaketh to the King, and hasty speech begins:
“No hanging back in Turnus is, and no Ænean thrall
Hath aught to do to break his word or plighted troth recall:
I will go meet him: Father, bring the Gods, the peace-troth plight;
Then either I this Dardan thing will send adown to night, —
This rag of Asia, — Latin men a-looking on the play,
And all alone the people’s guilt my sword shall wipe away;
Or let him take us beaten folk, and wed Lavinia then!”
But unto him from quiet soul Latinus spake again:
“Great-hearted youth, by e’en so much as thou in valorous might
Dost more excel, by so much I must counsel me aright,
And hang all haps that may betide in those sad scales of mine.
Thine are thy father Daunus’ realms, a many towns are thine,
Won by thine hand: Latinus too his gold and goodwill yields;
But other high-born maids unwed dwell in Laurentine fields
Or Latin land, — nay, suffer me to set all guile apart,
And say a hard thing — do thou take this also to thine heart:
To none of all her wooers of old my daughter may I wed;
This warning word of prophecy all men and Gods have sped.
But by thy kindred blood o’ercome, and by the love of thee,
And by my sad wife’s tears, I broke all bonds and set me free.
From son-in-law I rapt his bride, I drew a godless sword.
What mishaps and what wrack of peace have been my due reward
Thou seest, Turnus, and what grief I was the first to bear.
Twice beaten in a woeful fight, scarce is our city here
Held by the hope of Italy: still Tiber-flood rolls by,
Warm with our blood, and ‘neath our bones wide meadows whitening lie.
But whither waver I so oft? what folly shifts my mind?
If I am ready, Turnus dead, peace with these men to bind,
Shall I not rather while thou liv’st cast all the war away?
What shall my kindred Rutuli, what shall Italia say,
If I deliver thee to death, (Fate thrust the words aside!)
Thee, who hast wooed me for thy sire, my daughter for thy bride?
Look on the wavering hap of war, pity thy father’s eld,
Now far from thee in sorrow sore by ancient Ardea held.”
But not a whit might all these words the wrath of Turnus bend.
Nay, worser waxed he, sickening more by medicine meant to mend:
And e’en so soon as he might speak, such words were in his mouth:
“Thy trouble for my sake, best lord, e’en for my sake forsooth,
Lay down, I prithee; let me buy a little praise with death.
I too, O father, sow the spear, nor weak hand scattereth
The iron seed, with me afield: the blood-springs know my stroke.
Nor here shall be his Goddess-dame with woman’s cloud to cloak
A craven king, and hide herself in empty mirky shade.”
But now the Queen, by this new chance of battle sore afraid,
Fell weeping, as her fiery son she held with dying eyes:
“O Turnus, by these tears, by what of worship for me lies
Anigh thy heart; O, only hope of this my latter tide,
Sole rest from sorrow! thou, in whom all worship doth abide,
All glory of the Latin name, our falling house-wall stay!
Set not thine hand to Teucrian war; this thing alone I pray.
Whatever lot abideth thee, O Turnus, mid the fight,
Abideth me, and I with thee will leave the loathed light;
Nor will I, made Æneas’ thrall, behold him made my son.”
Lavinia heard her mother’s words with burning cheeks, whereon
Lay rain of tears, for thereunto exceeding ruddy flush
Had brought the fire that now along her litten face did rush:
As when the Indian ivory they wrong with blood-red dye,
Or when mid many lilies white the ruddy roses lie,
E’en such a mingled colour showed upon the maiden’s face.
Sore stirred by love upon the maid he fixed his constant gaze,
And, all the more afire for fight, thus to Amata said:
“I prithee, mother, with these tears, such sign of coming dread,
Dog not my feet as forth I wend to Mavors’ bitter play;
For Turnus is not free to thrust the hour of death away.
Go, Idmon, bear the Phrygian lord these very words of mine,
Nought for his pleasure: When the dawn tomorrow first shall shine,
And from her purple wheels aloft shall redden all the sky,
Lead not thy Teucrians to the fight: Teucrians and Rutuli
Shall let their swords be; and we twain, our blood shall quench the strife,
And we upon that field shall woo Lavinia for a wife.”
He spake, and to the roofed place now swiftly wending home,
Called for his steeds, and merrily stood there before their foam,
E’en those that Orithyia gave Pilumnus, gift most fair,
Whose whiteness overpassed the snow, whose speed the wingèd air.
The busy horse-boys stand about, and lay upon their breasts
The clapping of their hollow hands, and comb their manèd crests.
But he the mail-coat doth on him well-wrought with golden scale
And latten white; he fits the sword unto his hand’s avail:
His shield therewith, and hornèd helm with ruddy crest o’erlaid:
That sword, the very Might of Fire for father Daunus made,
And quenched the white-hot edge thereof amidst the Stygian flood.
Then the strong spear he took in hand that ‘gainst the pillar stood,
Amidmost of the house: that spear his hand won mightily
From Actor of Auruncum erst; he shakes the quivering tree
Loud crying: “Now, O spear of mine, who never heretofore
Hast failed my call, the day draws on: thee the huge Actor bore,
Now Turnus’ right hand wieldeth thee: to aid, that I prevail
To lay the Phrygian gelding low, and strip his rended mail
By might of hand; to foul with dust the ringlets of his hair,
Becrisped with curling-irons hot and drenched with plenteous myrrh!”
By such a fury is he driven; from all his countenance
The fiery flashes leap, the flames in his fierce eyeballs dance:
As when a bull in first of fight raiseth a fearful roar,
And teacheth wrath unto his horns and whets them for the war,
And ‘gainst the tree-trunks pusheth them, and thrusts the breezes home,
And with the scattering of the sand preludeth fight to come.
Nor less Æneas, terrible, in Venus’ armour dight,
Now whetteth war; and in his heart stirreth the wrath of fight,
That plighted peace shall lay the war fain is his heart and glad;
His fellows’ minds and bitter fear that makes Iulus sad
He solaceth with fate-wise words; then bids his folk to bear
His answer to the Latin king and peace-laws to declare.
But scarce the morrow’s dawn of day had lit the mountain steeps,
And scarce the horses of the Sun drew upward from the deeps,
And from their nostrils raised aloft blew forth the morning clear,
When Trojans and Rutulian men the field of fight prepare,
And measure out a space beneath the mighty city’s wall.
Midmost the hearths they hallow there to common Gods of all,
And grassy altars: other some bear
fire, and fountain’s flow,
All linen clad, and vervain leaves are crowning every brow.
Forth comes the host of Italy, the men that wield the spear
Pour outward from the crowded gate; the Trojan host is there,
And all the Tyrrhene company in battle-gear diverse,
Nor otherwise in iron clad, than if the War-god fierce
Cried on to arms: and in the midst of war-ranks thousandfold
The dukes are flitting, well beseen in purple dye and gold,
E’en Mnestheus of Assaracus, Asylas huge of force,
Messapus, Neptune’s very son, the tamer of the horse.
But when the sign was given abroad each to his own place won,
And set his spear-shaft in the earth and leaned his shield thereon.
Then streamed forth mothers fain to see and elders feeble grown;
The unarmed crowd beset the towers and houses of the town,
And others of the people throng the high-built gates around.
But Juno from the steep that men now call the Alban mound
(Though neither worship, name, nor fame it bore upon that day),
Was looking down upon the lists and either war-array
Of Trojan and Laurentine men, and King Latinus’ wall,
Then upon Turnus’ sister’s ear her words of God did fall:
A goddess she, the queen of mere and sounding river-wave;
Which worship Jupiter the King, the Heaven-Abider gave
A hallowed gift to pay her back for ravished maidenhood:
“O Nymph, the glory of the streams, heart well-beloved and good,
Thee only, as thou know’st, I love of all who e’er have come
Into the unkind bed of Jove from out a Latin home,
With goodwill have I granted thee the heavenly house to share;
Therefore, Juturna, know thy grief lest I the blame should bear:
While Fortune would, and while the Fates allowed the Latin folk
A happy day, so long did I thy town and Turnus cloak;
But now I see him hastening on to meet the fated ill:
His doomsday comes, the foeman’s hand shall soon his hour fulfil.
I may not look upon the fight, or see the wagered field;
But thou, if any present help thou durst thy brother yield,
Haste, it behoves thee! — happier days on wretches yet may rise.”
Scarce spake she ere Juturna poured the tear-flood from her eyes,
And thrice and four times smote with hand her bosom well beseen.
“Nay, this is now no weeping-time,” saith that Saturnian Queen,
“Haste; snatch thy brother from the death if all be not undone,
Or wake up war and rend apart the treaty scarce begun;
And I am she that bids thee dare.”
She urged her, and she left
Her wavering mind and turmoiled heart with sorrow’s torment cleft.
Meantime the Kings — Latinus there, a world of state around,
Is borne upon the fourfold car, his gleaming temples bound
With twice six golden rays, the sign of his own grandsire’s light,
The heavenly Sun; and Turnus wends with twi-yoked horses white,
Tossing in hand two shafts of war with broad-beat points of steel.
And hither Father Æneas, spring of the Roman weal,
Flaming with starry shield and arms wrought in the heavenly home,
And next to him Ascanius young, the second hope of Rome,
Fare from the camp: the priest thereon, in unstained raiment due,
Offereth a son of bristly sow and unshorn yearling ewe,
And bringeth up the four-foot hosts unto the flaming place.
But they, with all eyes turned about the rising sun to face,
Give forth the salt meal from the hand, and with the iron sign
The victims’ brows, and mid the flame pour out the bowls of wine:
Then good Æneas draws his sword, and thuswise prays the prayer:
“Bear witness, Sun, and thou, O Land, who dost my crying hear!
Land, for whose sake I waxed in might, sustaining toils enow;
And Thou, Almighty Father, hear! Saturnian Juno thou,
Grown kinder, Goddess, I beseech; and thou, most glorious Mars,
Father, whose hand of utter might is master of all wars;
Ye Springs, and River-floods I call, and whatsoever God
Is in the air, or whatso rules the blue sea with its rod —
If to Ausonian Turnus here Fortune shall give the day,
The conquered to Evander’s town shall straightly wend their way;
Iulus shall depart the land, nor shall Æneas’ folk
Stir war hereafter, or with sword the Latin wrath provoke.
But if the grace of victory here bow down upon our fight;
— (As I believe, as may the Gods make certain with their might!) —
I will not bid the Italian men to serve the Teucrian’s will;
Nor for myself seek I the realm; but all unconquered still
Let either folk with equal laws plight peace for evermore:
The Gods and worship I will give, Latinus see to war;
My father lawful rule shall have; for me my Teucrians here
Shall build a city, and that home Lavinia’s name shall bear.”
So first Æneas: after whom Latinus swears and says,
Looking aloft, and stretching hands up towards the starry ways:
“E’en so, Æneas, do I swear by Stars, and Sea, and Earth,
By twi-faced Janus, and the twins Latona brought to birth,
And by the nether Might of God and shrine of unmoved Dis;
And may the Sire who halloweth in all troth-plight hearken this:
I hold the altars, and these Gods and fires to witness take,
That, as for Italy, no day the peace and troth shall break,
What thing soever shall befall; no might shall conquer me.
Not such as with the wrack of flood shall mingle earth and sea,
Nor such as into nether Hell shall melt the heavenly land.
E’en as this sceptre” — (for by chance he bore a staff in hand) —
“Shall never more to leafage light and twig and shadow shoot,
Since when amid the thicket-place, cut off from lowest root,
It lost its mother, and the knife hath lopped it, leaf and bough, —
A tree once, but the craftsman’s hand hath wrapped it seemly now
With brass about, and made it meet for hands of Latin lords.”
So in the sight of all the chiefs with such abundant words
They bound the troth-plight fast and sure: then folk in due wise slay
The victims on the altar-flame, and draw the hearts away
Yet living, and with platters full the holy altars pile.
But unto those Rutulian men unequal this long while
The fight had seemed, and in their hearts the mingled trouble rose;
And all the more, as nigher now they note the ill-matched foes,
This helpeth Turnus’ silent step, and suppliant worshipping
About the altars, and his eyes that unto earth do cling,
His faded cheeks, his youthful frame that wonted colour lacks.
Wherefore Jaturna, when she hears the talk of people wax,
And how the wavering hearts of men in diverse manner sway,
Like unto Camers wendeth now amidst of that array;
— A mighty man, from mighty blood, his father well renowned
For valorous worth, and he himself keen in the battle found.
So through the mid array she speeds, well knowing what is toward,
And soweth rumour on the wind and speaketh such a word:
“O shame ye not, Rutulian men, to offer up one soul
For all your warriors? lack we aught in might or muster-roll
To match them? Here is all they have — Trojans, Ar
cadian peers,
And that Etruscan Turnus’ bane, the fateful band of spears:
Why, if we meet, each second man shall scantly find a foe.
And now their king, upborne by fame, unto the Gods shall go,
Upon whose shrines he vows himself; his name shall live in tale.
But we shall lose our fatherland and ‘neath proud lords shall fail,
E’en those that sit there heavy-slow upon our fields today.”
So with such words she lit the hearts of all that young array;
Yet more and more a murmur creeps about the ranks of men;
Changed even are Laurentine folk; changed are the Latins then;
They who had hoped that rest from fight and peaceful days were won,
Are now but fain of battle-gear, and wish the troth undone,
For ruth that such a cruel fate on Turnus’ head should fall.
But unto these a greater thing Jaturna adds withal,
A sign from heaven; and nought so much stirred Italy that day,
As this whose prodigy beguiled men’s hearts to go astray:
For now the yellow bird of Jove amid the ruddy light
Was chasing of the river-fowl, and drave in hurried flight
The noisy throng; when suddenly down to the waves he ran,
And caught in greedy hookèd claws a goodly-bodied swan:
Uprose the hearts of Italy, for all the fowl cry out,
And, wonderful for eyes to see, from fleeing turn about,
Darken the air with cloud of wings, and fall upon the foe;
Till he, oppressed by might of them and by his prey held low,
Gives way, and casts the quarry down from out his hookéd claws
Into the river, and aback to inner cloud-land draws.
Then to the sign the Rutuli shout greeting with one breath,
And spread their hands abroad; but first the seer Tolumnius saith:
“This, this is that, which still my prayers sought oft and o’er again.
I take the sign, I know the God! to arms with me, O men!
Poor people, whom the stranger-thief hath terrified with war.
E’en like these feeble fowl; who wastes the acres of your shore,
Yet shall he fly, and give his sails unto the outer sea:
But ye, your ranks with heart and mind now serry manfully,
And ward your ravished King and Duke with all your battle-world!”
He spake, and, running forth, a shaft against the foe he hurled.
Forth whizzed the cornel through the air, cleaving its way aright,
And therewithal great noise outbreaks, and every wedge of fight
Is turmoiled, and the hearts of men are kindled for the fray.