by Virgil
Of mustering crews. Poor Dido, crazed thereby,
Raves like a Thyiad, when the frenzied rout
With orgies hurry to Cithæron high,
And “Bacchus! Bacchus” through the night they shout. 334
At length the chief she finds, and thus her wrath breaks out:
XXXIX . “Thought’st thou to steal in silence from the land,
False wretch! and cloak such treason with a lie?
Can neither love, nor this my plighted hand,
Nor dying Dido keep thee? Must thou fly,
When North-winds howl, and wintry waves are high?
O cruel! what if home before thee lay,
Not lands unknown, beneath an alien sky,
If Troy were standing, as in ancient day, 343
Would’st thou for Troy’s own sake this angry deep essay?
XL . “Me dost thou fly? O, by these tears, thy hand
Late pledged, since madness leaves me naught beside,
But lovers’ vows and wedlock’s sacred band,
Scarce knit and now too soon to be untied;
If aught were pleasing in a new-won bride,
If sweet the memory of our marriage day,
O by these prayers — if place for prayer abide —
In mercy put that cruel mind away. 352
Pity a falling house, now hastening to decay.
XLI . “For thee the Libyans and each Nomad lord
Hate me, and Tyrians would their queen disown.
My wifely honour is a name abhorred,
And that chaste fame has perished, which alone
Perchance had raised me to a starry throne.
O think with whom thou leav’st me to thy fate,
Dear guest, no longer as a husband known.
Why stay I? till Pygmalion waste my state, 361
Or on Iarbas’ wheels, a captive queen, to wait?
XLII . “Ah! if at least, ere thou had’st sailed away,
Some babe, the token of thy love, were born,
Some child Æneas, in my halls to play,
Like thee at least in look, I should not mourn
As altogether captive and forlorn.”
She paused, but he, at Jove’s command, his eyes
Keeps still unmoved, and, though with anguish torn,
Strives with his love, nor suffers it to rise, 370
But checks his heaving heart, and thus at length replies:
XLIII . “Never, dear Queen, will I disown the debt,
Thy love’s deserts, too countless to repeat,
Nor ever fair Elissa’s name forget,
While memory shall last, or pulses beat.
Few words are mine, for fewest words are meet.
Think not I meant — the very thought were shame —
Thief-like to veil my going with deceit.
I gave no promise of a husband’s name, 379
Nor talked of ties like that, or wedlock’s sacred flame.
XLIV . “Did Fate but let me shape my life at will,
And rest at pleasure, Ilion, first of all,
And Troy’s sweet relics would I cling to still,
And Pergama and Priam’s stately hall
Once more should cheer the vanquished for their fall.
But now Grynoean Phoebus bids me fare
To great Italia; to Italia call
The Lycian lots, and so the Fates declare. 388
There lies the land I love, my destined home is there.
XLV . “If thee, Tyre-born, a Libyan town detain,
What grudge to Troy Ausonia’s land denies?
We too may seek a foreign realm to gain.
Me, oft as Night’s damp shadows from the skies
Have shrouded Earth, and fiery stars arise,
My sire Anchises’ troubled ghost in sleep
Upbraids and scares, and ever louder cries
The wrong, that on Ascanius’ head I heap, 397
Whom from Hesperia’s plains, his destined realms, I keep.
XLVI . “Now, too, Jove’s messenger himself comes down —
Bear witness both — I heard the voice divine,
I saw the God just entering the town.
Cease then to vex me, nor thyself repine.
Heaven’s will to Latium summons me, not mine.”
Him, speaking thus and pleading but in vain,
She viewed askance, rolling her restless eyne,
Then scanned him o’er, long silent, in disdain, 406
And thus at length broke out, and gave her wrath the rein.
XLVII . “False traitor! Goddess never gave thee birth,
Nor of thy race was Dardanus the first.
Thy limbs were fashioned in the womb of Earth,
The rugged rocks of Caucasus accurst.
Hyrcanian tigresses thy childhood nursed.
Why fawn and feign? what more have I to fear,
What more to wait for, having known the worst?
Moved he those eyes? dropped he a single tear 415
Sighed he with me, or spake a lover’s heart to cheer?
XLVIII . “What first? what last? Nor Juno, nay, nor Jove
With equal eyes beholds the wrongs I bear.
Faithless is earth, and false is Heaven above.
I took him in, an outcast, and bade spare,
His ships and wandering comrades, let him share
My home, and made him partner of my reign.
Ah me! the Furies drive me to despair.
Now Phoebus calls him, now the Lycian fane, 424
Now Jove’s own herald brings the dreadful news too plain:
XLIX . “Fit task for Gods; such cares disturb their ease.
I care not to confute thee nor delay.
Go, seek thy Latin lordship o’er the seas.
May Heaven — if Heaven be righteous — make thee pay
Thy forfeit, left on ocean’s rocks to pray
For help to Dido. There shall Dido go
With sulphurous flames, and vex thee far away.
My ghost in death shall haunt thee. I shall know 433
Thy punishment, false wretch, and hail the news below.”
L . Abrupt she ceased and, sickening with despair,
Turns from his gaze, and shuns the light of day,
And leaves the Dardan, faltering in his fear,
And thinking of a thousand things to say.
Back to her marble couch the maids convey
The fainting Queen. The pious Prince, though fain
With gentle words her anguish to ally,
Sighing full sore, and racked with inward pain, 442
Bows to the God’s behest, and hastens to the main.
LI . Stirred by his presence, at their chief’s command,
The Trojan mariners, with might and main,
Bend to the work. Along the shelving strand
They launch tall ships that long had idle lain.
The tarred keel joys the waters to regain.
Timbers unshaped and many a green-leaved oar
They fetch from out the forest, glad and fain
To speed their flight, and hurrying to the shore 451
Forth from the town-gates fast the mustering Trojans pour.
LII . As ants that, mindful of the cold to come,
Lay waste a mighty heap of garnered grain,
And store the golden treasure in their home:
Back through the grass, with plunder, o’er the plain
In narrow column troops the sable train:
Their tiny shoulders heave, with restless moil,
The cumbrous atomies; these scourge amain
The loiterers in the rear, and guard the spoil. 460
Hot fares the busy work; the pathway glows with toil.
LIII . What, hapless Dido, were thy feelings then?
What groans were thine, from out thy tower to view
The ships prepared, the shores astir with men,
The turmoil’d deep, the shouting of each crew!
O tyrant love, so potent to subdue!
Again, perforce, she weeps for him; again
She stoops to try persuasion, and to sue,
And yields, a suppliant, to her love’s sweet pain, 469
Lest aught remain untried, and Dido die in vain.
LIV . “Look yonder, look, dear Anna! all around
They crowd the shore their canvas wooes the wind!
Behold the poops with festal garlands crown’d.
If I could bear this prospect, I shall find
Strength still to suffer, and a soul resign’d.
One boon I ask — O pity my distress —
For thee alone he tells his inmost mind,
To thee alone unperjur’d; thou can’st guess 478
The means of soft approach, the seasons of address;
LV . “Go, sister, meekly tell the haughty foe,
Not I at Aulis with the Greeks did swear
To smite the Trojans and their towers o’erthrow,
Nor sought his father’s ashes to uptear.
Whom shuns he? wherefore would he spurn my prayer?
Beg him, in pity of poor love, to stay
Till flight is easy, and the winds breathe fair.
Not now for wedlock’s broken vows I pray, 487
Nor bid him lose for me fair Latium and his sway.
LVI . “I ask but time — a respite and reprieve —
A little truce, my passion to allay,
Till fortune teach my baffled love to grieve.
Grant, sister, this, the latest grace I pray,
And Death with interest shall the debt repay.”
She spake; sad Anna to the Dardan bears
Her piteous plea. But Fate hath barred the way:
Deaf stands Æneas to her prayers and tears: 496
Jove, unrelenting Jove, hath stopped his gentle ears.
LVII . E’en as when Northern Alpine blasts contend
This side and that to lay an oak-tree low,
Aged but strong: the branches creak and bend,
And leaves thick-falling all the ground bestrow:
The trunk clings firmly to the rock below:
High as it rears its weather-beaten crest,
So dive its roots to Tartarus. Even so
Beset with prayers, the hero stands distrest; 505
So vain are Anna’s tears, so moveless is his breast.
LVIII . Then — then unhappy Dido prays to die,
Maddened by Fate, aweary of the day,
Aweary of the over-arching sky.
And lo! an omen seems to chide delay,
And steel her purpose. As, in act to pay
Her gifts, with incense at the shrine she kneels,
Black turns the water, horrible to say;
To loathsome gore the sacred wine congeals. 514
Not e’en to Anna’s self this vision she reveals.
LIX . Nay more; within the precincts of her house
There stood a marble shrine, with garlands bright
And snow-white fleeces, sacred to her spouse.
Hence, oft as darkness shrouds the world from sight,
Voices she hears, and accents of affright,
As though Sychæus told aloud his wrong,
Hears from the roof-top, through the livelong night,
The solitary screech-owl’s funeral song, 523
Wailing an endless dirge, the dismal notes prolong.
LX . Dim warnings, given by many an ancient seer,
Affright her. Ever wandering, ever lost,
In dreams she sees the fierce Æneas near,
And seeks her Tyrians on a lonely coast.
So raving Pentheus sees the Furies’ host,
Twin suns and double Thebes. So, mad with Fate,
Blood-stained Orestes flees his mother’s ghost,
Armed with black snakes and firebrands; at the gate 532
The avenging Fiends, close-crouched, the murderer await.
LXI . So now, possessed with Furies, the poor queen,
O’ercome with grief and resolute to die,
Settles the time and manner. Joy serene
Smiles on her brow, her purpose to belie,
And hope dissembled sparkles in her eye.
“Dear Anna,” thus she hails with cheerful tone
Her weeping sister, “put thy sorrow by,
And joy with me. Indulgent Heaven hath shown 541
A way to gain his love, or rid me of my own.
LXII . “Near Ocean’s limits and the sunset, lies
A far-off land, by Æthiopians owned,
Where mighty Atlas turns the spangled skies.
There a Massylian priestess I have found,
The warder of the Hesperian fane renowned.
’Twas hers to feed the dragon, hers to keep
The golden fruit, and guard the sacred ground,
The dragon’s food in honied drugs to steep, 550
And mix the poppy drowse, that soothes the soul to sleep.
LXIII . “What souls she listeth, with her charms she claims
To free from passion, or with pains to smite
The love-sick heart; the planets all she tames,
And stays the rivers; and her voice of might
Calls forth the spirits from the realms of night.
Thyself the rumbling of the ground shalt hear,
And see the tall ash tumble from the height.
O, by the Gods, by thy sweet self I swear, 559
Loth am I, sister dear, these magic arms to wear.
LXIV . “Thou privily within the courtyard frame
A lofty pyre; his armour and attire
Heap on it, and the fatal couch of shame.
All relics of the wretch are doomed to fire;
So bids the priestess, and her charms require.”
She ended, pale as death, and Anna plied
Her task, not dreaming of a rage so dire.
Nought worse she fears than when Sychæus died, 568
Nor recks that these strange rites her purposed death could hide.
LXV . Now rose the pile within the courtyard’s space,
Of oak and pine-wood, open to the wind.
Herself the Queen with garlands decked the place,
And funeral chaplets in the sides entwined.
Above, his robes, the sword he left behind,
And, last, his image on the couch she laid,
Foreknowing all, and while the altars shined
With blazing offerings, the enchantress-maid, 577
Frenzied, with thundering voice and tresses disarrayed,
LXVI . Summons her gods — three hundred powers divine,
Chaos and Erebus, in Hell supreme,
And Dian-Hecate, the maiden trine;
Then water, feigned of dark Avernus’ stream,
She sprinkles round. Rank herbs are sought, that teem
With poisonous juice, and plants at midnight shorn
With brazen sickles by the Moon’s pale beam,
And from the forehead of a foal new-born, 586
Ere by the dam devoured, love’s talisman is torn.
LXVII . Herself, the queen, before the altar stands,
One foot unsandalled, and her flowing vest
Loosed from its cincture. In her stainless hands
The sacrificial cake she holds; her breast
Heaves, with approaching agony oppressed.
She calls the conscious planets as they move,
She calls the stars, her purpose to attest,
And all the gods, if any rules above, 595
Mindful of lovers’ wrongs, and just to injured love.
LXVIII . ’Twas night; on earth all creatures were asleep:
Midway the stars moved silent through the sphere;
Hushed were the forest and the angry deep,
And hushed was every field, and far and near
Reigned stillness, and the night spread calm and clear.
The flocks, t
he birds, with painted plumage gay,
That haunt the copse, or dwell in brake and brere,
Or skim the liquid lakes — all silent lay, 604
Lapt in oblivion sweet, forgetful of the day.
LXIX . Not so unhappy Dido; no sweet peace
Dissolves her cares; her wakeful eyes and breast
Drink not the dewy night; her pains increase,
And love, with warring passions unsuppressed,
Swells up, and stirs the tumult of unrest.
“What, then,” she sadly ponders, “shall I do?
Ah, woe is me! shall Dido, made a jest
To former lovers, stoop herself to sue, 613
And beg the Nomad lords their oft-scorned vows renew?
LXX . “Or with the fleet of Ilion shall I sail,
The slave and menial of a Trojan crew,
As though they count past kindness of avail,
Or dream that aught of gratitude be due?
Grant that I wished it, of these lordings who
Would take me, humbled and a thing of scorn?
Is Dido blind, if Trojans are untrue?
Know’st thou not yet, O lost one and forlorn, 622
Troy’s perjured race still shows Laomedon forsworn?
LXXI . “What, fly alone, and join their shouting crew?
Or launch, and chase them with my Tyrian train
Scarce torn from Tyre? Nay — die and take thy due;
The sword alone can ease thee of thy pain.
Sister, ’twas thy weak pity wrought this bane,
Swayed by my tears, and gave me to the foe.
Ah! had I lived unloving, void of stain,
Free as the beasts, nor meddled with this woe, 631
Nor wronged with broken vows Sychæus’ shade below!”
LXXII . So wailed the Queen. Æneas, fixt in mind,
All things prepared, his voyage to pursue,
Snatched a brief slumber, on the deck reclined,
Lo, in a dream, returning near him drew
The God, and seemed his warning to renew.
Like Mercury, the very God behold!
So sweet his voice, so radiant was his hue,
Such loveliness of limb and youthful mould, 640
Such cheeks of ruddiest bloom, and locks of burnished gold.
LXXIII . “O goddess-born Æneas, can’st thou sleep,