The Aeneids of Virgil Part 16

But black Night fluttereth over him with woeful mirky shade."

Then midst the rising of his tears father Anchises spoke: "O son, search not the mighty woe and sorrow of thy folk!

The Fates shall show him to the world, nor longer blossoming Shall give. O G.o.ds that dwell on high, belike o'ergreat a thing 870 The Roman tree should seem to you, should this your gift endure!

How great a wail of mighty men that Field of Fame shall pour On Mavors' mighty city walls: what death-rites seest thou there, O Tiber, as thou glidest by his new-wrought tomb and fair!

No child that is of Ilian stock in Latin sires shall raise Such glorious hope; nor shall the land of Romulus e'er praise So fair and great a nursling child mid all it ever bore.

Goodness, and faith of ancient days, and hand unmatched in war, Alas for all! No man unhurt had raised a weaponed hand Against him, whether he afoot had met the foeman's band, 880 Or smitten spur amid the flank of eager foaming horse.

O child of all men's ruth, if thou the bitter Fates mayst force, Thou art Marcellus. Reach ye hands of lily-blooms fulfilled; For I will scatter purple flowers, and heap such offerings spilled Unto the spirit of my child, and empty service do."

Thereafter upon every side they strayed that country through, Amid wide-spreading airy meads, and sight of all things won.

But after old Anchises now through all had led his son, And kindled love within his heart of fame that was to be, Then did he tell him of the wars that he himself should see, 890 And of Laurentian peoples taught, and town of Latin folk; And how from every grief to flee, or how to bear its stroke.

Now twofold are the Gates of Sleep, whereof the one, men say, Is wrought of horn, and ghosts of sooth thereby win easy way, The other clean and smooth is wrought of gleaming ivory, But lying dreams the nether G.o.ds send up to heaven thereby.

All said, Anchises on his son and Sibyl-maid doth wait Unto the last, and sends them up by that same ivory gate.

He wears the way and gains his fleet and fellow-folk once more.

So for Caieta's haven-mouth by straightest course they bore, 900 Till fly the anchors from the bows and sterns swing round ash.o.r.e.

BOOK VII.

ARGUMENT.

aeNEAS AND HIS TROJANS TAKE LAND BY THE TIBER-MOUTH, AND KING LATINUS PLIGHTETH PEACE WITH THEM; WHICH PEACE IS BROKEN BY THE WILL OF JUNO, AND ALL MEN MAKE THEM READY FOR WAR.

Thou also, O aeneas' nurse, Caieta, didst avail, E'en dying, unto these our sh.o.r.es to leave a deathless tale: And yet thy glory guards the place, thy bones have won it name Within the great Hesperian land, if that be prize of fame.

But good aeneas, when at last all funeral rites were paid And the grave heaped, when in a while the ocean's face was laid, Went on his way with sails aloft, and left the port behind: The faint winds breathe about the night, the moon shines clear and kind; Beneath the quivering shining road the wide seas gleaming lie.

But next the beach of Circe's land their swift ships glide anigh, 10 Where the rich daughter of the Sun with constant song doth rouse The groves that none may enter in, or in her glorious house Burneth the odorous cedar-torch amidst the dead of night, While through the slender warp she speeds the shrilling shuttle light.

And thence they hear the sound of groans, and wrath of lions dread Fretting their chains; and roaring things o'er night-tide fallen dead; And bristled swine and caged bears cried bitter-wild, and sore; And from the shapes of monstrous wolves the howling seaward bore.

These from the likeness of mankind had cruel Circe won By herbs of might, and shape and hide of beasts upon them done. 20 But lest the G.o.dly Trojan folk such wickedness should bear, Lest borne into the baneful bay they bring their keels o'er near, Their sails did Father Neptune fill with fair and happy breeze, And sped their flight and sent them swift across the hurrying seas.

Now reddened all the sea with rays, and from the heavenly plain The golden-hued Aurora shone amidst her rosy wain, Then fell the winds and every air sank down in utter sleep, And now the shaven oars must strive amid the sluggish deep: Therewith aeneas sees a wood rise from the water's face, And there it is the Tiber's flood amidst a pleasant place, 30 With many a whirling eddy swift and yellowing with sand Breaks into sea; and diversely above on either hand The fowl that love the river-bank and haunt the river-bed Sweetened the air with plenteous song and through the thicket fled.

So there aeneas bids his folk sh.o.r.eward their bows to lay, And joyfully he entereth in the stream's o'ershadowed way.

To aid, Erato! while I tell what kings, what deedful tide, What manner life, in Latin land did anciently abide When first the stranger brought his ships to that Ausonian sh.o.r.e; Yea help me while I call aback beginnings of the war. 40 O G.o.ddess, hearten thou thy seer! dread war my song-speech saith: It tells the battle in array, and kings full fain of death, The Tyrrhene host, all Italy, spurred on the sword to bear: Yea, greater matters are afoot, a mightier deed I stir.

The king Latinus, old of days, ruled o'er the fields' increase, And cities of the people there at rest in long-drawn peace: Of Faunus and Laurentian nymph, Marica, do we learn That he was born: but Faunus came of Picus, who must turn To thee, O Saturn, for his sire: 'twas he that blood began.

Now, as G.o.d would, this king had got no son to grow a man, 50 For he who first had dawned on him in earliest youth had waned: A daughter only such a house, so great a world sustained, Now ripe for man, the years fulfilled that made her meet for bed: And her much folk of Latin land were fain enow to wed, And all Ausonia: first of whom, and fairest to be seen, Was Turnus, great from fathers great; and him indeed the queen Was fain of for her son-in-law with wondrous love of heart: But dreadful portents of the G.o.ds the matter thrust apart.

Amidmost of the inner house a laurel-tree upbore Its hallowed leaves, that fear of G.o.d had kept through years of yore: 60 Father Latinus first, they said, had found it there, when he Built there his burg and hallowed it to Phoebus' deity, And on Laurentian people thence the name thereof had laid; On whose top now the gathered bees, O wondrous to be said!

Borne on with mighty humming noise amid the flowing air, Had settled down, and foot to foot all interwoven there, In sudden swarm they hung adown from off the leafy bough.

But straight the seer cries out: "Ah me! I see him coming now, The stranger man; I see a host from that same quarter come To this same quarter, to be lords amidst our highest home." 70

But further, while the altar-fires she feeds with virgin brands, The maid Lavinia, and beside her ancient father stands, Out! how along her length of hair the grasp of fire there came, And all the tiring of her head was caught in crackling flame.

And there her royal tresses blazed, and blazed her glorious crown Gem-wrought, and she one cloud of smoke and yellow fire was grown: And wrapped therein, the fiery G.o.d she scattered through the house: And sure it seemed a dreadful thing, a story marvellous: For they fell singing she should grow glorious of fame and fate, But unto all her folk should be the seed of huge debate. 80

So troubled by this tokening dread forth fareth now the king To Faunus' fane, his father-seer, to ask him counselling 'Neath Albunea the high, whose wood, the thicket most of worth, Resoundeth with the holy well and breathes the sulphur forth.

From whence the folk of Italy and all Oenotrian land Seek rede amidst of troublous time. Here, when the priest in hand Hath borne the gifts, and laid him down amidst the hush of night On the strown fells of slaughtered ewes, and sought him sleep aright, He seeth wondrous images about him flit and shift, He hearkeneth many a changing voice, of talk with G.o.ds hath gift, 90 And holdeth speech with Acheron, from deep Avernus come.

There now the sire Latinus went seeking the answers home, And there an hundred woolly ewes in order due did slay, And propped upon the fells thereof on bed of fleeces lay, Till from the thickets inner depths the sudden answer came:

"Seek not thy daughter, O my son, to wed to Latin name; Unto the bridal set on foot let not thy troth be given: Thy sons are coming over sea to raise our blood to heaven, And sons of sons' sons from their stem shall see beneath their feet All things for them to shift and doom; all things the sun may meet, 100 As to and fro he wendeth way 'twixt either ocean wave."

Such warnings of the silent night that father Faunus gave, Shut up betwixt his closed lips Latinus held no whit, But through Ausonia flying fame had borne the noise of it, When that Laomedontian folk at last had moored their ships Unto the gra.s.sy-mounded bank whereby the river slips.

aeneas and Iulus fair, and all their most and best, Beneath a tall tree's boughs had laid their bodies down to rest: They dight the feast; about the gra.s.s on barley-cakes they lay What meat they had,--for even so Jove bade them do that day,-- 110 And on the ground that Ceres gave the woodland apples pile.

And so it happed, that all being spent, they turn them in a while To Ceres' little field, and eat, egged on by very want, And dare to waste with hands and teeth the circle thin and scant Where fate lay hid, nor spare upon the trenchers wide to fall.

"Ah!" cries Iulus, "so today we eat up board and all."

'Twas all his jest-word; but its sound their labour slew at last, And swift his father caught it up, as from his mouth it pa.s.sed, And stayed him, by the might of G.o.d bewildered utterly. 119 Then forthwith: "Hail," he cried, "O land that Fate hath owed to me!

And ye, O House-G.o.ds of our Troy, hail ye, O true and kind!

This is your house, this is your land: my father, as I mind, Such secrets of the deeds of Fate left me in days of yore: 'O son, when hunger driveth thee stranded on outland sh.o.r.e To eat the very boards beneath thy victual scant at need, There hope for house, O weary one, and in that place have heed To set hand first unto the roof, and heap the garth around.'

So this will be that hunger-tide: this waited us to bound Our wasting evils at the last.

So come, and let us joyfully upon the first of dawn 130 Seek out the land, what place it is, what men-folk there abide, And where their city; diversely leaving the haven-side.

But now pour out the bowls to Jove, send prayer upon the way To sire Anchises, and the wine again on table lay."

He spake, and with the leafy bough his temples garlanded, And to the Spirit of the Soil forthwith the prayer he said, To Earth, the eldest-born of G.o.ds, to Nymphs, to Streams unknown As yet: he called upon the Night, and night-tide's signs new shown; Idaean Jove, the Phrygian Queen, the Mother, due and well He called on; and his parents twain in Heaven and in h.e.l.l. 140 But thrice the Almighty Father then from cloudless heaven on high Gave thunder, showing therewithal the glory of his sky All burning with the golden gleam, and shaken by his hand.

Then sudden rumour ran abroad amid the Trojan band, That now the day was come about their fateful walls to raise; So eagerly they dight the feast, gladdened by omen's grace, And bring the beakers forth thereto and garland well the wine.

But when the morrow's lamp of dawn across the earth 'gan shine, The sh.o.r.e, the fields, the towns of folk they search, wide scattering: And here they come across the pools of that Numician spring: 150 This is the Tiber-flood; hereby the hardy Latins dwell.

But therewithal Anchises' seed from out them chose him well An hundred sweet-mouthed men to go unto the walls renowned, Where dwelt the king, and every one with Pallas' olive crowned, To carry gifts unto the lord and peace for Teucrians pray.

So, bidden, nought they tarry now, but swift-foot wear the way.

But he himself marks out the walls with shallow ditch around, And falls to work upon the sh.o.r.e his first abode to found, In manner of a camp, begirt with bank and battlement.

Meanwhile his men beheld at last, when all the way was spent, 160 The Latin towers and roofs aloft, and drew the walls anigh: There were the lads and flower of youth afield the city by Backing the steed, or mid the dust a-steering of the car, Or bending of the bitter bow, hurling tough darts afar By strength of arm; for foot or fist crying the challenging.

Then fares a well-horsed messenger, who to the ancient king Bears tidings of tall new-comers in outland raiment clad: So straight Latinus biddeth them within his house be had, And he upon his father's throne sat down amidmost there.

High on an hundred pillars stood that mighty house and fair, 170 High in the burg, the dwelling-place Laurentian Picus won, Awful with woods, and worshipping of sires of time agone: Here was it wont for kings to take the sceptre in their hand, Here first to raise the axe of doom: 'twas court-house of the land, This temple, and the banquet-hall; here when the host was slain The fathers at the endlong boards would sit the feast to gain.

There too were dight in cedar old the sires of ancient line For there was fashioned Italus, and he who set the vine, Sabinus, holding yet in hand the image of the hook; And Saturn old, and imaging of Ja.n.u.s' double look, 180 Stood in the porch; and many a king was there from ancient tide, Who in their country's battle erst the wounds of Mars would bide: And therewithal were many arms hung on the holy door.

There hung the axes crooked-horned, and taken wains of war, And crested helms, and bolts and locks that city-gates had borne; And spears and shields, and thrusting-beaks from ships of battle torn.

There with Quirinus' crooked staff, girt in the shortened gown, With target in his left hand held, was Picus set adown,-- The horse-tamer, whom Circe fair, caught with desire erewhile, Smote with that golden rod of hers, and, sprinkling venom's guile, 190 Made him a fowl, and colours fair blent on his shifting wings.

In such a temple of the G.o.ds, in such a house of kings, Latinus sat when he had called those Teucrian fellows in, And from his quiet mouth and grave such converse did begin: "What seek ye, sons of Darda.n.u.s? for not unknown to me Is that your city or your blood; and how ye crossed the sea, That have I heard. But these your ships, what counsel or what lack Hath borne them to Ausonian strand o'er all the blue sea's back?

If ye have strayed from out your course, or, driven by stormy tide (For such things oft upon the sea must seafarers abide), 200 Have entered these our river-banks in haven safe to lie, Flee not our welcome, nor unknown the Latin folk pa.s.s by; The seed of Saturn, bound to right by neither law nor chain, But freely following in the ways whereof the G.o.d was fain.

Yea now indeed I mind a tale, though now with years outworn, How elders of Aurunce said that mid these fields was born That Darda.n.u.s, who reached at last the Phrygian Ida's walls, And Thracian Samos, that the world now Samothracia calls: From Tuscan stead of Corythus he went upon his ways; Whose throne is set in golden heaven, the star-besprinkled place, 210 Who adds one other to the tale of altared deities."

He ended, but Ilioneus followed in words like these: "O king, O glorious Faunus' child, no storm upon the main Drave us amid the drift of waves your country coast to gain; And neither star nor strand made blind the region of our road; But we by counsel and free will have sought out thine abode, Outcast from such a realm as once was deemed the mightiest The Sun beheld, as o'er the heaven she ran from east to west.

Jove is the well-spring of our race; the Dardan children joy In Jove for father; yea, our king, aeneas out of Troy, 220 Who sends us to thy door, himself is of the Highest's seed.

How great a tempest was let loose o'er our Idaean mead, From dire Mycenae Sent; what fate drave either clashing world, Europe and Asia, till the war each against each they hurled, His ears have heard, who dwells afar upon the land alone That ocean beats; and his no less the bondman of the zone, That midmost lieth of the four, by cruel sun-blaze worn.

Lo, from that flood we come to thee, o'er waste of waters borne, Praying a strip of harmless sh.o.r.e our House-G.o.ds' home to be, And grace of water and of air to all men lying free. 230 We shall not foul our land's renown; and thou, thy glory fair We know, and plenteous fruit of thanks this deed of thine shall bear: Nor ever may embrace of Troy Ausonia's soul despite.

Now by aeneas' fates I swear, and by his hand of might, Whether in troth it hath been tried, or mid the hosts of war, That many folks--yea, scorn us not that willingly we bore These fillets in our hands today with words beseeching peace-- That many lands have longed for us, and yearned for our increase.

But fate of G.o.ds and G.o.ds' command would ever drive us home To this your land: this is the place whence Darda.n.u.s was come, 240 And hither now he comes again: full sore Apollo drave To Tuscan Tiber, and the place of dread Numicius' wave.

Moreover, here some little gifts of early days of joy Giveth our king, a handful gleaned from burning-tide of Troy: Anchises at the altar erst would pour from out this gold; This was the gear that Priam used when in the guise of old He gave his gathered folk the law; sceptre, and holy crown, And weed the work of Ilian wives."

Now while Ilioneus so spake Latinus held his face, Musing and steadfast, on the ground setting his downcast gaze, 250 Rolling his eyes all thought-fulfilled; nor did the broidered gear Of purple move the King so much, nor Priam's sceptre fair, As on his daughter's bridal bed the thoughts in him had rest, For ancient Faunus' fateful word he turned within his breast.