Girds, now harmless forever, his sword once more to his side; Makes for the midst of the foemen, to die as a chieftain had died. Deep in the palace heart, and beneath heaven's canopy clear,
Lay a majestic altar; a veteran bay-tree near
Over it hung, and in shadow inclosed the Penates divine.
Hecuba here, and her daughters, in vain surrounding the shrine,Like doves swooping from heaven in a tempest's gloom to the
Sate all huddled, and clinging the god's great images round!
When in the arms of his youth she beheld her Priam arrayed-
"What wild purpose of battle, my ill-starred husband," she said,
"Ails thee to don these weapons, and whither fondly away?
Not such succor as thine can avail us in this sad day:
No man's weapons, - if even our Hector came at the call.
Hither, I pray thee, turn. One shrine shall shelter us all,
Else one death overwhelm us." She spake, then reaching her hand,
Gently the old man placed by the hallowed gods of his land.
Lo! from the ravaging Pyrrhus, Polites flying for life,
One of the sons of the king! Through foes, through weapons of strife,
Under the long colonnades, down halls now empty, he broke,
Wounded to death. On his traces aflame with murderous stroke,
Pyrrhus-behind-the pursuer! Behold, each minute of flight,
Hand outreaching to hold him, and spear uplifted to smite!
When in his parents' view and before their faces he stood,
Fainting he fell; in a torrent his life poured forth with his blood!
Then though about and around him already the death-shade
Priam held not his peace, gave rein to his wrath and his tongue! "Now may the gods, thou sinner, for this impiety bold —
If there still be an eye in the heaven these deeds to behold
Pay thee," he cried, "all thanks that are owed thee, dues that are
meet,―
Thou who hast made me witness mine own son die at my feet,
Yea, in the father's presence the earth with slaughter hast stained.
Not this wise did Achilles, the sire thou falsely hast feigned,
Deal with his enemy Priam. His heart knew generous shame,
Felt for a suppliant's honor, a righteous suppliant's claim,—
Hector's lifeless body to lie in the tomb he restored;
Home to my kingdom sent me, to reign once more as its lord."
The old man spake, and his weapon, a harmless, impotent thing,
Hurled; on the brass of the buckler it smote with a hollow ring,
Hung from the eye of the boss all nerveless. Pyrrhus in ire —
"Take these tidings thou, and relate this news to my sire:
Seek Pelides and tell him the shameless deeds I have done;
Fail not to say his Pyrrhus appears a degenerate son!
Die meanwhiles." And the aged king to the altar he haled,
Trembling, and sliding to earth in his own son's blood as he trailed;
Twined in the old man's tresses his left, with his right hand drew
Swiftly the sword, to the hilt in his heart then sheathed it anew.
This was the story of Priam,—the end appointed that came,
Sent by the Fates,- to behold as he died Troy's city aflame,
Pergama falling around him, who once in his high command
Swayed full many a people, in pride ruled many a land,
Asia's lord. He is lying a giant trunk on the shore,
Head from his shoulders severed, a corpse with a name no more.
Translation of Sir Charles Bowen.
[Queen Dido, deserted by Æneas, curses him and his Roman posterity. She foreshadows the career of Hannibal.]
ow from the saffron bed of Tithonus, morning again
Rises, and sprinkles with new-born light earth's every plain. Soon as the sleepless Queen, from her watch-towers set on the
Saw day whiten, the vessels with squared sails plowing the deep,
Desolate shores and abandoned ports,—thrice beating her fair
Breasts with her hand, thrice rending her yellow tresses of hair —
"Father of earth and of heaven! and shall this stranger," she cries,
"Wend on his treacherous way, flout Dido's realm as he flies?
Leaps no sword from the scabbard? Is Tyre not yet on his trail?
None of ye warping the ships from the dock-yards, hoisting the sail?
Forth with the flame and the arrow! To sea, and belabor the main!
Ah, wild words! Is it Dido? Has madness troubled her brain?
Ah, too late, poor Dido! the sin comes home to thee now!
Then was the hour to consider, when thou wast crowning his brow.
Look ye! - The faith and the honor of him who still, as they say,
Carries on shipboard with him his Trojan gods on the way!
Bore on his shoulders his aged sire! Ah! had I not force
Limb from limb to have torn him, and piecemeal scattered his corse
Over the seas? his crews to have slain, and, banquet of joy,
Served on the father's table the flesh of Iulus the boy?
Even were chance in the battle unequal,- death was at hand.
Whom had Dido to fear? I had borne to the vessels the brand,
Filled with flames each deck, each hold, child, people, and sire
Whelmed in the blazing ruin, and flung myself on the pyre!
Sun, whose flaming torches reveal earth's every deed;
Juno, witness of sad love's pains, who knowest my need;
Name on the midnight causeways howled,— thou, Hecate dire;
Sister avengers, Genius of Dido, soon to expire,
Gently receive her and give to her crying misery heed;
Listen and hear these prayers! If the heavens' stern laws have de
Yon base soul shall find him a harbor, and float to the land;
Thus Jove's destinies order, and so fate finally stand;
Harassed in war by the spears of a daring people and wild,
Far from the land of his fathers and torn from the arms of his child,
May he in vain ask succor, and watch his Teucrian band
Dying a death untimely! and when this warrior proud
Under the hard conditions of peace his spirit has bowed,
Neither of monarch's throne nor of sunlight sweet let him taste;
Fall ere time overtakes him, and tombless bleach on the waste.
This last prayer as my life ebbs forth I pour with my blood;
Let not thy hatred sleep, my Tyre, to the Teucrian brood;
Lay on the tomb of Dido for funeral offering this!—
Neither be love nor league to unite my people and his!
Rise! thou Nameless Avenger from Dido's ashes to come,
Follow with fire and slaughter the false Dardanians home!
Smite them to-day, hereafter, through ages yet unexplored,
Long as thy strength sustains thee, and fingers cling to the sword!
Sea upon sea wage battle for ever! shore upon shore,
Spear upon spear! To the sires and the children strife evermore!"
Translation of Sir Charles Bowen.
[Æneas meets in the Elysian Fields his father, Anchises, who shows him their most illustrious descendants.]
FTER the rite is completed, the gift to the goddess addressed, Now at the last they come to the realms where Joy has her throne:
Sweet green glades in the Fortunate Forests, abodes of the blest,
Fields in an ampler ether, a light more glorious dressed,
Lit evermore with their own bright stars and a sun of their own.
Some are training their limbs on the wrestling-green, and compete Gayly in sport on the yellow arenas; some with their feet
Treading their choral measures, or singing the hymns of the god While their Thracian priest, in a sacred robe that trails,
Chants them the air with the seven sweet notes of his musical
Now with his fingers striking, and now with his ivory rod.
Here are the ancient children of Teucer, fair to behold,
Generous heroes, born in the happier summers of old,-
Ilus, Assaracus by him, and Dardan, Founder of Troy.
Far in the distance yonder are visible armor and car
Unsubstantial; in earth their lances are planted; and far
Over the meadows are ranging the chargers freed from employ.
All the delight they took when alive in the chariot and sword,
All of the loving care that to shining coursers was paid,
Follows them now that in quiet below Earth's breast they are laid.
Banqueting here he beholds them to right and to left on the sward,
Chanting in chorus the Pæan, beneath sweet forests of bay;
Whence, amid wild wood covers, the river Eridanus, poured,
Rolls his majestic torrents to upper earth and the day. Chiefs for the land of their sires in the battle wounded of yore, Priests whose purity lasted until sweet life was no more, Faithful prophets who spake as beseemed their god and his shrine, All who by arts invented to life have added a grace,
All whose services earned the remembrance deep of the race, Round their shadowy foreheads the snow-white garland entwine.
Then as about them the phantoms stream, breaks silence the seer,
Turning first to Musæus,- for round him the shadows appear
Thickest to crowd, as he towers with his shoulders over the throng,-
"Tell me, ye joyous spirits, and thou, bright master of song,
Where is the home and the haunt of the great Anchises, for whom
Hither we come, and have traversed the awful rivers of gloom?"
Briefly in turn makes answer the hero: "None has a home
In fixed haunts. We inhabit the dark thick glades, on the brink
Ever of moss-banked rivers, and water meadows that drink
Living streams. But if onward your heart thus wills ye to go,
Climb this ridge. I will set ye in pathways easy to know."
Forward he marches, leading the way; from the heights at the end
Shows them a shining plain, and the mountain slopes they descend.
There withdrawn to a valley of green in a fold of the plain
Stood Anchises the father, his eyes intent on a train,—
Prisoned spirits, soon to ascend to the sunlight again,—
Numbering over his children dear, their myriad bands,
All their destinies bright, their ways, and the work of their hands.
When he beheld Æneas across those flowery lands
Moving to meet him, fondly he strained both arms to his boy;
Tears on his cheek fell fast, and his voice found slowly employ.
"Here thou comest at last, and the love I counted upon
Over the rugged path has prevailed. Once more, O my son,
I may behold thee, and answer with mine thy voice as of yore.
Long I pondered the chances, believed this day was in store,
Reckoning the years and the seasons. Nor was my longing belied.
O'er how many a land, past what far waters and wide,
Hast thou come to mine arms! What dangers have tossed thee, my child!
Ah, how I feared lest harm should await thee in Libya wild!"
"Thine own shade, my sire, thine own disconsolate shade,
Visiting oft my chamber, has made me seek thee," he said.
"Safe upon Tuscan waters the fleet lies. Grant me to grasp
Thy right hand, sweet father; withdraw thee not from its clasp."
So he replied; and a river of tears flowed over his face.
Thrice with his arms he essayed the beloved one's neck to embrace;
Thrice clasped vainly: the phantom eluded his hands in flight,
Thin as the idle breezes, and like some dream of the night.
There Æneas beholds in a valley withdrawn from the rest
Far-off glades, and a forest of boughs that sing in the breeze;
Near them the Lethe river that glides by abodes of the blest.
Round it numberless races and peoples floating he sees.
So on the flowery meadows in calm, clear summer, the bees
Settle on bright-hued blossoms, or stream in companies round
Fair white lilies, till every plain seems ringing with sound.
Strange to the scene Æneas, with terror suddenly pale,
Asks of its meaning, and what be the streams in the distant vale,
Who those warrior crowds that about yon river await.
Answer returns Anchises: "The spirits promised by Fate
Life in the body again. Upon Lethe's watery brink
These of the fountain of rest and of long oblivion drink.
Ever I yearn to relate thee the tale, display to thine eyes,
Count thee over the children that from my loins shall arise,
So that your joy may be deeper on finding Italy's skies."
"O my father! and are there, and must we believe it," he said,
"Spirits that fly once more to the sunlight back from the dead?
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