And now the looked-for day was come with simple light and sweet, And Phaeton's horses shining bright the ninth dawn in did bear. Fame and the name Acestes had the neighbouring people stir To fill the shore with joyful throng, AEneas' folk to see: But some were dight amid the games their strife-fellows to be. There first before the eyes of men the gifts to come they lay Amid the course; as hallowed bowls, and garlands of green bay, 110 And palms, the prize of victory, weapons, and raiment rolled In purple, and a talent's weight of silver and of gold; Then blast of horn from midst the mound the great games halloweth in: Four ships from all the fleet picked out will first the race begin With heavy oars; well matched are they for speed and rowers' tale: Hereof did Mnestheus' eager oars drive on the speedy Whale, Mnestheus to be of Italy, whence cometh Memmius' name. The huge Chimaera's mountain mass was Gyas set to tame; There on that city of a ship threesome its rowing plies The Dardan youth; the banks of oars in threefold order rise. 120 Sergestus next, the name whereof the Sergian house yet bears, Is ferried by the Centaur great: last in blue Scylla steers Cloanthus, whence the name of thee, Cluentius, man of Rome.

Far mid the sea a rock there is, facing the shore-line's foam, Which, beat by overtoppling waves, is drowned and hidden oft, What time the stormy North-west hides the stars in heaven aloft: But otherwhiles it lies in peace when nought the sea doth move, And riseth up a meadow fair that sunning sea-gulls love. There a green goal AEneas raised, dight of a leafy oak, To be a sign of turning back to that sea-faring folk, 130 That fetching compass round the same their long course they might turn.

So then by lot they take their place: there on the deck they burn. The captains, goodly from afar in gold and purple show: The other lads with poplar-leaf have garlanded the brow, And with the oil poured over them their naked shoulders shine. They man the thwarts; with hearts a-stretch they hearken for the sign, With arms a-stretch upon the oars; hard tugs the pulse of fear About their bounding hearts, hard strains the lust of glory dear. But when the clear horn gives the sound, forthwith from where they lie They leap away; the seamen's shouts smite up against the sky, 140 The upturned waters froth about as home the arms are borne: So timely they the furrows cut, and all the sea uptorn Is cloven by the sweep of oars and bows' three-headed push. —Nay, nought so swift in twi-yoke race forth from the barriers rush The scattered headlong chariots on to wear the space of plain, Nor eager so the charioteers shake waves along the rein Above the hurrying yoke, as hung over the lash they go. —Then with the shouts and praise of men, and hope cast to and fro, Rings all the grove; the cliff-walled shore rolleth great voice around, And beating 'gainst the mountain-side the shattering shouts rebound. 150

Before the others Gyas flies, and first the waves doth skim Betwixt the throng and roar, but hard Cloanthus presseth him; Who, better manned, is held aback by sluggish weight of pine. 'Twixt Whale and Centaur after these the edge of strife is fine, And hard they struggle each with each to win the foremost place. Now the Whale hath it; beaten now is foregone in the race By the huge Centaur; head and head now follow on the two, As the long keel of either one the salt sea furrows through.

But now they drew anigh the holm, the goal close on them gave, When Gyas first and conquering there amid the whirl of wave 160 Unto the helmsman of his ship, Menoetes, cries command: "And why so far unto the right? turn hither to this hand! Hug thou the shore; let the blades graze the very rocks a-lee. Let others hold the deep!" No less unto the wavy sea Menoetes, fearing hidden rocks, still turns away the bow: Gyas would shout him back again: "Menoetes, whither now? Steer for the rocks!" And therewithal, as back his eyes he cast. He sees Cloanthus hard at heel and gaining on him fast; Who, grazing on this hand and that the rocks and Gyas' ship, Now suddenly by leeward course a-head of all doth slip, 170 And leaving clear the goal behind hath open water's gain. Then unto Gyas' very bones deep burns the wrathful pain; Nor did his cheeks lack tears indeed: forgetting honour's trust, Forgetting all his fellows' weal, Menoetes doth he thrust Headlong from off the lofty deck into the sea adown, And takes the tiller, helmsman now and steering-master grown; He cheers his men, and toward the shore the rudder wresteth round. Menoetes, heavy, hardly won up from the ocean's ground, (For he was old, and floods enow fulfilled his dripping gear,) Made for the holm and sat him down upon the dry rock there: 180 The Teucrians laughed to see him fall, and laughed to see him swim, And laugh to see him spue the brine back from the heart of him.

Now Mnestheus' and Sergestus' hope began anew to spring, That they might outgo Gyas yet amid his tarrying: Of whom Sergestus draws ahead and nears the rocky holm; But not by all his keel indeed the other did o'ercome, But by the half; the eager Whale amidships held her place, Where Mnestheus midst the men themselves now to and fro did pace, Egging them on: "Now, now!" he cries; "up, up, on oar-heft high! Fellows of Hector, whom I chose when Troy last threw the die! 190 Now put ye forth your ancient heart, put forth the might of yore, Wherewith amid Getulian sand, Ionian sea ye bore; The heart and might ye had amidst Malea's following wave! I, Mnestheus, seek not victory now, nor foremost place to save. —Yet, O my heart! but let them win to whom thou giv'st the crown, O Neptune!—but the shameful last! O townsmen, beat it down. And ban such horror!" Hard on oars they lie mid utter throes, And quivereth all the brazen ship beneath their mighty blows; The sea's floor slippeth under them; the ceaseless pantings shake 199 Their limbs and parched mouths, and still the sweat-streams never slake. But very chance those strivers gave the prize they struggled for, Since now Sergestus, hot at heart, while to the stony shore He clingeth innerward, is come into the treacherous strait, And hapless driveth on the rocks thrust forth for such a fate: The cliffs are shaken and the oars against the flinty spikes Snap crashing, and the prow thrust up yet hangeth where it strikes: Up start the seafarers, and raise great hubbub tarrying; Then sprits all iron-shod and poles sharp-ended forth they bring To bear her off, and gather oars a-floating in the wash.

But Mnestheus, whetted by his luck, joyful, with hurrying dash 210 Of timely-beating oars, speeds forth, and praying breezes on, O'er waters' slope adown the sea's all open way doth run: —E'en as a pigeon in a cave stirred suddenly from rest, Who in the shady pumice-rock hath house and happy nest; Scared 'neath the roof she beateth forth with mighty flap of wings, And flieth, borne adown the fields, till in soft air she swings, And floateth on the flowing way, nor scarce a wing doth move; —So Mnestheus, so the Whale herself, the latter waters clove, So with the way erst made on her she flew on swift and soft; And first Sergestus doth she leave stayed on the rock aloft, 220 Striving in shallows' tanglement, calling for help in vain, And learning with his broken oars a little way to gain. Then Gyas and Chimaera's bulk he holdeth hard in chase, Who, from her lack of helmsman lost, must presently give place. And now at very end of all Cloanthus is the last With whom to deal: his most he strives, and presseth on him fast. Then verily shout thrusts on shout, and all with all goodwill Cry on the chase; their echoing noise the very lift doth fill. These, thinking shame of letting fall their hardly-gotten gain Of glory's meed, to buy the praise with very life are fain; 230 Those, fed on good-hap, all things may, because they deem they may: The twain, perchance, head laid to head, had won the prize that day, But if Cloanthus both his palms had stretched to seaward there, And called upon the Gods to aid and poured forth eager prayer:

"O Gods, whose lordship is the sea, whose waters I run o'er, Now glad will I, your debtor bound, by altars on the shore Bring forth for you a snow-white bull, and cast amid the brine His inner meat, and pour abroad a flowing of fair wine."

He spake, and all the Nereids' choir hearkened the words he said Down 'neath the waves, and Phorcus' folk, and Panopea the maid; 240 Yea, and the sire Portunus thrust the keel with mighty hand Upon its way, and arrow-swift it flew on toward the land, Swift as the South, and there at rest in haven deep it lies.

But now Anchises' seed, all men being summoned in due wise, Proclaims Cloanthus victor there by loud-voiced herald's shout, And with green garland of the bay he does his brows about; Then biddeth them to choose the gifts, for every ship three steers, And wine, and every crew therewith great weight of silver bears. And glorious gifts he adds withal to every duke of man: A gold-wrought cloak the victor hath, about whose rim there ran 250 A plenteous double wavy stream of Meliboean shell, And leafy Ida's kingly boy thereon was pictured well. A-following up the fleeing hart with spear and running fleet; Eager he seemed as one who pants; then him with hooked feet Jove's shield-bearer hath caught, and up with him from Ida flies, And there the ancient masters stretch vain palms unto the skies, While bark of staring hunting-hound beats fierce at upper air.

Then next for him who second place of might and valour bare A mail-coat wove of polished rings with threefold wire of gold, Which from Demoleos the King had stripped in days of old, 260 A conqueror then by Simois swift beneath high-builded Troy, He giveth now that lord to have a safeguard and a joy; Its many folds his serving-men, Phegeus and Sagaris, Scarce bore on toiling shoulders joined, yet clad in nought but this Swift ran Demoleos following on the Trojans disarrayed.

A third gift then he setteth forth, twin cauldrons brazen made, And silver bowls with picturing fret and wrought with utter pain.

And now when all had gotten gifts, and glorying in their gain, Were wending with the filleting of purple round the brow, Lo, gotten from the cruel rock with craft and toil enow, 270 With missing oars, and all one board unhandy and foredone, His ship inglorious and bemocked, Sergestus driveth on. —As with an adder oft it haps caught on the highway's crown, Aslant by brazen tire of wheel, or heavy pebble thrown By wayfarer, hath left him torn and nigh unto his end: Who writhings wrought for helpless flight through all his length doth send, And one half fierce with burning eyes uprears a hissing crest, The other half, with wounds all halt, still holding back the rest; He knitteth him in many a knot and on himself doth slip. —E'en such the crawling of the oars that drave the tarrying ship. 280 But they hoist sail on her, and so the harbour-mouth make shift To win: and there AEneas gives Sergestus promised gift, Blithe at his saving of the ship, and fellows brought aback: A maid he hath, who not a whit of Pallas' art doth lack. Of Crete she is, and Pholoe called, and twins at breast she bears.

Now all that strife being overpast, the good AEneas fares To grassy meads girt all about by hollow wooded hills, Where theatre-wise the racing-course the midmost valley fills. Thereto the hero, very heart of many a thousand men, Now wendeth, and on seat high-piled he sits him down again. 290 There whosoever may have will to strive in speedy race He hearteneth on with hope of gift, and shows the prize and grace. So from all sides Sicilians throng, and Trojan fellowship. Euryalus and Nisus first. Euryalus for goodliness and youth's first blossom famed, Nisus for fair love of the youth; then after these are named Diores, of the blood of kings from Priam's glorious race; Salius and Patron next; the one of Acarnanian place, The other from Arcadian blood of Tegeaea outsprung: Then two Trinacrians, Helymus and Panopes the young, 300 In woodcraft skilled, who ever went by old Acestes' side; And many others else there were whom rumour dimmed doth hide.

And now amidmost of all these suchwise AEneas spake: "Now hearken; let your merry hearts heed of my saying take: No man of all the tale of you shall henceforth giftless go; Two Gnosian spears to each I give with polished steel aglow, An axe to carry in the war with silver wrought therein. This honour is for one and all: the three first prize shall win, And round about their heads shall do the olive dusky-grey. A noble horse with trappings dight the first shall bear away; 310 A quiver of the Amazons with Thracian arrows stored The second hath; about it goes a gold belt broidered broad, With gem-wrought buckle delicate to clasp it at the end. But gladdened with this Argive helm content the third shall wend."

All said, they take their places due, and when the sign they hear, Forthwith they leave the bar behind and o'er the course they bear, Like drift of storm-cloud; on the goal all set their eager eyes: But far before all shapes of man shows Nisus, and outflies The very whistling of the winds or lightning on the wing. Then, though the space be long betwixt, comes Salius following; 320 And after Salius again another space is left, And then Euryalus is third; And after him is Helymus: but lo, how hard on heel Diores scuds! foot on his foot doth Helymus nigh feel, Shoulder on shoulder: yea, and if the course held longer out, He would slip by him and be first, or leave the thing in doubt.

Now, spent, unto the utmost reach and very end of all They came, when in the slippery blood doth luckless Nisus fall, E'en where the ground was all a-slop with bullocks slain that day, And all the topmost of the grass be-puddled with it lay: 330 There, as he went the victor now, exulting, failed his feet From off the earth, and forth he fell face foremost down to meet The midst of all the filthy slime blent with the holy gore: Yet for Euryalus his love forgat he none the more, For rising from the slippery place in Salius' way he thrust, Who, rolling over, lay along amid the thickened dust. Forth flies Euryalus, and flies to fame and foremost place, His own friend's gift, mid beat of hands and shouts that bear him grace. Next came in Helymus, and next the palm Diores bore. But over all the concourse set in hollow dale, and o'er 340 The heads of those first father-lords goes Salius' clamouring speech, Who for his glory reft away by guile doth still beseech. But safe goodwill and goodly tears Euryalus do bear, And lovelier seemeth valour set in body wrought so fair. Him too Diores backeth now, and crieth out on high, Whose palm of praise and third-won place shall fail and pass him by, If the first glory once again at Salius' bidding shift.

Then sayeth Father AEneas: "O fellows, every gift Shall bide unmoved: the palm of praise shall no man now displace. Yet for my sackless friend's mishap give me some pity's grace." 350

He spake, and unto Salius gave a mighty lion's hide, Getulian born, with weight of hair and golden claws beside: Then Nisus spake: "If such great gifts are toward for beaten men, And thou must pity those that fall, what gift is worthy then Of Nisus? I, who should have gained the very victory's crown, If me, as Salius, Fate my foe had never overthrown."

And even as he speaks the word he showeth face and limb Foul with the mud. The kindest lord, the Father, laughed on him, And bade them bring a buckler forth, wrought of Didymaon, Spoil of the Greeks, from Neptune's house and holy doors undone; 360 And there unto the noble youth he gives that noble thing. But now, the race all overpassed and all the gift-giving, Quoth he: "If any valour hath, or heart that may withstand, Let him come forth to raise his arm with hide-begirded hand."

So saying, for the fight to come he sets forth glories twain; A steer gilt-horned and garlanded the conquering man should gain, A sword and noble helm should stay the vanquished in his woe. No tarrying was there: Dares straight his face to all doth show, And riseth in his mighty strength amidst the murmur great: He who alone of all men erst with Paris held debate, 370 And he who at the mound wherein that mightiest Hector lay, Had smitten Butes' body huge, the winner of the day, Who called him come of Amycus and that Bebrycian land: But Dares stretched him dying there upon the yellow sand. Such was the Dares that upreared his head against the fight, And showed his shoulders' breadth and drave his fists to left and right, With arms cast forth, as heavy strokes he laid upon the air. But when they sought a man for him, midst all the concourse there Was none durst meet him: not a hand the fighting-glove would don: Wherefore, high-hearted, deeming now the prize from all was won, 380 He stood before AEneas' feet nor longer tarried, But with his left hand took the steer about the horn and said: "O Goddess-born, if no man dares to trust him in the play, What end shall be of standing here; must I abide all day? Bid them bring forth the gifts." Therewith they cried out one and all, The Dardan folk, to give the gifts that due to him did fall. But with hard words Acestes now Entellus falls to chide, As on the bank of grassy green they sat there side by side, "Entellus, bravest hero once of all men, and for nought, If thou wilt let them bear away without a battle fought 390 Such gifts as these. And where is he, thy master then, that God, That Eryx, told of oft in vain? where is thy fame sown broad Through all Trinacria, where the spoils hung up beneath thy roof?"

"Nay," said he, "neither love of fame nor glory holds aloof Beaten by fear, but cold I grow with eld that holdeth back. My blood is dull, my might gone dry with all my body's lack. Ah, had I that which once I had, that which the rascal there Trusts in with idle triumphing, the days of youth the dear, Then had I come into the fight by no gift-giving led, No goodly steer: nought heed I gifts." 400 And with the last word said, His fighting gloves of fearful weight amidst of them he cast, Wherewith the eager Eryx' hands amid the play had passed Full oft; with hardened hide of them his arms he used to bind. Men's hearts were mazed; such seven bull-hides each other in them lined, So stiff they were with lead sewn in and iron laid thereby; And chief of all was Dares mazed, and drew back utterly. But the great-souled Anchises' seed that weight of gauntlets weighed, And here and there he turned about their mighty folds o'erlaid. Then drew the elder from his breast words that were like to these:

"Ah, had ye seen the gloves that armed the very Hercules, 410 And that sad battle foughten out upon this country shore! For these are arms indeed that erst thy kinsmen Eryx bore: Lo, ye may see them even now flecked with the blood and brain. With these Alcides he withstood; with these I too was fain Of war, while mightier blood gave might, nor envious eld as yet On either temple of my head the hoary hairs had set. But if this Dares out of Troy refuse our weapons still, And good AEneas doom it so, and so Acestes will, My fight-lord; make the weapons like: these gloves of Eryx here I take aback: be not afraid, but doff thy Trojan gear." 420

He spake, and from his back he cast his twifold cloak adown, And naked his most mighty limbs and shoulders huge were shown, And on the midmost of the sand a giant there he stood. Wherewith Anchises' seed brought forth gloves even-matched and good, And so at last with gear alike the arms of each he bound, Then straightway each one stretched aloft on tip-toe from the ground: They cast their mighty arms abroad, nor any fear they know, The while their lofty heads they draw abackward from the blow: And so they mingle hands with hands and fall to wake the fight. The one a-trusting in his youth and nimbler feet and light; 430 The other's bulk of all avail, but, trembling, ever shrank His heavy knees, and breathing short for ever shook his flank. Full many a stroke those mighty men cast each at each in vain; Thick fall they on the hollow sides; the breasts ring out again With mighty sound; and eager-swift the hands full often stray Round ears and temples; crack the jaws beneath that heavy play: In one set strain, not moving aught, heavy Entellus stands, By body's sway and watchful eye shunning the dart of hands: But Dares is as one who brings the gin 'gainst high-built town, Or round about some mountain-hold the leaguer setteth down: 440 Now here now there he falleth on, and putteth art to pain At every place, and holds them strait with onset all in vain. Entellus, rising to the work, his right hand now doth show Upreared; but he, the nimble one, foresaw the falling blow Above him, and his body swift writhed skew-wise from the fall. Entellus spends his stroke on air, and, overborne withal, A heavy thing, falls heavily to earth, a mighty weight: As whiles a hollow-eaten pine on Erymanthus great, Or mighty Ida, rooted up, to earthward toppling goes. Then Teucrian and Trinacrian folk with wondrous longing rose, 450 And shouts went skyward: thither first the King Acestes ran, And pitying his like-aged friend raised up the fallen man; Who neither slackened by his fall, nor smit by any fear, Gets back the eagerer to the fight, for anger strength doth stir, And shame and conscious valour lights his ancient power again. In headlong flight his fiery wrath drives Dares o'er the plain, And whiles his right hand showereth strokes, his left hand raineth whiles. No tarrying and no rest there is; as hail-storm on the tiles Rattleth, so swift with either hand the eager hero now Beats on and batters Dares down, and blow is laid on blow. 460

But now the Father AEneas no longer might abide Entellus' bitter rage of soul or lengthening anger's tide, But laid an end upon the fight therewith, and caught away Dares foredone, and soothing words in such wise did he say: "Unhappy man, what madness then hath hold upon thine heart? Feel'st not another might than man's, and Heaven upon his part? Yield to the Gods!" So 'neath his word the battle sank to peace. But Dares his true fellows took, trailing his feeble knees, Lolling his head from side to side, the while his sick mouth sent The clotted blood from out of it wherewith the teeth were blent. 470 They lead him to the ships; then, called, they take the helm and sword, But leave Entellus' bull and palm, the victory's due reward; Who, high of heart, proud in the beast his conquering hand did earn, "O Goddess-born," he said, "and ye, O Teucrians, look, and learn What might was in my body once, ere youth it had to lack, And what the death whence Dares saved e'en now ye draw aback."

He spake, and at the great bull's head straightway he took his stand, As there it bode the prize of fight, and drawing back his hand Rose to the blow, and 'twixt the horns sent forth the hardened glove, And back upon his very brain the shattered skull he drove. 480 Down fell the beast and on the earth lay quivering, outstretched, dead, While over him from his inmost breast such words Entellus said: "Eryx, this soul, a better thing, for Dares doomed to die, I give thee, and victorious here my gloves and craft lay by."

Forth now AEneas biddeth all who have a mind to strive At speeding of the arrow swift, and gifts thereto doth give, And with his mighty hand the mast from out Serestus' keel Uprears; and there a fluttering dove, mark for the flying steel, Tied to a string he hangeth up athwart the lofty mast. Then meet the men; a brazen helm catches the lots down cast: 490 And, as from out their favouring folk ariseth up the shout, Hippocoon, son of Hyrtacus, before the rest leaps out; Then Mnestheus, who was victor erst in ship upon the sea, Comes after: Mnestheus garlanded with olive greenery. The third-come was Eurytion, thy brother, O renowned, O Pandarus, who, bidden erst the peace-troth to confound, Wert first amid Achaean host to send a winged thing. But last, at bottom of the helm, Acestes' name did cling, Who had the heart to try the toil amid the youthful rout.

Then with their strength of all avail they bend the bows about 500 Each for himself: from quiver then the arrows forth they take: And first from off the twanging string through heaven there went the wake Of shaft of young Hyrtacides, and clave the flowing air, And, flying home, amid the mast that stood before it there It stuck: the mast shook therewithal; the frighted, timorous bird, Fluttered her wings; and mighty praise all round about was heard. Then stood forth Mnestheus keen, and drew his bow unto the head, Aiming aloft; and shaft and eyes alike therewith he sped; But, worthy of all pitying, the very bird he missed, But had the hap to shear the knots and lines of hempen twist 510 Whereby, all knitted to her foot, she to the mast was tied: But flying toward the winds of heaven and mirky mist she hied. Then swift Eurytion, who for long had held his arrow laid On ready bow-string, vowed, and called his brother unto aid, And sighted her all joyful now amidst the void of sky, And smote her as she clapped her wings 'neath the black cloud on high: Then dead she fell, and mid the stars of heaven her life she left, And, falling, brought the shaft aback whereby her heart was cleft.

Acestes now was left alone, foiled of the victory's prize. No less the father sent his shot aloft unto the skies, 520 Fain to set forth his archer-craft and loud-resounding bow. Then to men's eyes all suddenly a portent there did show, A mighty sign of things to come, the ending showed how great When seers, the shakers of men's hearts, sang over it too late. For, flying through the flowing clouds, the swift reed burned about, And marked its road with flaming wake, and, eaten up, died out Mid the thin air: as oft the stars fly loose from heaven's roof, And run adown the space of sky with hair that flies aloof. Trinacrian men and Teucrian men, staring aghast they stood, Praying the Gods: but mightiest AEneas held for good 530 That tokening, and Acestes takes as one all glad at heart, And loadeth him with many gifts, and suchwise speaks his part:

"Take them, O father, for indeed by such a sign I wot Olympus' King will have thee win all honour without lot. This gift thou hast, Anchises' self, the ancient, had before, A bowl all stamped with images, which Cisseus once of yore, The Thracian, to my father gave, that he might bear the same A very tokening of his love and memory of his name."

So saying, a garland of green bay he doth his brows about, And victor over all the men Acestes giveth out: 540 Nor did the good Eurytion grudge his honour so preferred, Though he alone from height of heaven had brought adown the bird: But he came next in gift-giving who sheared the string, and last Was he who set his winged reed amidmost of the mast.

Now had AEneas called to him, ere yet the match was done, The child of Epytus, the guard, and fellow of his son, Beardless Iulus, and so spake into his faithful ear: "Go thou and bid Asoenius straight, if ready dight with gear He hath that army of the lads, and fair array of steeds, To bring unto his grandsire now, himself in warlike weeds, 550 That host of his." The lord meanwhile biddeth all folk begone Who into the long course had poured, and leave the meadow lone. Then come the lads: in equal ranks before their fathers' eyes They shine upon their bitted steeds, and wondering murmurs rise From men of Troy and Sicily as on their ways they fare. Due crown of well-ordained leaves bindeth their flowing hair, And each a pair of cornel shafts with iron head doth hold; And some the polished quiver bear at shoulder: limber gold, Ringing the neck with twisted stem, high on the breast is shown. Three companies of horse they are by tale, and up and down 560 Three captains ride, and twice six lads each leadeth to the war: In bands of even tale they shine, and like their leaders are. Their first array all glad at heart doth little Priam lead, Who from his grandsire had his name, thy well-renowned seed, Polites, fated to beget Italian folk: him bore A Thracian piebald flecked with white, whose feet were white before, And white withal the crest of him that high aloft he flung. Next Atys came, from whence the stem of Latin Atii sprung; Young Atys, whom Iulus young most well-beloved did call: Iulus last, in goodliness so far excelling all, 570 Upon a horse of Sidon came, whom that bright Dido gave To be a token of her love, her memory to save. On horses of Acestes old, Trinacrian-nurtured beasts, The others of the youth are borne.

With praise they greet their fluttering hearts and look on them with joy, Those Dardan folk, who see in them the ancient eyes of Troy. But after they had fared on steed the concourse all about Before the faces of their folk, Epytides did shout The looked-for sign afar to them, and cracked withal his whip: Then evenly they fall apart, in threesome order slip 580 Their cloven ranks; but, called again, aback upon their way They turn, and threatening levelled spears against each other lay. Then they to other onset now and other wheeling take, In bands opposed, and tanglements of ring on ring they make; So with their weapons every show of very fight they stir, And now they bare their backs in flight, and now they turn the spear In hostile wise; now side by side in plighted peace they meet. —E'en as they tell of Labyrinth that lies in lofty Crete, A road with blind walls crossed and crossed, an ever-shifting trap Of thousand ways, where he who seeks upon no sign may hap, 590 But midst of error, blind to seize or follow back, 'tis gone. Not otherwise Troy's little ones the tangle follow on At top of speed, and interweave the flight and battle's play; E'en as the dolphins, swimming swift amid the watery way, Cleave Libyan or Carpathian sea and sport upon the wave.

This guise of riding, such-like play, his folk Ascanius gave Once more, when round the Long White Stead the walls of war he drew: Withal the Ancient Latin Folk he taught the games to do, Suchwise as he a lad had learned with lads from Troy that came: 599 That same the Albans taught their sons; most mighty Rome that same Took to her thence, and honoured so her sires of yore agone: Now name of Troy and Trojan host the play and boys have won.

Thus far unto the Holy Sire the games were carried through, When Fortune turned her faith at last and changed her mind anew: For while the diverse hallowed games about the tomb they spent, Saturnian Juno Iris fair from heights of heaven hath sent Unto the Ilian ships, and breathed fair wind behind her ways, For sore she brooded, nor had spent her wrath of ancient days. So now the maid sped swift along her thousand-coloured bow, And swiftly ran adown the path where none beheld her go. 610 And there she saw that gathering great, and swept the strand with eye, And saw the haven void of folk, the ships unheeded lie. But far away on lonely beach the Trojan women weep The lost Anchises; and all they look ever on the deep Amid their weeping: "Woe are we! what waters yet abide! What ocean-waste for weary folk!" So one and all they cried, And all they yearn for city's rest: sea-toil is loathsome grown.

So she, not lacking craft of guile, amidst them lighted down, When she hath put away from her God's raiment and God's mien, And but as wife of Doryclus, the Tmarian man, is seen, 620 Old Beroe, who once had sons and lordly race and name; Amid the Dardan mother-folk such wise the Goddess came:

"O wretched ones!" she said, "O ye whom armed Achaean hand Dragged not to death before the walls that stayed your fatherland! Unhappy folk! and why hath Fate held back your doom till now? The seventh year is on the turn since Troy-town's overthrow; And we all seas the while, all lands, all rocks and skies that hate The name of guest, have wandered o'er, and through the sea o'ergreat Still chase that fleeing Italy mid wallowing waters tossed. Lo, here is Eryx' brother-land; Acestes is our host; 630 What banneth us to found our walls and lawful cities gain? O Fatherland! O House-Gods snatched from midst the foe in vain! Shall no walls more be called of Troy? Shall I see never more Xanthus or Simois, like the streams where Hector dwelt of yore? Come on, and those unhappy ships burn up with aid of me; For e'en now mid the dreams of sleep Cassandra did I see, Who gave me burning brand, and said, 'Here seek your Troy anew: This is the house that ye shall have.'—And now is time to do! No tarrying with such tokens toward! Lo, altars four are here Of Neptune: very God for us heart and the fire doth bear!" 640

So saying, first she caught upon the fiery bane, and raised Her hand aloft, and mightily she whirled it as it blazed And cast it: but the Ilian wives, their straining hearts are torn, Their souls bewildered: one of them, yea, and their eldest-born, Pyrgo, the queenly fosterer of many a Priam's son, Cried: "Mothers, nay no Beroe, nay no Rhoeteian one, The wife of Doryclus is this: lo, Godhead's beauty there! Behold the gleaming of her eyes, note how she breathes the air; Note ye her countenance and voice, the gait wherewith she goes. Yea, I myself left Beroe e'en now amidst her woes; 650 Sick, sad at heart that she alone must fail from such a deed, Nor bear unto Anchises' ghost his glory's righteous meed."

Such were the words she spake to them. But now those mothers, at the first doubtful, with evil eyes Gazed on the ships awhile between unhappy craving stayed For land they stood on, and the thought of land that Fortune bade: When lo! with even spread of wings the Goddess rose to heaven, And in her flight the cloudy lift with mighty bow was riven. Then, wildered by such tokens dread, pricked on by maddened hearts, Shrieking they snatch the hearthstone's fire and brand from inner parts; While some, they strip the altars there, and flaming leaf and bough 661 Cast forth: and Vulcan, let aloose, is swiftly raging now Along the thwarts, along the oars, and stems of painted fir.

But now with news of flaming ships there goes a messenger, Eumelus, to Anchises' tomb, and theatre-seats, and they Look round themselves and see the soot black in the smoke-cloud play. Then first Ascanius, e'en as blithe the riding-play he led, So eager now he rode his ways to camp bewildered, And nowise might they hold him back, his masters spent of breath.

"O what new madness then is this? What, what will ye?" he saith. "O wretched townswomen, no foe, no camp of Argive men 671 Ye burn, but your own hopes ye burn. Lo, your Ascanius then!"

Therewith before their feet he cast his empty helm afar, Dight wherewithal he stirred in sport that image of the war. And thither now AEneas sped, and crowd of Teucrian folk; Whereat the women diversely along the sea-shore broke, Fleeing afeard, and steal to woods and whatso hollow den, And loathe their deed, and loathe the light, as changed they know again Their very friends, and Juno now from every heart is cast.

But none the less the flaming rage for ever holdeth fast 680 With might untamed; the fire lives on within the timbers wet, The caulking sends forth sluggish smoke, the slow heat teeth doth set Upon the keel; to inmost heart down creeps the fiery bale; Nor all the might of mighty men nor rivers poured avail. Then good AEneas from his back the raiment off him tore, And called the Gods to aid, and high his palms to heaven upbore:

"Great Jove, if not all utterly a hater thou art grown Of Trojan folk, and if thy love of old yet looketh down On deeds of men, give to our ships to win from out the flame, O Father, now, and snatch from death the feeble Teucrian name, 690 Or else thrust down the remnant left, if so we merit aught, With bolt of death, and with thine hand sweep us away to nought!"

Scarce had he given forth the word, ere midst outpouring rain, The black storm rageth measureless, and earthly height and plain Shake to the thundering; all the sky casts forth confused flood, Most black with gathering of the South: then all the ship-hulls stood Fulfilled with water of the heavens; the half-burned oak was drenched, Until at last to utmost spark the smouldering fire is quenched, And all the ships escaped the bane of fiery end save four.

But, shaken by such bitter hap, Father AEneas bore 700 This way and that; and turned the cares on all sides in his breast: Whether amid Sicilian fields to set him down in rest, Forgetting Fate, or yet to strive for shores of Italy. Then the old Nautes, whom erewhile had Pallas set on high By her exceeding plenteous craft and lore that she had taught:— She gave him answers; telling him how wrath of God was wrought, And how it showed, and what the law of fate would ask and have:— This man unto AEneas now such words of solace gave:

"O Goddess-born, Fate's ebb and flow still let us follow on, Whate'er shall be, by bearing all must Fortune's fight be won. 710 Dardan Acestes have ye here, sprung of the Godhead's seed; Take his goodwill and fellowship to help thee in thy rede. Give him the crews of those burnt ships; to him let such-like go As faint before thy mighty hope and shifting weal and woe. The mothers weary of the sea, the elders spent with years, And whatsoever feeble is and whatsoever fears, Choose out, and in this land of his walls let the weary frame; And they their town by leave of thee shall e'en Acesta name."

So was he kindled by the speech of that wise ancient friend, Yet still down every way of care his thought he needs must send. 720

But now the wain of mirky night was holding middle sky, When lo, his father's image seemed to fall from heaven the high, And suddenly Anchises' lips such words to him poured forth:

"O son, that while my life abode more than my life wert worth; O son, well learned in Ilium's fates, hither my ways I take By Jove's commands, who even now the fiery bane did slake Amid thy ships, and now at last in heaven hath pitied thee: Yield thou to elder Nautes' redes; exceeding good they be: The very flower of all thy folk, the hearts that hardiest are, Take thou to Italy; for thee in Latium bideth war 730 With hardy folk of nurture rude: but first must thou be gone To nether dwelling-place of Dis: seek thou to meet me, son, Across Avernus deep: for me the wicked house of hell The dusk unhappy holdeth not; in pleasant place I dwell, Elysium, fellowship of good: there shall the holy Maid, The Sibyl, bring thee; plenteous blood of black-wooled ewes being paid: There shalt thou learn of all thy race, and gift of fated walls. And now farewell: for dewy night from mid way-faring falls, The panting steeds of cruel dawn are on me with their breath."

He spake, and midst thin air he fled as smoke-wreath vanisheth. 740 "Where rushest thou?" AEneas cried: "where hurriest thou again? Whom fleest thou? who driveth thee from these embraces fain?"

So saying, the flame asleep in ash he busied him to wake, And worshipped with the censer full and holy-kneaded cake The sacred Vesta's shrine and God of Pergamean wall. Then for his fellows doth he send, Acestes first of all, And teacheth them of Jove's command, and what his sire beloved Had bidden him, and whitherwise his heart thereto was moved. No tarrying there was therein, Acestes gainsaid nought; They write the mothers on the roll; thither a folk is brought, 750 Full willing hearts, who nothing crave the great reward of fame: But they themselves shape thwarts anew; and timbers gnawed by flame Make new within their ships again, and oars and rudders fit. A little band it is by tale, but valour lives in it.

Meanwhile AEneas marketh out the city with the plough, And, portioning the houses out, bids Troy and Ilium grow: Therewith Acestes, Trojan king, joys in his lordship fair; Sets forth the court, and giveth laws to fathers gathered there: Then on the head of Eryx huge a house that neareth heaven To Venus of Idalia is reared: a priest is given 760 And holy grove wide spread around, where old Anchises lay.

Now all the folk for nine days' space have made them holyday And worshipped God; and quiet winds have lowly laid the main, And ever gentle Southern breath woos to the deep again: Then all along the hollow shore ariseth weeping great, And 'twixt farewells and many a kiss a night and day they wait: Yea e'en the mothers, yea e'en they to whom so hard and drear The sea had seemed, a dreadful name they had no heart to bear, Are fain to go, are fain to take all toil the way may find. Whom good AEneas solaceth with friendly words and kind, 770 As to Acestes' kindred heart weeping he giveth them. Three calves to Eryx then he bids slay on the ocean's hem; To wind and weather an ewe lamb; then biddeth cast aloose: And he himself, begarlanded with olive clipped close, Stands, cup in hand, on furthest prow, and casts upon the brine The inner meat, and poureth forth the flowing of the wine. They gather way; springs up astern the fair and following breeze; The fellows strive in smiting brine and sweep the level seas.

But meanwhile Venus, sorely stirred by cares and all unrest, Hath speech of Neptune, pouring forth complaining from her breast: "The cruel wrath that Juno bears, and heart insatiate, 781 Drive me, O Neptune, prayer-fulfilled upon thy power to wait: She softeneth not by lapse of days nor piety's increase, Nor yielding unto Jove and Fate from troubling will she cease. 'Tis not enough to tear away from heart of Phrygian folk Their city by her cruel hate; nor with all ills to yoke Troy's remnant; but its ash and bones through death she followeth on. What! doth her own heart know the deed that all this wrath hath won? Be thou my witness how of late she stirred up suddenly Wild tumult of the Libyan sea! all waters with the sky 790 She mingled, trusting all in vain to storm of AEolus: This in thy very realm she dared. E'en now mad hearts to Trojan wives by wickedness she gave, And foully burned his ships; and him with crippled ship-host drave To leave his fellow-folk behind upon an outland shore. I pray thee let the remnant left sail safe thine ocean o'er, And let them come where into sea Laurentian Tiber falls, If right I ask, and unto these Fate giveth fateful walls."

Then Saturn's son, the sea-tamer, gave forth such words as these: "'Tis utter right, O Cytherean, to trust thee to my seas, 800 Whence thou wert born; and I myself deserve no less; e'en I, Who oft for thee refrain the rage of maddened sea and sky. Nor less upon the earth my care AEneas did embrace; Xanthus and Simois witness it!—When, following up the chace, The all-unheartened host of Troy 'gainst Troy Achilles bore, And many a thousand gave to death; choked did the rivers roar Nor any way might Xanthus find to roll his flood to sea: AEneas then in hollow cloud I caught away, when he Would meet Pelides' might with hands and Gods not strong enow. Yea, that was when from lowest base I wrought to overthrow 810 The walls of that same Troy forsworn my very hands had wrought. And now cast all thy fear away, my mind hath shifted nought; Avernus' haven shall he reach, e'en as thou deemest good, And one alone of all his folk shall seek amidst the flood; One head shall pay for all the rest."

So when these words had brought to peace the Goddess' joyful heart, The Father yokes his steeds with gold, and bridles the wild things With o'erfoamed bit, and loose in hand the rein above them flings, And light in coal-blue car he flies o'er topmost of the sea: The waves sink down, the heaped main lays his waters peacefully 820 Before the thunder of his wheels; from heaven all cloud-flecks fail. Lo, diverse bodies of his folk; lo, many a mighty whale; And Glaucus' ancient fellowship, Palaemon Ino's son, And Tritons swift, and all the host that Phorcus leadeth on; Maid Panopea and Melite, Cymodoce the fair, Nesaea, Spio, and Thalia, with Thetis leftward bear.

Now to AEneas' overstrained heart the kindly joy and soft Sinks deep: herewith he biddeth men raise all the masts aloft At swiftest, and along the yards to spread the sails to wind: So all sheet home together then; then leftward with one mind 830 They tack; then tack again to right: the yard-horns up in air They shift and shift, while kindly winds seaward the ship-host bear. But first before all other keels did Palinurus lead The close array, and all were charged to have his course in heed. And now the midmost place of heaven had dewy night drawn nigh, And 'neath the oars on benches hard scattered the shipmen lie, Who all the loosened limbs of them to gentle rest had given; When lo, the very light-winged Sleep stooped from the stars of heaven, Thrusting aside the dusky air and cleaving night atwain: The sackless Palinure he sought with evil dreams and vain. 840 So on the high poop sat the God as Phorbas fashioned, And as he sat such-like discourse from out his mouth he shed: "Iasian Palinure, unasked the waves our ship-host bear; Soft blow the breezes steadily; the hour for rest is here: Lay down thine head, steal weary eyes from toil a little space, And I will do thy deeds awhile and hold me in thy place."

But Palinure with scarce-raised eyes e'en such an answer gave: "To gentle countenance of sea and quiet of the wave Deem'st thou me dull? would'st have me trow in such a monster's truth? And shall I mine AEneas trust to lying breeze forsooth, 850 I, fool of peaceful heaven and sea so many times of old?"

So saying to the helm he clung, nor ever left his hold, And all the while the stars above his eyen toward them drew. But lo, the God brought forth a bough wet with Lethean dew, And sleepy with the might of Styx, and shook it therewithal Over his brow, and loosed his lids delaying still to fall: But scarce in first of stealthy sleep his limbs all loosened lay, When, weighing on him, did he tear a space of stern away, And rolled him, helm and wrack and all, into the flowing wave Headlong, and crying oft in vain for fellowship to save: 860 Then Sleep himself amid thin air flew, borne upon the wing.

No less the ship-host sails the sea, its safe way following Untroubled 'neath the plighted word of Father Neptune's mouth. So to the Sirens' rocks they draw, a dangerous pass forsooth In yore agone, now white with bones of many a perished man. Thence ever roared the salt sea now as on the rocks it ran; And there the Father felt the ship fare wild and fitfully, Her helmsman lost; so he himself steered o'er the night-tide sea, Sore weeping; for his fellow's end his inmost heart did touch: "O Palinure, that trowed the sky and soft seas overmuch, 870 Now naked on an unknown shore thy resting-place shall be!"



BOOK VI.

ARGUMENT.

AENEAS COMETH TO THE SIBYL OF CUMAE, AND BY HER IS LED INTO THE UNDER-WORLD, AND THERE BEHOLDETH MANY STRANGE THINGS, AND IN THE END MEETETH HIS FATHER, ANCHISES, WHO TELLETH HIM OF THE DAYS TO COME.

So spake he weeping, and his host let loose from every band, Until at last they draw anigh Cumae's Euboean strand. They turn the bows from off the main; the toothed anchors' grip Makes fast the keels; the shore is hid by many a curved ship. Hot-heart the youthful company leaps on the Westland's shore; Part falleth on to seek them out the seed of fiery store That flint-veins hide; part runneth through the dwellings of the deer, The thicket steads, and each to each the hidden streams they bare.

But good AEneas seeks the house where King Apollo bides, The mighty den, the secret place set far apart, that hides 10 The awful Sibyl, whose great soul and heart he seeketh home, The Seer of Delos, showing her the hidden things to come: And so the groves of Trivia and golden house they gain.

Now Daedalus, as tells the tale, fleeing from Minos' reign, Durst trust himself to heaven on wings swift hastening, and swim forth Along the road ne'er tried before unto the chilly north; So light at last o'er Chalcis' towers he hung amid the air, Then, come adown to earth once more, to thee he hallowed here, O Phoebus, all his winged oars, and built thee mighty fane: Androgeus' death was on the doors; then paying of the pain 20 By those Cecropians; bid, alas, each year to give in turn Seven bodies of their sons;—lo there, the lots drawn from the urn. But facing this the Gnosian land draws up amid the sea: There is the cruel bull-lust wrought, and there Pasiphae Embraced by guile: the blended babe is there, the twiformed thing, The Minotaur, that evil sign of Venus' cherishing; And there the tangled house and toil that ne'er should be undone: But ruth of Daedalus himself a queen's love-sorrow won, And he himself undid the snare and winding wilderment. Guiding the blind feet with the thread. Thou, Icarus, wert blent 30 Full oft with such a work be sure, if grief forbade it not; But twice he tried to shape in gold the picture of thy lot, And twice the father's hands fell down.

Long had their eyes read o'er Such matters, but Achates, now, sent on a while before, Was come with that Deiphobe, the Glaucus' child, the maid Of Phoebus and of Trivia, and such a word she said: "The hour will have no tarrying o'er fair shows for idle eyes; 'Twere better from an unyoked herd seven steers to sacrifice, And e'en so many hosts of ewes in manner due culled out."

She spake; her holy bidding then the warriors go about, 40 Nor tarry: into temple high she calls the Teucrian men, Where the huge side of Cumae's rock is carven in a den, Where are an hundred doors to come, an hundred mouths to go, Whence e'en so many awful sounds, the Sibyl's answers flow. But at the threshold cried the maid: "Now is the hour awake For asking—Ah, the God, the God!" And as the word she spake Within the door, all suddenly her visage and her hue Were changed, and all her sleeked hair, and gasping breath she drew, And with the rage her wild heart swelled, and greater was she grown, Nor mortal-voiced; for breath of God upon her heart was blown 50 As He drew nigher: "Art thou dumb of vows and prayers, forsooth, Trojan AEneas, art thou dumb? unprayed, the mighty mouth Of awe-mazed house shall open not." Even such a word she said, Then hushed: through hardened Teucrian bones swift ran the chilly dread, And straight the king from inmost heart the flood of prayers doth pour: "Phoebus, who all the woe of Troy hast pitied evermore, Who Dardan shaft and Paris' hands in time agone didst speed Against Achilles' body there, who me withal didst lead Over the seas that go about so many a mighty land, Through those Massylian folks remote, and length of Syrtes' sand, 60 Till now I hold that Italy that ever drew aback; And now perchance a Trojan fate we, even we may lack. Ye now, O Gods and Goddesses, to whom a stumbling-stone Was Ilium in the days of old, and Dardan folk's renown, May spare the folk of Pergamus. But thou, O holiest, O Maid that knowest things to come, grant thou the Latin rest To Teucrian men, and Gods of Troy, the straying way-worn powers! For surely now no realm I ask but such as Fate makes ours. To Phoebus and to Trivia then a temple will I raise, A marble world; in Phoebus' name will hallow festal days: 70 Thee also in our realm to be full mighty shrines await, There will I set thine holy lots and hidden words of fate Said to my folk, and hallow there well-chosen men for thee, O Holy One: But give thou not thy songs to leaf of tree, Lest made a sport to hurrying gales confusedly they wend; But sing them thou thyself, I pray!" Therewith his words had end. Meanwhile the Seer-maid, not yet tamed to Phoebus, raves about The cave, still striving from her breast to cast the godhead out; But yet the more the mighty God her mouth bewildered wears, Taming her wild heart, fashioning her soul with weight of fears. 80 At last the hundred mighty doors fly open, touched of none, And on the air the answer floats of that foreseeing one:

"O Thou, who dangers of the sea hast throughly worn away, Abides thee heavier toil of earth: the Dardans on a day Shall come to that Lavinian land,—leave fear thereof afar: Yet of their coming shall they rue. Lo, war, war, dreadful war! And Tiber bearing plenteous blood upon his foaming back. Nor Simois there, nor Xanthus' stream, nor Dorian camp shall lack: Yea, once again in Latin land Achilles is brought forth, God-born no less: nor evermore shall mighty Juno's wrath 90 Fail Teucrian men. Ah, how shalt thou, fallen on evil days, To all Italian lands and folks thine hands beseeching raise! Lo, once again a stranger bride brings woeful days on Troy, Once more the wedding of a foe. But thou, yield not to any ill, but set thy face, and wend The bolder where thy fortune leads; the dawn of perils' end, Whence least thou mightest look for it, from Greekish folk shall come."

Suchwise the Seer of Cumae sang from out her inner home The dreadful double words, wherewith the cavern moans again, As sooth amid the mirk she winds: Apollo shakes the rein 100 Over the maddened one, and stirs the strings about her breast; But when her fury lulled awhile and maddened mouth had rest, Hero AEneas thus began: "No face of any care, O maiden, can arise on me in any wise unware: Yea, all have I forecast; my mind hath worn through everything. One prayer I pray, since this they call the gateway of the King Of Nether-earth, and Acheron's o'erflow this mirky mere: O let me meet the eyes and mouth of my dead father dear; O open me the holy gate, and teach me where to go! I bore him on these shoulders once from midmost of the foe, 110 From flame and weapons thousandfold against our goings bent; My yoke-fellow upon the road o'er every sea he went, 'Gainst every threat of sea and sky a hardy heart he held, Though worn and feeble past decay and feebleness of eld. Yea, he it was who bade me wend, a suppliant, to thy door, And seek thee out: O holy one, cast thou thy pity o'er Father and son! All things thou canst, nor yet hath Hecate Set thee to rule Avernus' woods an empty Queen to be. Yea, Orpheus wrought with Thracian harp and strings of tuneful might To draw away his perished love from midmost of the night. 120 Yea, Pollux, dying turn for turn, his brother borrowed well, And went and came the road full oft—Of Theseus shall I tell? Or great Alcides? Ah, I too from highest Jove am sprung."

Such were the words he prayed withal and round the altars clung: Then she fell speaking: "Man of Troy, from blood of Godhead grown, Anchises' child, Avernus' road is easy faring down; All day and night is open wide the door of Dis the black; But thence to gain the upper air, and win the footsteps back, This is the deed, this is the toil: Some few have had the might, Beloved by Jove the just, upborne to heaven by valour's light, 130 The Sons of God. 'Twixt it and us great thicket fills the place That slow Cocytus' mirky folds all round about embrace; But if such love be in thine heart, such yearning in thee lie, To swim twice o'er the Stygian mere and twice to see with eye Black Tartarus, and thou must needs this idle labour win, Hearken what first there is to do: the dusky tree within Lurks the gold bough with golden leaves and limber twigs of gold, To nether Juno consecrate; this all these woods enfold, Dim shadowy places cover it amid the hollow dale; To come unto the under-world none living may avail 140 Till he that growth of golden locks from off the tree hath shorn; For this fair Proserpine ordained should evermore be borne Her very gift: but, plucked away, still faileth not the thing, Another golden stem instead hath leafy tide of spring. So throughly search with eyes: thine hand aright upon it lay When thou hast found: for easily 'twill yield and come away If the Fates call thee: otherwise no might may overbear Its will, nor with the hardened steel the marvel mayst thou shear.

—Ah! further,—of thy perished friend as yet thou nothing know'st, Whose body lying dead and cold defileth all thine host, 150 While thou beseechest answering words, and hangest on our door: Go, bring him to his own abode and heap the grave mound o'er; Bring forth the black-wooled ewes to be first bringing back of grace: So shalt thou see the Stygian groves, so shalt thou see the place That hath no road for living men." So hushed her mouth shut close: But sad-faced and with downcast eyes therefrom AEneas goes, And leaves the cave, still turning o'er those coming things, so dim, So dark to see. Achates fares nigh fellow unto him, And ever 'neath like load of cares he lets his footsteps fall: And many diverse words they cast each unto each withal, 160 What was the dead friend and the grave whereof the seer did teach. But when they gat them down at last upon the barren beach, They saw Misenus lying dead by death but lightly earned; Misenus, son of AEolus; no man more nobly learned In waking up the war with brass and singing Mars alight. Great Hector's fellow was he erst, with Hector through the fight He thrust, by horn made glorious, made glorious by the spear. But when from Hector life and all Achilles' hand did tear, Dardan AEneas' man became that mightiest under shield, Nor unto any worser lord his fellowship would yield. 170 Now while by chance through hollow shell he blew across the sea, And witless called the very Gods his singing-foes to be, The envious Triton caught him up, if ye the tale may trow, And sank the hero 'twixt the rocks in foaming waters' flow. Wherefore about him weeping sore were gathered all the men, And good AEneas chief of all: the Sibyl's bidding then Weeping they speed, and loiter not, but heap the tree-boughs high Upon the altar of the dead to raise it to the sky: Then to the ancient wood they fare, high dwelling of wild things; They fell the pine, and 'neath the axe the smitten holm-oak rings; 180 With wedge they cleave the ashen logs, and knitted oaken bole, Full fain to split; and mighty elms down from the mountains roll.

Amid the work AEneas is, who hearteneth on his folk, As with such very tools as they he girds him for the stroke; But through the sorrow of his heart such thought as this there strays, And looking toward the waste of wood such word as this he prays: "O if that very golden bough would show upon the tree, In such a thicket and so great; since all she told of thee, The seer-maid, O Misenus lost, was true and overtrue!"

But scarcely had he spoken thus, when lo, from heaven there flew 190 Two doves before his very eyes, who settled fluttering On the green grass: and therewithal that mightiest battle-king Knoweth his mother's birds new-come, and joyful poureth prayer: "O, if a way there be at all, lead ye amid the air, Lead on unto the thicket place where o'er the wealthy soil The rich bough casteth shadow down! Fail not my eyeless toil, O Goddess-mother!" So he saith, and stays his feet to heed What token they may bring to him, and whitherward they speed. So on they flutter pasturing, with such a space between, As they by eyes of following folk may scantly well be seen; 200 But when Avernus' jaws at last, the noisome place, they reach, They rise aloft and skim the air, and settle each by each Upon the very wished-for place, yea high amid the tree, Where the changed light through twigs of gold shines forth diversedly; As in the woods mid winter's chill puts forth the mistletoe, And bloometh with a leafage strange his own tree ne'er did sow, And with his yellow children hath the rounded trunk in hold, So in the dusky holm-oak seemed that bough of leafy gold, As through the tinkling shaken foil the gentle wind went by: Then straight AEneas caught and culled the tough stem greedily, 210 And to the Sibyl's dwelling-place the gift in hand he bore.

Nor less meanwhile the Teucrians weep Misenus on the shore, And do last service to the dead that hath no thanks to pay. And first fat fagots of the fir and oaken logs they lay, And pile a mighty bale and rich, and weave the dusk-leaved trees Between its sides, and set before the funeral cypresses, And over all in seemly wise the gleaming weapons pile: But some speed fire bewaved brass and water's warmth meanwhile, And wash all o'er and sleek with oil the cold corpse of the dead: Goes up the wail; the limbs bewept they streak upon the bed, 220 And cast thereon the purple cloths, the well-known noble gear. Then some of them, they shoulder up the mighty-fashioned bier, Sad service! and put forth the torch with faces from him turned, In fashion of the fathers old: there the heaped offerings burned, The frankincense, the dainty meats, the bowls o'erflowed with oil. But when the ashes were sunk down and fire had rest from toil, The relics and the thirsty ash with unmixed wine they wet. Then the gleaned bones in brazen urn doth Corynaeus set, Who thrice about the gathered folk the stainless water bore. As from the fruitful olive-bough light dew he sprinkled o'er, 230 And cleansed the men, and spake withal last farewell to the dead. But good AEneas raised a tomb, a mound huge fashioned, And laid thereon the hero's arms and oar and battle-horn, Beneath an airy hill that thence Misenus' name hath borne, And still shall bear it, not to die till time hath faded out.

This done, those deeds the Sibyl bade he setteth swift about: A deep den is there, pebble-piled, with mouth that gapeth wide; Black mere and thicket shadowy-mirk the secret of it hide. And over it no fowl there is may wend upon the wing And 'scape the bane; its blackened jaws bring forth such venoming. 240 Such is the breath it bears aloft unto the hollow heaven; So to the place the Greekish folk have name of Fowl-less given.

Here, first of all, four black-skinned steers the priestess sets in line, And on the foreheads of all these out-pours the bowl of wine. Then 'twixt the horns she culleth out the topmost of the hair, And lays it on the holy fire, the first-fruits offered there, And cries aloud on Hecate, of might in heaven and hell; While others lay the knife to throat and catch the blood that fell Warm in the bowls: AEneas then an ewe-lamb black of fleece Smites down with sword to her that bore the dread Eumenides, 250 And her great sister; and a cow yet barren slays aright To thee, O Proserpine, and rears the altars of the night Unto the Stygian King, and lays whole bulls upon the flame, Pouring rich oil upon the flesh that rush of fire o'ercame.

But now, when sunrise is at hand, and dawning of the day, The earth falls moaning 'neath their feet, the wooded ridges sway, And dogs seem howling through the dusk as now she drew anear The Goddess. "O be far away, ye unclean!" cries the seer. "Be far away! ah, get ye gone from all the holy wood! But thou, AEneas, draw thy steel and take thee to the road; 260 Now needeth all thine hardihood and steadfast heart and brave."

She spake, and wildly cast herself amidst the hollow cave, But close upon her fearless feet AEneas followeth.

O Gods, who rule the ghosts of men, O silent shades of death, Chaos and Phlegethon, hushed lands that lie beneath the night! Let me speak now, for I have heard: O aid me with your might To open things deep sunk in earth, and mid the darkness blent.

All dim amid the lonely night on through the dusk they went, On through the empty house of Dis, the land of nought at all. E'en as beneath the doubtful moon, when niggard light doth fall 270 Upon some way amid the woods, when God hath hidden heaven, And black night from the things of earth the colours dear hath driven.

Lo, in the first of Orcus' jaws, close to the doorway side, The Sorrows and Avenging Griefs have set their beds to bide; There the pale kin of Sickness dwells, and Eld, the woeful thing, And Fear, and squalid-fashioned Lack, and witless Hungering, Shapes terrible to see with eye; and Toil of Men, and Death, And Sleep, Death's brother, and the Lust of Soul that sickeneth: And War, the death-bearer, was set full in the threshold's way, And those Well-willers' iron beds: there heartless Discord lay, 280 Whose viper-breeding hair about was bloody-filleted.

But in the midst a mighty elm, dusk as the night, outspread Its immemorial boughs and limbs, where lying dreams there lurk, As tells the tale, still clinging close 'neath every leaf-side mirk. Withal most wondrous, many-shaped are all the wood-beasts there; The Centaurs stable by the porch, and twi-shaped Scyllas fare, And hundred-folded Briareus, and Lerna's Worm of dread Fell hissing; and Chimaera's length and fire-behelmed head, Gorgons and Harpies, and the shape of that three-bodied Shade. Then smitten by a sudden fear AEneas caught his blade, 290 And turned the naked point and edge against their drawing nigh; And but for her wise word that these were thin lives flitting by All bodiless, and wrapped about in hollow shape and vain, With idle sword had he set on to cleave the ghosts atwain.

To Acheron of Tartarus from hence the road doth go, That mire-bemingled, whirling wild, rolls on his desert flow, And all amid Cocytus' flood casteth his world of sand. This flood and river's ferrying doth Charon take in hand, Dread in his squalor: on his chin untrimmed the hoar hair lies Most plenteous; and unchanging flame bides in his staring eyes: 300 Down from his shoulders hangs his gear in filthy knot upknit; And he himself poles on his ship, and tends the sails of it, And crawls with load of bodies lost in bark all iron-grey, Grown old by now: but fresh and green is godhead's latter day.

Down thither rushed a mighty crowd, unto the flood-side borne; Mothers and men, and bodies there with all the life outworn Of great-souled heroes; many a boy and never-wedded maid, And youths before their fathers' eyes upon the death-bale laid: As many as the leaves fall down in first of autumn cold; As many as the gathered fowl press on to field and fold, 310 From off the weltering ocean-flood, when the late year and chill Hath driven them across the sea the sunny lands to fill.

There stood the first and prayed him hard to waft their bodies o'er, With hands stretched out for utter love of that far-lying shore. But that grim sailor now takes these, now those from out the band, While all the others far away he thrusteth from the sand.

AEneas wondered at the press, and moved thereby he spoke: "Say, Maid, what means this river-side, and gathering of the folk? What seek the souls, and why must some depart the river's rim, While others with the sweep of oars the leaden waters skim?" 320

Thereon the ancient Maid of Days in few words answered thus: "Anchises' seed, thou very child of Godhead glorious, Thou seest the deep Cocytus' pools, thou seest the Stygian mere, By whose might Gods will take the oath, and all forswearing fear: But all the wretched crowd thou seest are they that lack a grave, And Charon is the ferryman: those borne across the wave Are buried: none may ever cross the awful roaring road Until their bones are laid at rest within their last abode. An hundred years they stray about and wander round the shore, Then they at last have grace to gain the pools desired so sore." 330

There tarried then Anchises' child and stayed awhile his feet, Mid many thoughts, and sore at heart, for such a doom unmeet: And there he saw all sorrowful, without the death-dues dead, Leucaspis, and Orontes, he that Lycian ship-host led; Whom, borne from Troy o'er windy plain, the South wind utterly O'erwhelming, sank him, ships and men, in swallow of the sea. And lo ye now, where Palinure the helmsman draweth nigh, Who lately on the Libyan sea, noting the starry sky, Fell from the high poop headlong down mid wavy waters cast. His sad face through the plenteous dusk AEneas knew at last, 340 And spake: "What God, O Palinure, did snatch thee so away From us thy friends and drown thee dead amidst the watery way? Speak out! for Seer Apollo, found no guileful prophet erst, By this one answer in my soul a lying hope hath nursed; Who sang of thee safe from the deep and gaining field and fold Of fair Ausonia: suchwise he his plighted word doth hold!"

The other spake: "Apollo's shrine in nowise lied to thee, King of Anchises, and no God hath drowned me in the sea: But while I clung unto the helm, its guard ordained of right, And steered thee on, I chanced to fall, and so by very might 350 Seaward I dragged it down with me. By the rough seas I swear My heart, for any hap of mine, had no so great a fear As for thy ship; lest, rudderless, its master from it torn, Amid so great o'ertoppling seas it yet might fail forlorn. Three nights of storm I drifted on, 'neath wind and water's might, Over the sea-plain measureless; but with the fourth day's light There saw I Italy rise up from welter of the wave. Then slow I swam unto the land, that me well-nigh did save, But fell the cruel folk on me, heavy with raiment wet, And striving with my hooked hands hold on the rocks to get: 360 The fools, they took me for a prey, and steel against me bore. Now the waves have me, and the winds on sea-beach roll me o'er. But by the breath of heaven above, by daylight's joyous ways, By thine own father, by the hope of young Iulus' days, Snatch me, O dauntless, from these woes, and o'er me cast the earth! As well thou may'st when thou once more hast gained the Veline firth. Or if a way there be, if way thy Goddess-mother show,— For not without the will of Gods meseemeth wouldst thou go O'er so great floods, or have a mind to swim the Stygian mere,— Then give thine hand, and o'er the wave me woeful with thee bear, 370 That I at least in quiet place may rest when I am dead."

So spake he, but the priestess straight such word unto him said: "O Palinure, what godless mind hath gotten hold of thee, That thou the grim Well-willers' stream and Stygian flood wouldst see Unburied, and unbidden still the brim wilt draw anear? Hope not the Fates of very God to change by any prayer. But take this memory of my words to soothe thy wretched case: Through all their cities far and wide the people of the place, Driven by mighty signs from heaven, thy bones shall expiate And raise thee tomb, and year by year with worship on thee wait; 380 And there the name of Palinure shall dwell eternally."

So at that word his trouble lulled, his grief of heart passed by, A little while he joyed to think of land that bore his name.

So forth upon their way they went and toward the river came; But when from Stygian wave their path the shipman's gaze did meet, As through the dead hush of the grove shoreward they turned their feet, He fell upon them first with words and unbid chided them:

"Whoe'er ye be who come in arms unto our river's hem, Say what ye be! yea, speak from thence and stay your steps forthright! This is the very place of shades, and sleep, and sleepful night; 390 And living bodies am I banned in Stygian keel to bear. Nor soothly did I gain a joy, giving Alcides fare, Or ferrying of Pirithoues and Theseus time agone, Though come of God they were and matched in valiancy of none: He sought the guard of Tartarus chains on his limbs to lay, And from the King's own seat he dragged the quaking beast away: Those strove to carry off the Queen from great Dis' very bed."

The Amphrysian prophet answering, few words unto him said: "But here are no such guiles as this, so let thy wrath go by: Our weapons bear no war; for us still shall the door-ward lie 400 And bark in den, and fright the ghosts, the bloodless, evermore: Nor shall chaste Proserpine for us pass through her kinsman's door: Trojan AEneas, great in arms and great in godly grace, Goes down through dark of Erebus to see his father's face. But if such guise of piety may move thine heart no whit, At least this bough "—(bared from her weed therewith she showeth it)— "Know ye!" Then in his swelling heart adown the anger sank, Nor spake he more; but wondering at that gift a God might thank, The fateful stem, now seen once more so long a time worn by, He turned about his coal-blue keel and drew the bank anigh 410 The souls upon the long thwarts set therewith he thrusteth out, And clears the gangway, and withal takes in his hollow boat The huge AEneas, 'neath whose weight the seamed boat groans and creaks, And plenteous water of the mere lets in at many leaks. At last the Hero and the Maid safe o'er the watery way He leaveth on the ugly mire and sedge of sorry grey.

The three-mouthed bark of Cerberus here filleth all the place, As huge he lieth in a den that hath them full in face: But when the adders she beheld upon his crest upborne, A sleepy morsel honey-steeped, and blent of wizards' corn, 420 She cast him: then his threefold throat, all wild with hunger's lack, He opened wide, and caught at it, and sank his monstrous back, And there he lay upon the earth enormous through the cave. AEneas caught upon the pass the door-ward's slumber gave, And fled the bank of that sad stream no man may pass again. And many sounds they heard therewith, a wailing vast and vain; For weeping souls of speechless babes round the first threshold lay, Whom, without share of life's delight, snatched from the breast away, The black day hurried off, and all in bitter ending hid. And next were those condemned to die for deed they never did: 430 For neither doom nor judge nor house may any lack in death: The seeker Minos shakes the urn, and ever summoneth The hushed-ones' court, and learns men's lives and what against them stands.

The next place is of woeful ones, who sackless, with their hands Compassed their death, and weary-sick of light without avail Cast life away; but now how fain to bear the poor man's bale Beneath the heaven, the uttermost of weary toil to bear! But law forbiddeth: the sad wave of that unlovely mere Is changeless bond; and ninefold Styx compelleth to abide. Nor far from thence behold the meads far spread on every side, 440 The Mourning Meads—in tale have they such very name and sign. There those whom hard love ate away with cruel wasting pine Are hidden in the lonely paths with myrtle-groves about, Nor in the very death itself may wear their trouble out: Phaedra he saw, Procris he saw, and Eriphyle sad. Baring that cruel offspring's wound her loving body had: Evadne and Pasiphae, Laodamia there He saw, and Caenis, once a youth and then a maiden fair, And shifted by the deed of fate to his old shape again.

Midst whom Phoenician Dido now, fresh from the iron bane, 450 Went wandering in the mighty wood: and when the Trojan man First dimly knew her standing by amid the glimmer wan —E'en as in earliest of the month one sees the moon arise, Or seems to see her at the least in cloudy drift of skies— He spake, and let the tears fall down by all love's sweetness stirred: "Unhappy Dido, was it true, that bitter following word, That thou wert dead, by sword hadst sought the utter end of all? Was it thy very death I wrought? Ah! on the stars I call, I call the Gods and whatso faith the nether earth may hold, To witness that against my will I left thy field and fold! 460 But that same bidding of the Gods, whereby e'en now I wend Through dark, through deserts rusty-rough, through night without an end, Drave me with doom. Nor held my heart in anywise belief That my departure from thy land might work thee such a grief. O stay thy feet! nor tear thyself from my beholding thus. Whom fleest thou? this word is all that Fate shall give to us."

Such were the words AEneas spake to soothe her as she stood With stern eyes flaming, while his heart swelled with the woeful flood: But, turned away, her sick eyes still she fixed upon the earth; Nor was her face moved any more by all his sad words' birth 470 Than if Marpesian crag or flint had held her image so: At last she flung herself away, and fled, his utter foe, Unto the shady wood, where he, her husband of old days, Gives grief for grief, and loving heart beside her loving lays. Nor less AEneas, smitten sore by her unworthy woes, With tears and pity followeth her as far away she goes.

But thence the meted way they wear, and reach the outer field, Where dwell apart renowned men, the mighty under shield: There Tydeus meets him; there he sees the great fight-glorious man, Parthenopaeus; there withal Adrastus' image wan; 480 And there the Dardans battle-slain, for whom the wailing went To very heaven: their long array he saw with sad lament: Glaucus and Medon there he saw, Thersilochus, the three Antenor-sons, and Polyphoete, by Ceres' mystery Made holy, and Idaeus still in car with armed hand: There on the right side and the left the straying spirits stand. Nor is one sight of him enough; it joyeth them to stay And pace beside, asking for why he wendeth such a way. But when the lords of Danaan folk, and Agamemnon's hosts, Behold the man and gleaming arms amid the dusky ghosts, 490 They fall a-quaking full of fear: some turn their back to fly As erst they ran unto the ships; some raise a quavering cry, But never from their gaping vain will swell the shout begun.

And now Deiphobus he sees, the glorious Priam's son; But all his body mangled sore, his face all evilly hacked, His face and hands; yea, and his head, laid waste, the ear-lobes lacked, And nostrils cropped unto the root by wicked wound and grim. Scarcely he knew the trembling man, who strove to hide from him Those torments dire, but thus at last he spake in voice well known:

"O great in arms, Deiphobus, from Teucer's blood come down, 500 Who had the heart to work on thee such bitter wicked bale? Who had the might to deal thee this? Indeed I heard the tale, That, tired with slaying of the Greeks on that last night of all, Upon a heap of mingled death thou didst to slumber fall: And I myself an empty tomb on that Rhoetean coast Set up to thee, and thrice aloud cried blessing on thy ghost: Thy name and arms still keep the place; but thee I found not, friend, To set thee in thy fathers' earth ere I too needs must wend."

To him the child of Priam spake: "Friend, nought thou left'st undone; All things thou gav'st Deiphobus, and this dead shadowy one: 510 My Fates and that Laconian Bane, the Woman wicked-fair, Have drowned me in this sea of ills: she set these tokens here. How midst a lying happiness we wore the last night by 'Thou know'st: yea; overwell belike thou hold'st that memory Now when the baneful Horse of Fate high Pergamus leapt o'er, With womb come nigh unto the birth of weaponed men of war, She, feigning hallowed dance, led on a holy-shouting band Of Phrygian maids, and midst of them, the bale-fire in her hand, Called on the Danaan men to come, high on the castle's steep: But me, outworn with many cares and weighed adown with sleep, 520 The hapless bride-bed held meanwhile, and on me did there press Deep rest and sweet, most like indeed to death's own quietness. Therewith my glorious wife all arms from out the house withdrew, And stole away from o'er my head the sword whose faith I knew, Called Menelaues to the house and opened him the door, Thinking, forsooth, great gift to give to him who loved so sore, To quench therewith the tale gone by of how she did amiss. Why linger? They break in on me, and he their fellow is, Ulysses, preacher of all guilt.—O Gods, will ye not pay The Greeks for all? belike with mouth not godless do I pray. 530 —But tell me, thou, what tidings new have brought thee here alive? Is it blind strayings o'er the sea that hither doth thee drive, Or bidding of the Gods? Wherein hath Fortune worn thee so, That thou, midst sunless houses sad, confused lands, must go?"

But as they gave and took in talk, Aurora at the last In rosy wain the topmost crown of upper heaven had passed, And all the fated time perchance in suchwise had they spent; But warning of few words enow the Sibyl toward him sent: "Night falls, AEneas, weeping here we wear the hours in vain; And hard upon us is the place where cleaves the road atwain; 540 On by the walls of mighty Dis the right-hand highway goes, Our way to that Elysium: the left drags on to woes Ill-doers' souls, and bringeth them to godless Tartarus."

Then spake Deiphobus: "Great seer, be not o'erwroth with us: I will depart and fill the tale, and unto dusk turn back: Go forth, our glory, go and gain the better fate I lack!" And even with that latest word his feet he tore away. But suddenly AEneas turned, and lo, a city lay Wide-spread 'neath crags upon the left, girt with a wall threefold; And round about in hurrying flood a flaming river rolled, 550 E'en Phlegethon of Tartarus, with rattling, stony roar: In face with adamantine posts was wrought the mighty door, Such as no force of men nor might of heaven-abiders high May cleave with steel; an iron tower thence riseth to the sky: And there is set Tisiphone, with girded blood-stained gown, Who, sleepless, holdeth night and day the doorway of the town. Great wail and cruel sound of stripes that city sendeth out, And iron clanking therewithal of fetters dragged about.

Then fearfully AEneas stayed, and drank the tumult in: "O tell me, Maiden, what is there? What images of sin? 560 What torments bear they? What the wail yon city casts abroad?"

Then so began the seer to speak: "O glorious Teucrian lord, On wicked threshold of the place no righteous foot may stand: But when great Hecate made me Queen of that Avernus land, She taught me of God's punishments and led me down the path. —There Gnosian Rhadamanthus now most heavy lordship hath, And heareth lies, and punisheth, and maketh men confess Their deeds of earth, whereof made glad by foolish wickedness, They thrust the late repentance off till death drew nigh to grip: Those guilty drives Tisiphone, armed with avenging whip, 570 And mocks their writhings, casting forth her other dreadful hand Filled with the snakes, and crying on her cruel sister's band. And then at last on awful hinge loud-clanging opens wide The Door of Doom:—and lo, behold what door-ward doth abide Within the porch, what thing it is the city gate doth hold! More dreadful yet the Water-worm, with black mouth fiftyfold, Hath dwelling in the inner parts. Then Tartarus aright Gapes sheer adown; and twice so far it thrusteth under night As up unto the roof of heaven Olympus lifteth high: And there the ancient race of Earth, the Titan children, lie, 580 Cast down by thunder, wallowing in bottomless abode. There of the twin Aloidae the monstrous bodies' load I saw; who fell on mighty heaven to cleave it with their hands, That they might pluck the Father Jove from out his glorious lands; And Salmoneus I saw withal, paying the cruel pain That fire of Jove and heaven's own voice on earth he needs must feign: He, drawn by fourfold rush of steeds, and shaking torches' glare, Amidmost of the Grecian folks, amidst of Elis fair, Went glorying, and the name of God and utter worship sought. O fool! the glory of the storm, and lightning like to nought, 590 He feigned with rattling copper things and beat of horny hoof. Him the Almighty Father smote from cloudy rack aloof, But never brand nor pitchy flame of smoky pine-tree cast, As headlong there he drave him down amid the whirling blast. And Tityon, too, the child of Earth, great Mother of all things, There may ye see: nine acres' space his mighty frame he flings; His deathless liver still is cropped by that huge vulture's beak That evermore his daily meat doth mid his inwards seek, Fruitful of woe, and hath his home beneath his mighty breast: Whose heart-strings eaten, and new-born shall never know of rest. 600 Of Lapithae, Pirithoues, Ixion, what a tale! O'er whom the black crag hangs, that slips, and slips, and ne'er shall fail To seem to fall. The golden feet of feast beds glitter bright, And there in manner of the kings is glorious banquet dight. But lo, the Furies' eldest-born is crouched beside it there, And banneth one and all of them hand on the board to bear, And riseth up with tossing torch, and crieth, thundering loud. Here they that hated brethren sore while yet their life abode, The father-smiters, they that drew the client-catching net, The brooders over treasure found in earth, who never yet 610 Would share one penny with their friends—and crowded thick these are— Those slain within another's bed; the followers up of war Unrighteous; they no whit ashamed their masters' hand to fail, Here prisoned bide the penalty: seek not to know their tale Of punishment; what fate it is o'erwhelmeth such a folk. Some roll huge stones; some hang adown, fast bound to tire or spoke Of mighty wheels. There sitteth now, and shall sit evermore Theseus undone: wretch Phlegyas is crying o'er and o'er His warning, and in mighty voice through dim night testifies: 'Be warned, and learn of righteousness, nor holy Gods despise.' 620 This sold his fatherland for gold; this tyrant on it laid; This for a price made laws for men, for price the laws unmade: This broke into his daughter's bed and wedding-tide accursed: All dared to think of monstrous deed, and did the deed they durst. Nor, had I now an hundred mouths, an hundred tongues at need, An iron voice, might I tell o'er all guise of evil deed, Or run adown the names of woe those evil deeds are worth."

So when Apollo's ancient seer such words had given forth: "Now to the road! fulfil the gift that we so far have brought! 629 Haste on!" she saith, "I see the walls in Cyclops' furnace wrought; And now the opening of the gates is lying full in face, Where we are bidden lay adown the gift that brings us grace."

She spake, and through the dusk of ways on side by side they wend, And wear the space betwixt, and reach the doorway in the end. AEneas at the entering in bedews his body o'er With water fresh, and sets the bough in threshold of the door. So, all being done, the Goddess' gift well paid in manner meet, They come into a joyous land, and green-sward fair and sweet Amid the happiness of groves, the blessed dwelling-place. Therein a more abundant heaven clothes all the meadows' face 640 With purple light, and their own sun and their own stars they have. Here some in games upon the grass their bodies breathing gave; Or on the yellow face of sand they strive and play the play; Some beat the earth with dancing foot, and some, the song they say: And there withal the Thracian man in flowing raiment sings Unto the measure of the dance on seven-folded strings; And now he smites with finger-touch, and now with ivory reed. And here is Teucer's race of old, most lovely sons indeed; High-hearted heroes born on earth in better days of joy: Ilus was there, Assaracus, and he who builded Troy, 650 E'en Dardanus. Far off are seen their empty wains of war And war-weed: stand the spears in earth, unyoked the horses are, And graze the meadows all about; for even as they loved Chariot and weapons, yet alive, and e'en as they were moved To feed sleek horses, under earth doth e'en such joy abide. Others he saw to right and left about the meadows wide Feasting; or joining merry mouths to sing the battle won Amidst the scented laurel grove, whence earthward rolleth on The full flood that Eridanus athwart the wood doth pour. Lo, they who in their country's fight sword-wounded bodies bore; 660 Lo, priests of holy life and chaste, while they in life had part; Lo, God-loved poets, men who spake things worthy Phoebus' heart: And they who bettered life on earth by new-found mastery; And they whose good deeds left a tale for men to name them by: And all they had their brows about with snowy fillets bound.

Now unto them the Sibyl spake as there they flowed around,— Unto Musaeus first; for him midmost the crowd enfolds Higher than all from shoulders up, and reverently beholds: "Say, happy souls, and thou, O bard, the best earth ever bare, What land, what place Anchises hath? for whose sake came we here, 670 And swam the floods of Erebus and every mighty wave."

Then, lightly answering her again, few words the hero gave: "None hath a certain dwelling-place; in shady groves we bide, And meadows fresh with running streams, and beds by river-side: But if such longing and so sore the heart within you hath, O'ertop yon ridge and I will set your feet in easy path."

He spake and footed it afore, and showeth from above The shining meads; and thence away from hill-top down they move.

But Sire Anchises deep adown in green-grown valley lay, And on the spirits prisoned there, but soon to wend to day, 680 Was gazing with a fond desire: of all his coming ones There was he reckoning up the tale, and well-loved sons of sons: Their fate, their haps, their ways of life, their deeds to come to pass. But when he saw AEneas now draw nigh athwart the grass, He stretched forth either palm to him all eager, and the tears Poured o'er his cheeks, and speech withal forth from his mouth there fares:

"O come at last, and hath the love, thy father hoped for, won O'er the hard way, and may I now look on thy face, O son, And give and take with thee in talk, and hear the words I know? So verily my mind forebode, I deemed 'twas coming so, 690 And counted all the days thereto; nor was my longing vain. And now I have thee, son, borne o'er what lands, how many a main! How tossed about on every side by every peril still! Ah, how I feared lest Libyan land should bring thee unto ill!"

Then he: "O father, thou it was, thine image sad it was, That, coming o'er and o'er again, drave me these doors to pass: My ships lie in the Tyrrhene salt—ah, give the hand I lack! Give it, my father; neither thus from my embrace draw back!"

His face was wet with plenteous tears e'en as the word he spake, And thrice the neck of him beloved he strove in arms to take; 700 And thrice away from out his hands the gathered image streams, E'en as the breathing of the wind or winged thing of dreams.

But down amid a hollow dale meanwhile AEneas sees A secret grove, a thicket fair, with murmuring of the trees, And Lethe's stream that all along that quiet place doth wend; O'er which there hovered countless folks and peoples without end: And as when bees amid the fields in summer-tide the bright Settle on diverse flowery things, and round the lilies white Go streaming; so the fields were filled with mighty murmuring.

Unlearned AEneas fell aquake at such a wondrous thing, 710 And asketh what it all may mean, what rivers these may be, And who the men that fill the banks with such a company. Then spake Anchises: "These are souls to whom fate oweth now New bodies: there they drink the draught by Lethe's quiet flow, The draught that is the death of care, the long forgetfulness. And sure to teach thee of these things, and show thee all their press, And of mine offspring tell the tale, for long have I been fain, That thou with me mightst more rejoice in thine Italia's gain."

"O Father, may we think it then, that souls may get them hence To upper air and take once more their bodies' hinderance? 720 How can such mad desire be to win the worldly day?"

"Son, I shall tell thee all thereof, nor hold thee on the way." Therewith he takes the tale and all he openeth orderly:

"In the beginning: earth and sky and flowing fields of sea, And stars that Titan fashioned erst, and gleaming moony ball, An inward spirit nourisheth, one soul is shed through all, That quickeneth all the mass, and with the mighty thing is blent: Thence are the lives of men and beasts and flying creatures sent, And whatsoe'er the sea-plain bears beneath its marble face; Quick in these seeds is might of fire and birth of heavenly place, 730 Ere earthly bodies' baneful weight upon them comes to lie, Ere limbs of earth bewilder them and members made to die. Hence fear they have, and love, and joy, and grief, and ne'er may find The face of heaven amid the dusk and prison strait and blind: Yea, e'en when out of upper day their life at last is borne, Not all the ill of wretched men is utterly outworn, Not all the bane their bodies bred; and sure in wondrous wise The plenteous ill they bore so long engrained in them it lies: So therefore are they worn by woes and pay for ancient wrong: And some of them are hung aloft the empty winds among; 740 And some, their stain of wickedness amidst the water's heart Is washed away; amidst the fire some leave their worser part; And each his proper death must bear: then through Elysium wide Are we sent forth; a scanty folk in joyful fields we bide, Till in the fulness of the time, the day that long hath been Hath worn away the inner stain and left the spirit clean, A heavenly essence, a fine flame of all unmingled air. All these who now have turned the wheel for many and many a year God calleth unto Lethe's flood in mighty company, That they, remembering nought indeed, the upper air may see 750 Once more, and long to turn aback to worldly life anew."