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The Aeneid of Virgil
Book Three
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ARGUMENT
In obedience to oracles the Trojans build a fleet and sail to Thrace
(1-18). Seeking to found a city, they are warned away by the ghost
of Polydorus and visit Anius in Ortygia (19-99). Apollo promises
AEneas and his descendants world-wide empire if they return to "the
ancient motherland" of Troy,--which Anchises declares to be Crete
(100-144). They reach Crete, only to be again baffled. Drought and
plague interrupt this second attempt to found a city. On the point
of returning to ask Apollo for clearer counsel, AEneas in a dream
is certified by the home-gods of Troy that the true motherland is
Italy (145-207). Anchises owns his mistake, and recalls how
Cassandra had in other days been mocked for prophesying that Troy
should eventually be transplanted to Italy (208-225). Landing in the
Strophades, they unwittingly wrong the Harpies, whose queen Celaeno
thereupon threatens them with a portentous famine. Panic-stricken,
they coast along to Actium, where they celebrate their national games
and leave a defiance to the Greeks (226-342). At Buthrotum they find
Helenus and Andromache in possession of the kingdom of Pyrrhus, and
by them are entertained awhile and sent upon their way with gifts
and guidance (343-577). The voyage from Dyrrhachium and the first
glimpse of Italy. They land and propitiate Juno: then coast along
till they sight Mount AEtna (578-666). After a description of the
rescue of Achemenides and the escape from Polyphemus, the voyage and
the story end with the death of Anchises at Drepanum (667-819).
I. "When now the Gods have made proud Ilion fall,
And Asia's power and Priam's race renowned
O'erwhelmed in ruin undeserved, and all
Neptunian Troy lies smouldering on the ground,
In desert lands, to diverse exile bound,
Celestial portents bid us forth to fare;
Where Ida's heights above Antandros frowned,
A fleet we build, and gather crews, unware
Which way the Fates will lead, what home is ours and where.
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II. "Scarce now the summer had begun, when straight
My father, old Anchises, gave command
To spread our canvas and to trust to Fate.
Weeping, I leave my native port, the land,
The fields where once the Trojan towers did stand,
And, homeless, launch upon the boundless brine,
Heart-broken outcast, with an exiled band,
Comrades, and son, and household gods divine,
And the great Gods of Troy, the guardians of our line.
III. "Far off there lies, with many a spacious plain,
The land of Mars, by Thracians tilled and sown,
Where stern Lycurgus whilom held his reign;
A hospitable shore, to Troy well-known,
Her home-gods leagued in union with our own,
While Fortune smiled. Hither, with fates malign,
I steer, and landing for our purposed town
The walls along the winding shore design,
And coin for them a name 'AEneadae' from mine.
IV. "Due rites to Venus and the gods I bore,
The work to favour, and a sleek, white steer
To Heaven's high King was slaughtering on the shore.
With cornel shrubs and many a prickly spear
Of myrtle crowned, it chanced a mound was near.
Thither I drew, and strove with eager hold
A green-leaved sapling from the soil to tear,
To shade with boughs the altars, when behold
A portent, weird to see and wondrous to unfold!
V. "Scarce the first stem uprooted, from the wood
Black drops distilled, and stained the earth with gore.
Cold horror shook me, in my veins the blood
Was chilled, and curdled with affright. Once more
A limber sapling from the soil I tore;
Once more, persisting, I resolved in mind
With inmost search the causes to explore
And probe the mystery that lurked behind;
Dark drops of blood once more come trickling from the rind.
VI. "Much-musing, to the woodland nymphs I pray,
And Mars, the guardian of the Thracian plain,
With favouring grace the omen to allay,
And bless the dreadful vision. Then again
A third tall shaft I grasp, with sinewy strain
And firm knees pressed against the sandy ground;
When O! shall tongue make utterance or refrain?
Forth from below a dismal, groaning sound
Heaves, and a piteous voice is wafted from the mound:
VII. "'Spare, O AEneas, spare a wretch, nor shame
Thy guiltless hands, but let the dead repose.
From Troy, no alien to thy race, I came.
O, fly this greedy shore, these cruel foes!
Not from the tree--from Polydorus flows
This blood, for I am Polydorus. Here
An iron crop o'erwhelmed me, and uprose
Bristling with pointed javelins.'--Mute with fear,
Perplext, aghast I stood, and upright rose my hair.
VIII. "This Polydorus Priam from the war
To Thracia's King in secret had consigned
With store of gold, when, girt with siege, he saw
Troy's towers, and trust in Dardan arms resigned.
But when our fortune and our hopes declined,
The treacherous King the conqueror's cause professed,
And, false to faith, to friendship and to kind,
Slew Polydorus, and his wealth possessed.
Curst greed of gold, what crimes thy tyrant power attest!
IX. "Now, freed from terror, to my father first,
Then to choice friends the vision I declare.
All vote to sail, and quit the shore accurst.
So to his shade, with funeral rites, we rear
A mound, and altars to the dead prepare,
Wreathed with dark cypress. Round them, as of yore,
Pace Troy's sad matrons, with their streaming hair.
Warm milk from bowls, and holy blood we pour,
And thrice with loud farewell the peaceful shade deplore.
X. "Soon as our ships can trust the deep once more,
And South-winds chide, and Ocean smiles serene,
We crowd the beach, and launch, and town and shore
Fade from our view. Amid the waves is seen
An island, sacred to the Nereids' queen
And Neptune, lord of the AEgean wave,
Which, floating once, Apollo fixed between
High Myconos and Gyarus, and gave
For man's resort, unmoved the blustering winds to brave.
XI. "Hither we sail and on this island fair,
Worn out, find welcome in a sheltered bay,
And, landing, hail Apollo's town with prayer.
King Anius here, enwreath'd with laurel spray,
The priest of Phoebus meets us on the way;
With joy at once he recognised again
His friend Anchises of an earlier day.
And joining hands in fellowship, each fain
To show a friendly heart the palace-halls we gain.
XII. "There, in a temple built of ancient stone
I worship: 'Grant, Thymbrean lord divine,
A home, a settled city of our own,
Walls to the weary, and a lasting line,
To Troy another Pergamus. Incline
And harken. Save these Dardans sore-distrest,
The remnant of Achilles' wrath. Some sign
Vouchsafe us, whom to follow? where to rest?
Steal into Trojan hearts, and make thy power confessed.'
XIII. "Scarce spake I, suddenly the bays divine
Shook, and a trembling seized the temple door.
The mountain heaves, and from the opening shrine
Loud moans the tripod. Prostrate on the floor
We hear a voice; 'Brave hearts, the land that bore
Your sires shall nurse their Dardan sons again.
Seek out your ancient mother; from her shore
Through all the world the AEneian house shall reign,
And sons of sons unborn the lasting line sustain.'
XIV. "Straight rose a joyous uproar; each in turn
Ask what the walls that Phoebus hath designed?
Which way to wander, whither to return?
Then spake my sire, revolving in his mind
The ancient legends of the Trojan kind,
'Chieftains, give ear, and learn your hopes and mine;
Jove's island lies, amid the deep enshrined,
Crete, hundred-towned, a land of corn and wine,
Where Ida's mountain stands, the cradle of our line.
XV. "'Thence Troy's great sire, if I remember right,
Old Teucer, to Rhoeteum crossed the flood,
And for his future kingdom chose a site.
Nor yet proud Ilion nor her towers had stood;
In lowly vales sequestered they abode.
Thence Corybantian cymbals clashed and brayed
In praise of Cybele. In Ida's wood
Her mystic rites in secrecy were paid,
And lions, yoked in pomp, their sovereign's car conveyed.
XVI. "'Come then and seek we, as the gods command,
The Gnosian kingdoms, and the winds entreat.
Short is the way, nor distant lies the land.
If Jove be present and assist our fleet,
The third day lands us on the shores of Crete.'
So spake he and on altars, reared aright,
Due victims offered, and libations meet;
A bull to Neptune and Apollo bright,
To tempest a black lamb, to Western winds a white.
XVII. "Fame flies, Idomeneus has left the land,
Expelled his kingdom; that the shore lies clear
Of foes, and homes are ready to our hand.
Ortygia's port we leave, and skim the mere;
Soon Naxos' Bacchanalian hills appear,
And past Olearos and Donysa, crowned
With trees, and Paros' snowy cliffs we steer.
Far-scattered shine the Cyclades renowned,
And clustering isles thick-sown in many a glittering sound.
XVIII. "Loud rise the shouts of sailors to the sky;
'Crete and our fathers,' rings for all to hear
The cry of oarsmen. Through the deep we fly;
Behind us sings the stern breeze loud and clear.
So to the shores of ancient Crete we steer.
There in glad haste I trace the wished-for town,
And call the walls 'Pergamea,' and cheer
My comrades, glorying in the name well-known,
The castled keep to raise, and guard the loved hearth-stone.
XIX. "Scarce stand the vessels hauled upon the beach,
And bent on marriages the young men vie
To till new settlements, while I to each
Due law dispense and dwelling place supply,
When from a tainted quarter of the sky
Rank vapours, gathering, on my comrades seize,
And a foul pestilence creeps down from high
On mortal limbs and standing crops and trees,
A season black with death, and pregnant with disease.
XX. "Sweet life from mortals fled; they drooped and died.
Fierce Sirius scorched the fields, and herbs and grain
Were parched, and food the wasting crops denied.
Once more Anchises bids us cross the main
And seek Ortygia, and the god constrain
By prayer to pardon and advise, what end
Of evils to expect? what woes remain?
What fate hereafter shall our steps attend?
What rest for toil-worn men, and whitherward to wend?
XXI. "'Twas night; on earth all creatures were asleep,
When lo! the figures of our gods, the same
Whom erst from falling Ilion o'er the deep
I brought, scarce rescued from the midmost flame,
Before me, sleepless for my country's shame,
Stood plain, in plenteousness of light confessed,
Where streaming through the sunken lattice came
The moon's full splendour, and their speech addressed,
And I in heart took comfort, hearing their behest.
XXII. "'Lo! what Apollo from Ortygia's shrine
Would sing, unasked he sends us to proclaim.
We who have followed o'er the billowy brine
Thee and thine arms, since Ilion sank in flame,
Will raise thy children to the stars, and name
Thy walls imperial. Thou build them meet
For heroes. Shrink not from thy journey's aim,
Though long the way. Not here thy destined seat,
So saith the Delian god, not thine the shores of Crete.
XXIII. "'Far off there lies, across the rolling wave,
An ancient land, which Greeks Hesperia name;
Her soil is fruitful and her people brave.
Th' OEnotrians held it once, by later fame
The name Italia from their chief they claim.
Thence sprang great Dardanus; there lies thy seat;
Thence sire Iasius and the Trojans came.
Rise, and thy parent with these tidings greet,
To seek Ausonian shores, for Jove denies thee Crete.'
XXIV. "Awed by the vision and the voice divine
('Twas no mere dream; their very looks I knew,
I saw the fillets round their temples twine,
And clammy sweat did all my limbs bedew)
Forthwith, upstarting, from the couch I flew,
And hands and voice together raised in prayer,
And wine unmixt upon the altars threw.
This done, to old Anchises I repair,
Pleased with the rites fulfilled, and all the tale declare.
XXV. "The two-fold race Anchises understands,
The double sires, and owns himself misled
By modern error 'twixt two ancient lands.
'O son, long trained in Ilian fates,' he said,
This chance Cassandra, she alone, displayed.
Oft to Hesperia and Italia's reign
She called us. Ah! who listened or obeyed?
Who dreamed that Teucrians should Hesperia gain?
Yield we to Phoebus now, nor wisdom's words disdain.'
XXVI. "All hail the speech. We quit this other home,
And leaving here a handful on the shore,
Spread sail and scour with hollow keel the foam.
The fleet was on mid ocean; land no more
Was visible, naught else above, before
But sky and sea, when overhead did loom
A storm-cloud, black as heaven itself, that bore
Dark night and wintry tempest in its womb,
And all the waves grew rough and shuddered with the gloom.
XXVII. "Winds roll the waters, and the great seas rise.
Dispersed we welter on the gulfs. Damp night
Has snatched with rain the heaven from our eyes,
And storm-mists in a mantle wrapt the light.
Flash after flash, and for a moment bright,
Quick lightnings rend the welkin. Driven astray
We wander, robbed of reckoning, reft of sight.
No difference now between the night and day
E'en Palinurus sees, nor recollects the way.
XXVIII. "Three days, made doubtful by the blinding gloom,
As many nights, when not a star is seen,
We wander on, uncertain of our doom.
At last the fourth glad daybreak clears the scene,
And rising land, and opening uplands green,
And rolling smoke at distance greet the view.
No longer tarrying; to our oars we lean.
Down drop the sails; in order ranged, each crew
Flings up the foam to heaven, and sweeps the sparkling blue.
XXIX. "Saved from the sea, the Strophades we gain,
So called in Greece, where dwells, with Harpies, dire
Celaeno, in the vast Ionian main,
Since, forced from Phineus' palace to retire,
They fled their former banquet. Heavenly ire
Ne'er sent a pest more loathsome; ne'er were seen
Worse plagues to issue from the Stygian mire--
Birds maiden-faced, but trailing filth obscene,
With taloned hands and looks for ever pale and lean.
XXX. "The harbour gained, lo! herds of oxen bright
And goats untended browse the pastures fair.
We, sword in hand, make onset, and invite
The gods and Jove himself the spoil to share,
And piling couches, banquet on the fare.
When straight, down-swooping from the hills meanwhile
The Harpies flap their clanging wings, and tear
The food, and all with filthy touch defile,
And, mixt with screams, uprose a sickening stench and vile.
XXXI. "Once more, within a cavern screened from view,
Where circling trees a rustling shade supply,
The boards are spread, the altars blaze anew.
Back, from another quarter of the sky,
Dark-ambushed, round the clamorous Harpies fly
With taloned claws, and taste and taint the prey.
To arms I call my comrades, and defy
The loathsome brood to battle. They obey,
And swords and bucklers hide amid the grass away.
XXXII. "So when their screams descending fill the strand,
Misenus from his outlook sounds the fray.
All to the strange encounter, sword in hand,
Rush forth, these miscreants of the deep to slay.
No wounds they take, no weapon wins its way.
Swiftly they soar, all leaving, ere they go,
Their filthy traces on the half-gorged prey.
One perched, Celaeno, on a rock, and lo,
Thus croaked the dismal seer her prophecy of woe.
XXXIII. "'War, too, Laomedon's twice-perjured race!
War do ye bring, our cattle stol'n and slain?
And unoffending Harpies would ye chase
Forth from their old, hereditary reign?
Mark then my words and in your breasts retain.
What Jove, the Sire omnipotent, of old
Revealed to Phoebus, and to me again
Phoebus Apollo at his hest foretold,
I now to thee and thine, the Furies' Queen, unfold.
XXXIV. "'Ye seek Italia and, with favouring wind,
Shall reach Italia, and her ports attain.
But ne'er the town, by Destiny assigned,
Your walls shall gird, till famine's pangs constrain
To gnaw your boards, in quittance for our slain.'
So spake the Fiend, and backward to the wood
Soared on the wing. Cold horror froze each vein.
Aghast and shuddering my comrades stood;
Down sank at once each heart, and terror chilled the blood.
XXXV. "No more with arms, for peace with vows and prayer
We sue, and pardon of these powers implore,
Or be they goddesses or birds of air
Obscene and dire; and lifting on the shore
His hands, Anchises doth the gods adore.
'O Heaven!' he cries, 'avert these threats; be kind
And stay the curse, and vex with plagues no more
A pious folk,' then bids the crews unbind
The stern-ropes, loose the sheets and spread them to the wind.
XXXVI. "The South-wind fills the canvas; on we fly
Where breeze and pilot drive us through the deep.
Soon, crowned with woods, Zacynthos we espy,
Dulichium, Same and the rock-bound steep
Of Neritos. Past Ithaca we creep,
Laertes' realms, and curse the land that bred
Ulysses, cause of all the woes we weep.
Soon, where Leucate lifts her cloud-capt head,
Looms forth Apollo's fane, the seaman's name of dread.
XXXVII. "Tired out we seek the little town, and run
The sterns ashore and anchor in the bay,
Saved beyond hope and glad the land is won,
And lustral rites, with blazing altars, pay
To Jove, and make the shores of Actium gay
With Ilian games, as, like our sires, we strip
And oil our sinews for the wrestler's play.
Proud, thus escaping from the foemen's grip,
Past all the Argive towns, through swarming Greeks, to slip.
XXXVIII. "Meanwhile the sun rolls round the mighty year,
And wintry North-winds vex the waves once more.
In front, above the temple-gates I rear
The brazen shield which once great Abas bore,
And mark the deed in writing on the door,
_'AEneas these from conquering Greeks hath ta'en';_
Then bid my comrades quit the port and shore,
And man the benches. They with rival strain
And slanting oar-blades sweep the levels of the main.
XXXIX. "Phaeacia's heights with the horizon blend;
We skim Epirus, and Chaonia's bay
Enter, and to Buthrotum's town ascend.
Strange news we hear: A Trojan Greeks obey,
Helenus, master of the spouse and sway
Of Pyrrhus, and Andromache once more
Has yielded to a Trojan lord. Straightway
I burn to greet them, and the tale explore,
And from the harbour haste, and leave the ships and shore.
XL. "Within a grove Andromache that day,
Where Simois in fancy flowed again,
Her offerings chanced at Hector's grave to pay,
A turf-built cenotaph, with altars twain,
Source of her tears and sacred to the slain--
And called his shade. Distracted with amaze
She marked me, as the Trojan arms shone plain.
Heat leaves her frame; she stiffens with the gaze,
She swoons--and scarce at length these faltering words essays:
XLI. "'Real, then, real is thy face, and true
Thy tidings? Liv'st thou, child of heavenly seed?
If dead, then where is Hector?' Tears ensue,
And wailing, shrill as though her heart would bleed.
Then I, with stammering accents, intercede,
And, sore perplext, these broken words outthrow
To calm her transport, 'Yea, alive, indeed,--
Alive through all extremities of woe.
Doubt not, thou see'st the truth, no shape of empty show.
XLII. "'Alas! what lot is thine? What worthy fate
Hath caught thee, fallen from a spouse so high?
Hector's Andromache, art thou the mate
Of Pyrrhus?' Then with lowly downcast eye
She dropped her voice, and softly made reply.
'Ah! happy maid of Priam, doomed instead
At Troy upon a foeman's tomb to die!
Not drawn by lot for servitude, nor led
A captive thrall, like me, to grace a conqueror's bed.
XLIII. "'I, torn from burning Troy o'er many a wave,
Endured the lust of Pyrrhus and his pride,
And knew a mother's travail as his slave.
Fired with Hermione, a Spartan bride,
Me, joined in bed and bondage, he allied
To Helenus. But mad with love's despair,
And stung with Furies for his spouse denied,
At length Orestes caught the wretch unware,
E'en by his father's shrine, and smote him then and there.
XLIV. "'The tyrant dead, a portion of his reign
Devolves on Helenus, who Chaonia calls
From Trojan Chaon the Chaonian plain,
And on these heights rebuilds the Trojan walls.
But thou--what chance, or god, or stormy squalls
Have driven thee here unweeting?--and the boy
Ascanius--lives he, or what hap befalls
His parents' darling, and their only joy?
Breathes he the vital air, whom unto thee now Troy--
XLV. "'Still grieves he for his mother? Doth the name
Of sire or uncle make his young heart glow
For deeds of valour and ancestral fame?'
Weeping she spake, with unavailing woe,
And poured her sorrow to the winds, when lo,
In sight comes Helenus, with fair array,
And hails his friends, and hastening to bestow
Glad welcome, toward his palace leads the way;
But tears and broken words his mingled thoughts betray.
XLVI. "I see another but a tinier Troy,
A seeming Pergama recalls the great.
A dried-up Xanthus I salute with joy,
And clasp the portals of a Scaean gate.
Nor less kind welcome doth the rest await.
The monarch, mindful of his sire of old,
Receives the Teucrians in his courts of state.
They in the hall, the viands piled on gold,
Pledging the God of wine, their brimming cups uphold.
XLVII. "One day and now another passed; the gale
Sings in the shrouds, and calls us to depart,
When thus the prophet Helenus I hail,
'Troy-born interpreter of Heaven! whose art
The signs of Phoebus' pleasure can impart;
Thou know'st the tripod and the Clarian bay,
The stars, the voices of the birds, that dart
On wings with omens laden, speak and say,--
Since fate and all the gods foretell a prosperous way.
XLVIII. "'And point to far Italia,--One alone,
Celaeno, sings of famine foul and dread,
A nameless prodigy, a plague unknown,--
What perils first to shun? what path to tread,
To win deliverance from such toils?' This said,
I ceased, and Helenus with slaughtered kine
Implores the god, and from his sacred head
Unbinds the wreath, and leads me to the shrine,
Awed by Apollo's power, and chants the doom divine:
XLIX. "'O Goddess-born, high auspices are thine,
And heaven's plain omens guide thee o'er the main.
Thus Jove, by lot unfolding his design,
Assorts the chances, and the Fates ordain.
This much may I of many things explain,
How best o'er foreign seas to urge thy keel
In safety, and Ausonian ports attain,
The rest from Helenus the Fates conceal,
And Juno's envious power forbids me to reveal.
L. "'Learn then, Italia, that thou deem'st so near,
And thither dream'st of lightly passing o'er,
Long leagues divide, and many a pathless mere.
First must Trinacrian waters bend the oar,
Ausonian waves thy vessels must explore,
First must thou view the nether world, where flows
Dark Styx, and visit that AEaean shore,
The home of Circe, ere, at rest from woes,
Thou build the promised walls, and win the wished repose.
LI. "'These tokens bear, and in thy memory store.
When, musing sad and pensive, thou hast found
Beside an oak-fringed river, on the shore,
A huge sow thirty-farrowed, and around,
Milk-white as she, her litter, mark the ground,
That spot shall see thy promised town; for there
Thy toils are ended, and thy rest is crowned.
Fear not this famine--'tis an empty scare;
The Fates will find a way, and Phoebus hear thy prayer.
LII. "'As for yon shore and that Italian coast,
Washed, where the land lies nearest, by our main,
Shun them; their cities hold a hostile host.
There Troy's old foes, the evil Argives, reign,
Locrians of Narycos her towns contain.
There fierce Idomeneus from Crete brought o'er
His troops to vex the Sallentinian plain;
There, girt with walls and guarded by the power
Of Philoctetes, stands Petelia's tiny tower.
LIII. "'Nay, when thy vessels, ranged upon her shore,
Rest from the deep, and on the beach ye light
The votive altars, and the gods adore,
Veil then thy locks, with purple hood bedight,
And shroud thy visage from a foeman's sight,
Lest hostile presence, 'mid the flames divine,
Break in, and mar the omen and the rite.
This pious use keep sacred, thou and thine,
The sons of sons unborn, and all the Trojan line.
LIV. "'When, wafted to Sicilia, dawns in sight
Pelorus' channel, keep the leftward shore,
Though long the circuit, and avoid the right.
These lands, 'tis said, one continent of yore
(Such change can ages work) an earthquake tore
Asunder; in with havoc rushed the main,
And far Sicilia from Hesperia bore,
And now, where leapt the parted lands in twain,
The narrow tide pours through, 'twixt severed town and plain.
LV. "'Here Scylla, leftward sits Charybdis fell,
Who, yawning thrice, her lowest depths laid bare,
Sucks the vast billows in her throat's dark hell,
Then starward spouts the refluent surge in air.
Here Scylla, gaping from her gloomy lair,
The passing vessels on the rocks doth hale;
A maiden to the waist, with bosom fair
And human face; below, a monstrous whale,
Down from whose wolf-like womb hangs many a dolphin's tail.
LVI. "'Far better round Pachynus' point to steer,
Though long the course, and tedious the delay,
Than once dread Scylla to behold, or hear
The rocks rebellow with her hell-hounds' bay.
This more, besides, I charge thee to obey,
If any faith to Helenus be due,
Or skill in prophecy the seer display,
And mighty Phoebus hath inspired me true,
These warning words I urge, and oft will urge anew:
LVII. "'Seek Juno first; great Juno's power adore;
With suppliant gifts the potent queen constrain,
And winds shall waft thee to Italia's shore.
There, when at Cumae landing from the main,
Avernus' lakes and sounding woods ye gain,
Thyself shalt see, within her rock-hewn shrine,
The frenzied prophetess, whose mystic strain
Expounds the Fates, to leaves of trees consign
The notes and names that mark the oracles divine.
LVIII. "'Whate'er the maiden on those leaves doth trace,
In rows she sorts, and in the cave doth store.
There rest they, nor their sequence change, nor place,
Save when, by chance, on grating hinge the door
Swings open, and a light breath sweeps the floor,
Or rougher blasts the tender leaves disperse.
Loose then they flutter, for she recks no more
To call them back, and rearrange the verse;
Untaught the votaries leave, the Sibyl's cave to curse.
LIX. "'But linger thou, nor count thy lingering vain,
Though comrades chide, and breezes woo the fleet.
Approach the prophetess; with prayer unchain
Her voice to speak. She shall the tale repeat
Of wars in Italy, thy destined seat,--
What toils to shun, what dangers to despise,--
And make the triumph of thy quest complete.
Thou hast whate'er 'tis lawful to advise;
Go, and with deathless deeds raise Ilion to the skies.'
LX. "So spake the seer, and shipward bids his friends
Rich gifts convey, and store them in the hold.
Gold, silver plate, carved ivory he sends,
With massive caldrons of Dodona's mould;
A coat of mail, with triple chain of gold,
And shining helm, with cone and flowing crest,
The arms of Pyrrhus, glorious to behold.
Nor lacks my sire his presents; for the rest
Steeds, guides and arms he finds, and oarsmen of the best.
LXI. "Then to Anchises, as he bids us spread
The sails, with reverence speaks Apollo's seer,
'Far-famed Anchises, honoured with the bed
Of haughty Venus, Heaven's peculiar care,
Twice saved from Troy! behold Ausonia there,
Steer towards her coasts, yet skirt them; far away
That region lies, which Phoebus doth prepare.
Blest in thy son's devotion, take thy way.
Why should more words of mine the rising South delay?'
LXII. "Nor less Andromache, sore grieved to part,
Rich raiment fetches, wrought with golden thread,
And Phrygian scarf, and still with bounteous heart
Loads him with broideries. 'Take these,' she said,
'Sole image of Astyanax now dead.
Thy kin's last gifts, my handiwork, to show
How Hector's widow loved the son she bred.
Such eyes had he, such very looks as thou,
Such hands, and oh! like thine his age were ripening now!'
LXIII. "With gushing tears I bid the pair farewell.
Live happy ye, whose destinies are o'er;
We still must wander where the Fates compel.
Your rest is won; no oceans to explore,
No fair Ausonia's ever-fading shore.
Ye still can see a Xanthus and a Troy,
Reared by your hands, old Ilion to restore,
And brighter auspices than ours enjoy,
Nor tempt, like ours, the Greeks to ravage and destroy.
LXIV. "'If ever Tiber and the fields I see
Washed by her waves, ere mingling with the brine,
And build the city which the Fates decree,
Then kindred towns and neighbouring folk shall join,
Yours in Epirus, in Hesperia mine,
And linked thenceforth in sorrow and in joy,
With Dardanus the founder of each line,--
So let posterity its pains employ,
Two nations, one in heart, shall make another Troy.'
LXV. "On fly the barks o'er ocean. Near us frown
Ceraunia's rocks, whence shortest lies the way
To Italy. And now the sun goes down,
And darkness gathers on the mountains grey.
Close by the water, in a sheltered bay,
A few as guardians of the oars we choose,
Then stretched at random on the beach we lay
Our limbs to rest, and on the toil-worn crews
Sleep steals in silence down, and sheds her kindly dews.
LXVI. "Nor yet had Night climbed heaven, when up from sleep
Starts Palinurus, and with listening ear
Catches the breeze. He marks the stars, that keep
Their courses, gliding through the silent sphere,
Arcturus, rainy Hyads and each Bear,
And, girt with gold, Orion. Far away
He sees the firmament all calm and clear,
And from the stern gives signal. We obey,
And shifting camp, set sail and tempt the doubtful way.
LXVII. "The stars were chased, and blushing rose the day.
Dimly, at distance through the misty shroud
Italia's hills and lowlands we survey,
'Italia,' first Achates shouts aloud;
'Italia,' echoes from the joyful crowd.
Then sire Anchises hastened to entwine
A massive goblet with a wreath, and vowed
Libations to the gods, and poured the wine
And on the lofty stern invoked the powers divine:
LXVIII. "'Great gods, whom Earth and Sea and Storms obey,
Breathe fair, and waft us smoothly o'er the main.'
Fresh blows the breeze, and broader grows the bay,
And on the cliffs is seen Minerva's fane.
We furl the sails, and shoreward row amain.
Eastward the harbour arches, scarce descried.
Two jutting rocks, by billows lashed in vain,
Stretch out their arms the narrow mouth to hide.
Far back the temple stands, and seems to shun the tide.
LXIX. "Lo, here, first omen offered to our eyes,
Four snow-white steeds are grazing on the plain.
''Tis war thou bringest us,' Anchises cries,
'Strange land! For war the mettled steed they train,
And war these threaten. Yet in time again
These beasts are wont in harness to obey,
And bear the yoke, as guided by the rein.
Peace yet is hopeful.' So our vows we pay
To Pallas, famed in arms, whose welcome cheered the way.
LXX. "Veiled at her shrines in Phrygian hood we stand,
And chief to Juno, mindful of the seer,
Burnt-offerings pay, as pious rites demand.
This done, the sailyards to the wind we veer,
And leave the Grecians and the land of fear.
Lo, there Tarentum's harbour and the town,
If fame be true, of Hercules, and here
Lacinium's queen and Caulon's towers are known,
And Scylaceum's rocks, with shattered ships bestrown.
LXXI. "Far off is seen, above the billowy mere,
Trinacrian AEtna, and the distant roar
Of ocean and the beaten rocks we hear,
And the loud burst of breakers on the shore;
High from the shallows leap the surges hoar,
And surf and sand mix eddying. 'Behold
Charybdis!' cries Anchises, ''tis the shore,
The dreaded rocks that Helenus foretold.
Row, comrades, for dear life, and let the oars catch hold.'
LXXII. "He spake, 'twas done; and Palinurus first
Turns the prow leftward: to the left we ply
With oars and sail, and shun the rocks accurst.
Now curls the wave, and lifts us to the sky,
Now sinks and, plunging in the gulf we lie.
Thrice roar the caverned shore-cliffs, thrice the spray
Whirls up and wets the dewy stars on high.
Thus tired we drift, as sinks the wind and day,
Unto the Cyclops' shore, all weetless of the way.
LXXIII. "It was a spacious harbour, sheltered deep
From access of the winds, but looming vast
With awful ravage, AEtna's neighbouring steep
Thundered aloud, and, dark with clouds, upcast
Smoke and red cinders in a whirlwind's blast.
Live balls of flame, with showers of sparks, upflew
And licked the stars, and in combustion massed,
Torn rocks, her ragged entrails, molten new,
The rumbling mount belched forth from out the boiling stew.
LXXIV. "Here, while from AEtna's furnaces the flame
Bursts forth, Enceladus, 'tis said, doth lie,
Scorched by the lightning. As his wearied frame
He shifts, Trinacria, trembling at the cry
Moans through her shores, and smoke involves the sky.
There all night long, screened by the woods, we hear
The dreadful sounds, and know not whence nor why,
For stars are none, nor planet gilds the sphere;
Night holds the moon in clouds, and heaven is dark and drear.
LXXV. "Now rose the Day-star from the East, and cleared
The mists, that melted with advancing Morn,
When suddenly from out the woods appeared
An uncouth form, a creature wan and worn,
Scarce like a man, in piteous plight forlorn.
Suppliant his hands he stretches to the shore;
We turn and look on tatters tagged with thorn,
Dire squalor and a length of beard,--what more,
A Greek, to Troy erewhile in native arms sent o'er.
LXXVI. "He scared to see the Dardan garb once more
And Trojan arms, stood faltering with dismay,
Then rushed, with prayer and weeping, to the shore.
'O, by the stars, and by the Gods, I pray,
And life's pure breath, this light of genial day,
Take me, O Teucrians; wheresoe'er ye go,
Enough to bear me from this land away.
I once was of the Danaan crews, I know,
And came to Trojan homes and Ilion as a foe.
LXXVII. "'For that, if that be such a crime to you,
O strew me forth upon the watery waste,
And drown me in the deep. If death be due,
'Twere sweet of death by human hands to taste.'
He cried, and, grovelling, our knees embraced,
And, clasping, clung to us. We bid him stand
And tell his birth and trouble; and in haste
Himself the sire Anchises pledged his hand,
And he at length took heart, and answered our demand.
LXXVIII. "'My name is Achemenides. I come
From Ithaca. To Troy I sailed the sea
With evil-starred Ulysses, leaving home
And father, Adamastus;--poor was he,
And O! if such my poverty could be.
Me here my thoughtless comrades, hurrying fast
To quit the cruel threshold and be free,
Leave in the Cyclops' cavern. Dark and vast
That house of slaughtered men, and many a foul repast.
LXXIX. "'Himself so tall, he strikes the lofty skies
(O gods, rid earth of such a monstrous brood!),
None dare with speech accost, nor mortal eyes
Behold him. Human entrails are his food.
Myself have seen him, gorged with brains and blood,
Pluck forth two comrades, in his cave bent back,
And dash them till the threshold swam with blood,
Then crunch the gobbets in his teeth, while black
With gore the limbs still quivered, and the bones did crack:
LXXX. "'Not unavenged; nor brave Ulysses deigned
To brook such outrage. In that hour of tyne
True to himself the Ithacan remained.
When, gorged with food, and belching gore and wine,
With drooping neck, the giant snored supine,
Then, closing round him, to the gods we pray,
Each at his station, as the lots assign,
And where, beneath the frowning forehead, lay,
Huge as an Argive shield, or like the lamp of day,
LXXXI. "'His one great orb, deep in the monster's head
We drive the pointed weapon, joy'd at last
To wreak such vengeance for our comrades dead.
But fly, unhappy Trojans, fly, and cast
Your cables from the shore. Such and so vast
As Polyphemus, when the cave's huge door
Shuts on his flocks, and for his night's repast
He milks them, lo! a hundred Cyclops more
Roam on the lofty hills, and range the winding shore.
LXXXII. "'Now thrice the Moon hath filled her horns with light,
And still in woods and lonely dens I lie,
And see the Cyclops stalk from height to height,
And hear their tramp, and tremble at their cry.
My food--hard berries that the boughs supply,
And roots of grass. Thus wandering, as I scanned
The distant ocean with despairing eye,
I saw your ships first bearing to the land,
And vowed, whoe'er ye proved, the strangers' slave to stand.
LXXXIII. "'Enough, these monsters to escape; O take
My life, and tear me as you will from day,
Rather than these devour me!'--Scarce he spake,
When from the mountains to the well-known bay,
The shepherd Polyphemus gropes his way;
Huge, hideous, horrible in shape and show,
And visionless. A pine-trunk serves to stay
And guide his footsteps, and around him go
The sheep, his only joy and solace of his woe.
LXXXIV. "Down came the giant, wading in the main,
And rinsed his gory socket from the tide,
Gnashing his teeth and moaning in his pain.
On through the deep he stalks with awful stride,
So tall, the billows scarcely wet his side.
Forthwith our flight we hasten, prickt with fear,
On board--'twas due--we let the suppliant hide,
Then, mute and breathless, cut the stern-ropes clear,
Bend to the emulous oar, and sweep the whitening mere.
LXXXV. "He heard, and turned his footsteps to the sound.
Short of its mark the huge arm idly fell
Outstretched, and swifter than his stride he found
The Ionian waves. Then rose a monstrous yell;
All Ocean shudders and her waves upswell;
Far off, Italia trembles with the roar,
And AEtna groans through many a winding cell,
And trooping to the call the Cyclops pour
From wood and lofty hill, and crowding fill the shore.
LXXXVI. "We see them scowling impotent, the band
Of AEtna, towering to the stars above,
An awful conclave! Tall as oaks they stand,
Or cypresses--the lofty trees of Jove,
Or cone-clad guardians of Diana's grove.
Fain were we then, in agony of fear,
To shake the canvas to the winds, and rove
At random; natheless, we obey the seer,
Who past those fatal rocks had warned us not to steer,
LXXXVII. "Where Scylla here, and there Charybdis lies,
And death lurks double. Backward we essay
Our course, when lo, from out Pelorus flies
The North-Wind, sent to waft us on our way.
We pass the place where, mingling with the spray,
Through narrow rocks Pantagia's stream outflows;
We see low-lying Thapsus and the bay
Of Megara. These shores the suppliant shows,
Known from the time he shared his wandering chieftain's woes.
LXXXVIII. "Far-stretcht against Plemmyrium's wave-beat shore
An island lies, before Sicania's bay,
Now called Ortygia--'twas its name of yore.
Hither from distant Elis, legends say,
Beneath the seas Alpheus stole his way,
And, mingling now with Arethusa here,
Mounts, a Sicilian fountain, to the day.
Here we with prayer, obedient to the seer,
Invoke the guardian gods to whom the place is dear.
LXXXIX. "Thence past Helorus' marish speeds the bark,
Where fat and fruitful shines the meadowy lea.
We graze the cliffs and jutting rocks, that mark
Pachynus. Camarina's fen we see,
Fixt there for ever by the fates' decree;
Then Gela's town (the river gave the name)
And Gela's plains, far-stretching from the sea,
And distant towers and lofty walls proclaim
Steep Acragas, once known for generous steeds of fame.
XC. "Thee too we pass, borne onward by the wind,
Palmy Selinus, and the treacherous strand
And shoals of Lilybaeum leave behind.
Last, by the shore at Drepanum we stand
And take the shelter of her joyless land,
Here, tost so long o'er many a storm-lashed main,
We lose the stay and comfort of our band,
Here thou, best father, leav'st me to my pain,
Thou, saved from countless risks, but saved, alas, in vain.
XCI. "Not Helenus, who many an ill forecast,
Warned us to think such sorrow was in store,
Not even dire Celaeno. There at last
My wanderings ended, and my toils were o'er,
And thence a God hath led me to your shore."
Thus, while mute wonder did the rest compose,
The Sire AEneas did his tale outpour, And told his fates, his wanderings and
his woes; Then ceased at length his speech, and sought the
wished repose.
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