The Æneids of Virgil, Done into English Verse. Virgil

To whom, as through his breast and mind such cares of godhead passed,

       Spake Venus, sadder than her due with bright eyes gathering tears:

      "O thou, who rulest with a realm that hath no days nor years,

       Both Gods and men, and mak'st them fear thy thunder lest it fall,230

       What then hath mine Æneas done so great a crime to call?

       What might have Trojan men to sin? So many deaths they bore

       'Gainst whom because of Italy is shut the wide world's door.

       Was it not surely promised me that as the years rolled round

       The blood of Teucer come again should spring from out the ground,

       The Roman folk, such very lords, that all the earth and sea

       Their sway should compass? Father, doth the counsel shift in thee?

       This thing indeed atoned to me for Troy in ashes laid,

       And all the miserable end, as fate 'gainst fate I weighed:

       But now the self-same fortune dogs men by such troubles driven240

       So oft and oft. What end of toil then giv'st thou, King of heaven?

       Antenor was of might enow to 'scape the Achæan host,

       And safe to reach the Illyrian gulf and pierce Liburnia's coast,

       And through the inmost realms thereof to pass Timavus' head,

       Whence through nine mouths midst mountain roar is that wild water shed,

       To cast itself on fields below with all its sounding sea:

       And there he made Patavium's town and Teucrian seats to be,

       And gave the folk their very name and Trojan arms did raise:

       Now settled in all peace and rest he passeth quiet days.

       But we, thy children, unto whom thou giv'st with bowing head250

       The heights of heaven, our ships are lost, and we, O shame! betrayed,

       Are driven away from Italy for anger but of one.

       Is this the good man's guerdon then? is this the promised throne?"

      The Sower of the Gods and men a little smiled on her

       With such a countenance as calms the storms and upper air;

       He kissed his daughter on the lips, and spake such words to tell:

       "O Cytherean, spare thy dread! unmoved the Fates shall dwell

       Of thee and thine, and thou shalt see the promised city yet,

       E'en that Lavinium's walls, and high amidst the stars shalt set

       Great-souled Æneas: nor in me doth aught of counsel shift260

       But since care gnaws upon thine heart, the hidden things I lift

       Of Fate, and roll on time for thee, and tell of latter days.

       Great war he wars in Italy, and folk full wild of ways

       He weareth down, and lays on men both laws and wallèd steads,

       Till the third summer seeth him King o'er the Latin heads,

       And the third winter's wearing brings the fierce Rutulians low.

       Thereon the lad Ascanius, Iulus by-named now,

       (And Ilus was he once of old, when Ilium's city was,)

       Fulfilleth thirty orbs of rule with rolling months that pass,

       And from the town Lavinium shifts the dwelling of his race,270

       And maketh Alba-town the Long a mighty fencèd place.

       Here when for thrice an hundred years untouched the land hath been

       Beneath the rule of Hector's folk, lo Ilia, priestess-queen,

       Goes heavy with the love of Mars, and bringeth twins to birth.

       'Neath yellow hide of foster-wolf thence, mighty in his mirth,

       Comes Romulus to bear the folk, and Mavors' walls to frame,

       And by the word himself was called the Roman folk to name.

       On them I lay no bonds of time, no bonds of earthly part;

       I give them empire without end: yea, Juno, hard of heart,

       Who wearieth now with fear of her the heavens and earth and sea,280

       Shall gather better counsel yet, and cherish them with me;

       The Roman folk, the togaed men, lords of all worldly ways.

       Such is the doom. As weareth time there come those other days,

       Wherein Assaracus shall bind Mycenæ of renown,

       And Phthia, and shall lord it o'er the Argives beaten down.

       Then shall a Trojan Cæsar come from out a lovely name,

       The ocean-stream shall bound his rule, the stars of heaven his fame,

       Julius his name from him of old, the great Iulus sent:

       Him too in house of heaven one day 'neath spoils of Eastlands bent

       Thou, happy, shalt receive; he too shall have the prayers of men.290

       The wars of old all laid aside, the hard world bettereth then,

       And Vesta and the hoary Faith, Quirinus and his twin

       Now judge the world; the dreadful doors of War now shut within

       Their iron bolts and strait embrace the godless Rage of folk,

       Who, pitiless, on weapons set, and bound in brazen yoke

       Of hundred knots aback of him foams fell from bloody mouth."

      Such words he spake, and from aloft he sent down Maia's youth

       To cause the lands and Carthage towers new-built to open gate

       And welcome in the Teucrian men; lest Dido, fooled of fate,299

       Should drive them from her country-side. The unmeasured air he beat

       With flap of wings, and speedily in Libya set his feet:

       And straightway there his bidding wrought, and from the Tyrians fall,

       God willing it, their hearts of war; and Dido first of all

       Took peace for Teucrians to her soul, and quiet heart and kind.

      Now good Æneas through the night had many things in mind,

       And set himself to fare abroad at first of holy day

       To search the new land what it was, and on what shore he lay

       Driven by the wind; if manfolk there abode, or nought but deer,

       (For waste it seemed), and tidings true back to his folk to bear.

       So in that hollow bight of groves beneath the cavern cleft,310

       All hidden by the leafy trees and quavering shades, he left

       His ships: and he himself afoot went with Achates lone,

       Shaking in hand two slender spears with broad-beat iron done.

       But as he reached the thicket's midst his mother stood before,

       Who virgin face, and virgin arms, and virgin habit bore,

       A Spartan maid; or like to her who tames the Thracian horse,

       Harpalyce, and flies before the hurrying Hebrus' course.

       For huntress-wise on shoulder she had hung the handy bow,

       And given all her hair abroad for any wind to blow,

       And, naked-kneed, her kirtle long had gathered in a lap:320

       She spake the first:

       "Ho youths," she said, "tell me by any hap

       If of my sisters any