No More Learning

First he catches up Phalaris; then Gyges, and hamstrings
him; he plucks away their spears, and hurls them on the backs of the
flying crowd; Juno lends strength and courage. Halys he sends to join
them, and Phegeus, pierced right through the shield; then, as they
ignorantly raised their war-cry on the walls, Alcander and Halius,
Noemon and Prytanis. Lynceus advanced to meet him, calling up his
comrades; from the rampart the glittering sword sweeps to the left and
catches him; struck off by the one downright blow, head and helmet lay
far away. Next Amycus fell, the deadly huntsman, incomparable in skill
of hand to anoint his arrows and arm their steel with venom; and Clytius
the Aeolid, and Cretheus beloved of the Muses, Cretheus of the Muses'
company, whose delight was ever in songs and harps and stringing of
verses; ever he sang of steeds and armed men and battles.

At last, hearing of the slaughter of their men, the Teucrian captains,
Mnestheus and gallant Serestus, come up, and see their comrades in
disordered flight and the foe [781-814]let in. And Mnestheus: 'Whither
next, whither press you in flight? what other walls, what farther city
have you yet? Shall one man, and he girt in on all sides,
fellow-citizens, by your entrenchments, thus unchecked deal devastation
throughout our city, and send all our best warriors to the under world?
Have you no pity, no shame, cowards, for your unhappy country, for your
ancient gods, for great Aeneas? '

Kindled by such words, they take heart and rally in dense array. Little
by little Turnus drew away from the fight towards the river, and the
side encircled by the stream: the more bravely the Teucrians press on
him with loud shouts and thickening masses, even as a band that fall on
a wrathful lion with levelled weapons, but he, frightened back, retires
surly and grim-glaring; and neither does wrath nor courage let him turn
his back, nor can he make head, for all that he desires it, against the
surrounding arms and men. Even thus Turnus draws lingeringly backward,
with unhastened steps, and soul boiling in anger. Nay, twice even then
did he charge amid the enemy, twice drove them in flying rout along the
walls. But all the force of the camp gathers hastily up; nor does Juno,
daughter of Saturn, dare to supply him strength to countervail; for
Jupiter sent Iris down through the aery sky, bearing stern orders to his
sister that Turnus shall withdraw from the high Trojan town. Therefore
neither with shield nor hand can he keep his ground, so overpoweringly
from all sides comes upon him the storm of weapons. About the hollows of
his temples the helmet rings with incessant clash, and the solid brass
is riven beneath the stones; the horsehair crest is rent away; the
shield-boss avails not under the blows; Mnestheus thunders on with his
Trojans, and pours in a storm of spears. All over him the sweat trickles
and pours in swart stream, and no breathing space is given; sick gasps
shake [815-818]his exhausted limbs. Then at last, with a headlong
bound, he leapt fully armed into the river; the river's yellow eddies
opened for him as he came, and the buoyant water brought him up, and,
washing away the slaughter, returned him triumphant to his comrades.




BOOK TENTH

THE BATTLE ON THE BEACH


Meanwhile the heavenly house omnipotent unfolds her doors, and the
father of gods and king of men calls a council in the starry dwelling;
whence he looks sheer down on the whole earth, the Dardanian camp, and
the peoples of Latium. They sit down within from doorway to doorway:
their lord begins:

'Lords of heaven, wherefore is your decree turned back, and your minds
thus jealously at strife? I forbade Italy to join battle with the
Teucrians; why this quarrel in face of my injunction? What terror hath
bidden one or another run after arms and tempt the sword? The due time
of battle will arrive, call it not forth, when furious Carthage shall
one day sunder the Alps to hurl ruin full on the towers of Rome. Then
hatred may grapple with hatred, then hostilities be opened; now let them
be, and cheerfully join in the treaty we ordain. '

Thus Jupiter in brief; but not briefly golden Venus returns in
answer: . . .

'O Lord, O everlasting Governor of men and things--for what else may we
yet supplicate? --beholdest thou how the Rutulians brave it, and Turnus,
borne charioted through the ranks, proudly sweeps down the tide of
battle? Bar [22-58]and bulwark no longer shelter the Trojans; nay,
within the gates and even on the mounded walls they clash in battle and
make the trenches swim with blood. Aeneas is away and ignorant. Wilt
thou never then let our leaguer be raised? Again a foe overhangs the
walls of infant Troy; and another army, and a second son of Tydeus rises
from Aetolian Arpi against the Trojans. Truly I think my wounds are yet
to come, and I thy child am keeping some mortal weapons idle. If the
Trojans steered for Italy without thy leave and defiant of thy deity,
let them expiate their sin; aid not such with thy succour. But if so
many oracles guided them, given by god and ghost, why may aught now
reverse thine ordinance or write destiny anew? Why should I recall the
fleets burned on the coast of Eryx? why the king of storms, and the
raging winds roused from Aeolia, or Iris driven down the clouds? Now
hell too is stirred (this share of the world was yet untried) and
Allecto suddenly let loose above to riot through the Italian towns. In
no wise am I moved for empire; that was our hope while Fortune stood;
let those conquer whom thou wilt. If thy cruel wife leave no region free
to Teucrians, by the smoking ruins of desolated Troy, O father, I
beseech thee, grant Ascanius unhurt retreat from arms, grant me my
child's life. Aeneas may well be tossed over unknown seas and follow
what path soever fortune open to him; him let me avail to shelter and
withdraw from the turmoil of battle. Amathus is mine, high Paphos and
Cythera, and my house of Idalia; here, far from arms, let him spend an
inglorious life. Bid Carthage in high lordship rule Ausonia; there will
be nothing there to check the Tyrian cities. What help was it for the
Trojans to escape war's doom and thread their flight through Argive
fires, to have exhausted all those perils of sea and desolate lands,
while they seek Latium and the towers of a Troy rebuilt? Were it not
better to have [59-91]clung to the last ashes of their country, and the
ground where once was Troy? Give back, I pray, Xanthus and Simois to a
wretched people, and let the Teucrians again, O Lord, circle through the
fates of Ilium. '

Then Queen Juno, swift and passionate:

'Why forcest thou me to break long silence and proclaim my hidden pain?
Hath any man or god constrained Aeneas to court war or make armed attack
on King Latinus? In oracular guidance he steered for Italy: be it so: he
whom raving Cassandra sent on his way! Did we urge him to quit the camp
or entrust his life to the winds? to give the issue of war and the
charge of his ramparts to a child? to stir the loyalty of Tyrrhenia or
throw peaceful nations into tumult? What god, what potent cruelty of
ours, hath driven him on his hurt? Where is Juno in this, or Iris sped
down the clouds? It shocks thee that Italians should enring an infant
Troy with flame, and Turnus set foot on his own ancestral soil--he,
grandchild of Pilumnus, son of Venilia the goddess: how, that the dark
brands of Troy assail the Latins? that Trojans subjugate and plunder
fields not their own? how, that they choose their brides and tear
plighted bosom from bosom? that their gestures plead for peace, and
their ships are lined with arms? Thou canst steal thine Aeneas from
Grecian hands, and spread before them a human semblance of mist and
empty air; thou canst turn his fleet into nymphs of like number: is it
dreadful if we retaliate with any aid to the Rutulians? Aeneas is away
and ignorant; away and ignorant let him be. Paphos is thine and Idalium,
thine high Cythera; why meddlest thou with fierce spirits and a city big
with war? Is it we who would overthrow the tottering state of Phrygia?
we? or he who brought the Achaeans down on the hapless Trojans? who made
Europe and Asia bristle up in arms, and whose theft shattered the
alliance? Was it in my guidance the [92-125]adulterous Dardanian broke
into Sparta? or did I send the shafts of passion that kindled war? Then
terror for thy children had graced thee; too late now dost thou rise
with unjust complaints, and reproaches leave thy lips in vain. '

Thus Juno pleaded; and all the heavenly people murmured in diverse
consent; even as rising gusts murmur when caught in the forests, and
eddy in blind moanings, betraying to sailors the gale's approach. Then
the Lord omnipotent and primal power of the world begins; as he speaks
the high house of the gods and trembling floor of earth sink to silence;
silent is the deep sky, and the breezes are stilled; ocean hushes his
waters into calm.

'Take then to heart and lay deep these words of mine. Since it may not
be that Ausonians and Teucrians join alliance, and your quarrel finds no
term, to-day, what fortune each wins, what hope each follows, be he
Trojan or Rutulian, I will hold in even poise; whether it be Italy's
fate or Trojan blundering and ill advice that holds the camp in leaguer.
Nor do I acquit the Rutulians. Each as he hath begun shall work out his
destiny. Jupiter is one and king over all; the fates will find their
way. ' By his brother's infernal streams, by the banks of the pitchy
black-boiling chasm he signed assent, and made all Olympus quiver at his
nod. Here speaking ended: thereon Jupiter rises from his golden throne,
and the heavenly people surround and escort him to the doorway.

Meanwhile the Rutulians press round all the gates, dealing grim
slaughter and girdling the walls with flame. But the army of the
Aeneadae are held leaguered within their trenches, with no hope of
retreat. They stand helpless and disconsolate on their high towers, and
their thin ring girdles the walls,--Asius, son of Imbrasus, and
Thymoetes, son of Hicetaon, and the two Assaraci, and Castor, and old
Thymbris together in the front rank: by them Clarus and
[126-160]Themon, both full brothers to Sarpedon, out of high Lycia.
Acmon of Lyrnesus, great as his father Clytius, or his brother
Mnestheus, carries a stone, straining all his vast frame to the huge
mountain fragment. Emulously they keep their guard, these with javelins,
those with stones, and wield fire and fit arrows on the string. Amid
them he, Venus' fittest care, lo! the Dardanian boy, his graceful head
uncovered, shines even as a gem set in red gold on ornament of throat or
head, or even as gleaming ivory cunningly inlaid in boxwood or Orician
terebinth; his tresses lie spread over his milk-white neck, bound by a
flexible circlet of gold. Thee, too, Ismarus, proud nations saw aiming
wounds and arming thy shafts with poison,--thee, of house illustrious in
Maeonia, where the rich tilth is wrought by men's hands, and Pactolus
waters it with gold. There too was Mnestheus, exalted in fame as he who
erewhile had driven Turnus from the ramparts; and Capys, from whom is
drawn the name of the Campanian city.

They had closed in grim war's mutual conflict; Aeneas, while night was
yet deep, clove the seas. For when, leaving Evander for the Etruscan
camp, he hath audience of the king, and tells the king of his name and
race, and what he asks or offers, instructs him of the arms Mezentius is
winning to his side, and of Turnus' overbearing spirit, reminds him what
is all the certainty of human things, and mingles all with entreaties;
delaying not, Tarchon joins forces and strikes alliance. Then, freed
from the oracle, the Lydian people man their fleet, laid by divine
ordinance in the foreign captain's hand. Aeneas' galley keeps in front,
with the lions of Phrygia fastened on her prow, above them overhanging
Ida, sight most welcome to the Trojan exiles. Here great Aeneas sits
revolving the changing issues of war; and Pallas, clinging on his left
side, asks now [161-195]of the stars and their pathway through the dark
night, now of his fortunes by land and sea.

Open now the gates of Helicon, goddesses, and stir the song of the band
that come the while with Aeneas from the Tuscan borders, and sail in
armed ships overseas.

First in the brazen-plated Tiger Massicus cuts the flood; beneath him
are ranked a thousand men who have left Clusium town and the city of
Cosae; their weapons are arrows, and light quivers on the shoulder, and
their deadly bow. With him goes grim Abas, all his train in shining
armour, and a gilded Apollo glittering astern. To him Populonia had
given six hundred of her children, tried in war, but Ilva three hundred,
the island rich in unexhausted mines of steel. Third Asilas, interpreter
between men and gods, master of the entrails of beasts and the stars in
heaven, of speech of birds and ominous lightning flashes, draws a
thousand men after him in serried lines bristling with spears, bidden to
his command from Pisa city, of Alphaean birth on Etruscan soil. Astyr
follows, excellent in beauty, Astyr, confident in his horse and glancing
arms. Three hundred more--all have one heart to follow--come from the
householders of Caere and the fields of Minio, and ancient Pyrgi, and
fever-stricken Graviscae.

Let me not pass thee by, O Cinyras, bravest in war of Ligurian captains,
and thee, Cupavo, with thy scant company, from whose crest rise the swan
plumes, fault, O Love, of thee and thine, and blazonment of his father's
form. For they tell that Cycnus, in grief for his beloved Phaethon,
while he sings and soothes his woeful love with music amid the shady
sisterhood of poplar boughs, drew over him the soft plumage of white old
age, and left earth and passed crying through the sky. His son, followed
on shipboard with a band of like age, sweeps the huge Centaur forward
with his oars; he leans over the water, and [196-227]threatens the
waves with a vast rock he holds on high, and furrows the deep seas with
his length of keel.

He too calls a train from his native coasts, Ocnus, son of prophetic
Manto and the river of Tuscany, who gave thee, O Mantua, ramparts and
his mother's name; Mantua, rich in ancestry, yet not all of one blood, a
threefold race, and under each race four cantons; herself she is the
cantons' head, and her strength is of Tuscan blood. From her likewise
hath Mezentius five hundred in arms against him, whom Mincius, child of
Benacus, draped in gray reeds, led to battle in his advancing pine.
Aulestes moves on heavily, smiting the waves with the swinging forest of
an hundred oars; the channels foam as they sweep the sea-floor. He sails
in the vast Triton, who amazes the blue waterways with his shell, and
swims on with shaggy front, in human show from the flank upward; his
belly ends in a dragon; beneath the monster's breast the wave gurgles
into foam. So many were the chosen princes who went in thirty ships to
aid Troy, and cut the salt plains with brazen prow.

And now day had faded from the sky, and gracious Phoebe trod mid-heaven
in the chariot of her nightly wandering: Aeneas, for his charge allows
not rest to his limbs, himself sits guiding the tiller and managing the
sails. And lo, in middle course a band of his own fellow-voyagers meets
him, the nymphs whom bountiful Cybele had bidden be gods of the sea, and
turn to nymphs from ships; they swam on in even order, and cleft the
flood, as many as erewhile, brazen-plated prows, had anchored on the
beach. From far they know their king, and wheel their bands about him,
and Cymodocea, their readiest in speech, comes up behind, catching the
stern with her right hand: her back rises out, and her left hand oars
her passage through the silent water. Then she thus [228-261]accosts
her amazed lord: 'Wakest thou, seed of gods, Aeneas? wake, and loosen
the sheets of thy sails. We are thy fleet, Idaean pines from the holy
hill, now nymphs of the sea. When the treacherous Rutulian urged us
headlong with sword and fire, unwillingly we broke thy bonds, and we
search for thee over ocean. This new guise our Lady made for us in pity,
and granted us to be goddesses and spend our life under the waves. But
thy boy Ascanius is held within wall and trench among the Latin weapons
and the rough edge of war. Already the Arcadian cavalry and the brave
Etruscan together hold the appointed ground. Turnus' plan is fixed to
bar their way with his squadrons, that they may not reach the camp. Up
and arise, and ere the coming of the Dawn bid thy crews be called to
arms; and take thou the shield which the Lord of Fire forged for victory
and rimmed about with gold. To-morrow's daylight, if thou deem not my
words vain, shall see Rutulians heaped high in slaughter. ' She ended,
and, as she went, pushed the tall ship on with her hand wisely and well;
the ship shoots through the water fleeter than javelin or windswift
arrow. Thereat the rest quicken their speed. The son of Anchises of Troy
is himself deep in bewilderment; yet the omen cheers his courage. Then
looking on the heavenly vault, he briefly prays: 'O gracious upon Ida,
mother of gods, whose delight is in Dindymus and turreted cities and
lions coupled to thy rein, do thou lead me in battle, do thou meetly
prosper thine augury, and draw nigh thy Phrygians, goddess, with
favourable feet. ' Thus much he spoke; and meanwhile the broad light of
returning day now began to pour in, and chased away the night. First he
commands his comrades to follow his signals, brace their courage to arms
and prepare for battle. And now his Trojans and his camp are in his
sight as he stands high astern, when next he lifts the [262-296]blazing
shield on his left arm. The Dardanians on the walls raise a shout to the
sky. Hope comes to kindle wrath; they hurl their missiles strongly; even
as under black clouds cranes from the Strymon utter their signal notes
and sail clamouring across the sky, and noisily stream down the gale.
But this seemed marvellous to the Rutulian king and the captains of
Ausonia, till looking back they see the ships steering for the beach,
and all the sea as a single fleet sailing in. His helmet-spike blazes,
flame pours from the cresting plumes, and the golden shield-boss spouts
floods of fire; even as when in transparent night comets glow blood-red
and drear, or the splendour of Sirius, that brings drought and
sicknesses on wretched men, rises and saddens the sky with malignant
beams.

Yet gallant Turnus in unfailing confidence will prevent them on the
shore and repel their approach to land. 'What your prayers have sought
is given, the sweep of the sword-arm. The god of battles is in the hands
of men. Now remember each his wife and home: now recall the high deeds
of our fathers' honour. Let us challenge meeting at the water's edge,
while they waver and their feet yet slip as they disembark. Fortune aids
daring. . . . ' So speaks he, and counsels inly whom he shall lead to
meet them, whom leave in charge of the leaguered walls.

Meanwhile Aeneas lands his allies by gangways from the high ships. Many
watch the retreat and slack of the sea, and leap boldly into the shoal
water; others slide down the oars. Tarchon, marking the shore where the
shallows do not seethe and plash with broken water, but the sea glides
up and spreads its tide unbroken, suddenly turns his bows to land and
implores his comrades: 'Now, O chosen crew, bend strongly to your oars;
lift your ships, make them go; let the prows cleave this hostile land
and the keel plough [297-330]herself a furrow. I will let my vessel
break up on such harbourage if once she takes the land. ' When Tarchon
had spoken in such wise, his comrades rise on their oar-blades and carry
their ships in foam towards the Latin fields, till the prows are fast on
dry land and all the keels are aground unhurt. But not thy galley,
Tarchon; for she dashes on a shoal, and swings long swaying on the cruel
bank, pitching and slapping the flood, then breaks up, and lands her
crew among the waves. Broken oars and floating thwarts entangle them,
and the ebbing wave sucks their feet away.

Nor does Turnus keep idly dallying, but swiftly hurries his whole array
against the Trojans and ranges it to face the beach. The trumpets blow.
At once Aeneas charges and confounds the rustic squadrons of the Latins,
and slays Theron for omen of battle. The giant advances to challenge
Aeneas; but through sewed plates of brass and tunic rough with gold the
sword plunges in his open side. Next he strikes Lichas, cut from his
mother already dead, and consecrated, Phoebus, to thee, since his
infancy was granted escape from the perilous steel. Near thereby he
struck dead brawny Cisseus and vast Gyas, whose clubs were mowing down
whole files: naught availed them the arms of Hercules and their strength
of hand, nor Melampus their father, ever of Alcides' company while earth
yielded him sore travail. Lo! while Pharus utters weak vaunts the hurled
javelin strikes on his shouting mouth. Thou too, while thou followest
thy new delight, Clytius, whose cheeks are golden with youthful
down--thou, luckless Cydon, struck down by the Dardanian hand, wert
lying past thought, ah pitiable! of the young loves that were ever
thine, did not the close array of thy brethren interpose, the children
of Phorcus, seven in number, and send a sevenfold shower of darts. Some
glance ineffectual from helmet and shield; [331-365]some Venus the
bountiful turned aside as they grazed his body. Aeneas calls to trusty
Achates: 'Give me store of weapons; none that hath been planted in
Grecian body on the plains of Ilium shall my hand hurl at Rutulian in
vain. ' Then he catches and throws his great spear; the spear flies
grinding through the brass of Maeon's shield, and breaks through corslet
and through breast. His brother Alcanor runs up and sustains with his
right arm his sinking brother; through his arm the spear passes speeding
straight on its message, and holds its bloody way, and the hand dangles
by the sinews lifeless from the shoulder. Then Numitor, seizing his dead
brother's javelin, aims at Aeneas, but might not fairly pierce him, and
grazed tall Achates on the thigh. Here Clausus of Cures comes confident
in his pride of strength, and with a long reach strikes Dryops under the
chin, and, urging the stiff spear-shaft home, stops the accents of his
speech and his life together, piercing the throat; but he strikes the
earth with his forehead, and vomits clots of blood. Three Thracians
likewise of Boreas' sovereign race, and three sent by their father Idas
from their native Ismarus, fall in divers wise before him. Halesus and
his Auruncan troops hasten thither; Messapus too, seed of Neptune, comes
up charioted. This side and that strive to hurl back the enemy, and
fight hard on the very edge of Ausonia. As when in the depth of air
adverse winds rise in battle with equal spirit and strength; not they,
not clouds nor sea, yield one to another; long the battle is doubtful;
all stands locked in counterpoise: even thus clash the ranks of Troy and
ranks of Latium, foot fast on foot, and man crowded up on man.

But in another quarter, where a torrent had driven a wide path of
rolling stones and bushes torn away from the banks, Pallas saw his
Arcadians, unaccustomed to move as infantry, giving back before the
Latin pursuit, when the [366-400]roughness of the ground bade them
dismount. This only was left in his strait, to kindle them to valour,
now by entreaties, now by taunts: 'Whither flee you, comrades? by your
deeds of bravery, by your leader Evander's name, by your triumphant
campaigns, and my hope that now rises to rival my father's honour, trust
not to flight. Our swords must hew a way through the enemy. Where yonder
mass of men presses thickest, there your proud country calls you with
Pallas at your head. No gods are they who bear us down; mortals, we feel
the pressure of a mortal foe; we have as many lives and hands as he. Lo,
the deep shuts us in with vast sea barrier; even now land fails our
flight; shall we make ocean or Troy our goal? '

So speaks he, and bursts amid the serried foe. First Lagus meets him,
drawn thither by malign destiny; him, as he tugs at a ponderous stone,
hurling his spear where the spine ran dissevering the ribs, he pierces
and wrenches out the spear where it stuck fast in the bone. Nor does
Hisbo catch him stooping, for all that he hoped it; for Pallas, as he
rushes unguarded on, furious at his comrade's cruel death, receives him
on his sword and buries it in his distended lungs. Next he attacks
Sthenius, and Anchemolus of Rhoetus' ancient family, who dared to
violate the bridal chamber of his stepmother. You, too, the twins
Larides and Thymber, fell on the Rutulian fields, children of Daucus,
indistinguishable for likeness and a sweet perplexity to your parents.
But now Pallas made cruel difference between you; for thy head, Thymber,
is swept off by Evander's sword; thy right hand, Larides, severed, seeks
its master, and the dying fingers jerk and clutch at the sword. Fired by
his encouragement, and beholding his noble deeds, the Arcadians advance
in wrath and shame to meet the enemy in arms. Then Pallas pierces
Rhoeteus as he flies past in his chariot. This space, this
[401-435]much of respite was given to Ilus; for at Ilus he had aimed
the strong spear from afar, and Rhoeteus intercepts its passage, in
flight from thee, noble Teuthras and Tyres thy brother; he rolls from
the chariot in death, and his heels strike the Rutulian fields. And as
the shepherd, when summer winds have risen to his desire, kindles the
woods dispersedly; on a sudden the mid spaces catch, and a single
flickering line of fire spreads wide over the plain; he sits looking
down on his conquest and the revel of the flames; even so, Pallas, do
thy brave comrades gather close to sustain thee. But warrior Halesus
advances full on them, gathering himself behind his armour; he slays
Ladon, Pheres, Demodocus; his gleaming sword shears off Strymonius' hand
as it rises to his throat; he strikes Thoas on the face with a stone,
and drives the bones asunder in a shattered mass of blood and brains.
Halesus had his father the soothsayer kept hidden in the woodland: when
the old man's glazing eyes sank to death, the Fates laid hand on him and
devoted him to the arms of Evander. Pallas aims at him, first praying
thus: 'Grant now, lord Tiber, to the steel I poise and hurl, a
prosperous way through brawny Halesus' breast; thine oak shall bear
these arms and the dress he wore. ' The god heard it; while Halesus
covers Imaon, he leaves, alas! his breast unarmed to the Arcadian's
weapon. Yet at his grievous death Lausus, himself a great arm of the
war, lets not his columns be dismayed; at once he meets and cuts down
Abas, the check and stay of their battle. The men of Arcadia go down
before him; down go the Etruscans, and you, O Teucrians, invincible by
Greece. The armies close, matched in strength and in captains; the rear
ranks crowd in; weapons and hands are locked in the press. Here Pallas
strains and pushes on, here Lausus opposite, nearly matched in age,
excellent in beauty; but fortune [436-467]had denied both return to
their own land. Yet that they should meet face to face the sovereign of
high Olympus allowed not; an early fate awaits them beneath a mightier
foe.

Meanwhile Turnus' gracious sister bids him take Lausus' room, and his
fleet chariot parts the ranks. When he saw his comrades, 'It is time,'
he cried, 'to stay from battle. I alone must assail Pallas; to me and
none other Pallas is due; I would his father himself were here to see. '
So speaks he, and his Rutulians draw back from a level space at his
bidding. But then as they withdrew, he, wondering at the haughty
command, stands in amaze at Turnus, his eyes scanning the vast frame,
and his fierce glance perusing him from afar.
And with these words he
returns the words of the monarch: 'For me, my praise shall even now be
in the lordly spoils I win, or in illustrious death: my father will bear
calmly either lot: away with menaces. ' He speaks, and advances into the
level ring. The Arcadians' blood gathers chill about their hearts.
Turnus leaps from his chariot and prepares to close with him. And as a
lion sees from some lofty outlook a bull stand far off on the plain
revolving battle, and flies at him, even such to see is Turnus' coming.
When Pallas deemed him within reach of a spear-throw, he advances, if so
chance may assist the daring of his overmatched strength, and thus cries
into the depth of sky: 'By my father's hospitality and the board whereto
thou camest a wanderer, on thee I call, Alcides; be favourable to my
high emprise; let Turnus even in death discern me stripping his
blood-stained armour, and his swooning eyes endure the sight of his
conqueror. ' Alcides heard him, and deep in his heart he stifled a heavy
sigh, and let idle tears fall. Then with kindly words the father accosts
his son: 'Each hath his own appointed day; short and irrecoverable
[468-502]is the span of life for all: but to spread renown by deeds is
the task of valour. Under high Troy town many and many a god's son fell;
nay, mine own child Sarpedon likewise perished. Turnus too his own fate
summons, and his allotted period hath reached the goal. ' So speaks he,
and turns his eyes away from the Rutulian fields. But Pallas hurls his
spear with all his strength, and pulls his sword flashing out of the
hollow scabbard. The flying spear lights where the armour rises high
above the shoulder, and, forcing a way through the shield's rim, ceased
not till it drew blood from mighty Turnus. At this Turnus long poises
the spear-shaft with its sharp steel head, and hurls it on Pallas with
these words: _See thou if our weapon have not a keener point. _ He ended;
but for all the shield's plating of iron and brass, for all the
bull-hide that covers it round about, the quivering spear-head smashes
it fair through and through, passes the guard of the corslet, and
pierces the breast with a gaping hole. He tears the warm weapon from the
wound; in vain; together and at once life-blood and sense follow it. He
falls heavily on the ground, his armour clashes over him, and his
bloodstained face sinks in death on the hostile soil. And Turnus
standing over him . . . : 'Arcadians,' he cries, 'remember these my
words, and bear them to Evander. I send him back his Pallas as was due.
All the meed of the tomb, all the solace of sepulture, I give freely.
Dearly must he pay his welcome to Aeneas. ' And with these words,
planting his left foot on the dead, he tore away the broad heavy
sword-belt engraven with a tale of crime, the array of grooms foully
slain together on their bridal night, and the nuptial chambers dabbled
with blood, which Clonus, son of Eurytus, had wrought richly in gold.
Now Turnus exults in spoiling him of it, and rejoices at his prize. Ah
spirit of man, ignorant of fate and the allotted future, or to keep
bounds when elate with prosperity! --the day will [503-535]come when
Turnus shall desire to have bought Pallas' safety at a great ransom, and
curse the spoils of this fatal day. But with many moans and tears
Pallas' comrades lay him on his shield and bear him away amid their
ranks. O grief and glory and grace of the father to whom thou shalt
return! This one day sent thee first to war, this one day takes thee
away, while yet thou leavest heaped high thy Rutulian dead.

And now no rumour of the dreadful loss, but a surer messenger flies to
Aeneas, telling him his troops are on the thin edge of doom; it is time
to succour the routed Teucrians. He mows down all that meets him, and
hews a broad path through their columns with furious sword, as he seeks
thee, O Turnus, in thy fresh pride of slaughter. Pallas, Evander, all
flash before his eyes; the board whereto but then he had first come a
wanderer, and the clasped hands. Here four of Sulmo's children, as many
more of Ufens' nurture, are taken by him alive to slaughter in sacrifice
to the shade below, and slake the flames of the pyre with captive blood.
Next he levelled his spear full on Magus from far. He stoops cunningly;
the spear flies quivering over him; and, clasping his knees, he speaks
thus beseechingly: 'By thy father's ghost, by Iulus thy growing hope, I
entreat thee, save this life for a child and a parent. My house is
stately; deep in it lies buried wealth of engraven silver; I have masses
of wrought and unwrought gold. The victory of Troy does not turn on
this, nor will a single life make so great a difference. ' He ended; to
him Aeneas thus returns answer: 'All the wealth of silver and gold thou
tellest of, spare thou for thy children. Turnus hath broken off this thy
trafficking in war, even then when Pallas fell. Thus judges the ghost of
my father Anchises, thus Iulus. ' So speaking, he grasps his helmet with
his left hand, and, bending back his neck, drives his [536-572]sword up
to the hilt in the suppliant. Hard by is Haemonides, priest of Phoebus
and Trivia, his temples wound with the holy ribboned chaplet, all
glittering in white-robed array. Him he meets and chases down the plain,
and, standing over his fallen foe, slaughters him and wraps him in great
darkness; Serestus gathers the armour and carries it away on his
shoulders, a trophy, King Gradivus, to thee. Caeculus, born of Vulcan's
race, and Umbro, who comes from the Marsian hills, fill up the line. The
Dardanian rushes full on them. His sword had hewn off Anxur's left arm,
with all the circle of the shield--he had uttered brave words and deemed
his prowess would second his vaunts, and perchance with spirit lifted up
had promised himself hoar age and length of years--when Tarquitus in the
pride of his glittering arms met his fiery course, whom the nymph Dryope
had borne to Faunus, haunter of the woodland. Drawing back his spear, he
pins the ponderous shield to the corslet; then, as he vainly pleaded and
would say many a thing, strikes his head to the ground, and, rolling
away the warm body, cries thus over his enemy: 'Lie there now, terrible
one! no mother's love shall lay thee in the sod, or place thy limbs
beneath thine heavy ancestral tomb. To birds of prey shalt thou be left,
or borne down sunk in the eddying water, where hungry fish shall suck
thy wounds. ' Next he sweeps on Antaeus and Lucas, the first of Turnus'
train, and brave Numa and tawny-haired Camers, born of noble Volscens,
who was wealthiest in land of the Ausonians, and reigned in silent
Amyclae. Even as Aegaeon, who, men say, had an hundred arms, an hundred
hands, fifty mouths and breasts ablaze with fire, and arrayed against
Jove's thunders as many clashing shields and drawn swords: so Aeneas,
when once his sword's point grew warm, rages victorious over all the
field. Nay, lo! he darts full in face on Niphaeus' four-horse chariot;
before his long strides [573-608]and dreadful cry they turned in terror
and dashed back, throwing out their driver and tearing the chariot down
the beach. Meanwhile the brothers Lucagus and Liger drive up with their
pair of white horses. Lucagus valiantly waves his drawn sword, while his
brother wheels his horses with the rein. Aeneas, wrathful at their mad
onslaught, rushes on them, towering high with levelled spear. To him
Liger . . . 'Not Diomede's horses dost thou discern, nor Achilles'
chariot, nor the plains of Phrygia: now on this soil of ours the war and
thy life shall end together. ' Thus fly mad Liger's random words. But not
in words does the Trojan hero frame his reply: for he hurls his javelin
at the foe. As Lucagus spurred on his horses, bending forward over the
whip, with left foot advanced ready for battle, the spear passes through
the lower rim of his shining shield and pierces his left groin, knocks
him out of the chariot, and stretches him in death on the fields. To him
good Aeneas speaks in bitter words: 'Lucagus, no slackness in thy
coursers' flight hath betrayed thee, or vain shadow of the foe turned
them back; thyself thou leapest off the harnessed wheels. ' In such wise
he spoke, and caught the horses. His brother, slipping down from the
chariot, pitiably outstretched helpless hands: 'Ah, by the parents who
gave thee birth, great Trojan, spare this life and pity my prayer. ' More
he was pleading; but Aeneas: 'Not such were the words thou wert
uttering. Die, and be brother undivided from brother. ' With that his
sword's point pierces the breast where the life lies hid. Thus the
Dardanian captain dealt death over the plain, like some raging torrent
stream or black whirlwind. At last the boy Ascanius and his troops burst
through the ineffectual leaguer and issue from the camp.

Meanwhile Jupiter breaks silence to accost Juno: 'O sister and wife best
beloved, it is Venus, as thou deemedst, [609-639]nor is thy judgment
astray, who sustains the forces of Troy; not their own valour of hand in
war, and untamable spirit and endurance in peril. ' To whom Juno
beseechingly:

'Why, fair my lord, vexest thou one sick at heart and trembling at thy
bitter words? If that force were in my love that once was, and that was
well, never had thine omnipotence denied me leave to withdraw Turnus
from battle and preserve him for his father Daunus in safety. Now let
him perish, and pay forfeit to the Trojans of his innocent blood. Yet he
traces his birth from our name, and Pilumnus was his father in the
fourth generation, and oft and again his bountiful hand hath heaped thy
courts with gifts. '

To her the king of high heaven thus briefly spoke: 'If thy prayer for
him is delay of present death and respite from his fall, and thou dost
understand that I ordain it thus, remove thy Turnus in flight, and
snatch him from the fate that is upon him. For so much indulgence there
is room. But if any ampler grace mask itself in these thy prayers, and
thou dreamest of change in the whole movement of the war, idle is the
hope thou nursest. '

And Juno, weeping: 'Ah yet, if thy mind were gracious where thy lips are
stern, and this gift of life might remain confirmed to Turnus! Now his
portion is bitter and guiltless death, or I wander idly from the truth.
Yet, oh that I rather deluded myself with false alarms, and thou who
canst wouldst bend thy course to better counsels. '

These words uttered, she darted through the air straight from high
heaven, cloud-girt in driving tempest, and sought the Ilian ranks and
camp of Laurentum. Then the goddess, strange and ominous to see,
fashions into the likeness of Aeneas a thin and pithless shade of hollow
mist, decks it with Dardanian weapons, and gives it the mimicry of
shield and divine helmet plume, gives unsubstantial [640-673]words and
senseless utterance, and the mould and motion of his tread: like shapes
rumoured to flit when death is past, or dreams that delude the
slumbering senses. But in front of the battle-ranks the phantom dances
rejoicingly, and with arms and mocking accents provokes the foe. Turnus
hastens up and sends his spear whistling from far on it; it gives back
and turns its footsteps. Then indeed Turnus, when he believed Aeneas
turned and fled from him, and his spirit madly drank in the illusive
hope: 'Whither fliest thou, Aeneas? forsake not thy plighted bridal
chamber. This hand shall give thee the land thou hast sought overseas. '
So clamouring he pursues, and brandishes his drawn sword, and sees not
that his rejoicing is drifting with the winds. The ship lay haply moored
to a high ledge of rock, with ladders run out and gangway ready, wherein
king Osinius sailed from the coasts of Clusium. Here the fluttering
phantom of flying Aeneas darts and hides itself. Nor is Turnus slack to
follow; he overleaps the barriers and springs across the high gangways.
Scarcely had he lighted on the prow; the daughter of Saturn snaps the
hawser, and the ship, parted from her cable, runs out on the ebbing
tide. And him Aeneas seeks for battle and finds not, and sends many a
man that meets him to death. Then the light phantom seeks not yet any
further hiding-place, but, flitting aloft, melts in a dark cloud; and a
blast comes down meanwhile and sweeps Turnus through the seas. He looks
back, witless of his case and thankless for his salvation, and, wailing,
stretches both hands to heaven: 'Father omnipotent, was I so guilty in
thine eyes, and is this the punishment thou hast ordained? Whither am I
borne? whence came I? what flight is this, or in what guise do I return?
Shall I look again on the camp or walls of Laurentum? What of that array
of men who followed me to arms? whom--oh horrible! --I have abandoned all
amid [674-707]a dreadful death; and now I see the stragglers and catch
the groans of those who fall. What do I? or how may earth ever yawn for
me deep enough? Do you rather, O winds, be pitiful, carry my bark on
rock or reef; it is I, Turnus, who desire and implore you; or drive me
on the cruel shoals of the Syrtis, where no Rutulian may follow nor
rumour know my name. ' Thus speaking, he wavers in mind this way and
that: maddened by the shame, shall he plunge on his sword's harsh point
and drive it through his side, or fling himself among the waves, and
seek by swimming to gain the winding shore, again to return on the
Trojan arms? Thrice he essayed either way; thrice queenly Juno checked
and restrained him in pity of heart. Cleaving the deep, he floats with
the tide down the flood, and is borne on to his father Daunus' ancient
city.

But meanwhile at Jove's prompting fiery Mezentius takes his place in the
battle and assails the triumphant Teucrians. The Tyrrhene ranks gather
round him, and all at once in unison shower their darts down on the
hated foe. As a cliff that juts into the waste of waves, meeting the
raging winds and breasting the deep, endures all the threatening force
of sky and sea, itself fixed immovable, so he dashes to earth Hebrus son
of Dolichaon, and with him Latagus, and Palmus as he fled; catching
Latagus full front in the face with a vast fragment of mountain rock,
while Palmus he hamstrings, and leaves him rolling helpless; his armour
he gives Lausus to wear on his shoulders, and the plumes to fix on his
crest. With them fall Evanthes the Phrygian, and Mimas, fellow and
birthmate of Paris; for on one night Theano bore him to his father
Amycus, and the queen, Cisseus' daughter, was delivered of Paris the
firebrand; he sleeps in his fathers' city; Mimas lies a stranger on the
Laurentian coast. And as the boar driven by snapping hounds from the
mountain heights, [708-744]many a year hidden by Vesulus in his pines,
many an one fed in the Laurentian marsh among the reedy forest, once
come among the nets, halts and snorts savagely, with shoulders bristling
up, and none of them dare be wrathful or draw closer, but they shower
from a safe distance their darts and cries; even thus none of those
whose anger is righteous against Mezentius have courage to meet him with
drawn weapon: far off they provoke him with missiles and huge clamour,
and he turns slow and fearless round about, grinding his teeth as he
shakes the spears off his shield. From the bounds of ancient Corythus
Acron the Greek had come, leaving for exile a bride half won. Seeing him
afar dealing confusion amid the ranks, in crimson plumes and his
plighted wife's purple,--as an unpastured lion often ranging the deep
coverts, for madness of hunger urges him, if he haply catches sight of a
timorous roe or high-antlered stag, he gapes hugely for joy, and, with
mane on end, clings crouching over its flesh, his cruel mouth bathed in
reeking gore. . . . so Mezentius darts lightly among the thick of the
enemy. Hapless Acron goes down, and, spurning the dark ground, gasps out
his life, and covers the broken javelin with his blood. But the victor
deigned not to bring down Orodes with the blind wound of his flying
lance as he fled; full face to face he meets him, and engages man with
man, conqueror not by stealth but armed valour. Then, as with planted
foot, he thrust him off the spear: 'O men,' he cries, 'Orodes lies low,
no slight arm of the war. ' His comrades shout after him the glad battle
chant. And the dying man: 'Not unavenged nor long, whoso thou art, shalt
thou be glad in victory: thee too an equal fate marks down, and in these
fields thou shalt soon lie. ' And smiling on him half wrathfully,
Mezentius: 'Now die thou. But of me let the father of gods and king of
men take counsel. ' So saying, he drew the weapon out of his body.
[745-780]Grim rest and iron slumber seal his eyes; his lids close on
everlasting night. Caedicus slays Alcathous, Sacrator Hydaspes, Rapo
Parthenius and the grim strength of Orses, Messapus Clonius and
Erichaetes son of Lycaon, the one when his reinless horse stumbling had
flung him to the ground, the other as they met on foot. And Agis the
Lycian advanced only to be struck from horseback by Valerus, brave as
his ancestry; and Thronius by Salius, and Salius by Nealces with
treacherous arrow-shot that stole from far.

Now the heavy hand of war dealt equal woe and counterchange of death; in
even balance conquerors and conquered slew and fell; nor one nor other
knows of retreat. The gods in Jove's house pity the vain rage of either
and all the agonising of mortals. From one side Venus, from one opposite
Juno, daughter of Saturn, looks on; pale Tisiphone rages among the many
thousand men. But now, brandishing his huge spear, Mezentius strides
glooming over the plain, vast as Orion when, with planted foot, he
cleaves his way through the vast pools of mid-ocean and his shoulder
overtops the waves, or carrying an ancient mountain-ash from the
hilltops, paces the ground and hides his head among the clouds: so moves
Mezentius, huge in arms. Aeneas, espying him in the deep columns, makes
on to meet him. He remains, unterrified, awaiting his noble foe, steady
in his own bulk, and measures with his eye the fair range for a spear.
'This right hand's divinity, and the weapon I poise and hurl, now be
favourable! thee, Lausus, I vow for the live trophy of Aeneas, dressed
in the spoils stripped from the pirate's body. ' He ends, and throws the
spear whistling from far; it flies on, glancing from the shield, and
pierces illustrious Antores hard by him sidelong in the flank; Antores,
companion of Hercules, who, sent thither from Argos, had stayed by
Evander, and [781-814]settled in an Italian town. Hapless he goes down
with a wound not his own, and in death gazes on the sky, and Argos is
sweet in his remembrance. Then good Aeneas throws his spear; through the
sheltering circle of threefold brass, through the canvas lining and
fabric of triple-sewn bull-hide it went, and sank deep in his groin; yet
carried not its strength home. Quickly Aeneas, joyful at the sight of
the Tyrrhenian's blood, snatches his sword from his thigh and presses
hotly on his struggling enemy. Lausus saw, and groaned deeply for love
of his dear father, and tears rolled over his face. Here will I not keep
silence of thy hard death-doom and thine excellent deeds (if in any wise
things wrought in the old time may win belief), nor of thyself, O fitly
remembered! He, helpless and trammelled, withdrew backward, the deadly
spear-shaft trailing from his shield. The youth broke forward and
plunged into the fight; and even as Aeneas' hand rose to bring down the
blow, he caught up his point and held him in delay. His comrades follow
up with loud cries, so the father may withdraw in shelter of his son's
shield, while they shower their darts and bear back the enemy with
missiles from a distance. Aeneas wrathfully keeps covered. And as when
storm-clouds pour down in streaming hail, all the ploughmen and
country-folk scatter off the fields, and the wayfarer cowers safe in his
fortress, a stream's bank or deep arch of rock, while the rain falls,
that they may do their day's labour when sunlight reappears; thus under
the circling storm of weapons Aeneas sustains the cloud of war till it
thunders itself all away, and calls on Lausus, on Lausus, with chiding
and menace: 'Whither runnest thou on thy death, with daring beyond thy
strength? thine affection betrays thee into rashness. ' But none the less
he leaps madly on; and now wrath rises higher and fiercer in the
Dardanian captain, and the Fates pass Lausus' last [815-849]threads
through their hand; for Aeneas drives the sword strongly right through
him up all its length: the point pierced the light shield that armed his
assailant, and the tunic sewn by his mother with flexible gold: blood
filled his breast, and the life left the body and passed mourning
through the air to the under world. But when Anchises' son saw the look
on the dying face, the face pale in wonderful wise, he sighed deeply in
pity, and reached forth his hand, as the likeness of his own filial
affection flashed across his soul. 'What now shall good Aeneas give
thee, what, O poor boy, for this thy praise, for guerdon of a nature so
noble? Keep for thine own the armour thou didst delight in; and I
restore thee, if that matters aught at all, to the ghosts and ashes of
thy parents. Yet thou shalt have this sad comfort in thy piteous death,
thou fallest by great Aeneas' hand. ' Then, chiding his hesitating
comrades, he lifts him from the ground, dabbling the comely-ranged
tresses with blood.

Meanwhile his father, by the wave of the Tiber river, stanched his wound
with water, and rested his body against a tree-trunk. Hard by his brazen
helmet hangs from the boughs, and the heavy armour lies quietly on the
meadow. Chosen men stand round; he, sick and panting, leans his neck and
lets his beard spread down over his chest. Many a time he asks for
Lausus, and sends many an one to call him back and carry a parent's sad
commands. But Lausus his weeping comrades were bearing lifeless on his
armour, mighty and mightily wounded to death. Afar the soul prophetic of
ill knew their lamentation: he soils his gray hairs plenteously with
dust, and stretches both hands on high, and clings on the dead. 'Was
life's hold on me so sweet, O my son, that I let him I bore receive the
hostile stroke in my room? Am I, thy father, saved by these wounds of
thine, and living by thy death? Alas and woe! [850-885]now at last
exile is bitter! now the wound is driven deep! And I, even I, O my son,
stained thy name with crime, driven in hatred from the throne and
sceptre of my fathers. I owed vengeance to my country and my people's
resentment; might mine own guilty life but have paid it by every form of
death! Now I live, and leave not yet man and day; but I will. ' As he
speaks thus he raises himself painfully on his thigh, and though the
violence of the deep wound cripples him, yet unbroken he bids his horse
be brought, his beauty, his comfort, that ever had carried him
victorious out of war, and says these words to the grieving beast:
'Rhoebus, we have lived long, if aught at all lasts long with mortals.
This day wilt thou either bring back in triumph the gory head and spoils
of Aeneas, and we will avenge Lausus' agonies; or if no force opens a
way, thou wilt die with me: for I deem not, bravest, thou wilt deign to
bear an alien rule and a Teucrian lord. ' He spoke, and took his welcome
seat on the back he knew, loading both hands with keen javelins, his
head sheathed in glittering brass and shaggy horse-hair plumes. Thus he
galloped in. Through his heart sweep together the vast tides of shame
and mingling madness and grief. And with that he thrice loudly calls
Aeneas. Aeneas knew the call, and makes glad invocation: 'So the father
of gods speed me, so Apollo on high: do thou essay to close hand to
hand. . . . ' Thus much he utters, and moves up to meet him with levelled
spear. And he: 'Why seek to frighten me, fierce man, now my son is gone?
this was thy one road to my ruin. We shrink not from death, nor relent
before any of thy gods. Cease; for I come to my death, first carrying
these gifts for thee. ' He spoke, and hurled a weapon at his enemy; then
plants another and yet another as he darts round in a wide circle; but
they are stayed on the boss of gold. Thrice he rode wheeling close round
him by the [886-908]left, and sent his weapons strongly in; thrice the
Trojan hero turns round, taking the grim forest on his brazen guard.
Then, weary of lingering in delay on delay, and plucking out spear-head
after spear-head, and hard pressed in the uneven match of battle, with
much counselling of spirit now at last he bursts forth, and sends his
spear at the war-horse between the hollows of the temples. The creature
raises itself erect, beating the air with its feet, throws its rider,
and coming down after him in an entangled mass, slips its shoulder as it
tumbles forward. The cries of Trojans and Latins kindle the sky. Aeneas
rushes up, drawing his sword from the scabbard, and thus above him:
'Where now is gallant Mezentius and all his fierce spirit? ' Thereto the
Tyrrhenian, as he came to himself and gazing up drank the air of heaven:
'Bitter foe, why these taunts and menaces of death? Naught forbids my
slaughter; neither on such terms came I to battle, nor did my Lausus
make treaty for this between me and thee. This one thing I beseech thee,
by whatsoever grace a vanquished enemy may claim: allow my body
sepulture. I know I am girt by the bitter hatred of my people. Stay, I
implore, their fury, and grant me and my son union in the tomb. ' So
speaks he, and takes the sword in his throat unfalteringly, and the
lifeblood spreads in a wave over his armour.