His beauty these, and those his blooming age,
The rest his house, and his own fame engage.
While Turnus urges thus his enterprise,
The Stygian Fury to the Trojans flies;
New frauds invents, and takes a steepy stand,
Which overlooks the vale with wide command;
Where fair Ascanius and his youthful train,
With horns and hounds a hunting match ordain, 665
And pitch their toils around the shady plain.
The Fury fires the pack; they snuff, they vent,
And feed their hungry nostrils with the scent.
'Twas of a well-grown stag, whose antlers rise
High o'er his front, his beams invade the skies.
From this light cause, th' infernal maid prepares
The country churls to mischief, hate, and wars.
The stately beast the two Tyrrhidæ bred, Snatch'd from his dam, and the tame youngling fed. Their father Tyrrheus did his fodder bring; Tyrrheus, chief ranger to the Latian king: Their sister Sylvia cherish'd with her care The little wanton, and did wreaths prepare To hang his budding horns, with ribbons tied His tender neck, and comb'd his silken hide, And bathed his body. Patient of command In time he grew, and growing used to hand. He waited at his master's board for food;
Then sought his savage kindred in the wood,
Where grazing all the day, at night he came
To his known lodgings, and his country dame.
This household beast, that used the woodland grounds,
Was view'd at first by the young hero's hounds,
As down the stream he swam, to seek retreat
In the cool waters, and to quench his heat.
Ascanius, young, and eager of his game,
Soon bent his bow, uncertain in his aim :
But the dire fiend the fatal arrow guides,
Which pierced his bowels through his panting sides.
The bleeding creature issues from the floods,
Possess'd with fear, and seeks his known abodes,
His old familiar hearth, and household gods.
He falls; he fills the house with heavy groans,
Implores their pity, and his pain bemoans.
Young Sylvia beats her breast, and cries aloud
For succor from the clownish neighborhood:
The churls assemble; for the fiend, who lay
In the close woody covert, urged their way.
One with a brand yet burning from the flame,
Arm'd with a knotty club another came :
Whate'er they catch or find, without their care,
Their fury makes an instrument of war.
Tyrrheus, the foster-father of the beast,
Then clench'd a hatchet in his horny fist,
But held his hand from the descending stroke,
And left his wedge within the cloven oak,
To whet their courage, and their rage provoke.
And now the goddess, exercised in ill,
Who watch'd an hour to work her impious will,
Ascends the roof, and to her crooked horn,
Such as was then by Latian shepherds borne,
Adds all her breath. The rocks and woods around,
And mountains, tremble at th' infernal sound.
The sacred lake of Trivia from afar,
The Veline fountains, and sulphureous Nar,
Shake at the baleful blast, the signal of the war.
Young mothers wildly stare, with fear possess'd,
And strain their helpless infants to their breast.
The clowns, a boist'rous, rude, ungovern'd crew,
With furious haste to the loud summons flew.
The pow'rs of Troy, then issuing on the plain,
With fresh recruits their youthful chief sustain :
Nor theirs a raw and unexperienced train,
But a firm body of embattled men.
At first, while fortune favor'd neither side,
The fight with clubs and burning brands was tried :
But now, both parties reinforced, the fields
Are bright with flaming swords and brazen shields.
A shining harvest either host displays,
And shoots against the sun with equal rays.
Thus, when a black-brow'd gust begins to rise,
White foam at first on the curl'd ocean fries;
Then roars the main, the billows mount the skies;
Till, by the fury of the storm full blown,
The muddy bottom o'er the clouds is thrown.
First Almon falls, old Tyrrheus' eldest care,
Pierced with an arrow from the distant war:
Fix'd in his throat the flying weapon stood,
And stopp'd his breath, and drank his vital blood.
Huge heaps of slain around the body rise :
Among the rest, the rich Galesus lies;
A good old man, while peace he preach'd in vain,
Amidst the madness of th' unruly train :
Five herds, five bleating flocks his pastures fill'd;
His lands a hundred yoke of oxen till'd.
Thus, while in equal scales their fortune stood,
The Fury bathed them in each other's blood;
Then, having fix'd the fight, exulting flies,
And bears fulfill'd her promise to the skies.
To Juno thus she speaks: ‘Behold! 'tis done,
The blood already drawn, the war begun ;
The discord is complete; nor can they cease
The dire debate, nor you command the peace.
Now, since the Latian and the Trojan brood
Have tasted vengeance, and the sweets of blood, 760
Speak, and my pow'r shall add this office more:
The neighb'ring nations of th' Ausonian shore
Shall hear the dreadful rumor from afar,
Of arm'd invasion, and embrace the war.'
Then Juno thus: 'The grateful work is done,
The seeds of discord sow'd, the war begun :
Frauds, fears, and fury, have possess'd the state,
And fix'd the causes of a lasting hate.
A bloody Hymen shall th' alliance join
Betwixt the Trojan and Ausonian line:
But thou with speed to Night and Hell repair;
For not the gods, nor angry Jove, will bear
Thy lawless wand'ring walks in upper air.
Leave what remains to me.' Saturnia said:
The sullen fiend her sounding wings display'd,
Unwilling left the light, and sought the nether shade.
In midst of Italy, well known to fame, There lies a lake, Amsanctus is the name. Below the lofty mounts on either side
Thick forests the forbidden entrance hide.
Full in the centre of the sacred wood
An arm arises of the Stygian flood,
Which, breaking from beneath with bellowing sound, Whirls the black waves and rattling stones around. Here Pluto pants for breath from out his cell,
And opens wide the grinning jaws of hell.
To this infernal lake the Fury flies;
Here hides her hated head, and frees the lab'ring skies.
Saturnian Juno now, with double care,
Attends the fatal process of the war.
The clowns, return'd from battle, bear the slain,
Implore the gods, and to their king complain.
The corpse of Almon, and the rest are shown:
Shrieks, clamors, murmurs, fill the frighted town.
Ambitious Turnus in the press appears,
And, aggravating crimes, augments their fears;
Proclaims his private injuries aloud,
A solemn promise made, and disavow'd;
A foreign son is sought, and a mix'd mongrel brood.
Then they, whose mothers, frantic with their fear,
In woods and wilds the flags of Bacchus bear,
And lead his dances with dishevel'd hair,
Increase the clamor, and the war demand
(Such was Amata's int'rest in the land) /
Against the public sanctions of the peace,
Against all omens of their ill success.
With fates averse, the rout in arms resort,
To force their monarch, and insult the court.
But, like a rock unmoved, a rock that braves
The raging tempest and the rising waves-
Propp'd on himself he stands: his solid sides
Wash off the sea-weeds, and the sounding tides-
So stood the pious prince unmoved, and long
Sustain'd the madness of the noisy throng.
But, when he found that Juno's pow'r prevail'd,
And all the methods of cool counsel fail'd,
He calls the gods to witness their offence,
Disclaims the war, asserts his innocence.
'Hurried by fate,' he cries, 'and borne before
A furious wind, we leave the faithful shore!
O more than madmen! you yourselves shall bear
The guilt of blood and sacrilegious war :
Thou, Turnus, shalt atone it by thy fate,
And pray to heav'n for peace, but pray too late.
For me, my stormy voyage at an end,
I to the port of death securely tend.
The fun'ral pomp which to your kings you pay,
Is all I want, and all you take away.'
He said no more, but, in his walls confined,
Shut out the woes which he too well divined;
Nor with the rising storm would vainly strive,
But left the helm, and let the vessel drive.
A solemn custom was observed of old,
Which Latium held, and now the Romans hold:
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