In mournful pomp the matrons walk the round: 90
With baleful cypress and blue fillets crown'd;
With eyes dejected, and with hair unbound.
Then bowls of tepid milk and blood we pour,
And thrice invoke the foul of Polydore.

Now when the raging storms no longer reign;
But fouthern gales invite us to the main;
We launch our vessels, with a profperous wind;
And leave the cities and the shores behind.

An island in th' Ægean main appears;
Neptune and watery Doris claim it theirs.
It floated once, till Phœbus fix'd the fides
To rooted earth, and now it braves the tides.
Here, borne by friendly winds, we come afhore,
With needful ease our weary limbs restore:
And the fun's temple and his town adore.

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Anius the priest, and king, with laurel crown'd, His hoary locks with purple fillets bound, Who faw my fire the Delian shore afcend, Came forth with eager haste to meet his friend: Invites him to his palace: and in fign Of ancient love, their plighted hands they join. Then to the temple of the god I went; And thus before the shrine my vows present:

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Give, O Thymbræus, give a refting-place
To the sad relicks of the Trojan race:

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A feat secure, a region of their own,

A lasting empire, and a happier town.

Where shall we fix, where shall our labours end,

Whom shall we follow, and what fate attend?

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Let not my prayers a doubtful answer find,
But in clear auguries unveil thy mind.
Scarce had I faid; he shook the holy ground,
The laurels, and the lofty hills around:
And from the tripos rush'd a bellowing found.
Prostrate we fell, confefs'd the present god;.
Who gave this answer from his dark abode :
Undaunted youths, go seek that mother earth.
From which your ancestors derive their birth,
The foil that fent you forth, her ancient race,
In her old bosom, shall again embrace.
Through the wide world th' Æneian house shall reign,
And childrens children shall the crown sustain.
Thus Phœbus did our future fates disclose.:.

A mighty tumult, mix'd with joy, arose.

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All are concern'd to know what place the god 135.
Afsign'd, and where determin'd our abode.
My father, long revolving in his mind
The race and lineage of the Trojan kind,
Thus anfwer'd their demands: Ye princes, hear
Your pleasing fortune; and difpel your fear.
The fruitful ifle of Crete, well known to fame,
Sacred of old to Jove's imperial name,
In the mid ocean lies with large command;
And on its plains a hundred cities stand.
Another Ida rises there; and we

From thence derive our Trojan ancestry.
From thence, as 'tis divulg'd by certain fame,
To the Rhætean shores old Teucer came:

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There

There fix'd, and there the feat of empire chofe,
Ere Ilium and the Trojan towers arose.
In humble vales they built their soft abodes:
Till Cybele, the mother of the gods,
With tinkling cymbals, charm'd'th' Idean woods.
She fecret rites and ceremonics taught,
And to the yoke the favage lions brought:
Let us the land, which heaven appoints, explore;
Appease the winds, and seek the Gnoffian hore.
If Jove affift the passage of our fleet,
The third propitious dawn discovers Crete.
Thus having faid, the facrifices laid
On smoaking altars, to the gods he paid.
A bull to Neptune, an oblation due,
Another bull to bright Apollo flew :

A milk-white ewe the western winds to pleafe:
And one coal black to calm the stormy feas.
Ere this, a flying rumour rad been spread,
That fierce Idomeneus from Crete was fled;
Expell'd and exil'd; that the coaft was free
From foreign or domeftic enemy:

We leave the Delian ports, and put to fea.
By Naxos, fam'd for vintage, make our way:
Then green Donyfa pass; and fail in fight
Of Paros ifle, with marble quarries white.
We pass the scatter'd ifles of Cyclades,

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That, scarce diftinguish'd, seem to stud the feas. 175

The shouts of failors double near the shores;

They stretch their canvas, and they ply their oars.

All hands aloft, for Crete, for Crete they cry,
And fwiftly through the foamy billows fly.
Full on the promis'd land at length we bore,
With joy defcending on the Cretan shore.
With eager hafte a rising town I frame,
Which from the Trojan Pergamus I name :
The name itself was grateful; I exhort
To found their houses, and erect a fort.
Our ships are haul'd upon the yellow strand.
The youth begin to till the labour'd land.
And I myself new marriages promote,
Give laws; and dwellings I divide by lot.
When rifing vapours choke the wholesom air,
And blafts of noisom winds corrupt the year:
The trees, devouring caterpillars burn :
Parch'd was the grass, and blighted was the corn.
Nor scape the beasts: for Sirius from on high
With peftilential heat infects the sky :
My men, fome fall, the rest in fevers fry.
Again my father bids me feek the shore
Of facred Delos and the god implore :
To learn what end of woes we might expect,
And to what clime our weary course direct.

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'Twas night, when every creature, void of cares, The common gift of balmy slumber shares : The statues of my gods (for such they seem'd), Those gods whom I from flaming Troy redeem'd, Before me stood; majestically bright, Full in the beams of Phœbe's entering light.

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Then

Then thus they spoke; and eas'd my troubled mind:
What from the Delian god thou go'st to find,

He tells thee here; and sends us to relate :

{

Those powers are we, companions of thy fate,
Who from the burning town by thee were brought;
Thy fortune follow'd, and thy fafety wrought.
Through feas and lands as we thy steps attend,

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So shall our care thy glorious race befriend.

An ample realm for thee thy fates ordain;
A town, that o'er the conquer'd world shall reign.
Thou mighty walls for mighty nations build;

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Nor let thy weary mind to labours yield :
But change thy feat; for not the Delian god,
Nor we, have giv'n thee Crete for our abode.
A land there is, Hesperia call'd of old,
The foil is fruitful, and the natives bold.
Th' Oenotrians held it once; by later fame,
Now call'd Italia from the leader's name.

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Jafius there, and Dardanus were born :

From thence we came, and thither must return.
Rise, and thy fire with these glad tidings greet;

Search Italy, for Jove denies thee Crete.

Astonish'd at their voices, and their fight,

(Nor were they dreams, but visions of the night; 230

I faw, I knew their faces, and descry'd

In perfect view their hair with fillets ty'd);
I started from my couch, and clammy sweat
On all my limbs and shivering body fate.
To heaven I lift my hands with pious haste,
And facred incenfe in the flames I caft.

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Thus