and a murmur crept through their columns; the very Laurentines, the very
Latins are changed; and they who but now hoped for rest from battle and
rescue of fortune now desire arms and pray the treaty were undone, and
pity Turnus' cruel lot. To this Juturna adds a yet stronger impulse, and
high in heaven shews a sign more potent than any to confuse Italian
souls with delusive augury. For on the crimsoned sky Jove's tawny bird
flew chasing, in a screaming crowd, fowl of the shore that winged their
column; then suddenly stooping to the water, pounces on a noble swan
with merciless crooked talons. The startled Italians watch, while all
the birds together clamorously wheel round from flight, wonderful to
see, and dim the sky with their pinions, and in thickening cloud urge
their foe through air, till, conquered by their attack and his heavy
prey, he yielded and dropped it from his talons into the river, and
winged his way deep into the clouds. Then indeed the Rutulians
clamorously greet the omen, and their hands flash out. And Tolumnius the
augur cries before them all: 'This it was, this, that my vows often have
sought; I welcome and know a deity; [261-294]follow me, follow, snatch
up the sword, O hapless people whom the greedy alien frightens with his
arms like silly birds, and with strong hand ravages your shores. He too
will take to flight, and spread his sails afar over ocean. Do you with
one heart close up your squadrons, and defend in battle your lost king.'
He spoke, and darting forward, hurled a weapon full on the enemy; the
whistling cornel-shaft sings, and unerringly cleaves the air. At once
and with it a vast shout goes up, and all their rows are amazed, and
their hearts hotly stirred. The spear flies on; where haply stood
opposite in ninefold brotherhood all the beautiful sons of one faithful
Tyrrhene wife, borne of her to Gylippus the Arcadian, one of them,
midway where the sewn belt rubs on the flank and the clasp bites the
fastenings of the side, one of them, excellent in beauty and glittering
in arms, it pierces clean through the ribs and stretches on the yellow
sand. But of his banded brethren, their courage fired by grief, some
grasp and draw their swords, some snatch weapons to throw, and rush
blindly forward. The Laurentine columns rush forth against them; again
from the other side Trojans and Agyllines and Arcadians in painted
armour flood thickly in: so hath one passion seized all to make decision
by the sword. They pull the altars to pieces; through all the air goes a
thick storm of weapons, and faster falls the iron rain. Bowls and
hearth-fires are carried off; Latinus himself retreats, bearing the
outraged gods of the broken treaty. The others harness their chariots,
or vault upon their horses and come up with swords drawn. Messapus,
eager to shatter the treaty, rides menacingly down on Aulestes the
Tyrrhenian, a king in a king's array. Retreating hastily, and tripped on
the altars that meet him behind, the hapless man goes down on his head
and shoulders. But Messapus flies up with wrathful spear, and strikes
him, as he pleads sore, a deep downward [295-330]blow from horseback
with his beam-like spear, saying thus: _That for him: the high gods take
this better victim._ The Italians crowd in and strip his warm limbs.
Corynaeus seizes a charred brand from the altar, and meeting Ebysus as
he advances to strike, darts the flame in his face; his heavy beard
flamed up, and gave out a scorched smell. Following up his enemy's
confusion, the other seizes him with his left hand by the hair, and
bears him to earth with a thrust of his planted knee, and there drives
the unyielding sword into his side. Podalirius pursues and overhangs
with naked sword the shepherd Alsus as he rushes amid the foremost line
of weapons; Alsus swings back his axe, and severs brow and chin full in
front, wetting his armour all over with spattered blood. Grim rest and
iron slumber seal his eyes; his lids close on everlasting night.
But good Aeneas, his head bared, kept stretching his unarmed hand and
calling loudly to his men: 'Whither run you? What is this strife that so
spreads and swells? Ah, restrain your wrath! truce is already stricken,
and all its laws ordained; mine alone is the right of battle. Leave me
alone, and my hand shall confirm the treaty; these rites already make
Turnus mine.' Amid these accents, amid words like these, lo! a whistling
arrow winged its way to him, sped from what hand or driven by what god,
none knows, or what chance or deity brought such honour to the
Rutulians; the renown of the high deed was buried, nor did any boast to
have dealt Aeneas' wound. Turnus, when he saw Aeneas retreating from the
ranks and his captains in dismay, burns hot with sudden hope. At once he
calls for his horses and armour, and with a bound leaps proudly into his
chariot and handles the reins. He darts on, dealing many a brave man's
body to death; many an one he rolls half-slain, or crushes whole files
under his chariot, or seizes and showers spears on the fugitives. As
[331-364]when by the streams of icy Hebrus Mavors kindles to bloodshed
and clashes on his shield, and stirs war and speeds his furious
coursers; they outwing south winds and west on the open plain; utmost
Thrace groans under their hoof-beats; and around in the god's train rush
the faces of dark Terror, and Wraths and Ambushes; even so amid the
battle Turnus briskly lashes on his reeking horses, trampling on the
foes that lie piteously slain; the galloping hoof scatters bloody dew,
and spurns mingled gore and sand. And now hath he dealt Sthenelus to
death, and Thamyrus and Pholus, him and him at close quarters, the other
from afar; from afar both the sons of Imbrasus, Glaucus and Lades, whom
Imbrasus himself had nurtured in Lycia and equipped in equal arms,
whether to meet hand to hand or to outstrip the winds on horseback.
Elsewhere Eumedes advances amid the fray, ancient Dolon's brood,
illustrious in war, renewing his grandfather's name, his father's
courage and strength of hand, who of old dared to claim Pelides' chariot
as his price if he went to spy out the Grecian camp; to him the son of
Tydeus told out another price for his venture, and he dreams no more of
Achilles' horses. Him Turnus descried far on the open plain, and first
following him with light javelin through long space of air, stops his
double-harnessed horses and leaps from the chariot, and descends on his
fallen half-lifeless foe, and, planting his foot on his neck, wrests the
blade out of his hand and dyes its glitter deep in his throat, adding
these words withal: 'Behold, thou liest, Trojan, meting out those
Hesperian fields thou didst seek in war. Such guerdon is theirs who dare
to tempt my sword; thus do they found their city.' Then with a
spear-cast he sends Asbutes to follow him, and Chloreus and Sybaris,
Dares and Thersilochus, and Thymoetes fallen flung over his horse's
neck. And as when [365-398]the Edonian North wind's wrath roars on the
deep Aegean, and the wave follows it shoreward; where the blast comes
down, the clouds race over the sky; so, wheresoever Turnus cleaves his
way, columns retreat and lines turn and run; his own speed bears him on,
and his flying plume tosses as his chariot meets the breeze. Phegeus
brooked not his proud approach; he faced the chariot, and caught and
twisted away in his right hand the mouths of his horses, spurred into
speed and foaming on the bit. Dragged along and hanging by the yoke he
is left uncovered; the broad lance-head reaches him, pins and pierces
the double-woven breastplate, and lightly wounds the surface of his
body. Yet turning, he advanced on the enemy behind his shield, and
sought succour in the naked point; when the wheel running forward on its
swift axle struck him headlong and flung him to ground, and Turnus'
sword following it smote off his head between the helmet-rim and the
upper border of the breastplate, and left the body on the sand.
And while Turnus thus victoriously deals death over the plains,
Mnestheus meantime and faithful Achates, and Ascanius by their side, set
down Aeneas in the camp, dabbled with blood and leaning every other step
on his long spear. He storms, and tries hard to pull out the dart where
the reed had broken, and calls for the nearest way of remedy, to cut
open the wound with broad blade, and tear apart the weapon's
lurking-place, and so send him back to battle. And now Iapix son of
Iasus came, beloved beyond others of Phoebus, to whom once of old,
smitten with sharp desire, Apollo gladly offered his own arts and gifts,
augury and the lyre and swift arrows: he, to lengthen out the destiny of
a parent given over to die, chose rather to know the potency of herbs
and the practice of healing, and deal in a silent art unrenowned. Aeneas
stood chafing bitterly, propped on his vast spear, mourning
[399-435]Iülus and a great crowd of men around, unstirred by their
tears. The aged man, with garment drawn back and girt about him in
Paeonian fashion, makes many a hurried effort with healing hand and the
potent herbs of Phoebus, all in vain; in vain his hand solicits the
arrow-head, and his pincers' grasp pulls at the steel. Fortune leads him
forward in nowise; Apollo aids not with counsel; and more and more the
fierce clash swells over the plains, and the havoc draws nigher on.
Already they see the sky a mass of dust, the cavalry approaching, and
shafts falling thickly amid the camp; the dismal cry uprises of warriors
fighting and falling under the War-god's heavy hand. At this, stirred
deep by her son's cruel pain, Venus his mother plucked from Cretan Ida a
stalk of dittamy with downy leaves and bright-tressed flowers, the plant
not unknown to wild goats when winged arrows are fast in their body.
This Venus bore down, her shape girt in a dim halo; this she steeps with
secret healing in the river-water poured out and sparkling abrim, and
sprinkles life-giving juice of ambrosia and scented balm. With that
water aged Iapix washed the wound, unwitting; and suddenly, lo! all the
pain left his body, all the blood in the deep wound was stanched. And
now following his hand the arrow fell out with no force, and strength
returned afresh as of old. 'Hasten! arms for him quickly! why stand
you?' cries Iapix aloud, and begins to kindle their courage against the
enemy; 'this comes not by human resource or schooling of art, nor does
my hand save thee, Aeneas: a higher god is at work, and sends thee back
to higher deeds.' He, eager for battle, had already clasped on the
greaves of gold right and left, and scorning delay, brandishes his
spear. When the shield is adjusted by his side and the corslet on his
back, he clasps Ascanius in his armed embrace, and lightly kissing him
through the helmet, cries: 'Learn of me, O boy, valour [436-470]and
toil indeed, fortune of others. Now mine hand shall give thee defence in
war, and lead thee to great reward: do thou, when hereafter thine age
ripens to fulness, keep this in remembrance, and as thou recallest the
pattern of thy kindred, let thy spirit rise to thy father Aeneas, thine
uncle Hector.'
These words uttered, he issued towering from the gates, brandishing his
mighty spear: with him in serried column rush Antheus and Mnestheus, and
all the throng streams forth of the camp. The field drifts with blinding
dust, and the startled earth trembles under the tramp of feet. From his
earthworks opposite Turnus saw and the Ausonians saw them come, and an
icy shudder ran deep through their frame; first and before all the
Latins Juturna heard and knew the sound, and in terror fled away. He
flies on, and hurries his dark column over the open plain. As when in
fierce weather a storm-cloud moves over mid sea to land, with presaging
heart, ah me, the hapless husbandmen shudder from afar; it will deal
havoc to their trees and destruction to their crops, and make a broad
path of ruin; the winds fly before it, and bear its roar to the beach;
so the Rhoetean captain drives his army full on the foe; one and all
they close up in wedges, and mass their serried ranks. Thymbraeus smites
massive Osiris with the sword, Mnestheus slays Arcetius, Achates Epulo,
Gyas Ufens: Tolumnius the augur himself goes down, he who had hurled the
first weapon against the foe. Their cry rises to heaven, and in turn the
routed Rutulians give backward in flight over the dusty fields. Himself
he deigns not to cut down the fugitives, nor pursue such as meet him
fair on foot or approach in arms: Turnus alone he tracks and searches in
the thick haze, alone calls him to conflict. Then panic-stricken the
warrior maiden flings Turnus' charioteer out over his reins, and leaving
him far where he slips from the [471-504]chariot-pole, herself succeeds
and turns the wavy reins, tones and limbs and armour all of Metiscus'
wearing. As when a black swallow flits through some rich lord's spacious
house, and circles in flight the lofty halls, gathering her tiny food
for sustenance to her twittering nestlings, and now swoops down the
spacious colonnades, now round the wet ponds; in like wise dart
Juturna's horses amid the enemy, and her fleet chariot passes flying
over all the field. And now here and now here she displays her
triumphant brother, nor yet allows him to close, but flies far and away.
None the less does Aeneas thread the circling maze to meet him, and
tracks his man, and with loud cry cries on him through the scattered
ranks. Often as he cast eyes on his enemy and essayed to outrun the
speed of the flying-footed horses, so often Juturna wheeled her team
away. Alas, what can he do? Vainly he tosses on the ebb and flow, and in
his spirit diverse cares make conflicting call; when Messapus, who haply
bore in his left hand two tough spear-shafts topped with steel, runs
lightly up and aims and hurls one of them upon him with unerring stroke.
Aeneas stood still, and gathered himself behind his armour, sinking on
bended knee; yet the rushing spear bore off his helmet-spike, and dashed
the helmet-plume from the crest. Then indeed his wrath swells; and
forced to it by their treachery, while chariot and horses disappear, he
calls Jove oft and again to witness, and the altars of the violated
treaty, and now at last plunges amid their lines. Sweeping terrible down
the tide of battle he wakens fierce indiscriminate carnage, and flings
loose all the reins of wrath.
What god may now unfold for me in verse so many woes, so many diverse
slaughters and death of captains whom now Turnus, now again the Trojan
hero, drives over all the field? Was it well, O God, that nations
destined to everlasting peace should clash in so vast a shock? Aeneas
[505-540]meets Sucro the Rutulian; the combat stayed the first rush of
the Teucrians, but delayed them not long; he catches him on the side,
and, when fate comes quickest, drives the harsh sword clean through the
ribs where they fence the breast. Turnus brings down Amycus from
horseback with his brother Diores, and meets them on foot; him he
strikes with his long spear as he comes, him with his sword-point, and
hangs both severed heads on his chariot and carries them off dripping
with blood. The one sends to death Talos and Tanaïs and brave Cethegus,
three at one meeting, and gloomy Onites, of Echionian name, and Peridia
the mother that bore him; the other those brethren sent from Lycia and
Apollo's fields, and Menoetes the Arcadian, him who loathed warfare in
vain; who once had his art and humble home about the river-fisheries of
Lerna, and knew not the courts of the great, but his father was tenant
of the land he tilled. And as fires kindled dispersedly in a dry forest
and rustling laurel-thickets, or foaming rivers where they leap swift
and loud from high hills, and speed to sea each in his own path of
havoc; as fiercely the two, Aeneas and Turnus, dash amid the battle;
now, now wrath surges within them, and unconquerable hearts are torn;
now in all their might they rush upon wounds. The one dashes Murranus
down and stretches him on the soil with a vast whirling mass of rock, as
he cries the names of his fathers and forefathers of old, a whole line
drawn through Latin kings; under traces and yoke the wheels spurned him,
and the fast-beating hoofs of his rushing horses trample down their
forgotten lord. The other meets Hyllus rushing on in gigantic pride, and
hurls his weapon at his gold-bound temples; the spear pierced through
the helmet and stood fast in the brain. Neither did thy right hand save
thee from Turnus, O Cretheus, bravest of the Greeks; nor did his gods
shield Cupencus when Aeneas came; he gave his [541-575]breast full to
the steel, nor, alas! was the brazen shield's delay aught of avail. Thee
likewise, Aeolus, the Laurentine plains saw sink backward and cover a
wide space of earth; thou fallest, whom Argive battalions could not lay
low, nor Achilles the destroyer of Priam's realm. Here was thy goal of
death; thine high house was under Ida, at Lyrnesus thine high house, on
Laurentine soil thy tomb. The whole battle-lines gather up, all Latium
and all Dardania, Mnestheus and valiant Serestus, with Messapus, tamer
of horses, and brave Asilas, the Tuscan battalion and Evander's Arcadian
squadrons; man by man they struggle with all their might; no rest nor
pause in the vast strain of conflict.
At this Aeneas' mother most beautiful inspired him to advance on the
walls, directing his columns on the town and dismaying the Latins with
sudden and swift disaster. As in search for Turnus he bent his glance
this way and that round the separate ranks, he descries the city free
from all this warfare, unpunished and unstirred. Straightway he kindles
at the view of a greater battle; he summons Mnestheus and Sergestus and
brave Serestus his captains, and mounts a hillock; there the rest of the
Teucrian army gathers thickly, still grasping shield and spear. Standing
on the high mound amid them, he speaks: 'Be there no delay to my words;
Jupiter is with us; neither let any be slower to move that the design is
sudden. This city to-day, the source of war, the royal seat of Latinus,
unless they yield them to receive our yoke and obey their conquerors,
will I raze to ground, and lay her smoking roofs level with the dust.
Must I wait forsooth till Turnus please to stoop to combat, and choose
again to face his conqueror? This, O citizens, is the fountain-head and
crown of the accursed war. Bring brands speedily, and reclaim the treaty
in fire.' He ended; all with spirit alike emulous form a wedge and
advance in serried masses to the walls. Ladders are run [576-611]up,
and fire leaps sudden to sight. Some rush to the separate gates, and cut
down the guards of the entry, others hurl their steel and darken the sky
with weapons. Aeneas himself among the foremost, upstretching his hand
to the city walls, loudly reproaches Latinus, and takes the gods to
witness that he is again forced into battle, that twice now do the
Italians choose warfare and break a second treaty. Discord rises among
the alarmed citizens: some bid unbar the town and fling wide their gates
to the Dardanians, and pull the king himself towards the ramparts;
others bring arms and hasten to defend the walls: as when a shepherd
tracks bees to their retreat in a recessed rock, and fills it with
stinging smoke, they within run uneasily up and down their waxen
fortress, and hum louder in rising wrath; the smell rolls in darkness
along their dwelling, and a blind murmur echoes within the rock as the
smoke issues to the empty air.
This fortune likewise befell the despairing Latins, this woe shook the
whole city to her base. The queen espies from her roof the enemy's
approach, the walls scaled and firebrands flying on the houses; and
nowhere Rutulian ranks, none of Turnus' columns to meet them; alas! she
deems him destroyed in the shock of battle, and, distracted by sudden
anguish, shrieks that she is the source of guilt, the spring of ill, and
with many a mad utterance of frenzied grief rends her purple attire with
dying hand, and ties from a lofty beam the ghastly noose of death. And
when the unhappy Latin women knew this calamity, first her daughter
Lavinia tears her flower-like tresses and roseate cheeks, and all the
train around her madden in her suit; the wide palace echoes to their
wailing, and from it the sorrowful rumour spreads abroad throughout the
town. All hearts sink; Latinus goes with torn raiment, in dismay at his
wife's doom and his city's downfall, defiling his hoary hair with
soilure of sprinkled dust.
[614-648]Meanwhile on the skirts of the field Turnus chases scattered
stragglers, ever slacker to battle, ever less and less exultant in his
coursers' victorious speed. The confused cry came to him borne in blind
terror down the breeze, and his startled ears caught the echoing tumult
and disastrous murmur of the town. 'Ah me! what agony shakes the city?
or what is this cry that fleets so loud from the distant town?' So
speaks he, and distractedly checks the reins. And to him his sister, as
changed into his charioteer Metiscus' likeness she swayed horses and
chariot-reins, thus rejoined: 'This way, Turnus, let us pursue the brood
of Troy, where victory opens her nearest way; there are others whose
hands can protect their dwellings. Aeneas falls fiercer on the Italians,
and closes in conflict; let our hand too deal pitiless death on his
Teucrians. Neither in tale of dead nor in glory of battle shalt thou
retire outdone.' Thereat Turnus: . . .
'Ah my sister, long ere now I knew thee, when first thine arts shattered
the treaty, and thou didst mingle in the strife; and now thy godhead
conceals itself in vain. But who hath bidden thee descend from heaven to
bear this sore travail? was it that thou mightest see thy hapless
brother cruelly slain? for what do I, or what fortune yet gives promise
of safety? Before my very eyes, calling aloud on me, I saw Murranus,
than whom none other is left me more dear, sink huge to earth, borne
down by as huge a wound. Hapless Ufens is fallen, not to see our shame;
corpse and armour are in Teucrian hands. The destruction of their
households, this was the one thing yet lacking; shall I suffer it? Shall
my hand not refute Drances' jeers? shall I turn my back, and this land
see Turnus a fugitive? Is Death all so bitter? Do you, O Shades, be
gracious to me, since the powers of heaven are estranged; to you shall I
go down, a pure spirit and [649-681]ignorant of your blame, never once
unworthy of my mighty fathers of old.'