Iulus then: By all the powers above! By those Penates,* who my country love; By hoary Vesta's sacred fane, I swear, My hopes are all in you, ye generous pair! Restore my father to my grateful sight, And all my sorrows yield to one delight. Nisus! two silver goblets are thine own, Saved from Arisba's stately domes o'erthrown; My sire secured them on that fatal day, Nor left such bowls, an Argive robber's prey; Two massy tripods, also, shall be thine, Two talents polish'd from the glittering mine; An ancient cup, which Tyrian Dido gave, While yet our vessels press'd the Punic wave; But, when the hostile chiefs at length bow down, When great Æneas wears Hesperia's crown, The casque, the buckler, and the fiery steed Which Turnus guides with more than mortal speed, Are thine; no envious lot shall then be cast, I pledge my word, irrevocably past;

Nay more, twelve slaves, and twice six captive
dames,

To soothe thy softer hours with amorous flames,
And all the realms, which now the Latins sway,
The labours of to-night shall well repay.

But thou, my generous youth, whose tender years
Are near my own, whose worth my heart reveres,
Henceforth, affection, sweetly thus begun,
Shall join our bosoms and our souls in one;
Without thy aid, no glory shall be mine,
Without thy dear advice, no great design;
Alike through life esteem'd, thou god-like boy,
In war my bulwark, and in peace my joy,'
To him Euryalus, 'no day shall shame
The rising glories which from this I claim,
* Household gods.

Fortune may favour, or the skies may frown,
But valour, spite of fate, obtains renown.
Yet, ere from hence our eager steps depart,
One boon I beg, the nearest to my heart:
My mother, sprung from Priam's royal line,
Like thine ennobled, hardly less divine,
Nor Troy, nor king Acestes' realms restrain
Her feeble age from dangers of the main;
Alone she came, all selfish fears above,
A bright example of maternal love.
Unknown the secret enterprise I brave,
Lest grief should bend my parent to the grave,
From this alone no fond adieus I seek,
No fainting mother's lips have press'd my cheek;
By gloomy night, and thy right hand I vow,
Her parting tears would shake my purpose now:
Do thou, my prince, her failing age sustain,
In thee her much-loved child may live again;
Her dying hours with pious conduct bless,
Assist her wants, relieve her fond distress:
So dear a hope must all my soul inflame,
To rise in glory, or to fall in fame.'
Struck with a filial care, so deeply felt,
In tears at once the Trojan warriors melt;
Faster than all, Iulus' eyes o'erflow,

6

Such love was his, and such had been his woe;

All thou hast ask'd, receive,' the Prince replied,

Nor this alone, but many a gift beside;

To cheer thy mother's years shall be my aim,
Creusa's style but wanting to the dame:
Fortune an adverse wayward course may run,
But bless'd thy mother in so dear a son.
Now, by my life, my sire's most sacred oath,
To thee I pledge my full, my firmest troth,

* The mother of Iulus, lost on the night when Troy was taken.

All the rewards which once to thee were vow'd,
If thou should'st fall, on her shall be bestow'd,' a
Thus spoke the weeping Prince, then forth to view
A gleaming falchion from the sheath he drew;t
Lycaon's utmost skill had graced the steel,
For friends to envy and for foes to feel;
A tawny hide, the Moorish lion's spoil,
Slain 'midst the forest, in the hunter's toil,
Mnestheus to guard the elder youth bestows,
And old Alethes' casque defends his brows;
Arm'd, thence they go, while all th' assembled
train,

To aid their cause, implore the gods in vain.
More than a boy, in wisdom and in grace,
Iulus holds amidst the chiefs his place,

His prayers he sends, but what can prayers avail!
Lost in the murmurs of the sighing gale!

The trench is pass'd, and, favour'd by the night, Through sleeping foes they wheel their wary flight; When shall the sleep of many a foe be o'er? Alas! some slumber who shall wake no more! Chariots and bridles, mix'd with arms are seen, And flowing flasks, and scatter'd troops between; Bacchus and Mars, to rule the camp, combine; A mingled chaos this of war and wine.

Now,' cries the first, for deeds of blood prepare,
With me the conquest and the labour share;
Here lies our path, lest any hand arise,

Watch thou, while many a dreaming chieftain dies;
I'll carve our passage through the heedless foe,
And clear thy road with many a deadly blow.'
His whispering accents then the youth repress'd,
And pierced proud Rhamnes through his panting
breast,

Stretch'd at his ease, th' incautious king reposed,
Debauch, and not fatigue, his eyes had closed;

To Turnus dear, a prophet, and a prince,
His omens more than augur's skill evince :
But he, who thus foretold the fate of all,
Could not avert his own untimely fall.
Next Remus' armour-bearer, hapless, fell,
And three unhappy slaves the carnage swell;
The charioteer along his courser's sides
Expires, the steel his sever'd neck divides;
And last, his lord is number'd with the dead,
Bounding convulsive, flies the gasping head;
From the swollen veins the blackening torrents

pour,

Stain'd is the couch and earth with clotting gore.
Young Lamyrus and Lamus next expire,
And gay Serranus, fill'd with youthful fire;
Half the long night in childish games were pass'd,
Lull'd by the potent grape, he slept at last;
Ah! happier far, had he the morn survey'd,
And till Aurora's dawn his skill display'd.
In slaughter'd folds, the keepers lost in sleep,
His hungry fangs a lion thus may steep;
'Mid the sad flock, at dead of night he prowls,
With murder glutted, and in carnage rolls;
Insatiate still, through teeming herds he roams,
In seas of gore the lordly tyrant foams.

Nor less the other's deadly vengeance came,
But falls on feeble crowds without a name;
His wound unconscious Fadus scarce can feel,
Yet wakeful Rhesus sees the threatening steel;
His coward breast behind a jar he hides,
And vainly in the weak defence confides;
Full in his heart, the falchion search'd his veins,
The reeking weapon bears alternate stains;
Through wine and blood, commingling as they
flow,

One feeble spirit seeks the shades below.

Now, where Messapus dwelt, they bend their way, Whose fires emit a faint and trembling ray; There, unconfined, behold each grazing steed, Unwatch'd, unheeded, on the herbage feed; Brave Nisus here arrests his comrade's arm, Too flush'd with carnage, and with conquest warm: Hence let us haste, the dangerous path is pass'd, Full foes enough to-night have breath'd their last; Soon will the day those eastern clouds adorn, Now let us speed, nor tempt the rising morn.' What silver arms, with various arts emboss'd, What bowls and mantles in confusion toss'd, They leave regardless; yet, one glittering prize Attracts the younger hero's wandering eyes; The gilded harness Rhamnes' coursers felt, The gems which stud the monarch's golden belt; This from the pallid corse was quickly torn, Once by a line of former chieftain's worn. Th' exulting boy the studded girdle wears, Messapus' helm his head in triumph bears; Then from the tents their cautious steps they bend, To seek the vale where safer paths extend. Just at this hour, a band of Latian horse To Turnus' camp pursue their destined course; While the slow foot their tardy march delay, The knights, impatient, spur along the way: Three hundred mail-clad men by Volscens led, To Turnus, with their master's promise sped; Now they approach the trench, and view the walls, When, on the left, a light reflection falls, The plunder'd helmet, through the waning night, Sheds forth a silver radiance, glancing bright; Volscens, with questions loud, the pair alarms, 'Stand, stragglers! stand! why early thus in arms? From whence, to whom?' he meets with no reply, Trusting the covert of the night, they fly;