houses scourges and fire-brands of death; with thee are a thousand specious pretexts, a thousand arts of doing mischief: ransack thy fruitful bosom, unhinge the established peace, sow crimes, the seeds of war: let the youth incline to, and at once demand and snatch up arms. Forthwith Alecto, infected with Gorgonian poisons, repairs first to Latium, and the lofty palace of the Laurentine monarch, and took possession of Amata's silent pensive gate; in whose inflamed breast a thousand female cares and angry commotions boiled, on account of the arrival of the Trojans, and the match with Turnus. At her the goddess flings from her serpentine locks one of her snakes, and plunges it deep in her bosom down to its inmost recesses, that, by the monster, driven to fury, she may the whole family embroil. He, sliding between her robes and smooth breast, rolls on with imperceptible touch, and, in the transport of her rage, steals on her unawares, infusing into her a viperish soul: the huge snake becomes a chain of wreathed gold around her neck, he becomes a long winding fillet, and entwines her hair, and, in slippery mazes, creeps over all her limbs. And while the first infection, downward gliding, diffuses its humid poison through her senses, and blends the mingling fire with her bones; and while her mind, in all its powers, has not yet caught the flame; she spoke with softer accents, and in the wonted manner of tender mothers, making many a heavy lamentation about her daughter and the Phrygian match: And is Lavinia given in marriage to Trojan exiles? and have you, her father, no pity on your daughter, or on yourself, or on her mother, whom with the first fair wind the perfidious pirate will abandon, and return to sea, carrying off the virgin? Did not the Phrygian shepherd thus steal into Lacedæmon, and bear away Ledæan Helen to the Trojan towers? What becomes of your solemnly-plighted faith, that fond regard you have always shewn for your people, and your right hand of promise, so often given to your kinsman Turnus? If the Latins must have a son-in-law from a foreign nation, and this be determined, and the Idque sedet, Faunique premunt te jussa parentis; His ubi nequicquam dictis experta, Latinum 370 375 380 385 390 395 372. Acrisiusque. Danae, the daughter of Acrisius, who removed his seat of empire from Argos to Mycenae, was thrown into the sea by her father's orders in a wooden chest, which was wafted to the coast of Italy. See ver. 409. There she landed and married Pilumnus, one of Turnus' ancestors. 390. Thyrsos. Spears wrapped about with vine and ivy-leaves, which Bacchus and his retinue wore. 391. Sacrum, etc. Virgins frequently consecrated their hair to some divinity, and did not cut it till a short time before their mar riage, when they suspended it in the temple of that deity. commands of your father Faunus press you, for my part, I reckon every land foreign, which, independent, is disjoined from our dominion, and that thus the gods intend. And (if the first origin of his family be traced back) Turnus has Inachus and Achrisius for his progenitors, and Mycenae, in the midst of Greece, for his country. : When, having tried him by these words in vain, she finds Latinus resolutely fixed against her, and the serpent's infuriated poison had now sunk deep into her bowels, and crept through all her frame; then, indeed, in wretched disorder, startled by hideous monsters, she rages frantic with unexampled fury through the ample bounds of the city as at times a top whirling under the twisted lash, which boys intent on their sport exercise and torture in a large circuit round some empty court; the engine driven about by the scourge is hurried round and round in circling spires; the unpractised throng and beardless band are lost in admiration of the voluble wood; they lend their souls to the stroke. With no less impetuous career is the queen impelled through the midst of cities, and among crowds all in fierce commotion. Aiming even at a more atrocious deed, and ushering in a higher scene of madness, having counterfeited the enthusiasm of Bacchus, she flies out into the forest, and conceals her daughter in the woody mountains, that from the Trojans she may wrest the match, and retard the nuptials; exclaiming, Evo Bacchus, and bawling out, that thou alone art worthy of the virgin: for that, in honour of thee, she wields the tender ivy-spears, round thee she circuits with her virgin-choir, for thee she feeds her sacred locks. The rumour hereof flies; and forthwith the same enthusiasm at once actuates all the matrons, inflamed by the Furies in their breasts, to seek out new habitations: They instantly abandon their homes; to the winds they expose their necks and hair. Others again fill the skies with tremulous yells, and wrapped in skins wield their vinedressed spears. She herself, in the midst of them, all on fire, sustains a blazing pine, and sings the nuptial song for her daughter and Turnus, whirling her bloody eye Sanguineam torquens aciem: torvùmque repentè Præcipiti delata Noto. Locus Ardua quondam 400 405 410 415 420 Exuit; 425 413. Fortuna fuit. In the same sense as Aen. ii. 325. Fuimus Troes, fuit Ilium, which imports, The Trojans once were; Ilium once was, but is now no more. See also Aen. iii. 16; x. 43. 422. Transcribi. This word was properly applied to those whose names were enrolled in order to be transported into some new colony Hence it came to signify, to transfer. balls round; and suddenly, with a stern air, she cries : Io! ye Latin matrons, hear, wherever you may chance to be: if any affection for unhappy Amata dwells in your humane souls, if concern for a mother's right touches you to the quick, unbind the fillets of your hair, with me take up the orgies. In this manner among the woods, among the deserts of wild beasts, Alecto, with the stimulating fury of Bacchus, all around goads on the queen. After she seemed sufficiently to have kindled the first transports of rage, and embroiled the counsel and whole family of Latinus; forthwith the baleful goddess hence is borne on dusky wings to the walls of the bold Rutulian; which city Danaë, wafted to Italy by the impetuous south-wind, is said to have founded for her crisian colony. The place was formerly called Ardua by the ancient inhabitants, and now Ardea it remains, an illustrious name: but its fortune was now gone. Here, in his lofty palace, was Turnus enjoying repose at the black hour of midnight. Alecto lays aside her hideous aspect, and Fury's limbs; she transforms herself into the shape of an old hag, ploughs with wrinkles her obscene loathed front, assumes grey hairs with a fillet, and binds on them an olive-bough: she becomes Calybe, the aged priestess of Juno's temple, and with these words presents herself to the youth full in his view: O Turnus, will you suffer so many toils thus to be lost and thrown away, and your sceptre to be transferred to a Trojan colony? The king absolutely refuses you the match and dowry you have purchased with your blood; and a foreigner is sought to inherit his crown. Go now, thus baffled, expose yourself to thankless dangers; go, overthrow the Tuscan armies; in peace protect the Latins. And now, in these very terms, the all-powerful queen of heaven herself commanded me plainly to address you, reclining in the still silent night. Wherefore dispatch, and with alacrity order the youth to be armed, and march forth to war; in flames consume both the Phrygian leaders, who are stationed in the fair river, and their painted vessels. So the awful majesty of heaven commands. |