Et prædulce decus primo certamine posset. 155 Vota precesque meæ! tuque, ô sanctissima conjux, 160 165 175 Quàm pius Æneas, et quàm magni Phryges, et quàm 170 Aurora interea miseris mortalibus almam 180 185 170. Phryges. Troy stood in Phrygia Minor or Troas. 178. Turnum natoque, etc. Literally, Which, you see, owes Tarnus to the son and to the sire, who have both deserved it. probation in early war! Alas! my vows and prayers are by none of the gods regarded! Thou most holy partner of my bed, happy in thy death, and not to this woe reserved! whilst I by living on have overpassed my natural bounds to remain a childless father. When I followed the confederate arms of Troy, the Rutulians should have overwhelmed me with their darts: my life with joy I had resigned, and me, not Pallas, this funeral pomp had home conveyed. Nor you, ye Trojans, will I accuse, nor your alliance, nor those right, hands we joined in hospitable league: this stroke of fortune was destined to my old age. However, if untimely death awaited my son, it will be some satisfaction that ushering the Trojans into Latium he fell, having first slain thousands of the Volscians. And now with no other funeral obsequies, O Pallas, can I thee grace, than what the pious Æneas, and the noble Trojans, the Tuscan leaders, and whole army of the Tuscans, have given thee. Thy illustrious trophies they bear, those whom victims to death thy right-hand offered. Thou too, O Turnus, shouldst have stood among them a huge trunk in arms, had pay age been equal, and my strength from years the same with yours. But why do I, hapless man, detain the Trojans from the war? Go, and faithfully bear back these mandates to your king: If I linger out a hated life, after my Pallas is slain, it is in consequence of the hopes I derive from thy right hand: from which you see vengeance on Turnus is justly due to a son and sire. This post of honour is alone reserved for thee and thy fortune. It is not any joy in life I seek, nor is it fit I should; but I wish to carry the joyful tidings to my son down to the shades below. Meanwhile to wretched mortals Aurora had brought forth the auspicious light, renewing the works, and labours of the day. Now father Æneas, now Tarchon, on the winding shore erected funeral piles. Hither they conveyed, each after the manner of his ancestors, the bodies of their dead; and, the baleful fires being applied under them, the lofty sky, with smouldering smoke, is Palla Conditur in tenebras altum caligine cœlum. Multa boüm circa mactantur corpora morti; 190 195 200 Nec minùs et miseri diversâ in parte Latini Innumeras struxere pyras; et corpora partim Multa virum terræ infodiunt; avectaque partim Finitimos tollunt in agros, urbique remittunt. Cætera, confusæque ingentem cædis acervum, 205 Nec numero nec honore cremant: tunc undique vasti 210 215 220 211. Ruebant is here used in an active sense, as in other places of Virgil. hidden in darkness. Thrice round the blazing piles, on foot they ran, in shining armour clad; thrice they encompassed the mournful funeral fire on horseback, and sent forth doleful yells. With their tears bedewed is the earth, bedewed are their arms. The shrieks of men and clangor of the trumpets pierce the sky. Next into the fire some throw the spoils torn from the Latins slain, helmets, and glittering swords, bits, and glowing chariotwheels: some, presents to the dead well known, their own bucklers and unsuccessful darts. Many heads of oxen all around are offered victims to death; and over the flames they stab bristly boars, and sheep snatched from all the fields: then along the whole shore they view their burning friends, and watch their half-consumed piles; nor can they be torn from them, before humid night inverts the face of heaven, bespangled with shining stars. Nor with less pious care the wretched Latins in a different quarter reared numberless piles; and they bury in the earth many bodies of their heroes, forming a part of the mass of slain; and part carried off they to the neighbouring fields convey, and send back to the city. The rest, and a vast heap of promiscuous slaughter, without number and without honour, they burn: then on all sides the spacious fields, as rivalling each other, blaze together with frequent fires. The third day's light had from the sky removed the chill shades of night; when with melancholy aspect they huddled together on the hearths the heaped-up ashes and bones mingled in confusion, and loaded them with a smoking mount of earth. But now in the courts of opulent Latinus, and in the city, is the chief uproar, and by far the deepest scene of mourning. Here mothers and hapless brides, here tender-hearted sisters in deep anguish, and striplings of their sires bereft, curse the rueful war, and the nuptials of Turnus; and himself they urge by arms, himself by the sword to decide the quarrel with his rival, since for himself alone he claims the crown of Italy and the first honours. This the malicious Drances aggravates, and Testatur, solum posci in certamina Turnum. Hos inter motus, medio in flagrante tumultu, Admonet ira Deûm, tumulique ante ora recentes. Imperio accitos, alta intra limina cogit. Olli convenere, fluuntque ad regia plenis Tecta viis. Sedet in mediis, et maximus ævo, 225 230 235 240 245 Qui bellum intulerint, quæ causa attraxerit Arpos. 250 Auditis ille hæc placido sic reddidit ore : O fortunatæ gentes, Saturnia regna, Antiqui Ausonii, quæ vos fortuna quietos 247. Iapygis. Apulian, so called from Iapys the son of Daedalus, who first settled in those parts. |