The Æneids of Virgil, Done into English Verse. Virgil

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СКАЧАТЬ thou? or whither then is gone thy heed of me?

       Wilt thou not first behold the place where worn by eld is he,

       Anchises, left? Wilt thou not see if yet thy wife abide

       Creusa, or Ascanius yet? The Greekish bands fare wide

       About them now on every hand, and but my care withstood

       The fire had wafted them away or sword had drunk their blood.600

       Laconian Helen's beauty cursed this overthrow ne'er wrought.

       Nor guilty Paris; nay, the Gods, the Gods who pity nought,

       Have overturned your lordship fair, and laid your Troy alow.

       Behold! I draw aside the cloud that all abroad doth flow,

       Dulling the eyes of mortal men, and darkening dewily

       The world about. And look to it no more afeard to be

       Of what I bid, nor evermore thy mother's word disown.

       There where thou seest the great walls cleft, and stone torn off from stone,

       And seest the waves of smoke go by with mingled dust-cloud rolled—

       There Neptune shakes the walls and stirs the foundings from their hold

       With mighty trident, tumbling down the city from its base.611

       There by the Scæan gates again hath bitter Juno place

       The first of all, and wild and mad, herself begirt with steel,

       Calls up her fellows from the ships.

       Look back! Tritonian Pallas broods o'er topmost burg on high,

       All flashing bright with Gorgon grim from out her stormy sky;

       The very Father hearteneth on, and stays with happy might

       The Danaans, crying on the Gods against the Dardan fight.

       Snatch flight, O son, whiles yet thou may'st, and let thy toil be o'er,

       I by thy side will bring thee safe unto thy father's door.'620

      She spake, and hid herself away where thickest darkness poured.

       Then dreadful images show forth, great Godheads are abroad,

       The very haters of our Troy.

       And then indeed before mine eyes all Ilium sank in flame,

       And overturned was Neptune's Troy from its foundations deep.

       E'en as betideth with an ash upon the mountain steep,

       Round which sore smitten by the steel the acre-biders throng,

       And strive in speeding of the axe: and there it threateneth long,

       And, shaken, trembleth nodding still with heavy head of leaf;

       Till overcome by many hurts it groans its latest grief,630

       And torn from out the ridgy hill, drags all its ruin alow.

      I get me down, and, Goddess-led, speed on 'twixt fire and foe,

       And point and edge give place to me, before me sinks the flame;

       But when unto my father's door and ancient house I came,

       And I was fain of all things first my father forth to bear

       Unto the mountain-tops, and first I sought to find him there,

       Still he gainsayed to spin out life now Troy was lost and dead,

       Or suffer exile: 'Ye whose blood is hale with youth,' he said,

       'Ye other ones, whose might and main endureth and is stout,

       See ye to flight while yet ye may!640

       Full surely if the heavenly ones my longer life had willed,

       They would have kept me this abode: the measure is fulfilled

       In that the murder I have seen, and lived when Troy-town fell.

       O ye, depart, when ye have bid my body streaked farewell.

       My hand itself shall find out death, or pity of my foes,

       Who seek my spoils: the tomb methinks a little thing to lose.

       Forsooth I tarry overlong, God-cursed, a useless thing,

       Since when the Father of the Gods, the earth-abiders' King,

       Blew on me blast of thunder-wind and touched me with his flame.'

      His deed was stubborn as his word, no change upon him came.650

       But all we weeping many tears, my wife Creusa there,

       Ascanius, yea and all the house, besought him not to bear

       All things to wrack with him, nor speed the hastening evil tide.

       He gainsaith all, and in his will and home will yet abide.

       So wretchedly I rush to arms with all intent to die;

       For what availeth wisdom now, what hope in fate may lie?

      'And didst thou hope, O father, then, that thou being left behind,

       My foot would fare? Woe worth the word that in thy mouth I find!

       But if the Gods are loth one whit of such a town to save,

       And thou with constant mind wilt cast on dying Troy-town's grave660

       Both thee and thine, wide is the door to wend adown such ways;

       For Pyrrhus, red with Priam's blood, is hard at hand, who slays

       The son before the father's face, the father slays upon

       The altar. Holy Mother, then, for this thou ledst me on

       Through fire and sword!—that I might see our house filled with the foe,

       My father old, Ascanius, Creusa lying low,

       All weltering in each other's blood, and murdered wretchedly.

       Arms, fellows, arms! the last day's light on vanquished men doth cry.

       Ah! give me to the Greeks again, that I may play the play

       Another while: not unavenged shall all we die today.'670

      So was I girt with sword again, and in my shield would set

       My left hand now, and was in point from out of doors to get,

       When lo, my wife about my feet e'en in the threshold clung,

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