Well hors'd, well clad-a rich and shining train. 30 35 Black'ning the fields, and thick'ning through the skies. Then to his fellows thus aloud he calls: 40 "What rolling clouds, my friends, approach the walls? Arm! arm! and man the works! prepare your spears, And pointed darts! the Latian host appears." Thus warn'd, they shut their gates; with shouts ascend The bulwarks, and, secure, their foes attend: For their wise gen'ral, with foreseeing care, 45 Nor, though provok'd, in open fields advance, But close within their lines attend their chance. 50 Unwilling, yet they keep the strict command, And sourly wait in arms the hostile band. A piebald steed of Thracian strain he press'd; 54 His helm of massy gold; and crimson was his crest. With twenty horse to second his designs, An unexpected foe, he fac'd the lines. "Is there (he said), in arms who bravely dare. His leader's honour and his danger share?" Then spurring on, his brandish'd dart he threw, 60 In sign of war :-applauding shouts ensue. Amaz'd to find a dastard race that run Behind the rampires, and the battle shun, And stops at ev'ry post, and ev'ry passage tries. 65 Wet with descending show'rs, and stiff with cold, He howls for hunger, and he grins for pain (His gnashing teeth are exercis'd in vain); And, impotent of anger, finds no way 70 In his distended paws to grasp the prey. navy 75 lies The mothers listen; but the bleating lambs 80 85 91 'Tis said, that, when the chief prepar'd his flight, And fell'd his timber from mount Ida's height, The grandame goddess then approach'd her son, 95 100 "Grant me (she said) the sole request I bring, The floating forests of the sacred pine: Then thus reply'd her awful son, who rolls 105 The radiant stars, and heav'n and earth controuls: What then is fate? Shall bold Æneas ride, Yet, what I can, I grant: when, wafted o'er, The chief is landed on the Latian shore, At my command shall change their fading forms To nymphs divine, and plough the watʼry way, Like Doto and the daughters of the sea." To seal his sacred vow, by Styx he swore, The lake of liquid pitch, the dreary shore, And Phlegethon's innavigable flood, And the black regions of his brother god.. 115 120 He said; and shook the skies with his imperial nod. And now at length the number'd hours were come, Prefix'd by fate's irrevocable doom, When the great mother of the gods was free 126 To save her ships, and finish Jove's decree. "O Trojan race! your needless aid forbear; 135 |