Aeneid

Virgil

Vergil. The Aeneid of Virgil. Williams, Theodore, C, translator. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1910.

  1. ‘Latona's daughter, whose benignant grace
  2. protects this grove, behold, her father now
  3. gives thee this babe for handmaid! Lo, thy spear
  4. her infant fingers hold, as from her foes
  5. she flies a suppliant to thee! Receive,
  6. O goddess, I implore, what now I cast
  7. upon the perilous air.’—He spoke, and hurled
  8. with lifted arm the whirling shaft. The waves
  9. roared loud, as on the whistling javelin
  10. hapless Camilla crossed th' impetuous flood.
  11. But Metabus, his foes in hot pursuit,
  12. dared plunge him in mid-stream, and, triumphing,
  13. soon plucked from grass-grown river-bank the spear,
  14. the child upon it,—now to Trivia vowed,
  15. a virgin offering. Him nevermore
  16. could cities hold, nor would his wild heart yield
  17. its sylvan freedom, but his days were passed
  18. with shepherds on the solitary hills.
  19. His daughter too in tangled woods he bred:
  20. a brood-mare from the milk of her fierce breast
  21. suckled the child, and to its tender lips
  22. .Her udders moved; and when the infant feet
  23. their first firm steps had taken, the small palms
  24. were armed with a keen javelin; her sire
  25. a bow and quiver from her shoulder slung.
  26. Instead of golden combs and flowing pall,
  27. she wore, from her girl-forehead backward thrown,
  28. the whole skin of a tigress; with soft hands
  29. she made her plaything of a whirling spear,
  30. or, swinging round her head the polished thong
  31. of her good sling, she fetched from distant sky
  32. Strymonian cranes or swans of spotless wing.
  33. From Tuscan towns proud matrons oft in vain
  34. sought her in marriage for their sons; but she
  35. to Dian only turned her stainless heart,
  36. her virgin freedom and her huntress' arms
  37. with faithful passion serving. Would that now
  38. this Iove of war had ne'er seduced her mind
  39. the Teucrians to provoke! So might she be
  40. one of our wood-nymphs still. But haste, I pray,
  41. for bitter is her now impending doom.
  42. Descend, dear nymph, from heaven, and explore
  43. the country of the Latins, where the fight
  44. with unpropitious omens now begins.
  45. These weapons take, and from this quiver draw
  46. a vengeful arrow, wherewith he who dares
  47. to wound her sacred body, though he be
  48. a Trojan or Italian, shall receive
  49. bloody and swift reward at my command.
  50. Then, in a cloud concealed, I will consign
  51. her corpse, ill-fated but inviolate
  52. unto the sepulchre, restoring so
  53. the virgin to her native land.” Thus spake
  54. the goddess; but her handmaid, gliding down,
  55. took her loud pathway on the moving winds,
  56. and mantled in dark storm her shape divine.