Aeneid

Virgil

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

  1. After these things Jove gave his kingly mind
  2. to further action, that he might forthwith
  3. cut off Juturna from her brother's cause.
  4. Two plagues there be, called Furies, which were spawned
  5. at one birth from the womb of wrathful Night
  6. with dread Megaera, phantom out of hell;
  7. and of their mother's gift, each Fury wears
  8. grim-coiling serpents and tempestuous wings.
  9. These at Jove's throne attend, and watch the doors
  10. of that stern King—to whet the edge of fear
  11. for wretched mortals, when the King of gods
  12. hurls pestilence and death, or terrifies
  13. offending nations with the scourge of war.
  14. 'T was one of these which Jove sent speeding down
  15. from his ethereal seat, and bade her cross
  16. the pathway of Juturna for a sign.
  17. Her wings she spread, and earthward seemed to ride
  18. upon a whirling storm. As when some shaft,
  19. with Parthian poison tipped or Cretan gall,
  20. a barb of death, shoots cloudward from the bow,
  21. and hissing through the dark hastes forth unseen:
  22. so earthward flew that daughter of the night.
  23. Soon as she spied the Teucrians in array
  24. and Turnus' lines, she shrivelled to the shape
  25. of that small bird which on lone tombs and towers
  26. sits perching through the midnight, and prolongs
  27. in shadow and deep gloom her troubling cry.
  28. In such disguise the Fury, screaming shrill,
  29. flitted in Turnus' face, and with her wings
  30. smote on his hollow shield. A strange affright
  31. palsied his every limb; each several hair
  32. lifted with horror, and his gasping voice
  33. died on his lips. But when Juturna knew
  34. from far the shrieking fiend's infernal wing,
  35. she loosed her tresses, and their beauty tore,
  36. to tell a sister's woe; with clenching hands
  37. she marred her cheeks and beat her naked breast.
  38. “What remedy or help, my Turnus, now
  39. is in a sister's power? What way remains
  40. for stubborn me? Or with what further guile
  41. thy life prolong? What can my strength oppose
  42. to this foul thing? I quit the strife at last.
  43. Withdraw thy terror from my fearful eyes,
  44. thou bird accurst! The tumult of thy wings
  45. I know full well, and thy death-boding call.
  46. The harsh decrees of that large-minded Jove
  47. I plainly see. Is this the price he pays
  48. for my lost maidenhood? Why flatter me
  49. with immortality, and snatch away
  50. my property of death? What boon it were
  51. to end this grief this hour, and hie away
  52. to be my brother's helpmeet in his grave!
  53. I, an immortal? O, what dear delight
  54. is mine, sweet brother, living without thee?
  55. O, where will earth yawn deep enough and wide
  56. to hide a goddess with the ghosts below?”
  57. She spoke; and veiled in glistening mantle gray
  58. her mournful brow; then in her stream divine
  59. the nymph sank sighing to its utmost cave.