Aeneid

Virgil

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

  1. Then rallied from the grove-clad, Iofty isle
  2. the Cyclops' clan, and lined the beach and bay.
  3. We saw each lonely eyeball glare in vain,
  4. as side by side those brothers Aetna-born
  5. stood towering high, a conclave dark and dire:
  6. as when, far up some mountain's famous crest,
  7. wind-fronting oaks or cone-clad cypresses
  8. have made assembling in the solemn hills,
  9. Jove's giant wood or Dian's sacred grove.
  10. We, terror-struck, would fly we knew not where,
  11. with loosened sheet and canvas swelling strong
  12. before a welcome wind; but Helenus
  13. bade us both Scylla and Charybdis fear,
  14. where 'twixt the twain death straitly hems the way;
  15. and so the counsel was to veer our bark
  16. the course it came. But lo! a northern gale
  17. burst o'er us from Pelorus' narrowed side,
  18. and on we rode far past Pantagia's bay
  19. of unhewn rock, and past the haven strong
  20. of Megara, and Thapsus Iying low.
  21. Such were the names retold, and such the shores
  22. shown us by Achemenides, whose fate
  23. made him familiar there, for he had sailed
  24. with evil-starred Ulysses o'er that sea.
  1. Off the Sicilian shore an island lies,
  2. wave-washed Plemmyrium, called in olden days
  3. Ortygia; here Alpheus, river-god,
  4. from Elis flowed by secret sluice, they say,
  5. beneath the sea, and mingles at thy mouth,
  6. fair Arethusa! with Sicilian waves.
  7. Our voices hailed the great gods of the land
  8. with reverent prayer; then skirted we the shore,
  9. where smooth Helorus floods the fruitful plain.
  10. Under Pachynus' beetling precipice
  11. we kept our course; then Camarina rose
  12. in distant view, firm-seated evermore
  13. by Fate's decree; and that far-spreading vale
  14. of Gela, with the name of power it takes
  15. from its wide river; and, uptowering far,
  16. the ramparts of proud Acragas appeared,
  17. where fiery steeds were bred in days of old.
  18. Borne by the winds, along thy coast I fled,
  19. Selinus, green with palm! and past the shore
  20. of Lilybaeum with its treacherous reef;
  21. till at the last the port of Drepanum
  22. received me to its melancholy strand.
  23. Here, woe is me I outworn by stormful seas,
  24. my sire, sole comfort of my grievous doom,
  25. Anchises ceased to be. O best of sires!
  26. Here didst thou leave me in the weary way;
  27. through all our perils—O the bitter loss! —
  28. borne safely, but in vain. King Helenus,
  29. whose prophet-tongue of dark events foretold,
  30. spoke not this woe; nor did Celeno's curse
  31. of this forebode. Such my last loss and pain;
  32. such, of my weary way, the destined goal.
  33. From thence departing, the divine behest
  34. impelled me to thy shores, O listening queen!
  1. Such was, while all gave ear, the tale sublime
  2. father Aeneas, none but he, set forth
  3. of wanderings and of dark decrees divine:
  4. silent at last, he ceased, and took repose.