Aeneid

Virgil

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

  1. Messapus came, steed-tamer, Neptune's son,
  2. by sword and fire invincible: this day,
  3. though mild his people and unschooled in war,
  4. he calls them to embattled lines, and draws
  5. no lingering sword. Fescennia musters there,
  6. Aequi Falisci, and what clans possess
  7. Soracte's heights, Flavinia's fruitful farms,
  8. Ciminian lake and mountain, and the groves
  9. about Capena. Rank on rank they move,
  10. loud singing of their chieftain's praise: as when
  11. a flock of snowy swans through clouded air
  12. return from feeding, and make tuneful cry
  13. from their long throats, while Asia's rivers hear,
  14. and lone Cayster's startled moorland rings:
  15. for hardly could the listening ear discern
  16. the war-cry of a mail-clad host; the sound
  17. was like shrill-calling birds, when home from sea
  18. their soaring flock moves shoreward like a cloud.