Whilst he was away, the camp was left in charge of his son Iulus, and as adjutant and counselor to the young prince he appointed his most experienced general, old Aletes.
But Juno, the implacable foe of Troy, had despatched to Turnus, the Rutulian Prince, her messenger Iris to tell him of Æneas' absence and bid him seize the occasion to storm the Trojan camp. So all day long the garrison, reduced in numbers and without its great captain, saw the tide of horse and foot, Latins, Rutulians, and Etruscans, gathering in the plain and sweeping onward to overwhelm them, like the Nile in full flood. As Æneas had bid them, they retired within their intrenchments, too strong to be carried at the first assault.
At nightfall the enemy withdrew, and the weary defenders lay down to sleep, but in fear of a night attack they ventured not to unbuckle their armor, and at each camp-gate was posted a strong guard of sentinels.
Conspicuous among the captains of the guard was Nisus, whom his mother, Ida, the world-famed huntress, had sent as squire to Æneas, no less skilled than his mother with javelin or with bow. With him as his lieutenant was Euryalus, the fairest youth, save Iulus alone, in all the Trojan host, the down of manhood just showing on his cheek, elsewise as round and smooth as a girl's.
The two were more than brothers-in-arms, inseparable as twin cherries on a single stalk; the one followed the other as his shadow, and their love was more than the love of man and maid.
And now as they kept watch together they thus conversed:
Nisus. I know not what ails me, brother, but to-night I feel a wild unrest, a strange prompting to be up and doing some doughty deed. What think you, brother? Is it an inspiration of heaven or only my own fiery spirit, pent up within these walls and fretting for the fray? Mark you, brother. The enemy's camp is silent as the tomb. Not a sentinel is stirring, and the rare watch-fires burn low. 'Tis plain to me that the captains, having driven us back to our trenches, have been celebrating their victory and are now buried in drunken slumber. Now I will expound to thee the plan that is working in my brain. At all hazards Æneas must be summoned back from the city of Evander—so our generals and men are all agreed. If only my proposal is accepted, methinks I have discovered a way to bear the message and work our deliverance.
Euryalus. Verily 'tis a glorious venture and well worth the risk, but thou speakest as if the venture were thine. Can I have heard thee aright? Truly, brother, the plan is thine, but the execution is ours. Thinkest thou, brother, alone to put thy head into the lion's mouth? Shall I not share thy triumph or thy death? In life we have been one, and in death we shall not be divided.
Nisus. Nay, brother, I never doubted thy courage or thy love. This thought alone, perhaps a selfish thought, was mine: if perchance I should fall—and sanguine as I am of success I know 'tis a perilous hazard—I would fain one sure friend survived to lay my body in mother earth, or if that grace is denied, at least to perform due rites at my cenotaph. I thought, moreover, that thou art the younger man and thy mother's only son.
Euryalus. Out on thy vain excuses! Only if thou takest me with thee will I forgive them. My mind is set. Let us to work.