The Aeneid of Virgil

by Virgil

Here fortune changed, not keeping faith; for Juno,
While the ritual of sport went on, sent Iris,
With a fair wind, to the Trojan fleet. She was angry,
Still, and the ancient grudge unsatisfied,
And Iris, over her thousand-colored rainbow,
Ran her swift path, unseen, beheld the crowd,
Surveyed the shore, harbor and fleet deserted,
While far off on the lonely coast the women
Mourned for Anchises lost, weeping and watching
The unfathomable deep. “For weary people,
Alas! how much remains, of shoal and ocean!”
So ran the common sigh. They crave a city,
They are tired of bearing the vast toil of sailing,
And into their midst came Iris, versed in mischief,
Laying aside her goddess-guise, becoming
Old Beroe, Doryclus’ wife, who sometime
Had children, fame, and lineage. Now Iris,
Resembling her, came down to the Trojan mothers.
“Alas for us!” she cried, “on whom the Greeks
Never laid hands, to drag us down to death
Before our native walls! Unfortunate people,
For what is fortune saving us, what doom,
What dying? It is seven weary summers
Since Troy’s destruction, and still we wander over
All lands, all seas, with rocks and stars forever
Implacable, as we go on pursuing
A land that flees forever over the waters.
Here lived our brother Eryx, here we find
A welcomer, king Acestes; who forbids us
To found the walls, to build our city here?
O fatherland, O household gods in vain
Saved from the Greeks, will there never be any walls
For Troy again? No Simois or Xanthus,
The rivers Hector loved? Come with me, burn
These vessels of ill-omen. Let me tell you,
I have been given warnings; in a dream
I saw Cassandra, she was giving me firebrands,
Here seek your Troy, here is your home, she told me;
It is time for us to act, be quick about it!
Neptune himself, with fire on these four altars,
Provides the method, and the resolution.”

She was the first to seize a brand; she raised it
Above her head, and swung it, streaming and glowing,
And flung it forth. The women, for a moment,
Stood in bewilderment, and one, the oldest,
Named Pyrgo, nurse to Priam’s many children,
Cried out:—“This is no Beroe, I tell you,
Mothers! Look at her flashing eyes, her spirit,
Her stride, her features; every mark of the goddess
Attends her presence. Beroe I myself
Have just now come from; she lies ill and grieving
All by herself, in sorrow for her absence
From reverence for Anchises.”

As they gazed
Doubtfully at the ships, with sullen eyes,
Distracted, torn between a sickly yearning
For present land and rest, and the kingdoms calling
Them fatefully over the sea, the goddess, cleaving
The air on her bright pinions, rose to heaven.
They were shaken then, amazed, and frenzy-driven;
They cried aloud; tore fire from the hearths and altars;
Made tinder of the altar-decorations,
The garlandry and wreaths. And the fire, let loose,
Rioted over thwarts and oars and rigging.

To theatre and tomb Eumelus brought
Word of the ships on fire; and the men could see
The black ash billowing in the smoky cloud,
And first Ascanius, as full of spirit
As when he led the games, rushed to the trouble
As fast as he could ride; no troubled masters
Could hold him back. “Poor things, what are you doing?
What craziness is this? what are you up to?
It is no Greek camp, no enemy you’re burning
But your own hopes! Look at me! Here I am,
Your own Ascanius!” And before their feet
He flung the helmet he had worn when leading
The little war-game. And Aeneas hurried
With others to the troubled camp. The women
Scattered and fled along the shore, in terror
And guilt, wherever they could, to hiding-places
In woods or caves in the rock; they are ashamed
Of daylight and their deed; Juno is shaken
Out of their hearts, and they recognize their own.
That does not stop the fire; it burns in fury
Under wet oak, tow smoulders, and the stubborn
Steam eats the keels away, destruction seizing
On deck and hull, and water can not quench it,
Nor any strength of men. Tearing his garment
Loose from his shoulders, Aeneas prays to heaven:—
“Almighty Jove, if the Trojans are not hateful
To the last man, if any record of goodness
Alleviates human trouble, let our fleet
Escape this flame, O father; save from doom
This little Trojan remnant; or with lightning,
If I deserve it, strike us down forever!”
He had scarcely spoken, when a cloudburst fell
Full force, with darkness and black tempest streaming,
And thunder rumbling over plain and hillock,
The whole sky pouring rain; the ships were drowned
With water from above, the half-burnt timbers
Were soaked, and the hiss of steam died out; four vessels
Were gone, the others rescued from disaster.

And now Aeneas, stunned by the bitter evil,
Was troubled at heart, uncertain, anxious, grieving:
What could be done? forget the call of the fates
And settle here in Sicily, or keep on
To the coast of Italy? An old man, Nautes,
Whom Pallas had instructed in deep wisdom,
Gave him the answer. “Goddess-born, wherever
Fate pulls or hauls us, there we have to follow;
Whatever happens, fortune can be beaten
By nothing but endurance. We have here
A friend, Acestes, Trojan-born, divine
In parentage; make him an ally in counsel,
Partner in enterprise; to him hand over
The ones whose ships are lost, and all the weary,
The sick and tired, the old men, and the mothers
Who have had too much of the sea, and the faint-hearted,
Whose weariness may find a city for them
Here in this land; Acesta, let them call it.”
The old man’s words still troubled him; the mind
Was torn this way and that. Night rode the heavens
In her dark chariot, and there came from the darkness
The image of Anchises, speaking to him
In words of comfort:—“Son, more dear to me
Than life, when life was mine; son, sorely troubled
By Trojan fate, I come at Jove’s command,
Who drove the fire away, and from the heaven
Has taken pity. Obey the words of Nautes,
He gives the best of counsel; the flower of the youth,
The bravest hearts, lead on to Italy.
There will be trouble there, a rugged people
Must be subdued in Latium. Come to meet me,
First, in the lower world; come through Avernus
To find me, son. Tartarus’ evil prison
Of gloomy shades I know not, for I dwell
Among the happy spirits in Elysium.
Black sheep are good for sacrifice. The Sibyl,
A holy guide, will lead the way, foretelling
The race to come, the given walls. Farewell,
My son; the dewy night is almost over,
I feel the breath of the morning’s cruel horses.”
He spoke, and vanished, smoke into airy thinness,
From the cries of his son, who woke, and roused the embers
Of the drowsing altar-fires, with meal and censer
Propitiating Vesta, making worship
To Trojan household gods.

And called Acestes
And the Trojan counsellors, told them of Jove
And his good father’s orders, the decision
He has reached at last. They all agree, Acestes
Accepts the trust. They make a roll for the city,
The women-folk, the people willing to linger,
The unadventurous; and they make ready
The thwarts again, replace the fire-scorched timbers,
Fit out new oars and rigging. There are not many,
But a living company, for war brave-hearted.
Aeneas ploughs the limits for the city,
Sets out new homes, Ilium, again, and Troy,
A kingdom welcome to Acestes, senate
And courts, and laws, established; and a shrine
High on the crest of Eryx, is given Venus,
Near the high stars, and a priest assigned as warden
To the wide boundaries of Anchises’ grove.

Nine days they hold farewells, one tribe together
For the last time, with honor at the altars,
And seas are calm, and winds go down, and the whisper
Of a little breeze calls to the sail; the shore
Hears a great wail arise; they cling to each other
All through the night and day. Even the mothers,
The weary men, to whom the face of the sea
Once seemed so cruel, and its very name
A menacing monster, want to go now, willing
For all the toil of exile. These Aeneas
Comforts with friendly words, and bids Acestes
Be their good brother. Then he slays to Eryx
Three bullocks, and a lamb to the gods of storm-cloud.
It is time to loose the cables. At the bow
He stands, his temples garlanded with olive,
Makes to the sea libation of wine and entrails,
And the wind comes up astern, and they sweep the waters
In happy rivalry.

But meanwhile Venus,
Driven by worry, went to Neptune, pouring
Complaints from a full heart:—“Neptune, the anger
Of Juno, her insatiable vengeance,
Which neither time nor any goodness softens,
Drives me to humble prayer. She never weakens
For Jove’s command, nor the orders of the fates;
It is not enough for her that the Trojan city
Is quite consumed by hatred, and the remnants
Of that poor town harried all over the world
With every kind of punishment; she still follows
Even their bones and ashes. She may know
The reasons for that wrath of hers. Remember
How great a weight of water she stirred up lately
In the Libyan seas, confusing sky and ocean,
With Aeolus conspiring, and in your kingdom!
And now her crime has driven the Trojan mothers
To burn their ships, to give their comrades over
To a coast unknown. Let what is left come safely
Over the sea, to reach Laurentian Tiber,
If what I ask is just, if those are walls
Due them by fate’s decree.”

And Neptune answered:—
“None has a better right to trust my kingdom
Than the goddess born of the sea-foam. And I have earned
This confidence. I have often checked the anger
Of sea and sky. And the rivers of Troy are witness
I have helped on land as well, and saved Aeneas.
When thousands died at Troy, with fierce Achilles
In hot pursuit, and the rivers groaned, and Xanthus
Could hardly find the sea, I formed a cloud
Around Aeneas, when he met Achilles
With the gods adverse, and no great strength to help him
I rescued him, in spite of my own anger
At the perjury of Troy, in spite of my passion
To raze the walls I had built. Now too my purpose
Remains; have done with fear; he will reach in safety
The haven of Avernus; the prayer is granted.
Let one be lost in the flood, one life alone
Be given for the many.”

This comfort given,
To bring the goddess joy, he yoked his horses,
Gold bridle, foaming bit, and sent them flying
With the lightest touch of the reins, skimming the surface
In the bright blue car; and the waves went down, the axle
Subdued the swell of the wave, and storm-clouds melted
To nothing in the sky, and his attendants
Followed along, great whales, and ancient Glaucus,
Palaemon, Ino’s son, and the rushing Tritons,
The army of Phorcus, Melite and Thetis
Watching the left, and the maiden Panopea,
Cymodoce and Thalia and Spio,
So that Aeneas, in his turn, was happy,
Less anxious at heart. The masts are raised, and sail
Stretched from the halyards; right and left they bend
The canvas to fair winds: at the head of the fleet
Rides Palinurus, and the others follow,
As ordered, close behind him; dewy night
Has reached mid-heaven, while the sailors, sleeping,
Relax on the hard benches under the oars,
All calm, all quiet. And the god of Sleep
Parting the shadowy air, comes gently down,
Looking for Palinurus, bringing him,
A guiltless man, ill-omened dreams. He settles
On the high stern, a god disguised as a man,
Speaking in Phorbas’ guise, “O Palinurus,
The fleet rides smoothly in the even weather,
The hour is given for rest. Lay down the head,
Rest the tired eyes from toil. I will take over
A little while.” But Palinurus, barely
Lifting his eyes, made answer: “Trust the waves,
However quiet? trust a peaceful ocean?
Put faith in such a monster? Never! I
Have been too often fooled by the clear stars
To trust Aeneas to their faithless keeping.”
And so he clung to the tiller, never loosed
His hand from the wood, his eyes from the fair heaven.
But lo, the god over his temples shook
A bough that dripped with dew from Lethe, steeped
With Stygian magic, so the swimming eyes,
Against his effort close, blink open, close
Again, and slumber takes the drowsy limbs.
Bending above him, leaning over, the god
Shoves him, still clinging to the tiller, calling
His comrades vainly, into the clear waves.
And the god is gone like a bird to the clear air,
And the fleet is going safely over its journey
As Neptune promised. But the rocks were near,
The Siren-cliffs, most perilous of old,
White with the bones of many mariners,
Loud with their hoarse eternal warning sound.
Aeneas starts from sleep, aware, somehow,
Of a lost pilot, and a vessel drifting,
Himself takes over guidance, with a sigh
And heartache for a friend’s mishap, “Alas,
Too trustful in the calm of sea and sky,
O Palinurus, on an unknown shore,
You will be lying, naked.”