The Æneids of Virgil, Done into English Verse

by Virgil

Then so began the seer to speak: "O glorious Teucrian lord,
On wicked threshold of the place no righteous foot may stand:
But when great Hecate made me Queen of that Avernus land,
She taught me of God's punishments and led me down the path.
—There Gnosian Rhadamanthus now most heavy lordship hath,
And heareth lies, and punisheth, and maketh men confess
Their deeds of earth, whereof made glad by foolish wickedness,
They thrust the late repentance off till death drew nigh to grip:
Those guilty drives Tisiphone, armed with avenging whip,570
And mocks their writhings, casting forth her other dreadful hand
Filled with the snakes, and crying on her cruel sister's band.
And then at last on awful hinge loud-clanging opens wide
The Door of Doom:—and lo, behold what door-ward doth abide
Within the porch, what thing it is the city gate doth hold!
More dreadful yet the Water-worm, with black mouth fiftyfold,
Hath dwelling in the inner parts. Then Tartarus aright
Gapes sheer adown; and twice so far it thrusteth under night
As up unto the roof of heaven Olympus lifteth high:
And there the ancient race of Earth, the Titan children, lie,580
Cast down by thunder, wallowing in bottomless abode.
There of the twin Aloidæ the monstrous bodies' load
I saw; who fell on mighty heaven to cleave it with their hands,
That they might pluck the Father Jove from out his glorious lands;
And Salmoneus I saw withal, paying the cruel pain
That fire of Jove and heaven's own voice on earth he needs must feign:
He, drawn by fourfold rush of steeds, and shaking torches' glare,
Amidmost of the Grecian folks, amidst of Elis fair,
Went glorying, and the name of God and utter worship sought.
O fool! the glory of the storm, and lightning like to nought,590
He feigned with rattling copper things and beat of horny hoof.
Him the Almighty Father smote from cloudy rack aloof,
But never brand nor pitchy flame of smoky pine-tree cast,
As headlong there he drave him down amid the whirling blast.
And Tityon, too, the child of Earth, great Mother of all things,
There may ye see: nine acres' space his mighty frame he flings;
His deathless liver still is cropped by that huge vulture's beak
That evermore his daily meat doth mid his inwards seek,
Fruitful of woe, and hath his home beneath his mighty breast:
Whose heart-strings eaten, and new-born shall never know of rest.600
Of Lapithæ, Pirithoüs, Ixion, what a tale!
O'er whom the black crag hangs, that slips, and slips, and ne'er shall fail
To seem to fall. The golden feet of feast beds glitter bright,
And there in manner of the kings is glorious banquet dight.
But lo, the Furies' eldest-born is crouched beside it there,
And banneth one and all of them hand on the board to bear,
And riseth up with tossing torch, and crieth, thundering loud.
Here they that hated brethren sore while yet their life abode,
The father-smiters, they that drew the client-catching net,
The brooders over treasure found in earth, who never yet610
Would share one penny with their friends—and crowded thick these are—
Those slain within another's bed; the followers up of war
Unrighteous; they no whit ashamed their masters' hand to fail,
Here prisoned bide the penalty: seek not to know their tale
Of punishment; what fate it is o'erwhelmeth such a folk.
Some roll huge stones; some hang adown, fast bound to tire or spoke
Of mighty wheels. There sitteth now, and shall sit evermore
Theseus undone: wretch Phlegyas is crying o'er and o'er
His warning, and in mighty voice through dim night testifies:
'Be warned, and learn of righteousness, nor holy Gods despise.'620
This sold his fatherland for gold; this tyrant on it laid;
This for a price made laws for men, for price the laws unmade:
This broke into his daughter's bed and wedding-tide accursed:
All dared to think of monstrous deed, and did the deed they durst.
Nor, had I now an hundred mouths, an hundred tongues at need,
An iron voice, might I tell o'er all guise of evil deed,
Or run adown the names of woe those evil deeds are worth."

So when Apollo's ancient seer such words had given forth:
"Now to the road! fulfil the gift that we so far have brought!629
Haste on!" she saith, "I see the walls in Cyclops' furnace wrought;
And now the opening of the gates is lying full in face,
Where we are bidden lay adown the gift that brings us grace."

She spake, and through the dusk of ways on side by side they wend,
And wear the space betwixt, and reach the doorway in the end.
Æneas at the entering in bedews his body o'er
With water fresh, and sets the bough in threshold of the door.
So, all being done, the Goddess' gift well paid in manner meet,
They come into a joyous land, and green-sward fair and sweet
Amid the happiness of groves, the blessèd dwelling-place.
Therein a more abundant heaven clothes all the meadows' face640
With purple light, and their own sun and their own stars they have.
Here some in games upon the grass their bodies breathing gave;
Or on the yellow face of sand they strive and play the play;
Some beat the earth with dancing foot, and some, the song they say:
And there withal the Thracian man in flowing raiment sings
Unto the measure of the dance on seven-folded strings;
And now he smites with finger-touch, and now with ivory reed.
And here is Teucer's race of old, most lovely sons indeed;
High-hearted heroes born on earth in better days of joy:
Ilus was there, Assaracus, and he who builded Troy,650
E'en Dardanus. Far off are seen their empty wains of war
And war-weed: stand the spears in earth, unyoked the horses are,
And graze the meadows all about; for even as they loved
Chariot and weapons, yet alive, and e'en as they were moved
To feed sleek horses, under earth doth e'en such joy abide.
Others he saw to right and left about the meadows wide
Feasting; or joining merry mouths to sing the battle won
Amidst the scented laurel grove, whence earthward rolleth on
The full flood that Eridanus athwart the wood doth pour.
Lo, they who in their country's fight sword-wounded bodies bore;660
Lo, priests of holy life and chaste, while they in life had part;
Lo, God-loved poets, men who spake things worthy Phœbus' heart:
And they who bettered life on earth by new-found mastery;
And they whose good deeds left a tale for men to name them by:
And all they had their brows about with snowy fillets bound.

Now unto them the Sibyl spake as there they flowed around,—
Unto Musæus first; for him midmost the crowd enfolds
Higher than all from shoulders up, and reverently beholds:
"Say, happy souls, and thou, O bard, the best earth ever bare,
What land, what place Anchises hath? for whose sake came we here,670
And swam the floods of Erebus and every mighty wave."

Then, lightly answering her again, few words the hero gave:
"None hath a certain dwelling-place; in shady groves we bide,
And meadows fresh with running streams, and beds by river-side:
But if such longing and so sore the heart within you hath,
O'ertop yon ridge and I will set your feet in easy path."

He spake and footed it afore, and showeth from above
The shining meads; and thence away from hill-top down they move.

But Sire Anchises deep adown in green-grown valley lay,
And on the spirits prisoned there, but soon to wend to day,680
Was gazing with a fond desire: of all his coming ones
There was he reckoning up the tale, and well-loved sons of sons:
Their fate, their haps, their ways of life, their deeds to come to pass.
But when he saw Æneas now draw nigh athwart the grass,
He stretched forth either palm to him all eager, and the tears
Poured o'er his cheeks, and speech withal forth from his mouth there fares:

"O come at last, and hath the love, thy father hoped for, won
O'er the hard way, and may I now look on thy face, O son,
And give and take with thee in talk, and hear the words I know?
So verily my mind forebode, I deemed 'twas coming so,690
And counted all the days thereto; nor was my longing vain.
And now I have thee, son, borne o'er what lands, how many a main!
How tossed about on every side by every peril still!
Ah, how I feared lest Libyan land should bring thee unto ill!"

Then he: "O father, thou it was, thine image sad it was,
That, coming o'er and o'er again, drave me these doors to pass:
My ships lie in the Tyrrhene salt—ah, give the hand I lack!
Give it, my father; neither thus from my embrace draw back!"

His face was wet with plenteous tears e'en as the word he spake,
And thrice the neck of him beloved he strove in arms to take;700
And thrice away from out his hands the gathered image streams,
E'en as the breathing of the wind or wingèd thing of dreams.