'Twas Nursæ in the heart of hills sent thee to battle-clash,
O Ufens, well renowned of fame, and rich in battle's grace;
Whose folk are roughest lived of men, eager for woodland chase;
Æquiculi they hight; who dwell on land of little gain,
And ever armed they till the earth, and ever are they fain
To drive the spoil from hour to hour, and live upon the prey.
Then Umbro of the hardy heart went on the battle-way;750
Priest was he of Marruvian folk; about his helm was bent
The happy olive, leaf and twig: him King Archippus sent:
Wont was he with his hand and voice the bitter viper-kind
And water-worms of evil breath in bonds of sleep to bind;
And he would soothe the wrath of them, and dull their bite by craft,
Yet nothing might he heal the hurt that came of Dardan shaft;
Nay, nothing might the sleepy song avail against his bane,
All herbs on Marsian mountains plucked were nought thereto and vain.
Anguitia's thicket wept for thee, Fucinus wave of glass,
The thin wan waters wept for thee.760
Most goodly Virbius went to war, Hippolytus' own son:
His mother fair Aricia sent this battle-glorious one
From fostering of Egeria's wood, from out the marish place
Where standeth Dian's altar rich fulfilled of plenteous grace.
For folk say, when Hippolytus, undone by step-dame's lie,
Had paid unto his father's wrath that utmost penalty,
He, piecemeal torn by maddened steeds, yet came aback to live
Beneath the starry firmament, and air that heaven doth give,
Brought back to life by healing herbs and Dian's cherishing:
Then the Almighty Father, wroth that any mortal thing770
Should rise again to light of life from nether shadows wan,
Beat down with bolt to Stygian wave the Phœbus-gotten man,
The finder of such healing craft, the wise in such an art.
But Trivia's lovingkindness hid Hippolytus apart,
And in the nymph Egeria's wood she held him many a day:
Alone in woods of Italy he wore his life away,
Deedless, his very name all changed, and Virbius by-named then.
So for this cause to Trivia's fane and hallowed grove do men
Drive horn-foot steeds, because, o'ercome by sea-beasts dread of yore,
Piecemeal the chariot and the man they strewed about the shore.780
No less his son would drive the steeds across the level plain
For all their heat, and rush to war aloft in battle-wain.
Now mid the forefront Turnus self of body excellent,
Strode sword in hand: there by the head all others he outwent:
His threefold crested helm upbore Chimæra in her wrath;
Where very flame of Ætna's womb her jaws were pouring forth;
And fiercer of her flames was she, and madder of her mood
As bloomed the battle young again with more abundant blood.
But on the smoothness of his shield was golden Io shown
With upraised horns, with hairy skin, a very heifer grown,—790
A noble tale;—and Argus there was wrought, the maiden's ward;
And father Inachus from bowl well wrought the river poured.
A cloud of foot-folk follow him; his shielded people throng
The meadows all about; forth goes the Argive manhood strong;
Aruncan men and Rutuli, Sicanians of old years,
Sacranian folk, Labicus' band the blazoned shield-bearers:
Thy thicket-biders, Tiber; those that holy acres till
Beside Numicus, those that plough Rutulian holt and hill,
And ridges of Circæi: they whose meadows Anxur Jove
Looks down on, where Feronia joys amid her fair green grove;800
Where Satura's black marish lies, where chilly Ufens glides,
Seeking a way through lowest dales, till in the sea he hides.
And after these from Volscian folk doth fair Camilla pass,
Leading a mighty host of horse all blossoming with brass;
A warrior maid, whose woman's hands unused to ply the rock,
Unused to bear Minerva's crate, were wise in battle's shock.
The very winds might she outgo with hurrying maiden feet,
Or speed across the topmost blades of tall unsmitten wheat,
Nor ever hurt the tender ears below her as she ran;
Or she might walk the middle sea, and cross the welter wan,810
Nor dip the nimble soles of her amid the wavy ways.
From house and field the youth pours forth to wonder and to gaze;
The crowd of mothers stands at stare all marvelling, and beholds
Her going forth; how kingly cloak of purple dye enfolds
Her shining shoulders, how the clasp of gold knots up her hair,
And how a quiver Lycian-wrought the Queen herself doth bear,
And shepherd's staff of myrtle-wood steel-headed to a spear.