"But thou, at least, with thine hot blood shalt pay the due award
For both," he cries; and therewithal, swift drawing forth the sword,
He falleth on Euryalus. Then, wild with all affright,
Nisus shrieks out, and cares no more to cloak himself with night,
And hath no heart to bear against so great a misery.
"On me, me! Here—I did the deed! turn ye the sword on me,
Rutulians!—all the guilt is mine: he might not do nor dare.
May heaven and those all-knowing stars true witness of it bear!
Only with too exceeding love he loved his hapless friend."429
Such words he poured forth, but the sword no less its way doth wend,
Piercing the flank and rending through the goodly breast of him;
And rolls Euryalus in death: in plenteous blood they swim
His lovely limbs, his drooping neck low on his shoulder lies:
As when the purple field-flower faints before the plough and dies,
Or poppies when they hang their heads on wearied stems outworn,
When haply by the rainy load their might is overborne.
Then Nisus falls amidst of them, and Volscens seeks alone
For aught that any man may do: save him he heedeth none.
About him throng the foe: all round the strokes on him are laid
To thrust him off: but on he bears, whirling his lightning blade,440
Till full in Volscens' shouting mouth he burieth it at last,
Tearing the life from out the foe, as forth his own life passed.
Then, ploughed with wounds, he cast him down upon his lifeless friend,
And so in quietness of death gat resting in the end.
O happy twain, if anywise my song-craft may avail,
From out the memory of the world no day shall blot your tale,
While on the rock-fast Capitol Æneas' house abides,
And while the Roman Father still the might of empire guides.
The Rutuli, victorious now with spoils and prey of war,
But sorrowing still, amid the camp the perished Volscens bore.450
Nor in the camp was grief the less, when they on Rhamnes came
Bloodless; and many a chief cut off by one death and the same;
Serranus dead and Numa dead: a many then they swarm
About the dead and dying men, and places wet and warm
With new-wrought death, and runnels full with plenteous foaming blood.
Then one by one the spoils they note; the glittering helm and good
Messapus owned: the gear such toil had won back from the dead.
But timely now Aurora left Tithonus' saffron bed,
And over earth went scattering wide the light of new-born day:
The sun-flood flowed, and all the world unveiled by daylight lay.460
Then Turnus, clad in arms himself, wakes up the host to arms,
And every lord to war-array bids on his brazen swarms;
And men with diverse tidings told their battle-anger whet.
Moreover (miserable sight!) on upraised spears they set
Those heads, and follow them about with most abundant noise,
Euryalus and Nisus dead.
Meanwhile Æneas' hardy sons upon their leftward wall
Stand in array; for on the right the river girdeth all.
In woe they ward the ditches deep, and on the towers on high469
Stand sorrowing; for those heads upreared touch all their hearts anigh,
Known overwell to their sad eyes mid the black flow of gore.
Therewith in wingèd fluttering haste, the trembling city o'er
Goes tell-tale Fame, and swift amidst the mother's ears doth glide;
And changed she was, nor in her bones the life-heat would abide:
The shuttle falls from out her hand, unrolled the web doth fall,
And with a woman's hapless shrieks she flieth to the wall:
Rending her hair, beside herself, she faced the front of fight,
Heedless of men, and haps of death, and all the weapons' flight,
And there the very heavens she filled with wailing of her grief:
"O son, and do I see thee so? Thou rest and last relief480
Of my old days! hadst thou the heart to leave me lone and spent?
O cruel! might I see thee not on such a peril sent?
Was there no time for one last word amid my misery?
A prey for Latin fowl and dogs how doth thy body lie,
On lands uncouth! Not e'en may I, thy mother, streak thee, son,
Thy body dead; or close thine eyes, or wash thy wounds well won,
Or shroud thee in the cloth I wrought for thee by night and day,
When hastening on the weaving-task I kept eld's cares at bay?
Where shall I seek thee? What earth hides thy body, mangled sore,
And perished limbs? O son, to me bringest thou back no more490
Than this? and have I followed this o'er every land and sea?
O pierce me through, if ye be kind; turn all your points on me,
Rutulians! Let me first of all with battle-steel be sped!
Father of Gods, have mercy thou! Thrust down the hated head
Beneath the House of Tartarus with thine own weapon's stress,
Since otherwise I may not break my life-days' bitterness."
Their hearts were shaken with her wail, and Sorrow fain will weep,
And in all men their battle-might unbroken lay asleep.
But Actor and Idæus take that flaming misery,
As bade Ilioneus, and young Iulus, sore as he500
Went weeping: back in arms therewith they bear her 'neath the roof.