"Ho, Lucagus! no dastard flight of steeds thy car betrayed,
No empty shadow turned them back from facing of the foe,
But thou thyself hast leapt from wheel and let the yoke-beasts go."
He spake, and caught the reins withal; slipped down that wretched one
His brother, and stretched forth the hands that little deed had done:
"By thee, by those that brought thee forth so glorious unto day,
O Trojan hero, spare my life, and pity me that pray!"
Æneas cut athwart his speech: "Not so erewhile ye spake.
Die! ill it were for brother thus a brother to forsake."600
And in his breast the sword he drave home to the house of breath.
Thus through the meads the Dardan Duke set forth the tale of death,
With rage as of the rushing flood, or whirl-storm of the wind.
At last they break forth into field and leave their camp behind,
Ascanius and the lads of war in vain beleaguerèd.
Meanwhile to Juno Jupiter set forth the speech and said:
"O thou who art my sister dear and sweetest wife in one,
'Tis Venus as thou deemedst, (nought thy counsel is undone),
Who upholds Trojan might forsooth: they lack fight-eager hand,
They lack fierce heart and steady soul the peril to withstand!"610
To whom spake Juno, meek of mood: "And why, O fairest lord,
Dost thou so vex me sad at heart, fearing thy heavy word?
But in my soul were love as strong as once it used to be,
And should be, thou though all of might wouldst ne'er deny it me,
That Turnus I should draw away from out the midst of fight,
That I might keep him safe to bless his father Daunus' sight.
Now let him die, let hallowed blood the Teucrian hate atone:
And yet indeed his name and race from blood of ours hath grown;
He from Pilumnus is put forth: yea, good gifts furthermore
His open hand full oft hath piled within thine holy door."620
To whom air-high Olympus' king short-worded answer made:
"If for the youth who soon must fall respite of death is prayed,
And tarrying-time, nor aught thou deem'st but that my doom must stand,
Then carry Turnus off by flight, snatch him from fate at hand.
So far thy longing may I please: but if a greater grace
Lurk 'neath thy prayers, and thou hast hope to change the battle's face,
And turmoil everything once more, thou feedest hope in vain."
Then Juno weeping: "Ah, but if thy heart should give the gain
Thy voice begrudgeth! if 'twere doomed that he in life abide—
But ill-end dogs the sackless man, unless I wander wide630
Away from sooth—Ah, yet may I be mocked of fear-wrought lies,
And may thy rede as thou hast might be turned to better wise."
She spake the word and cast herself adown from heaven the high,
Girt round with rain-cloud, driving on a storm amid the sky,
And that Laurentian leaguer sought and Ilium's hedge of fight.
And there she fashioned of the cloud a shadow lacking might:
With image of Æneas' shape the wondrous show is drest,
She decks it with the Dardan spear and shield, and mocks the crest
Of that all-godlike head, and gives a speech that empty flows,
Sound without soul, and counterfeits the gait wherewith he goes,—640
As dead men's images they say about the air will sweep,
Or as the senses weary-drenched are mocked with dreams of sleep.
But in the forefront of the fight war-merry goes the thing,
And cries the warrior on with words and weapons brandishing:
On whom falls Turnus, and afar hurleth his whizzing spear:
Then turns the phantom back about and fleeth as in fear.
Then verily when Turnus deemed he saw Æneas fled.
With all the emptiness of hope his headlong heart he fed:
"Where fleest thou, Æneas, then? why leave thy plighted bride?649
This hand shall give thee earth thou sought'st so far across the tide."
So cries he following, brandishing his naked sword on high,
Nor sees what wise adown the wind his battle-bliss goes by.
By hap a ship was moored anear unto a ledgy stone,
With ladders out and landing-bridge all ready to let down,
That late the King Orsinius bore from Clusium o'er the sea;
And thereinto the hurrying lie, Æneas' shape, did flee,
And down its lurking-places dived: but Turnus none the more
Hangs back, but beating down delay swift runs the high bridge o'er.
Scarce on the prow, ere Juno brake the mooring-rope atwain,
And rapt the sundered ship away o'er back-draught of the main.660
And there afar from fight is he on whom Æneas cries,
Still sending down to death's abode an host of enemies;
Nor any more the image then will seek his shape to shroud,
But flying upward blendeth him amid the mirky cloud.