by Virgil
Or scourge the loiterers: hot the work fares all along the road.
Ah Dido, when thou sawest all what heart in thee abode!
What groans thou gavest when thou saw’st from tower-top the long strand
A-boil with men all up and down; the sea on every hand
Before thine eyes by stir of men torn into all unrest!
O evil Love, where wilt thou not drive on a mortal breast?
Lo, she is driven to weep again and pray him to be kind,
And suppliant, in the bonds of love her lofty heart to bind,
Lest she should leave some way untried and die at last for nought.
“Anna, thou seest the strand astir, the men together brought
From every side, the canvas spread calling the breezes down.
While joyful on the quarter-deck the sea-folk lay the crown.
Sister, since I had might to think that such a thing could be,
I shall have might to bear it now: yet do one thing for me,
Poor wretch, O Anna: for to thee alone would he be kind,
That traitor, and would trust to thee the inmost of his mind;
And thou alone his softening ways and melting times dost know.
O sister, speak a suppliant word to that high-hearted foe:
I never swore at Aulis there to pluck up root and branch
The Trojan folk; for Pergamus no war-ship did I launch:
Anchises’ buried ghost from tomb I never tore away:
Why will his ears be ever deaf to any word I say?
Where hurrieth he? O let him give his wretched love one gift;
Let him but wait soft sailing-tide, when fair the breezes shift.
No longer for the wedding past, undone, I make my prayer,
Nor that he cast his lordship by, and promised Latium fair.
For empty time, for rest and stay of madness now I ask,
Till Fortune teach the overthrown to learn her weary task.
Sister, I pray this latest grace; O pity me today,
And manifold when I am dead the gift will I repay.”
So prayed she: such unhappy words of weeping Anna bears,
And bears again and o’er again: but him no weeping stirs,
Nor any voice he hearkeneth now may turn him from his road:
God shut the hero’s steadfast ears; fate in the way abode.
As when against a mighty oak, strong growth of many a year,
On this side and on that the blasts of Alpine Boreas bear,
Contending which shall root it up: forth goes the roar, deep lie
The driven leaves upon the earth from shaken bole on high.
But fast it clingeth to the crag, and high as goes its head
To heaven aloft, so deep adown to hell its roots are spread.
E’en so by ceaseless drift of words the hero every wise
Is battered, and the heavy care deep in his bosom lies;
Steadfast the will abides in him; the tears fall down for nought.
Ah, and unhappy Dido then the very death besought,
Outworn by fate: the hollow heaven has grown a sight to grieve.
And for the helping of her will, that she the light may leave,
She seeth, when mid the frankincense her offering she would lay,
The holy water blackening there, O horrible to say!
The wine poured forth turned into blood all loathly as it fell.
Which sight to none, not e’en unto her sister, would she tell.
Moreover, to her first-wed lord there stood amidst the house
A marble shrine, the which she loved with worship marvellous,
And bound it was with snowy wool and leafage of delight;
Thence heard she, when the earth was held in mirky hand of night,
Strange sounds come forth, and words as if her husband called his own.
And o’er and o’er his funeral song the screech-owl wailed alone,
And long his lamentable tale from high aloft was rolled.
And many a saying furthermore of god-loved seers of old
Fears her with dreadful memory: all wild amid her dreams
Cruel Æneas drives her on, and evermore she seems
Left all alone; and evermore a road that never ends,
Mateless, and seeking through the waste her Tyrian folk, she wends.
As raving Pentheus saw the rout of that Well-willing Folk,
When twofold sun and twofold Thebes upon his eyes outbroke:
Or like as Agamemnon’s son is driven across the stage,
Fleeing his mother’s fiery hand that bears the serpent’s rage,
While there the avenging Dreadful Ones upon the threshold sit.
But when she gave the horror birth, and, grief-worn, cherished it,
And doomed her death, then with herself she planned its time and guise,
And to her sister sorrowing sore spake word in such a wise,
Covering her end with cheerful face and calm and hopeful brow:
“Kinswoman, I have found a way, (joy with thy sister now!)
Whereby to bring him back to me or let me loose from him.
Adown beside the setting sun, hard on the ocean’s rim,
Lies the last world of Æthiops, where Atlas mightiest grown
Upon his shoulder turns the pole with burning stars bestrown.
A priestess thence I met erewhile, come of Massylian seed,
The warden of the West-maid’s fane, and wont the worm to feed,
Mingling for him the honey-juice with poppies bearing sleep,
Whereby she maketh shift on tree the hallowed bough to keep.
She by enchantment takes in hand to loose what hearts she will,
But other ones at need will she with heavy sorrows fill;
And she hath craft to turn the stars and back the waters beat,
Call up the ghosts that fare by night, make earth beneath thy feet
Cry out, and ancient ash-trees draw the mountain-side adown.
Dear heart, I swear upon the Gods, I swear on thee, mine own
And thy dear head, that I am loath with magic craft to play.
But privily amid the house a bale for burning lay
‘Neath the bare heaven, and pile on it the arms that evil one
Left in the chamber: all he wore, the bridal bed whereon
My days were lost: for so ’tis good: the priestess showeth me
All tokens of the wicked man must perish utterly.”
No more she spake, but with the word her face grew deadly white.
But Anna sees not how she veiled her death with new-found rite,
Nor any thought of such a deed her heart encompasseth;
Nor fears she heavier things to come than at Sychæus’ death.
Wherefore she takes the charge in hand.
But now the Queen, that bale being built amid the inner house
‘Neath the bare heavens, piled high with fir and cloven oak enow,
Hangeth the garlands round the place, and crowns the bale with bough
That dead men use: the weed he wore, his very effigy,
His sword, she lays upon the bed, well knowing what shall be.
There stand the altars, there the maid, wild with her scattered hair,
Calls Chaos, Erebus, and those three hundred godheads there,
And Hecate triply fashionèd to maiden Dian’s look;
Water she scattered, would-be wave of dark Avernus’ brook;
And herbs she brought, by brazen shears ‘neath moonlight harvested,
All downy-young, though inky milk of venomed ill they shed.
She brings the love-charm snatched away from brow of new-born foal
Ere yet the mother snatcheth it.
Dido herself the altars nigh, meal in her hallowed hands,
With one foot of its bindings bare, and ungirt raiment stands,
And dying calls upon the Gods, and stars that fateful fare;
And then if any godhead
is, mindful and just to care
For unloved lovers, unto that she sendeth up the prayer.
Now night it was, and everything on earth had won the grace
Of quiet sleep: the woods had rest, the wildered waters’ face:
It was the tide when stars roll on amid their courses due,
And all the tilth is hushed, and beasts, and birds of many a hue;
And all that is in waters wide, and what the waste doth keep
In thicket rough, amid the hush of night-tide lay asleep,
And slipping off the load of care forgat their toilsome part.
But ne’er might that Phoenician Queen, that most unhappy heart,
Sink into sleep, or take the night unto her eyes and breast:
Her sorrows grow, and love again swells up with all unrest,
And ever midst her troubled wrath rolls on a mighty tide;
And thus she broods and turns it o’er and o’er on every side.
“Ah, whither now? Shall I bemocked my early lovers try,
And go Numidian wedlock now on bended knee to buy:
I, who so often scorned to take their bridal-bearing hands?
Or shall I, following Ilian ships, bear uttermost commands
Of Teucrian men, because my help their lightened hearts makes kind;
Because the thank for deed I did lies ever on their mind?
But if I would, who giveth leave, or takes on scornful keel
The hated thing? Thou knowest not, lost wretch, thou may’st not feel,
What treason of Laomedon that folk for ever bears.
What then? and shall I follow lone the joyous mariners?
Or, hedged with all my Tyrian host, upon them shall I bear,
Driving again across the sea those whom I scarce might tear
From Sidon’s city, forcing them to spread their sails abroad?
Nay, stay thy grief with steel, and die, and reap thy due reward!
Thou, sister, conquered by my tears, wert first this bane to lay
On my mad soul, and cast my heart in that destroyer’s way.
Why was I not allowed to live without the bridal bed,
Sackless and free as beasts afield, with no woes wearièd?
Why kept I not the faith of old to my Sychæus sworn?”
Such wailing of unhappy words from out her breast was torn.
Æneas on the lofty deck meanwhile, assured of flight,
Was winning sleep, since every need of his was duly dight;
When lo! amid the dreams of sleep that shape of God come back,
Seemed once again to warn him thus: nor yet the face did lack
Nor anything of Mercury; both voice and hue was there,
And loveliness of youthful limbs and length of yellow hair:
“O Goddess-born, and canst thou sleep through such a tide as this?
And seest thou not how round about the peril gathered is?
And, witless, hear’st not Zephyr blow with gentle, happy wind?
For treason now and dreadful deed she turneth in her mind,
Assured of death; and diversely the tide of wrath sets in.
Why fleest thou not in haste away, while haste is yet to win?
Thou shalt behold the sea beat up with oar-blade, and the brand
Gleam dire against thee, and one flame shall run adown the strand,
If thee tomorrow’s dawn shall take still lingering on this shore.
Up! tarry not! for woman’s heart is shifting evermore.”
So saying, amid the mirk of night he mingled and was lost.
And therewithal Æneas, feared by sudden-flitting ghost,
Snatching his body forth from sleep, stirs up his folk at need:
“Wake ye, and hurry now, O men! get to the thwarts with speed,
And bustle to unfurl the sails! here sent from heaven again
A God hath spurred us on to flight, and biddeth hew atwain
The hempen twine. O holy God, we follow on thy way,
Whatso thou art; and glad once more thy bidding we obey.
O be with us! give gracious aid; set stars the heaven about
To bless our ways!”
And from the sheath his lightning sword flew out
E’en as he spake: with naked blade he smote the hawser through,
And all are kindled at his flame; they hurry and they do.
The shore is left, with crowd of keels the sight of sea is dim;
Eager they whirl the spray aloft, as o’er the blue they skim.
And now Aurora left alone Tithonus’ saffron bed,
And first light of another day across the world she shed.
But when the Queen from tower aloft beheld the dawn grow white,
And saw the ships upon their way with fair sails trimmed aright,
And all the haven shipless left, and reach of empty strand,
Then thrice and o’er again she smote her fair breast with her hand,
And rent her yellow hair, and cried, “Ah, Jove! and is he gone?
And shall a very stranger mock the lordship I have won?
Why arm they not? Why gather not from all the town in chase?
Ho ye! why run ye not the ships down from their standing-place?
Quick, bring the fire! shake out the sails! hard on the oars to sea!
— What words are these, or where am I? What madness changeth me?
Unhappy Dido! now at last thine evil deed strikes home.
Ah, better when thou mad’st him lord — lo whereunto are come
His faith and troth who erst, they say, his country’s house-gods held
The while he took upon his back his father spent with eld?
Why! might I not have shred him up, and scattered him piecemeal
About the sea, and slain his friends, his very son, with steel,
Ascanius on his father’s board for dainty meat to lay?
But doubtful, say ye, were the fate of battle? Yea, O yea!
What might I fear, who was to die? — if I had borne the fire
Among their camp, and filled his decks with flame, and son and sire
Quenched with their whole folk, and myself had cast upon it all!
— O Sun, whose flames on every deed earth doeth ever fall,
O Juno, setter-forth and seer of these our many woes,
Hecate, whose name howled out a-nights o’er city crossway goes,
Avenging Dread Ones, Gods that guard Elissa perishing,
O hearken! turn your might most meet against the evil thing!
O hearken these our prayers! and if the doom must surely stand,
And he, the wicked head, must gain the port and swim aland,
If Jove demand such fixèd fate and every change doth bar,
Yet let him faint mid weapon-strife and hardy folk of war!
And let him, exiled from his house, torn from Iulus, wend,
Beseeching help mid wretched death of many and many a friend.
And when at last he yieldeth him to pact of grinding peace,
Then short-lived let his lordship be, and lovèd life’s increase.
And let him fall before his day, unburied on the shore!
Lo this I pray, this last of words forth with my blood I pour.
And ye, O Tyrians, ‘gainst his race that is, and is to be,
Feed full your hate! When I am dead send down this gift to me:
No love betwixt the peoples twain, no troth for anything!
And thou, Avenger of my wrongs, from my dead bones outspring,
To bear the fire and the sword o’er Dardan-peopled earth
Now or hereafter; whensoe’er the day brings might to birth.
I pray the shore against the shore, the sea against the sea,
The sword ‘gainst sword — fight ye that are, and ye that are to be!”
So sayeth she, and everywise she turns about her mind
How ending of the loathèd light she speediest now may find.
And few words unto
Barce spake, Sychæus’ nurse of yore;
For the black ashes held her own upon the ancient shore:
“Dear nurse, my sister Anna now bring hither to my need,
And bid her for my sprinkling-tide the running water speed;
And bid her have the hosts with her, and due atoning things:
So let her come; but thou, thine head bind with the holy strings;
For I am minded now to end what I have set afoot,
And worship duly Stygian Jove and all my cares uproot;
Setting the flame beneath the bale of that Dardanian head.”
She spake; with hurrying of eld the nurse her footsteps sped.
But Dido, trembling, wild at heart with her most dread intent,
Rolling her blood-shot eyes about, her quivering cheeks besprent
With burning flecks, and otherwhere dead white with death drawn nigh
Burst through the inner doorways there and clomb the bale on high,
Fulfilled with utter madness now, and bared the Dardan blade,
Gift given not for such a work, for no such ending made.
There, when upon the Ilian gear her eyen had been set,
And bed well known, ‘twixt tears and thoughts awhile she lingered yet;
Then brooding low upon the bed her latest word she spake:
“O raiment dear to me while Gods and fate allowed, now take
This soul of mine and let me loose from all my woes at last!
I, I have lived, and down the way fate showed to me have passed;
And now a mighty shade of me shall go beneath the earth!
A glorious city have I raised, and brought my walls to birth,
Avenged my husband, made my foe, my brother, pay the pain:
Happy, ah, happy overmuch were all my life-days’ gain,
If never those Dardanian keels had drawn our shores anigh.”
She spake: her lips lay on the bed: “Ah, unavenged to die!
But let me die! Thus, thus ’tis good to go into the night!
Now let the cruel Dardan eyes drink in the bale-fire’s light,
And bear for sign across the sea this token of my death.”
Her speech had end: but on the steel, amid the last word’s breath,
They see her fallen; along the blade they see her blood foam out,
And all her hands besprent therewith: wild fly the shrieks about
The lofty halls, and Rumour runs mad through the smitten town.
The houses sound with women’s wails and lamentable groan;
The mighty clamour of their grief rings through the upper skies.
’Twas e’en as if all Carthage fell mid flood of enemies,
