The Aeneid, Virgil [ebook audio reader .txt] 📗

’Twas dead of night; when to his slumb’ring eyes
His father’s shade descended from the skies,
And thus he spoke: “O more than vital breath,
Lov’d while I liv’d, and dear ev’n after death;
O son, in various toils and troubles toss’d,
The King of Heav’n employs my careful ghost
On his commands: the god, who sav’d from fire
Your flaming fleet, and heard your just desire.
The wholesome counsel of your friend receive,
And here the coward train and woman leave:
The chosen youth, and those who nobly dare,
Transport, to tempt the dangers of the war.
The stern Italians will their courage try;
Rough are their manners, and their minds are high.
But first to Pluto’s palace you shall go,
And seek my shade among the blest below:
For not with impious ghosts my soul remains,
Nor suffers with the damn’d perpetual pains,
But breathes the living air of soft Elysian plains.
The chaste Sibylla shall your steps convey,
And blood of offer’d victims free the way.
There shall you know what realms the gods assign,
And learn the fates and fortunes of your line.
But now, farewell! I vanish with the night,
And feel the blast of heav’n’s approaching light.”
He said, and mix’d with shades, and took his airy flight.
“Whither so fast?” the filial duty cried;
“And why, ah why, the wish’d embrace denied?”

He said, and rose; as holy zeal inspires,
He rakes hot embers, and renews the fires;
His country gods and Vesta then adores
With cakes and incense, and their aid implores.
Next, for his friends and royal host he sent,
Reveal’d his vision, and the gods’ intent,
With his own purpose. All, without delay,
The will of Jove, and his desires obey.
They list with women each degenerate name,
Who dares not hazard life for future fame.
These they cashier: the brave remaining few,
Oars, banks, and cables, half consum’d, renew.
The prince designs a city with the plow;
The lots their sev’ral tenements allow.
This part is nam’d from Ilium, that from Troy,
And the new king ascends the throne with joy;
A chosen senate from the people draws;
Appoints the judges, and ordains the laws.
Then, on the top of Eryx, they begin
A rising temple to the Paphian queen.
Anchises, last, is honour’d as a god;
A priest is added, annual gifts bestow’d,
And groves are planted round his blest abode.
Nine days they pass in feasts, their temples crown’d;
And fumes of incense in the fanes abound.
Then from the south arose a gentle breeze
That curl’d the smoothness of the glassy seas;
The rising winds a ruffling gale afford,
And call the merry mariners aboard.

Now loud laments along the shores resound,
Of parting friends in close embraces bound.
The trembling women, the degenerate train,
Who shunn’d the frightful dangers of the main,
Ev’n those desire to sail, and take their share
Of the rough passage and the promis’d war:
Whom good Aeneas cheers, and recommends
To their new master’s care his fearful friends.
On Eryx’s altars three fat calves he lays;
A lamb new-fallen to the stormy seas;
Then slips his haulsers, and his anchors weighs.
High on the deck the godlike hero stands,
With olive crown’d, a charger in his hands;
Then cast the reeking entrails in the brine,
And pour’d the sacrifice of purple wine.
Fresh gales arise; with equal strokes they vie,
And brush the buxom seas, and o’er the billows fly.

Meantime the mother goddess, full of fears,
To Neptune thus address’d, with tender tears:
“The pride of Jove’s imperious queen, the rage,
The malice which no suff’rings can assuage,
Compel me to these pray’rs; since neither fate,
Nor time, nor pity, can remove her hate:
Ev’n Jove is thwarted by his haughty wife;
Still vanquish’d, yet she still renews the strife.
As if ’twere little to consume the town
Which aw’d the world, and wore th’ imperial crown,
She prosecutes the ghost of Troy with pains,
And gnaws, ev’n to the bones, the last remains.
Let her the causes of her hatred tell;
But you can witness its effects too well.
You saw the storm she rais’d on Libyan floods,
That mix’d the mounting billows with the clouds;
When, bribing Aeolus, she shook the main,
And mov’d rebellion in your wat’ry reign.
With fury she possess’d the Dardan dames,
To burn their fleet with execrable flames,
And forc’d Aeneas, when his ships were lost,
To leave his foll’wers on a foreign coast.
For what remains, your godhead I implore,
And trust my son to your protecting pow’r.
If neither Jove’s nor Fate’s decree withstand,
Secure his passage to the Latian land.”

Then thus the mighty Ruler of the Main:
“What may not Venus hope from Neptune’s reign?
My kingdom claims your birth; my late defence
Of your indanger’d fleet may claim your confidence.
Nor less by land than sea my deeds declare
How much your lov’d Aeneas is my care.
Thee, Xanthus, and thee, Simoïs, I attest.
Your Trojan troops when proud Achilles press’d,
And drove before him headlong on the plain,
And dash’d against the walls the trembling train;
When floods were fill’d with bodies of the slain;
When crimson Xanthus, doubtful of his way,
Stood up on ridges to behold the sea;
(New heaps came tumbling in, and chok’d his way;)
When your Aeneas fought, but fought with odds
Of force unequal, and unequal gods;
I spread a cloud before the victor’s sight,
Sustain’d the vanquish’d, and secur’d his flight;
Ev’n then secur’d him, when I sought with joy
The vow’d destruction of ungrateful Troy.
My will’s the same: fair goddess, fear no more,
Your fleet shall safely gain the Latian shore;
Their lives are giv’n; one destin’d head alone
Shall perish, and for multitudes atone.”
Thus having arm’d with hopes her anxious mind,
His finny team Saturnian Neptune join’d,
Then adds the foamy bridle to their jaws,
And to the loosen’d reins permits the laws.
High on the waves his azure car he guides;
Its axles thunder, and the sea subsides,
And the smooth ocean rolls her silent tides.
The tempests fly before their father’s face,
Trains of inferior gods his triumph grace,
And monster whales before their master play,
And choirs of Tritons crowd the wat’ry way.
The marshal’d pow’rs in equal troops divide
To right and left; the gods his better side
Inclose, and on the worse the Nymphs and Nereids ride.

Now smiling hope, with sweet vicissitude,
Within the hero’s mind his joys renew’d.
He calls to raise the masts, the sheets display;
The cheerful crew with diligence obey;
They scud before the wind, and sail in open sea.
Ahead of all the master pilot steers;
And, as he leads, the following navy veers.
The steeds of Night had travel’d half the