Aeneas thus: then with uplifted eyesLatinus swore, his right hand raised to heaven:“I too, Aeneas, take the sacred vow.By earth and sea and stars in heaven I swear,by fair Latona's radiant children twain,and two-browed Janus; by the shadowy powersof Hades and th' inexorable shrinesof the Infernal King; and may Jove hear,who by his lightnings hallows what is sworn!I touch these altars, and my lips invokethe sacred altar-fires that 'twixt us burn:we men of Italy will make this peaceinviolate, and its bond forever keep,let come what will; there is no power can changemy purpose, not if ocean's waves o'erwhelmthe world in billowy deluge and obscurethe bounds of heaven and hell. We shall remainimmutable as my smooth sceptre is“(By chance a sceptre in his hand he bore),“which wears no more light leaf or branching shade;for long since in the grove 't was plucked awayfrom parent stem, and yielded to sharp steelits leaves and limbs; erewhile 't was but a tree,till the wise craftsman with fair sheath of bronzeencircled it and laid it in the handsof Latium's royal sires.” With words like thesethey swore the bond, in the beholding eyesof gathered princes. Then they slit the throatsof hallowed victims o'er the altar's blaze,drew forth the quivering vitals, and with fleshon loaded chargers heaped the sacrifice.

But to Rutulian eyes th' approaching joustseemed all ill-matched; and shifting hopes and fearsdisturbed their hearts the closer they surveyedth' unequal risks: still worse it was to seehow Turnus, silent and with downcast eyes,dejectedly drew near the place of prayer,worn, pale, and wasted in his youthful bloom.The nymph Juturna, with a sister's fear,noted the growing murmur, and perceivedhow all the people's will did shift and change;she went from rank to rank, feigning the shapeof Camers, scion of illustrious line,with heritage of valor, and himselfdauntless in war; unceasingly she ranfrom rank to rank, spreading with skilful tongueopinions manifold, and thus she spoke:“Will ye not blush, Rutulians, so to stakeone life for many heroes? Are we nottheir match in might and numbers? O, beholdthose Trojan sons of Heaven making leaguewith exiled Arcady; see Tuscan hordesstorming at Turnus. Yet we scarce could findone foe apiece, forsooth, if we should darefight them with half our warriors. Of a truthyour champion brave shall to those gods ascendbefore whose altars his great heart he vows;and lips of men while yet on earth he stayswill spread his glory far. Ourselves, instead,must crouch to haughty masters, and resignthis fatherland upon whose fruitful fieldswe dwell at ease.” So speaking, she inflamedthe warriors' minds, and through the legions ranincreasing whisper; the Laurentine hostand even Latium wavered. Those who lateprayed but for rest and safety, clamored loudfor arms, desired annulment of the league,and pitied Turnus' miserable doom.Whereon Juturna tried a mightier stroke,a sign from heaven, which more than all besideconfused the Latins and deceived their heartswith prodigy. For through the flaming skiesJove's golden eagle swooped, and scattered fara clamorous tribe of river-haunting birds;then, swiftly to the waters falling, seizedone noble swan, which with keen, curving clawshe ruthless bore away: th' Italians allwatched eagerly, while the loud-screaming flockwheeled upward (wondrous sight!), with host of wingsshadowed the sky, and in a legion-cloudchased through the air the foe; till, overborneby heavier odds, the eagle from his clawsflung back his victim to the waves, and fledto the dim, distant heaven. The Rutules thenhailed the good omen with consenting cry,and grasped the sword and shield. Tolumniusthe augur spake first: “Lo, the sign I soughtwith many a prayer! I welcome and obeythe powers divine. Take me for captain, me!And draw your swords, ye wretches, whom th' assaultof yonder foreign scoundrel puts in fearlike feeble birds, and with his violencelays waste your shore. He too shall fly away,spreading his ships' wings on the distant seas.Close up your ranks—one soul in all our breasts!Defend in open war your stolen King.”So saying, he hurled upon th' opposing foehis javelin, running forward. The strong shaftof corner whistled shrill, and clove the airunerring. Instantly vast clamor rose,and all th' onlookers at the spectacleleaped up amazed, and every heart beat high.The spear sped flying to the foeman's line,where stood nine goodly brethren, pledges allof one true Tuscan mother to her lord,Gylippus of Arcadia; it struck fullon one of these at his gold-belted waist,and where the clasp clung, pierced the rib clean through.And stretched the fair youth in his glittering armsfull length and lifeless on the yellow sand.His brothers then, bold band to wrath arousedby sorrow, seize the sword or snatch the spearand blindly charge. Opposing them, the hostLaurentine makes advance, and close-arrayedthe Trojans like a torrent pour, enforcedby Tuscans and the gay-accoutred clansof Arcady. One passion moved in allto try the judgment of the sword. They torethe altars down: a very storm of spearsrose angrily to heaven, in iron raindown-pouring: while the priests bore far awaythe sacrificial bowls and sacred fires.Even Latinus fled; his stricken godsfar from his violated oath he bore.

Some leaped to horse or chariot and rodewith naked swords in air. Messapus, wildto break the truce, assailed the Tuscan King,Aulestes, dressed in kingly blazon fair,with fearful shock of steeds; the Tuscan droppedhelplessly backward, striking as he fellhis head and shoulders on the altar-stonethat lay behind him. But Messapus flew,infuriate, a javelin in his hand,and, towering o'er the suppliant, smote him strongwith the great beam-like spear, and loudly cried:“Down with him! Ah! no common victim heto give the mighty gods!” Italia's mendespoiled the dead man ere his limbs were cold.Then Corynaeus snatched a burning brandout of the altar, and as Ebysuscame toward him for to strike, he hurled the flamefull in his face: the big beard quickly blazedwith smell of singeing; while the warrior boldstrode over him, and seized with firm left handhis quailing foe's Iong hair; then with one kneehe pushed and strained, compelled him to the `ground—and struck straight at his heart with naked steel.The shepherd Alsus in the foremost linecame leaping through the spears; when o'er him toweredhuge Podalirius with a flashing swordin close pursuit; the mighty battle-axeclove him with swinging stroke from brow to chin,and spilt along his mail the streaming gore:so stern repose and iron slumber fellupon that shepherd's eyes, and sealed their gaze in endless night. But good Aeneas nowstretched forth his unarmed hand, and all unhelmedthus Ioudly to his people called: “What meansthis frantic stir, this quarrel rashly bold?Recall your martial rage! The pledge is givenand all its terms agreed. 'T is only Ido lawful battle here. So let me forth,and tremble not. My own hand shall confirmthe solemn treaty. For these rites consignTurnus to none but me.” Yet while he spoke,behold, a winged arrow, hissing loud,the hero pierced; but what bold hand impelledits whirling speed, none knew; nor if it werechance or some power divine that brought this fameupon Rutulia; for the glorious deedwas covered o'er with silence: none would boastan arrow guilty of Aeneas' wound.When Turnus saw Aeneas from the lineretreating, and the captains in dismay,with sudden hope he burned: he called for steeds,for arms, and, leaping to his chariot,rode insolently forth, the reins in hand.Many strong heroes he dispatched to die,as on he flew, and many stretched half-dead,or from his chariot striking, or from farraining his javelins on the recreant foe.As Mars, forth-speeding by the wintry streamof Hebrus, smites his sanguinary shieldand whips the swift steeds to the front of war,who, flying past the winds of eve and morn,scour the wide champaign; the bounds of Thrace beneath their hoof-beats thunder; the dark shapesof Terror, Wrath, and Treachery move onin escort of the god: in such grim guisebold Turnus lashed into the fiercest frayhis streaming steeds, that pitiful to seetrod down the slaughtered foe; each flying hoofscattered a bloody dew; their path was laidin mingled blood and sand. To death he flungPholus and Sthenelus and Thamyris:two smitten in close fight and one from far:also from far he smote with fatal spearGlaucus and Lades, the Imbrasidae,whom Imbrasus himself in Lycia bred,and honored them with arms of equal skillwhen grappling with a foe, or o'er the fieldspeeding a war-horse faster than the wind.

Elsewhere Eumedes through a throng of foesto battle rode, the high-born Dolon's child,famous in war, who bore his grandsire's name,but seemed in might and courage like his sire:that prince, who reconnoitring crept so nearthe Argive camp, he dared to claim for spoilthe chariot of Achilles; but that daygreat Diomed for such audacious deedpaid wages otherwise,—and he no moredreamed to possess the steeds of Peleus' son.When Turnus recognized in open fieldthis warrior, though far, he aimed and flunghis javelin through the spacious air; then stayedhis coursers twain, and, leaping from his car,found the wretch helpless fallen; so planted hehis foot upon his neck, and from his handwrested the sword and thrust it glitteringdeep in the throat, thus taunting as he slew:“There's land for thee, thou Trojan! Measure thereth' Hesperian provinces thy sword would find.Such reward will I give to all who daredraw steel on me; such cities they shall build.”To bear him company his spear laid lowAsbutes, Sybaris, Thersilochus, Chloreus and Dares, and Thymoetes thrownsheer off the shoulders of his balking steed.As when from Thrace the north wind thunders downthe vast Aegean, flinging the swift floodagainst the shore, and where his blasts assailthe cloudy cohorts vanish out of heaven:so before Turnus, where his path he clove,the lines fell back, the wheeling legions fled.The warrior's own wild impulse swept him on,and every wind that o'er his chariot blewshook out his plume in air. But such advanceso bold, so furious, Phegeus could not brook,but, fronting the swift chariot's path, he seizedthe foam-flecked bridles of its coursers wild,while from the yoke his body trailed and swung;the broad lance found his naked side, and torehis double corselet, pricking lightly throughthe outer flesh; but he with lifted shieldstill fought his foe and thrust with falchion bare;but the fierce pace of whirling wheel and poleflung him down prone, and stretched him on the plain.Then Turnus, aiming with relentless swordbetween the corselet's edge and helmet's rimstruck off his whole head, leaving on the sandsthe mutilated corpse. While thus afieldvictorious Turnus dealt out death and doom,Mnestheus, Achates true, and by their sideAscanius, have carried to the campAeneas, gashed and bleeding, whose long lancesustained his limping step. With fruitless ragehe struggled with the spear-head's splintered barb,and bade them help him by the swiftest wayto carve the wound out with a sword, to ripthe clinging weapon forth, and send him backto meet the battle. Quickly to his sidecame Iapyx, dear favorite and friendof Phoebus, upon whom the god bestowedhis own wise craft and power, Iove-impelled.The gifts of augury were given, and song,with arrows of swift wing: he when his sirewas carried forth to die, deferred the doomfor many a day, by herbs of virtue knownto leechcraft; and without reward or praisehis silent art he plied. Aeneas stood,bitterly grieving, propped upon his spear;a throng of warriors were near him, andIulus, sorrowing. The aged mangathered his garments up as leeches do,and with skilled hand and Phoebus' herbs of powerbustled in vain; in vain his surgerypried at the shaft, and with a forceps strongseized on the buried barb. But Fortune gaveno remedy, nor did Apollo aidhis votary. So more and more grim fearstalks o'er the field of war, and nearer hiesthe fatal hour; the very heavens are dust;the horsemen charge, and in the midmost campa rain of javelins pours. The dismal cryof men in fierce fight, and of men who fallbeneath relentless Mars, rends all the air.

Then Venus, by her offspring's guiltless woesore moved, did cull from Cretan Ida's crestsome dittany, with downy leaf and stemand flowers of purple bloom—a simple knownto mountain goats, when to their haunches clingsan arrow gone astray. This Venus brought,mantling her shape in cloud; and this she steepedin bowls of glass, infusing secretlyambrosia's healing essence and sweet dropsof fragrant panacea. Such a balmaged Iapyx poured upon the wound,though unaware; and sudden from the fleshall pain departed and the blood was staunched,while from the gash the arrow uncompelledfollowed the hand and dropped: his wonted strengthflowed freshly through the hero's frame. “Make haste!Bring forth his arms! Why tarry any more?”Iapyx shouted, being first to firetheir courage 'gainst the foe. “This thing is donenot of man's knowledge, nor by sovereign skill;nor has my hand, Aeneas, set thee free.Some mighty god thy vigor gives againfor mighty deeds.” Aeneas now put on,all fever for the fight, his golden greaves,and, brooking not delay, waved wide his spear.Soon as the corselet and the shield were boundon back and side, he clasped Ascaniusto his mailed breast, and through his helmet grimtenderly kissed his son. “My boy", he cried,“What valor is and patient, genuine toillearn thou of me; let others guide thy feetto prosperous fortune. Let this hand and sworddefend thee through the war and lead thee onto high rewards. Thou also play the man!And when thy riper vigor soon shall bloom,forget not in thy heart to ponder wellthe story of our line. Heed honor's call,like Sire Aeneas and Hector thy close kin.”