From whence the race of Alban fathers come,
And the long glories of majestic Rome.
O Muse! the causes and the crimes relate;
What goddess was provoked, and whence her hate;
For what offence the queen of heav'n began
To persecute so brave, so just a man ;
Involved his anxious life in endless cares,
Exposed to wants, and hurried into wars!
Can heav'nly minds such high resentment show,
Or exercise their spite in human woe?
Against the Tiber's mouth, but far away,
An ancient town was seated on the sea-
A Tyrian colony-the people made
Stout for the war, and studious of their trade :
Carthage the name-beloved by Juno more
Than her own Argos, or the Samian shore.
Here stood her chariot; here, if heav'n were kind, 25
The seat of awful empire she design'd.
Yet she had heard an ancient rumor fly
(Long cited by the people of the sky),
That times to come should see the Trojan race
Her Carthage ruin, and her tow'rs deface;
Nor thus confined, the yoke of sov'reign sway
Should on the necks of all the nations lay.
She ponder'd this, and fear'd it was in fate;
Nor could forget the war she waged of late,
For conqu❜ring Greece, against the Trojan state.
Besides, long causes working in her mind,
And secret seeds of envy, lay behind:
Deep graven in her heart, the doom remain'd
Of partial Paris, and her form disdain'd;
The grace bestow'd on ravish'd Ganymed,
Electra's glories and her injured bed.
Each was a cause alone; and all combined
To kindle vengeance in her haughty mind.
For this, far distant from the Latian coast,
She drove the remnants of the Trojan host:
And sev'n long years th' unhappy wand'ring train
Were toss'd by storms, and scatter'd through the
main.
Such time, such toil, required the Roman name,
Such length of labor for so vast a frame.
Now scarce the Trojan fleet, with sails and oars, 50 Had left behind the fair Sicilian shores,
Ent'ring with cheerful shouts the wať'ry reign,
And ploughing frothy furrows in the main ;
When, lab'ring still with endless discontent,
The queen of heav'n did thus her fury vent:-
• Then am I vanquish'd? must I yield?" said she: And must the Trojans reign in Italy?
So fate will have it; and Jove adds his force;
Nor can my pow'r divert their happy course.
Could angry Pallas, with revengeful spleen,
The Grecian navy burn, and drown the men?
She, for the fault of one offending foe,
The bolts of Jove himself presumed to throw :
With whirlwinds from beneath she toss'd the ship,
And bare exposed the bosom of the deep;
Then as an eagle gripes the trembling game—
The wretch, yet hissing with her father's flame,
She strongly seized, and, with a burning wound
Transfix'd and naked, on a rock she bound.
But I, who walk in awful state above,
The majesty of heav'n, the sister wife of Jove,
For length of years my fruitless force employ
Against the thin remains of ruin'd Troy!
What nations now to Juno's pow'r will pray,
Or off'rings on my slighted altars lay?'
Thus raged the goddess; and, with fury fraught, The restless regions of the storms she sought,
Where, in a spacious cave of living stone,
The tyrant Æolus, from his airy throne,
With pow'r imperial curbs the struggling winds,
And sounding tempests in dark prisons binds.
This way, and that, th' impatient captives tend,
And, pressing for release, the mountains rend.
High in his hall th' undaunted monarch stands,
And shakes his sceptre, and their rage commands; 85 Which did he not, their unresisted sway
Would sweep the world before them in their way; Earth, air, and seas, through empty space would roll,
And heav'n would fly before the driving soul.
In fear of this, the father of the gods
Confined their fury to those dark abodes,
And lock'd them safe within, oppress'd with mountain
Imposed a king with arbitrary sway,
To loose their fetters, or their force allay;
To whom the suppliant queen her pray'rs address'd, 95 And thus the tenor of her suit express'd:
'O Æolus !-for to thee the king of heaven
The pow'r of tempests and of winds has given;
Thy force alone their fury can restrain,
And smooth the waves, or swell the troubled main—
A race of wand'ring slaves, abhorr'd by me,
With prosp'rous passage cut the Tuscan sea;
To fruitful Italy their course they steer,
And, for their vanquish'd gods, design new temples
Raise all thy winds; with night involve the skies; 105 Sink or disperse my fatal enemies.
Twice seven, the charming daughters of the main,
Around my person wait, and bear my train:
Succeed my wish, and second my design,
The fairest, Deiopeia, shall be thine,
And make thee father of a happy line.'
To this the god-'Tis yours, O queen! to will
The work, which duty binds me to fulfil.
These airy kingdoms, and this wide command,
Are all the presents of your bounteous hand:
Yours is my sov'reign's grace; and, as your guest,
I sit with gods at their celestial feast:
Raise tempests at your pleasure, or subdue;
Dispose of empire, which I hold from you.'
He said, and hurl'd against the mountain-side
His quiv'ring spear, and all the god applied!
The raging winds rush through the hollow wound,
And dance aloft in air, and skim along the ground;
Then settling on the sea, the surges sweep,
Raise liquid mountains, and disclose the deep.
South, east, and west, with mix'd confusion roar,
And roll the foaming billows to the shore.
The cables crack; the sailors' fearful cries
Ascend; and sable night involves the skies ;
And heav'n itself is ravish'd from their eyes.
Loud peals of thunder from the poles ensue ;
Then flashing fires the transient light renew;
The face of things a frightful image bears;
And present death in various forms appears.
Struck with unusual fright, the Trojan chief,
With lifted hands and eyes, invokes relief;
And Thrice and four times happy those,' he cried,
'That under Ilian walls, before their parents, died!
Tydides, bravest of the Grecian train !
Why could not I by that strong arm be slain,
And lie by noble Hector on the plain,
Or great Sarpedon, in those bloody fields,
Where Simois rolls the bodies and the shields
Of heroes, whose dismember'd hands yet bear
The dart aloft, and clench the pointed spear' ?'
Thus while the pious prince his fate bewails,
Fierce Boreas drove against his flying sails,
And rent the sheets: the raging billows rise,
And mount the tossing vessel to the skies:
Nor can the shiv'ring oars sustain the blow;
The galley gives her side, and turns her prow;
While those astern, descending down the steep,
Through gaping waves behold the boiling deep.
Three ships were hurried by the southern blast,
And on the secret shelves with fury cast.
Those hidden rocks th' Ausonian sailors knew:
They call'd them altars, when they rose in view,
And show'd their spacious backs above the flood.
Three more fierce Eurus, in his angry mood,
Dash'd on the shallows of the moving sand,
And in mid ocean left them moor'd a-land.
Orontes' bark, that bore the Lycian crew,
(A horrid sight) ev'n in the hero's view,
From stem to stern by waves was overborne :
The trembling pilot, from his rudder torn,
Was headlong hurl'd: thrice round the ship was toss'd,
Then bulged at once, and in the deep was lost;
And here and there above the waves were seen
Arms, pictures, precious goods, and floating men.
The stoutest vessel to the storm gave way,
And suck'd through loosen'd planks the rushing sea. Ilioneus was her chief: Aletes old,
Achates faithful, Abas young and bold,
Endured not less: their ships, with gaping seams,
Admit the deluge of the briny streams.
Meantime imperial Neptune heard the sound Of raging billows breaking on the ground.
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