He spoke no more, but hastened, void of fear,
And threatened with his long protended spear.
To whom Mezentius thus:-"Thy vaunts are vain.
My Lausus lies extended on the plain :
He's lost! thy conquest is already won;
The wretched sire is murdered in the son.
Nor fate I fear, but all the gods defy.
Forbear thy threats: my business is to die;
But first receive this parting legacy."

He said; and straight a whirling dart he sent;
Another after, and another, went.

Round in a spacious ring he rides the field,
And vainly plies the impenetrable shield.

Thrice rode he round; and thrice Æneas wheeled,
Turned as he turned: the golden orb withstood
The strokes, and bore about an iron wood.
Impatient of delay, and weary grown,
Still to defend, and to defend alone,

To wrench the darts which in his buckler light,
Urged, and o'er-laboured in unequal fight-
At length resolved, he throws, with all his force,
Full at the temples of the warrior horse.

Just where the stroke was aimed, the unerring spear
Made way, and stood transfixed through either ear.
Seized with unwonted pain, surprised with fright,
The wounded steed curvets, and, raised upright,
Lights on his feet before; his hoofs behind
Spring up in air aloft, and lash the wind.
Down comes the rider headlong from his height:
His horse came after with unwieldy weight,
And, floundering forward, pitching on his head,
His lord's encumbered shoulder overlaid.

From either host, the mingled shouts and cries
Of Trojans and Rutulians rend the skies:
Eneas, hastening, waved his fatal sword

High o'er his head, with this reproachful word :

"Now! where are now thy vaunts, the fierce disdain,
Of proud Mezentius, and the lofty strain ?"
Struggling, and wildly staring on the skies
With scarce recovered sight, he thus replies :-
"Why these insulting words, this waste of breath,
To souls undaunted, and secure of death?
'Tis no dishonour for the brave to die:
Nor came I here with hope of victory;
Nor ask I life, nor fought with that design.
As I had used my fortune, use thou thine.
My dying son contracted no such band:
The gift is hateful from his murderer's hand.
For this, this only favour let me sue,
If pity can to conquered foes be due,
Refuse it not; but let my body have
The last retreat of human kind, a grave.
Too well I know the insulting people's hate;
Protect me from their vengeance after fate:
This refuge for my poor remains provide,
And lay my much-loved Lausus by my side."
He said, and to the sword his throat applied.
The crimson stream distained his arms around,
And the disdainful soul came rushing through the
wound.

NOTES

ON

ENEIS, BOOK X.

Note I.

A choir of Nereids, &c.---P. 73.

These were transformed from ships to sea-nymphs. This is almost as violent a machine, as the death of Arruns by a goddess in the episode of Camilla. But the poet makes use of it with greater art; for here it carries on the main design. These new-made divinities not only tell Æneas what had passed in his camp during his absence, and what was the present distress of his besieged people, and that his horsemen, whom he had sent by land, were ready to join him at his descent; but warn him to provide for battle the next day, and foretel him good success: so that this episodical machine is properly a part of the great poem; for, besides what I have said, they push on his navy with celestial vigour, that it might reach the port more speedily, and take the enemy more unprovided to resist the landing: whereas the machine relating to Camilla is only ornamental; for it has no effect, which I can find, but to please the reader, who is concerned that her death should be revenged.

Note II.

Now, sacred sisters, open all your spring!

The Tuscan leaders, and their army, sing.---P. 71.

The poet here begins to tell the names of the Tuscan captains who followed Æneas to the war: and I observe him to be very

particular in the description of their persons, and not forgetful of their manners; exact also in the relation of the numbers which each of them command. I doubt not but, as, in the Fifth Book, he gave us the names of the champions who contended for the several prizes, that he might oblige many of the most ancient Roman families, their descendants---and as, in the Seventh Book, he mustered the auxiliary forces of the Latins on the same account--so here he gratifies his Tuscan friends with the like remembrance of their ancestors, and, above the rest, Mæcenas, his great patron, who, being of a royal family in Etruria, was probably represented under one of the names here mentioned, then known among the Romans, though, at so great a distance, unknown to

us.

And, for his sake chiefly, as I guess, he makes Eneas (by whom he always means Augustus) to seek for aid in the country of Mæcenas, thereby to endear his protector to his emperor, as if there had been a former friendship betwixt their lines. And who knows, but Mæcenas might pretend, that the Cilnian family was derived from Tarchon, the chief commander of the Tuscans?

Note III.

Nor I, his mighty sire, could ward the blow.---P. 83.

I have mentioned this passage in my preface to the Æneïs, to prove that fate was superior to the gods, and that Jove could neither defer nor alter its decrees. Sir Robert Howard has since been pleased to send me the concurrent testimony of Ovid: it is in the last book of his Metamorphoses, where Venus complains that her descendant, Julius Cæsar, was in danger of being murdered by Brutus and Cassius, at the head of the commonwealthfaction, and desires [the gods] to prevent that barbarous assassination. They are moved to compassion; they are concerned for Cæsar; but the poet plainly tells us, that it was not in their power to change destiny. All they could do, was to testify their sorrow for his approaching death, by fore-shewing it with signs and prodigies, as appears by the following lines ;--

Talia necquidquam toto Venus anxia cælo

Verba jacit; superosque movet: qui rumpere quanquam
Ferrea non possunt veterum decreta sororum,

Signa tamen luctus dant haud incerta futuri.

Then she addresses to her father Jupiter, hoping aid from him, because he was thought omnipotent. But he, it seems, could do as little as the rest; for he answers thus:

sola insuperabile Fatum,

Nata, movere paras? Intres licet ipsa sororum
Tecta trium; cernes illic, molimine vasto,

Ex ære et solido rerum tabularia ferro,

Quæ neque concursum cœli, neque fulminis iram,
Nec metuunt ullas, tuta atque æterna, ruinas.
Invenies illic, incisa adamante perenni,
Fata tui generis. Legi ipse, animoque notavi;
Et referam, ne sis etiamnum ignara futuri.
Hic sua complevit (pro quo, Cytherea, laboras)
Tempora, perfectis, quos terræ debuit, annis, &c.

Jupiter, you see, is only library-keeper, or custos rotulorum, to the Fates for he offers his daughter a cast of his office, to give her a sight of their decrees, which the inferior gods were not permitted to read without his leave. This agrées with what I have said already in the preface; that they, not having seen the re cords, might believe they were his own hand-writing, and consequently at his disposing, either to blot out or alter, as he saw convenient. And of this opinion was Juno in those words, tua, qui potes, orsa reflectas. Now the abode of those Destinies being in hell, we cannot wonder why the swearing by Styx was an inviolable oath amongst the gods of heaven, and that Jupiter himself should fear to be accused of forgery by the Fates, if he altered any thing in their decrees; Chaos, Night, and Erebus, being the most ancient of the deities, and instituting those fundamental laws, by which he was afterwards to govern. Hesiod gives us the genealogy of the gods; and I think I may safely infer the rest. I will only add, that Homer was more a fatalist than Virgil: for it has been observed, that the word Tvxn, or Fortune, is not to be found in his two poems; but, instead of it, always Moipa.