Ye mystic tripods, guardians of the fates And Paean, thou, from whom no day is hid By heaven's high rulers, Master of the truth, Why fear'st thou to reveal the deaths of kings, Rome's murdered princes, and the latest doom Of her great Empire tottering to its fall, And all the bloodshed of that western land? Were yet the stars in doubt on Magnus' fate Not yet decreed, and did the gods yet shrink From that, the greatest crime? Or wert thou dumb That Fortune's sword for civil strife might wreak Just vengeance, and a Brutus' arm once more Strike down the tyrant?

From the temple doors Rushed forth the prophetess in frenzy driven, Not all her knowledge uttered; and her eyes, Still troubled by the god who reigned within, Or filled with wild affright, or fired with rage Gaze on the wide expanse: still works her face Convulsive; on her cheeks a crimson blush With ghastly pallor blent, though not of fear. Her weary heart throbs ever; and as seas Boom swollen by northern winds, she finds in sighs, All inarticulate, relief. But while She hastes from that dread light in which she saw The fates, to common day, lo! on her path The darkness fell. Then by a Stygian draught Of the forgetful river, Phoebus snatched Back from her soul his secrets; and she fell Yet hardly living.

Nor did Appius dread Approaching death, but by dark oracles Baffled, while yet the Empire of the world Hung in the balance, sought his promised realm In Chalcis of Euboea. Yet to escape All ills of earth, the crash of war — what god Can give thee such a boon, but death alone? Far on the solitary shore a grave Awaits thee, where Carystos' marble crags (17) Draw in the passage of the sea, and where The fane of Rhamnus rises to the gods Who hate the proud, and where the ocean strait Boils in swift whirlpools, and Euripus draws Deceitful in his tides, a bane to ships, Chalcidian vessels to bleak Aulis' shore.

But Caesar carried from the conquered west His eagles to another world of war; When envying his victorious course the gods Almost turned back the prosperous tide of fate. Not on the battle-field borne down by arms But in his tents, within the rampart lines, The hoped-for prize of this unholy war Seemed for a moment gone. That faithful host, His comrades trusted in a hundred fields, Or that the falchion sheathed had lost its charm; Or weary of the mournful bugle call Scarce ever silent; or replete with blood, Well nigh betrayed their general and sold For hope of gain their honour and their cause. No other perilous shock gave surer proof How trembled 'neath his feet the dizzy height From which great Caesar looked. A moment since His high behest drew nations to the field: Now, maimed of all, he sees that swords once drawn Are weapons for the soldier, not the chief. From the stern ranks no doubtful murmur rose; Not silent anger as when one conspires, His comrades doubting, feared himself in turn; Alone (he thinks) indignant at the wrongs Wrought by the despot. In so great a host Dread found no place. Where thousands share the guilt Crime goes unpunished. Thus from dauntless throats They hurled their menace: "Caesar, give us leave To quit thy crimes; thou seek'st by land and sea The sword to slay us; let the fields of Gaul And far Iberia, and the world proclaim How for thy victories our comrades fell. What boots it us that by an army's blood The Rhine and Rhone and all the northern lands Thou hast subdued? Thou giv'st us civil war For all these battles; such the prize. When fled The Senate trembling, and when Rome was ours What homes or temples did we spoil? Our hands Reek with offence! Aye, but our poverty Proclaims our innocence! What end shall be Of arms and armies? What shall be enough If Rome suffice not? and what lies beyond? Behold these silvered locks, these nerveless hands And shrunken arms, once stalwart! In thy wars Gone is the strength of life, gone all its pride! Dismiss thine aged soldiers to their deaths. How shameless is our prayer! Not on hard turf To stretch our dying limbs; nor seek in vain, When parts the soul, a hand to close our eyes; Not with the helmet strike the stony clod: (19) Rather to feel the dear one's last embrace, And gain a humble but a separate tomb. Let nature end old age. And dost thou think We only know not what degree of crime Will fetch the highest price? What thou canst dare These years have proved, or nothing; law divine Nor human ordinance shall hold thine hand. Thou wert our leader on the banks of Rhine; Henceforth our equal; for the stain of crime Makes all men like to like. Add that we serve A thankless chief: as fortune's gift he takes The fruits of victory our arms have won. We are his fortunes, and his fates are ours To fashion as we will. Boast that the gods Shall do thy bidding! Nay, thy soldiers' will Shall close the war." With threatening mien and speech Thus through the camp the troops demand their chief.

When faith and loyalty are fled, and hope For aught but evil, thus may civil war In mutiny and discord find its end! What general had not feared at such revolt? But mighty Caesar trusting on the throw, As was his wont, his fortune, and o'erjoyed To front their anger raging at its height Unflinching comes. No temples of the gods, Not Jove's high fane on the Tarpeian rock, Not Rome's high dames nor maidens had he grudged To their most savage lust: that they should ask The worst, his wish, and love the spoils of war. Nor feared he aught save order at the hands Of that unconquered host. Art thou not shamed That strife should please thee only, now condemned Even by thy minions? Shall they shrink from blood, They from the sword recoil? and thou rush on Heedless of guilt, through right and through unright, Nor learn that men may lay their arms aside Yet bear to live? This civil butchery Escapes thy grasp. Stay thou thy crimes at length; Nor force thy will on those who will no more.

Upon a turfy mound unmoved he stood And, since he feared not, worthy to be feared; And thus while anger stirred his soul began: "Thou that with voice and hand didst rage but now Against thine absent chief, behold me here; Here strike thy sword into this naked breast, To stay the war; and flee, if such thy wish. This mutiny devoid of daring deed Betrays your coward souls, betrays the youth Who tires of victories which gild the arms Of an unconquered chief, and yearns for flight. Well, leave me then to battle and to fate! I cast you forth; for every weapon left, Fortune shall find a man, to wield it well. Shall Magnus in his flight with such a fleet Draw nations in his train; and not to me as My victories bring hosts, to whom shall fall The prize of war accomplished, who shall reap Your laurels scorned, and scathless join the train That leads my chariot to the sacred hill? While you, despised in age and worn in war, Gaze on our triumph from the civic crowd. Think you your dastard flight shall give me pause? If all the rivers that now seek the sea Were to withdraw their waters, it would fail By not one inch, no more than by their flow It rises now. Have then your efforts given Strength to my cause? Not so: the heavenly gods Stoop not so low; fate has no time to judge Your lives and deaths. The fortunes of the world Follow heroic souls: for the fit few The many live; and you who terrified With me the northern and Iberian worlds, Would flee when led by Magnus. Strong in arms For Caesar's cause was Labienus; (20) now That vile deserter, with his chief preferred, Wanders o'er land and sea. Nor were your faith One whit more firm to me if, neither side Espoused, you ceased from arms. Who leaves me once, Though not to fight against me with the foe, Joins not my ranks again. Surely the gods Smile on these arms who for so great a war Grant me fresh soldiers. From what heavy load Fortune relieves me! for the hands which aimed At all, to which the world did not suffice, I now disarm, and for myself alone Reserve the conflict. Quit ye, then, my camp, 'Quirites', (21) Caesar's soldiers now no more, And leave my standards to the grasp of men! Yet some who led this mad revolt I hold, Not as their captain now, but as their judge. Lie, traitors, prone on earth, stretch out the neck And take th' avenging blow. And thou whose strength Shall now support me, young and yet untaught, Behold the doom and learn to strike and die."

Such were his words of ire, and all the host Drew back and trembled at the voice of him They would depose, as though their very swords Would from their scabbards leap at his command Themselves unwilling; but he only feared Lest hand and blade to satisfy the doom Might be denied, till they submitting pledged Their lives and swords alike, beyond his hope. To strike and suffer (22) holds in surest thrall The heart inured to guilt; and Caesar kept, By dreadful compact ratified in blood, Those whom he feared to lose.

He bids them march Upon Brundusium, and recalls the ships From soft Calabria's inlets and the point Of Leucas, and the Salapinian marsh, Where sheltered Sipus nestles at the feet Of rich Garganus, jutting from the shore In huge escarpment that divides the waves Of Hadria; on each hand, his seaward slopes Buffeted by the winds; or Auster borne From sweet Apulia, or the sterner blast Of Boreas rushing from Dalmatian strands.

But Caesar entered trembling Rome unarmed, Now taught to serve him in the garb of peace. Dictator named, to grant their prayers, forsooth: Consul, in honour of the roll of Rome. Then first of all the names by which we now Lie to our masters, men found out the use: For to preserve his right to wield the sword He mixed the civil axes with his brands; With eagles, fasces; with an empty word Clothing his power; and stamped upon the time A worthy designation; for what name Could better mark the dread Pharsalian year Than "Caesar, Consul"? (23) Now the famous field Pretends its ancient ceremonies: calls The tribes in order and divides the votes In vain solemnity of empty urns. Nor do they heed the portents of the sky: Deaf were the augurs to the thunder roll; The owl flew on the left; yet were the birds Propitious sworn. Then was the ancient name Degraded first; and monthly Consuls, (24) Shorn of their rank, are chosen to mark the years. And Trojan Alba's (25) god (since Latium's fall Deserving not) beheld the wonted fires Blaze from his altars on the festal night.

Then through Apulia's fallows, that her hinds Left all untilled, to sluggish weeds a prey Passed Caesar onward, swifter than the fire Of heaven, or tigress dam: until he reached Brundusium's winding ramparts, built of old By Cretan colonists. There icy winds Constrained the billows, and his trembling fleet Feared for the winter storms nor dared the main. But Caesar's soul burned at the moments lost For speedy battle, nor could brook delay Within the port, indignant that the sea Should give safe passage to his routed foe: And thus he stirred his troops, in seas unskilled, With words of courage: "When the winter wind Has seized on sky and ocean, firm its hold; But the inconstancy of cloudy spring Permits no certain breezes to prevail Upon the billows. Straight shall be our course. No winding nooks of coast, but open seas Struck by the northern wind alone we plough, And may he bend the spars, and bear us swift To Grecian cities; else Pompeius' oars, Smiting the billows from Phaeacian (26) coasts, May catch our flagging sails. Cast loose the ropes From our victorious prows. Too long we waste Tempests that blow to bear us to our goal."

Now sank the sun to rest; the evening star Shone on the darkening heaven, and the moon Reigned with her paler light, when all the fleet Freed from retaining cables seized the main. With slackened sheet the canvas wooed the breeze, Which rose and fell and fitful died away, Till motionless the sails, and all the waves Were still as deepest pool, where never wind Ripples the surface. Thus in Scythian climes Cimmerian Bosphorus restrains the deep Bound fast in frosty fetters; Ister's streams (27) No more impel the main, and ships constrained Stand fast in ice; and while in depths below The waves still murmur, loud the charger's hoof Sounds on the surface, and the travelling wheel Furrows a track upon the frozen marsh. Cruel as tempest was the calm that lay In stagnant pools upon the mournful deep: Against the course of nature lay outstretched A rigid ocean: 'twas as if the sea Forgat its ancient ways and knew no more The ceaseless tides, nor any breeze of heaven, Nor quivered at the image of the sun, Mirrored upon its wave. For while the fleet Hung in mid passage motionless, the foe Might hurry to attack, with sturdy stroke Churning the deep; or famine's deadly grip Might seize the ships becalmed. For dangers new New vows they find. "May mighty winds arise And rouse the ocean, and this sluggish plain Cast off stagnation and be sea once more." Thus did they pray, but cloudless shone the sky, Unrippled slept the surface of the main; Until in misty clouds the moon arose And stirred the depths, and moved the fleet along Towards the Ceraunian headland; and the waves And favouring breezes followed on the ships, Now speeding faster, till (their goal attained) They cast their anchors on Palaeste's (28) shore.

This land first saw the chiefs in neighbouring camps Confronted, which the streams of Apsus bound And swifter Genusus; a lengthy course Is run by neither, but on Apsus' waves Scarce flowing from a marsh, the frequent boat Finds room to swim; while on the foamy bed Of Genusus by sun or shower compelled The melted snows pour seawards. Here were met (So Fortune ordered it) the mighty pair; And in its woes the world yet vainly hoped That brought to nearer touch their crime itself Might bleed abhorrence: for from either camp Voices were clearly heard and features seen. Nor e'er, Pompeius, since that distant day When Caesar's daughter and thy spouse was reft By pitiless fate away, nor left a pledge, Did thy loved kinsman (save on sands of Nile) So nearly look upon thy face again.

But Caesar's mind though frenzied for the fight Was forced to pause until Antonius brought The rearward troops; Antonius even now Rehearsing Leucas' fight. With prayers and threats Caesar exhorts him. "Why delay the fates, Thou cause of evil to the suffering world? My speed hath won the major part: from thee Fortune demands the final stroke alone. Do Libyan whirlpools with deceitful tides Uncertain separate us? Is the deep Untried to which I call? To unknown risks Art thou commanded? Caesar bids thee come, Thou sluggard, not to leave him. Long ago I ran my ships midway through sands and shoals To harbours held by foes; and dost thou fear My friendly camp? I mourn the waste of days Which fate allotted us. Upon the waves And winds I call unceasing: hold not back Thy willing troops, but let them dare the sea; Here gladly shall they come to join my camp, Though risking shipwreck. Not in equal shares The world has fallen between us: thou alone Dost hold Italia, but Epirus I And all the lords of Rome." Twice called and thrice Antonius lingered still: but Caesar thought To reap in full the favour of the gods, Not sit supine; and knowing danger yields To whom heaven favours, he upon the waves Feared by Antonius' fleets, in shallow boat Embarked, and daring sought the further shore.

Now gentle night had brought repose from arms; And sleep, blest guardian of the poor man's couch, Restored the weary; and the camp was still. The hour was come that called the second watch When mighty Caesar, in the silence vast With cautious tread advanced to such a deed (29) As slaves should dare not. Fortune for his guide, Alone he passes on, and o'er the guard Stretched in repose he leaps, in secret wrath At such a sleep. Pacing the winding beach, Fast to a sea-worn rock he finds a boat On ocean's marge afloat. Hard by on shore Its master dwelt within his humble home. No solid front it reared, for sterile rush And marshy reed enwoven formed the walls, Propped by a shallop with its bending sides Turned upwards. Caesar's hand upon the door Knocks twice and thrice until the fabric shook. Amyclas from his couch of soft seaweed Arising, calls: "What shipwrecked sailor seeks My humble home? Who hopes for aid from me, By fates adverse compelled?" He stirs the heap Upon the hearth, until a tiny spark Glows in the darkness, and throws wide the door. Careless of war, he knew that civil strife Stoops not to cottages. Oh! happy life That poverty affords! great gift of heaven Too little understood! what mansion wall, What temple of the gods, would feel no fear When Caesar called for entrance? Then the chief: "Enlarge thine hopes and look for better things. Do but my bidding, and on yonder shore Place me, and thou shalt cease from one poor boat To earn thy living; and in years to come Look for a rich old age: and trust thy fates To those high gods whose wont it is to bless The poor with sudden plenty." So he spake E'en at such time in accents of command, For how could Caesar else? Amyclas said, "'Twere dangerous to brave the deep to-night. The sun descended not in ruddy clouds Or peaceful rays to rest; part of his beams Presaged a southern gale, the rest proclaimed A northern tempest; and his middle orb, Shorn of its strength, permitted human eyes To gaze upon his grandeur; and the moon Rose not with silver horns upon the night Nor pure in middle space; her slender points Not drawn aright, but blushing with the track Of raging tempests, till her lurid light Was sadly veiled within the clouds. Again The forest sounds; the surf upon the shore; The dolphin's mood, uncertain where to play; The sea-mew on the land; the heron used To wade among the shallows, borne aloft And soaring on his wings — all these alarm; The raven, too, who plunged his head in spray, As if to anticipate the coming rain, And trod the margin with unsteady gait. But if the cause demands, behold me thine. Either we reach the bidden shore, or else Storm and the deep forbid — we can no more."

Thus said he loosed the boat and raised the sail. No sooner done than stars were seen to fall In flaming furrows from the sky: nay, more; The pole star trembled in its place on high: Black horror marked the surging of the sea; The main was boiling in long tracts of foam, Uncertain of the wind, yet seized with storm. Then spake the captain of the trembling bark: "See what remorseless ocean has in store! Whether from east or west the storm may come Is still uncertain, for as yet confused The billows tumble. Judged by clouds and sky A western tempest: by the murmuring deep A wild south-eastern gale shall sweep the sea. Nor bark nor man shall reach Hesperia's shore In this wild rage of waters. To return Back on our course forbidden by the gods, Is our one refuge, and with labouring boat To reach the shore ere yet the nearest land Way be too distant."

But great Caesar's trust Was in himself, to make all dangers yield. And thus he answered: "Scorn the threatening sea, Spread out thy canvas to the raging wind; If for thy pilot thou refusest heaven, Me in its stead receive. Alone in thee One cause of terror just — thou dost not know Thy comrade, ne'er deserted by the gods, Whom fortune blesses e'en without a prayer. Break through the middle storm and trust in me. The burden of this fight fails not on us But on the sky and ocean; and our bark Shall swim the billows safe in him it bears. Nor shall the wind rage long: the boat itself Shall calm the waters. Flee the nearest shore, Steer for the ocean with unswerving hand: Then in the deep, when to our ship and us No other port is given, believe thou hast Calabria's harbours. And dost thou not know The purpose of such havoc? Fortune seeks In all this tumult of the sea and sky A boon for Caesar." Then a hurricane Swooped on the boat and tore away the sheet: The fluttering sail fell on the fragile mast: And groaned the joints. From all the universe Commingled perils rush. In Atlas' seas First Corus (30) lifts his head, and stirs the depths To fury, and had forced upon the rocks Whole seas and oceans; but the chilly north Drove back the deep that doubted which was lord. But Scythian Aquilo prevailed, whose blast Tossed up the main and showed as shallow pools Each deep abyss; and yet was not the sea Heaped on the crags, for Corus' billows met The waves of Boreas: such seas had clashed Even were the winds withdrawn; Eurus enraged Burst from the cave, and Notus black with rain, And all the winds from every part of heaven Strove for their own; and thus the ocean stayed Within his boundaries. No petty seas Rapt in the storm are whirled. The Tuscan deep Invades th' Aegean; in Ionian gulfs Sounds wandering Hadria. How long the crags Which that day fell, the Ocean's blows had braved! What lofty peaks did vanquished earth resign! And yet on yonder coast such mighty waves Took not their rise; from distant regions came Those monster billows, driven on their course By that great current which surrounds the world. (31) Thus did the King of Heaven, when length of years Wore out the forces of his thunder, call His brother's trident to his help, what time The earth and sea one second kingdom formed And ocean knew no limit but the sky. Now, too, the sea had risen to the stars In mighty mass, had not Olympus' chief Pressed down its waves with clouds: came not from heaven That night, as others; but the murky air Was dim with pallor of the realms below; (32) The sky lay on the deep; within the clouds The waves received the rain: the lightning flash Clove through the parted air a path obscured By mist and darkness: and the heavenly vaults Re-echoed to the tumult, and the frame That holds the sky was shaken. Nature feared Chaos returned, as though the elements Had burst their bonds, and night had come to mix Th' infernal shades with heaven.

In such turmoil Not to have perished was their only hope. Far as from Leucas point the placid main Spreads to the horizon, from the billow's crest They viewed the dashing of th' infuriate sea; Thence sinking to the middle trough, their mast Scarce topped the watery height on either hand, Their sails in clouds, their keel upon the ground. For all the sea was piled into the waves, And drawn from depths between laid bare the sand. The master of the boat forgot his art, For fear o'ercame; he knew not where to yield Or where to meet the wave: but safety came From ocean's self at war: one billow forced The vessel under, but a huger wave Repelled it upwards, and she rode the storm Through every blast triumphant. Not the shore Of humble Sason (33), nor Thessalia's coast Indented, not Ambracia's scanty ports Dismay the sailors, but the giddy tops Of high Ceraunia's cliffs.

But Caesar now, Thinking the peril worthy of his fates: "Are such the labours of the gods?" exclaimed, "Bent on my downfall have they sought me thus, Here in this puny skiff in such a sea? If to the deep the glory of my fall Is due, and not to war, intrepid still Whatever death they send shall strike me down. Let fate cut short the deeds that I would do And hasten on the end: the past is mine. The northern nations fell beneath my sword; My dreaded name compels the foe to flee. Pompeius yields me place; the people's voice Gave at my order what the wars denied. And all the titles which denote the powers Known to the Roman state my name shall bear. Let none know this but thou who hear'st my prayers, Fortune, that Caesar summoned to the shades, Dictator, Consul, full of honours, died Ere his last prize was won. I ask no pomp Of pyre or funeral; let my body lie Mangled beneath the waves: I leave a name That men shall dread in ages yet to come And all the earth shall honour." Thus he spake, When lo! a tenth gigantic billow raised The feeble keel, and where between the rocks A cleft gave safety, placed it on the shore. Thus in a moment fortune, kingdoms, lands, Once more were Caesar's.

But on his return When daylight came, he entered not the camp Silent as when he parted; for his friends Soon pressed around him, and with weeping eyes In accents welcome to his ears began: "Whither in reckless daring hast thou gone, Unpitying Caesar? Were these humble lives Left here unguarded while thy limbs were given, Unsought for, to be scattered by the storm? When on thy breath so many nations hang For life and safety, and so great a world Calls thee its master, to have courted death Proves want of heart. Was none of all thy friends Deserving held to join his fate with thine? When thou wast tossed upon the raging deep We lay in slumber! Shame upon such sleep! And why thyself didst seek Italia's shores? 'Twere cruel (such thy thought) to speak the word That bade another dare the furious sea. All men must bear what chance or fate may bring, The sudden peril and the stroke of death; But shall the ruler of the world attempt The raging ocean? With incessant prayers Why weary heaven? is it indeed enough To crown the war, that Fortune and the deep Have cast thee on our shores? And would'st thou use The grace of favouring deities, to gain Not lordship, not the empire of the world, But lucky shipwreck!" Night dispersed, and soon The sun beamed on them, and the wearied deep, The winds permitting, lulled its waves to rest. And when Antonius saw a breeze arise Fresh from a cloudless heaven, to break the sea, He loosed his ships which, by the pilots' hands And by the wind in equal order held, Swept as a marching host across the main. But night unfriendly from the seamen snatched All governance of sail, parting the ships In divers paths asunder. Like as cranes Deserting frozen Strymon for the streams Of Nile, when winter falls, in casual lines Of wedge-like figures (34) first ascend the sky; But when in loftier heaven the southern breeze Strikes on their pinions tense, in loose array Dispersed at large, in flight irregular, They wing their journey onwards. Stronger winds With day returning blew the navy on, Past Lissus' shelter which they vainly sought, Till bare to northern blasts, Nymphaeum's port, But safe in southern, gave the fleet repose, For favouring winds came on.

When Magnus knew That Caesar's troops were gathered in their strength And that the war for quick decision called Before his camp, Cornelia he resolved To send to Lesbos' shore, from rage of fight Safe and apart: so lifting from his soul The weight that burdened it. Thus, lawful Love. Thus art thou tyrant o'er the mightiest mind! His spouse was the one cause why Magnus stayed Nor met his fortunes, though he staked the world And all the destinies of Rome. The word He speaks not though resolved; so sweet it seemed, When on the future pondering, to gain A pause from Fate! But at the close of night, When drowsy sleep had fled, Cornelia sought To soothe the anxious bosom of her lord And win his kisses. Then amazed she saw His cheek was tearful, and with boding soul She shrank instinctive from the hidden wound, Nor dared to rouse him weeping. But he spake: "Dearer to me than life itself, when life Is happy (not at moments such as these); The day of sorrow comes, too long delayed, Nor long enough! With Caesar at our gates With all his forces, a secure retreat Shall Lesbos give thee. Try me not with prayers. This fatal boon I have denied myself. Thou wilt not long be absent from thy lord. Disasters hasten, and things highest fall With speediest ruin. 'Tis enough for thee To hear of Magnus' peril; and thy love (35) Deceives thee with the thought that thou canst gaze Unmoved on civil strife. It shames my soul On the eve of war to slumber at thy side, And rise from thy dear breast when trumpets call A woeful world to misery and arms. I fear in civil war to feel no loss To Magnus. Meantime safer than a king Lie hid, nor let the fortune of thy lord Whelm thee with all its weight. If unkind heaven Our armies rout, still let my choicest part Survive in thee; if fated is my flight, Still leave me that whereto I fain would flee."

Hardly at first her senses grasped the words In their full misery; then her mind amazed Could scarce find utterance for the grief that pressed. "Nought, Magnus, now is left wherewith to upbraid The gods and fates of marriage; 'tis not death That parts our love, nor yet the funeral pyre, Nor that dread torch which marks the end of all. I share the ignoble lot of vulgar lives: My spouse rejects me. Yes, the foe is come! Break we our bonds and Julia's sire appease! — Is this thy consort, Magnus, this thy faith In her fond loving heart? Can danger fright Her and not thee? Long since our mutual fates Hang by one chain; and dost thou bid me now The thunder-bolts of ruin to withstand Without thee? Is it well that I should die Even while you pray for fortune? And suppose I flee from evil and with death self-sought Follow thy footsteps to the realms below — Am I to live till to that distant isle Some tardy rumour of thy fall may come? Add that thou fain by use would'st give me strength To bear such sorrow and my doom. Forgive Thy wife confessing that she fears the power. And if my prayers shall bring the victory, The joyful tale shall come to me the last In that lone isle of rocks. When all are glad, My heart shall throb with anguish, and the sail Which brings the message I shall see with fear, Not safe e'en then: for Caesar in his flight Might seize me there, abandoned and alone To be his hostage. If thou place me there, The spouse of Magnus, shall not all the world Well know the secret Mitylene holds? This my last prayer: if all is lost but flight, And thou shalt seek the ocean, to my shores Turn not thy keel, ill-fated one: for there, There will they seek thee." Thus she spoke distraught, Leaped from the couch and rushed upon her fate; No stop nor stay: she clung not to his neck Nor threw her arms about him; both forego The last caress, the last fond pledge of love, And grief rushed in unchecked upon their souls; Still gazing as they part no final words Could either utter, and the sweet Farewell Remained unspoken. This the saddest day Of all their lives: for other woes that came More gently struck on hearts inured to grief. Borne to the shore with failing limbs she fell And grasped the sands, embracing, till at last Her maidens placed her senseless in the ship.

Not in such grief she left her country's shores When Caesar's host drew near; for now she leaves, Though faithful to her lord, his side in flight And flees her spouse. All that next night she waked; Then first what means a widowed couch she knew, Its cold, its solitude. When slumber found Her eyelids, and forgetfulness her soul, Seeking with outstretched arms the form beloved, She grasps but air. Though tossed by restless love, She leaves a place beside her as for him Returning. Yet she feared Pompeius lost To her for ever. But the gods ordained Worse than her fears, and in the hour of woe Gave her to look upon his face again.

ENDNOTES:

(1) The Pleiades, said to be daughters of Atlas. (2) These were the Consuls for the expiring year, B.C. 49 — Caius Marcellus and L. Lentulus Crus. (3) That is to say, Caesar's Senate at Rome could boast of those Senators only whom it had, before Pompeius' flight, declared public enemies. But they were to be regarded as exiles, having lost their rights, rather than the Senators in Epirus, who were in full possession of theirs. (4) Dean Merivale says that probably Caesar's Senate was not less numerous than his rival's. Duruy says there were senators in Pompeius' camp, out of a total of between 500 and 600. Mommsen says, "they were veritably emigrants. This Roman Coblentz presented a pitiful spectacle of the high pretensions and paltry performances of the grandees of Rome." (Vol. iv., p. 397.) Almost all the Consulars were with Pompeius. (5) By the will of Ptolemy Auletes, Cleopatra had been appointed joint sovereign of Egypt with her young brother. Lucan means that Caesar would have killed Pompeius if young Ptolemy had not done so. She lost her hare of the kingdom, and Caesar was clear of the crime. (6) Appius was Proconsul, and in command of Achaia, for the Senate. (7) See Book IV., 82. (8) Themis, the goddess of law, was in possession of the Delphic oracle, previous to Apollo. (Aesch., "Eumenides", line 2.) (9) The modern isle of Ischia, off the Bay of Naples. (10) The Tyrians consulted the oracle in consequence of the earthquakes which vexed their country (Book III., line 225), and were told to found colonies. (11) See Herodotus, Book VII., 140-143. The reference is to the answer given by the oracle to the Athenians that their wooden walls would keep them safe; which Themistocles interpreted as meaning their fleet. (12) Cicero, on the contrary, suggests that the reason why the oracles ceased was this, that men became less credulous. ("De Div.", ii., 57) Lecky, "History of European Morals from Augustus to Charlemagne", vol. i., p. 368. (13) This name is one of those given to the Cumaean Sibyl mentioned at line 210. She was said to have been the daughter of Apollo. (14) Probably by the Gauls under Brennus, B.C. 279. (15) These lines form the Latin motto prefixed to Shelley's poem, "The Demon of the World". (16) Referring to the visit of Aeneas to the Sibyl. (Virgil, "Aeneid", vi., 70, &c.) (17) Appius was seized with fever as soon as he reached the spot; and there he died and was buried, thus fulfilling the oracle. (18) That is, Nemesis. (19) Reading "galeam", with Francken; not "glebam". (20) Labienus left Caesar's ranks after the Rubicon was crossed, and joined his rival. In his mouth Lucan puts the speech made at the oracle of Hammon in Book IX. He was slain at Munda, B.C. 45. (21) That is, civilians; no longer soldiers. This one contemptuous expression is said to have shocked and abashed the army. (Tacitus, "Annals", I., 42.) (22) Reading "tenet", with Hosius and Francken; not "timet", as Haskins. The prospect of inflicting punishment attracted, while the suffering of it subdued, the mutineers. (23) Caesar was named Dictator while at Massilia. Entering Rome, he held the office for eleven days only, but was elected Consul for the incoming year, B.C. 48, along with Servilius Isauricus. (Caesar, "De Bello Civili", iii., 1; Merivale, chapter xvi.) (24) In the time of the Empire, the degraded Consulship, preserved only as a name, was frequently transferred monthly, or even shorter, intervals from one favourite to another. (25) Caesar performed the solemn rites of the great Latin festival on the Alban Mount during his Dictatorship. (Compare Book VII., line 471.) (26) Dyrrhachium was founded by the Corcyreams, with whom the Homeric Phaeacians have been identified. (27) Apparently making the Danube discharge into the Sea of Azov. See Mr. Heitland's Introduction, p. 53. (28) At the foot of the Acroceraunian range. (29) Caesar himself says nothing of this adventure. But it is mentioned by Dion, Appian and Plutarch ("Caesar", 38). Dean Merivale thinks the story may have been invented to introduce the apophthegm used by Caesar to the sailor, "Fear nothing: you carry Caesar and his fortunes" (lines 662-665). Mommsen accepts the story, as of an attempt which was only abandoned because no mariner could be induced to undertake it. Lucan colours it with his wildest and most exaggerated hyperbole. (30) See Book I., 463. (31) The ocean current, which, according to Hecataeus, surrounded the world. But Herodotus of this theory says, "For my part I know of no river called Ocean, and I think that Homer or one of the earlier poets invented the name and introduced it into his poetry." (Book II., 23, and Book IV., 36.) In "Oceanus" Aeschylus seems to have intended to personify the great surrounding stream. ("Prom. Vinc.", lines 291, 308.) (32) Comp. VI., 615. (33) Sason is a small island just off the Ceraunian rocks, the point of which is now called Cape Linguetta, and is nearly opposite to Brindisi. (34) Compare "Paradise Lost", VII., 425. (35) Reading "Teque tuus decepit amor", as preferred by Hosius.



BOOK VI

THE FIGHT NEAR DYRRHACHIUM. SCAEVA'S EXPLOITS. THE WITCH OF THESSALIA

Now that the chiefs with minds intent on fight Had drawn their armies near upon the hills And all the gods beheld their chosen pair, Caesar, the Grecian towns despising, scorned To reap the glory of successful war Save at his kinsman's cost. In all his prayers He seeks that moment, fatal to the world, When shall be cast the die, to win or lose, And all his fortune hang upon the throw. Thrice he drew out his troops, his eagles thrice, Demanding battle; thus to increase the woe Of Latium, prompt as ever: but his foes, Proof against every art, refused to leave The rampart of their camp. Then marching swift By hidden path between the wooded fields He seeks, and hopes to seize, Dyrrhachium's (1) fort; But Magnus, speeding by the ocean marge, First camped on Petra's slopes, a rocky hill Thus by the natives named. From thence he keeps Watch o'er the fortress of Corinthian birth Which by its towers alone without a guard Was safe against a siege. No hand of man In ancient days built up her lofty wall, No hammer rang upon her massive stones: Not all the works of war, nor Time himself Shall undermine her. Nature's hand has raised Her adamantine rocks and hedged her in With bulwarks girded by the foamy main: And but for one short bridge of narrow earth Dyrrhachium were an island. Steep and fierce, Dreaded of sailors, are the cliffs that bear Her walls; and tempests, howling from the west, Toss up the raging main upon the roofs; And homes and temples tremble at the shock.

Thirsting for battle and with hopes inflamed Here Caesar hastes, with distant rampart lines Seeking unseen to coop his foe within, Though spread in spacious camp upon the hills. With eagle eye he measures out the land Meet to be compassed, nor content with turf Fit for a hasty mound, he bids his troops Tear from the quarries many a giant rock: And spoils the dwellings of the Greeks, and drags Their walls asunder for his own. Thus rose A mighty barrier which no ram could burst Nor any ponderous machine of war. Mountains are cleft, and level through the hills The work of Caesar strides: wide yawns the moat, Forts show their towers rising on the heights, And in vast circle forests are enclosed And groves and spacious lands, and beasts of prey, As in a line of toils. Pompeius lacked Nor field nor forage in th' encircled span Nor room to move his camp; nay, rivers rose Within, and ran their course and reached the sea; And Caesar wearied ere he saw the whole, And daylight failed him. Let the ancient tale Attribute to the labours of the gods The walls of Ilium: let the fragile bricks Which compass in great Babylon, amaze The fleeting Parthian. Here a larger space Than those great cities which Orontes swift And Tigris' stream enclose, or that which boasts In Eastern climes, the lordly palaces Fit for Assyria's kings, is closed by walls Amid the haste and tumult of a war Forced to completion. Yet this labour huge Was spent in vain. So many hands had joined Or Sestos with Abydos, or had tamed With mighty mole the Hellespontine wave, Or Corinth from the realm of Pelops' king Had rent asunder, or had spared each ship Her voyage round the long Malean cape, Or had done anything most hard, to change The world's created surface. Here the war Was prisoned: blood predestinate to flow In all the parts of earth; the host foredoomed To fall in Libya or in Thessaly Was here: in such small amphitheatre The tide of civil passion rose and fell.

At first Pompeius knew not: so the hind Who peaceful tills the mid-Sicilian fields Hears not Pelorous (2) sounding to the storm; So billows thunder on Rutupian shores (3), Unheard by distant Caledonia's tribes. But when he saw the mighty barrier stretch O'er hill and valley, and enclose the land, He bade his columns leave their rocky hold And seize on posts of vantage in the plain; Thus forcing Caesar to extend his troops On wider lines; and holding for his own Such space encompassed as divides from Rome Aricia, (4) sacred to that goddess chaste Of old Mycenae; or as Tiber holds From Rome's high ramparts to the Tuscan sea, Unless he deviate. No bugle call Commands an onset, and the darts that fly Fly though forbidden; but the arm that flings For proof the lance, at random, here and there Deals impious slaughter. Weighty care compelled Each leader to withhold his troops from fight; For there the weary earth of produce failed Pressed by Pompeius' steeds, whose horny hoofs Rang in their gallop on the grassy fields And killed the succulence. They strengthless lay Upon the mown expanse, nor pile of straw, Brought from full barns in place of living grass, Relieved their craving; shook their panting flanks, And as they wheeled Death struck his victim down. Then foul contagion filled the murky air Whose poisonous weight pressed on them in a cloud Pestiferous; as in Nesis' isle (5) the breath Of Styx rolls upwards from the mist-clad rocks; Or that fell vapour which the caves exhale From Typhon (6) raging in the depths below. Then died the soldiers, for the streams they drank Held yet more poison than the air: the skin Was dark and rigid, and the fiery plague Made hard their vitals, and with pitiless tooth Gnawed at their wasted features, while their eyes Started from out their sockets, and the head Drooped for sheer weariness. So the disease Grew swifter in its strides till scarce was room, 'Twixt life and death, for sickness, and the pest Slew as it struck its victim, and the dead Thrust from the tents (such all their burial) lay Blent with the living. Yet their camp was pitched Hard by the breezy sea by which might come All nations' harvests, and the northern wind Not seldom rolled the murky air away. Their foe, not vexed with pestilential air Nor stagnant waters, ample range enjoyed Upon the spacious uplands: yet as though In leaguer, famine seized them for its prey. Scarce were the crops half grown when Caesar saw How prone they seized upon the food of beasts, And stripped of leaves the bushes and the groves, And dragged from roots unknown the doubtful herb. Thus ate they, starving, all that teeth may bite Or fire might soften, or might pass their throats Dry, parched, abraded; food unknown before Nor placed on tables: while the leaguered foe Was blessed with plenty.

When Pompeius first Was pleased to break his bonds and be at large, No sudden dash he makes on sleeping foe Unarmed in shade of night; his mighty soul Scorns such a path to victory. 'Twas his aim, To lay the turrets low; to mark his track, By ruin spread afar; and with the sword To hew a path between his slaughtered foes. Minucius' (7) turret was the chosen spot Where groves of trees and thickets gave approach Safe, unbetrayed by dust.

Up from the fields Flashed all at once his eagles into sight And all his trumpets blared. But ere the sword Could win the battle, on the hostile ranks Dread panic fell; prone as in death they lay Where else upright they should withstand the foe; Nor more availed their valour, and in vain The cloud of weapons flew, with none to slay. Then blazing torches rolling pitchy flame Are hurled, and shaken nod the lofty towers And threaten ruin, and the bastions groan Struck by the frequent engine, and the troops Of Magnus by triumphant eagles led Stride o'er the rampart, in their front the world.

Yet now that passage which not Caesar's self Nor thousand valiant squadrons had availed To rescue from their grasp, one man in arms Steadfast till death refused them; Scaeva named This hero soldier: long he served in fight Waged 'gainst the savage on the banks of Rhone; And now centurion made, through deeds of blood, He bore the staff before the marshalled line. Prone to all wickedness, he little recked How valourous deeds in civil war may be Greatest of crimes; and when he saw how turned His comrades from the war and sought in flight A refuge, (8) "Whence," he cried, "this impious fear Unknown to Caesar's armies? Do ye turn Your backs on death, and are ye not ashamed Not to be found where slaughtered heroes lie? Is loyalty too weak? Yet love of fight Might bid you stand. We are the chosen few Through whom the foe would break. Unbought by blood This day shall not be theirs. 'Neath Caesar's eye, True, death would be more happy; but this boon Fortune denies: at least my fall shall be Praised by Pompeius. Break ye with your breasts Their weapons; blunt the edges of their swords With throats unyielding. In the distant lines The dust is seen already, and the sound Of tumult and of ruin finds the ear Of Caesar: strike; the victory is ours: For he shall come who while his soldiers die Shall make the fortress his." His voice called forth The courage that the trumpets failed to rouse When first they rang: his comrades mustering come To watch his deeds; and, wondering at the man, To test if valour thus by foes oppressed, In narrow space, could hope for aught but death. But Scaeva standing on the tottering bank Heaves from the brimming turret on the foe The corpses of the fallen; the ruined mass Furnishing weapons to his hands; with beams, And ponderous stones, nay, with his body threats His enemies; with poles and stakes he thrusts The breasts advancing; when they grasp the wall He lops the arm: rocks crush the foeman's skull And rive the scalp asunder: fiery bolts Dashed at another set his hair aflame, Till rolls the greedy blaze about his eyes With hideous crackle. As the pile of slain Rose to the summit of the wall he sprang, Swift as across the nets a hunted pard, Above the swords upraised, till in mid throng Of foes he stood, hemmed in by densest ranks And ramparted by war; in front and rear, Where'er he struck, the victor. Now his sword Blunted with gore congealed no more could wound, But brake the stricken limb; while every hand Flung every quivering dart at him alone; Nor missed their aim, for rang against his shield Dart after dart unerring, and his helm In broken fragments pressed upon his brow; His vital parts were safeguarded by spears That bristled in his body. Fortune saw Thus waged a novel combat, for there warred Against one man an army. Why with darts, Madmen, assail him and with slender shafts, 'Gainst which his life is proof? Or ponderous stones This warrior chief shall overwhelm, or bolts Flung by the twisted thongs of mighty slings. Let steelshod ram or catapult remove This champion of the gate. No fragile wall Stands here for Caesar, blocking with its bulk Pompeius' way to freedom. Now he trusts His shield no more, lest his sinister hand, Idle, give life by shame; and on his breast Bearing a forest of spears, though spent with toil And worn with onset, falls upon his foe And braves alone the wounds of all the war. Thus may an elephant in Afric wastes, Oppressed by frequent darts, break those that fall Rebounding from his horny hide, and shake Those that find lodgment, while his life within Lies safe, protected, nor doth spear avail To reach the fount of blood. Unnumbered wounds By arrow dealt, or lance, thus fail to slay This single warrior. But lo! from far A Cretan archer's shaft, more sure of aim Than vows could hope for, strikes on Scaeva's brow To light within his eye: the hero tugs Intrepid, bursts the nerves, and tears the shaft Forth with the eyeball, and with dauntless heel Treads them to dust. Not otherwise a bear Pannonian, fiercer for the wound received, Maddened by dart from Libyan thong propelled, Turns circling on her wound, and still pursues The weapon fleeing as she whirls around. Thus, in his rage destroyed, his shapeless face Stood foul with crimson flow. The victors' shout Glad to the sky arose; no greater joy A little blood could give them had they seen That Caesar's self was wounded. Down he pressed Deep in his soul the anguish, and, with mien, No longer bent on fight, submissive cried, "Spare me, ye citizens; remove the war Far hence: no weapons now can haste my death; Draw from my breast the darts, but add no more. Yet raise me up to place me in the camp Of Magnus, living: this your gift to him; No brave man's death my title to renown, But Caesar's flag deserted." So he spake. Unhappy Aulus thought his words were true, Nor saw within his hand the pointed sword; And leaping forth in haste to make his own The prisoner and his arms, in middle throat Received the lightning blade. By this one death Rose Scaeva's valour again; and thus he cried, Such be the punishment of all who thought Great Scaeva vanquished; if Pompeius seeks Peace from this reeking sword, low let him lay At Caesar's feet his standards. Me do ye think Such as yourselves, and slow to meet the fates? Your love for Magnus and the Senate's cause Is less than mine for death." These were his words; And dust in columns proved that Caesar came. Thus was Pompeius' glory spared the stain Of flight compelled by Scaeva. He, when ceased The battle, fell, no more by rage of fight, Or sight of blood out-pouring from his wounds, Roused to the combat. Fainting there he lay Upon the shoulders of his comrades borne, Who him adoring (as though deity Dwelt in his bosom) for his matchless deeds, Plucked forth the gory shafts and took his arms To deck the gods and shield the breast of Mars. Thrice happy thou with such a name achieved, Had but the fierce Iberian from thy sword, Or heavy shielded Teuton, or had fled The light Cantabrian: with no spoils shalt thou Adorn the Thunderer's temple, nor upraise The shout of triumph in the ways of Rome. For all thy prowess, all thy deeds of pride Do but prepare her lord.

Nor on this hand Repulsed, Pompeius idly ceased from war, Content within his bars; but as the sea Tireless, which tempests force upon the crag That breaks it, or which gnaws a mountain side Some day to fall in ruin on itself; He sought the turrets nearest to the main, On double onset bent; nor closely kept His troops in hand, but on the spacious plain Spread forth his camp. They joyful leave the tents And wander at their will. Thus Padus flows In brimming flood, and foaming at his bounds, Making whole districts quake; and should the bank Fail 'neath his swollen waters, all his stream Breaks forth in swirling eddies over fields Not his before; some lands are lost, the rest Gain from his bounty.

Hardly from his tower Had Caesar seen the fire or known the fight: And coming found the rampart overthrown, The dust no longer stirred, the rains cold As from a battle done. The peace that reigned There and on Magnus' side, as though men slept, Their victory won, aroused his angry soul. Quick he prepares, so that he end their joy Careless of slaughter or defeat, to rush With threatening columns on Torquatus' post. But swift as sailor, by his trembling mast Warned of Circeian tempest, furls his sails, So swift Torquatus saw, and prompt to wage The war more closely, he withdrew his men Within a narrower wall.

Now past the trench Were Caesar's companies, when from the hills Pompeius hurled his host upon their ranks Shut in, and hampered. Not so much o'erwhelmed As Caesar's soldiers is the hind who dwells On Etna's slopes, when blows the southern wind, And all the mountain pours its cauldrons forth Upon the vale; and huge Enceladus (9) Writhing beneath his load spouts o'er the plains A blazing torrent.

Blinded by the dust, Encircled, vanquished, ere the fight, they fled In cloud of terror on their rearward foe, So rushing on their fates. Thus had the war Shed its last drop of blood and peace ensued, But Magnus suffered not, and held his troops. Back from the battle.

Thou, oh Rome, had'st been Free, happy, mistress of thy laws and rights Were Sulla here. Now shalt thou ever grieve That in his crowning crime, to have met in fight A pious kinsman, Caesar's vantage lay. Oh tragic destiny! Nor Munda's fight Hispania had wept, nor Libya mourned Encrimsoned Utica, nor Nilus' stream, With blood unspeakable polluted, borne A nobler corse than her Egyptian kings: Nor Juba (10) lain unburied on the sands, Nor Scipio with his blood outpoured appeased The ghosts of Carthage; nor the blameless life Of Cato ended: and Pharsalia's name Had then been blotted from the book of fate.

But Caesar left the region where his arms Had found the deities averse, and marched His shattered columns to Thessalian lands. Then to Pompeius came (whose mind was bent To follow Caesar wheresoe'er he fled) His captains, striving to persuade their chief To seek Ausonia, his native land, Now freed from foes. "Ne'er will I pass," he said, "My country's limit, nor revisit Rome Like Caesar, at the head of banded hosts. Hesperia when the war began was mine; Mine, had I chosen in our country's shrines, (11) In midmost forum of her capital, To join the battle. So that banished far Be war from Rome, I'll cross the torrid zone Or those for ever frozen Scythian shores. What! shall my victory rob thee of the peace I gave thee by my flight? Rather than thou Should'st feel the evils of this impious war, Let Caesar deem thee his." Thus said, his course He turned towards the rising of the sun, And following devious paths, through forests wide, Made for Emathia, the land by fate Foredoomed to see the issue.

Thessalia on that side where Titan first Raises the wintry day, by Ossa's rocks Is prisoned in: but in th' advancing year When higher in the vault his chariot rides 'Tis Pelion that meets the morning rays. And when beside the Lion's flames he drives The middle course, Othrys with woody top Screens his chief ardour. On the hither side Pindus receives the breezes of the west And as the evening falls brings darkness in. There too Olympus, at whose foot who dwells Nor fears the north nor sees the shining bear. Between these mountains hemmed, in ancient time The fields were marsh, for Tempe's pass not yet Was cleft, to give an exit to the streams That filled the plain: but when Alcides' hand Smote Ossa from Olympus at a blow, (12) And Nereus wondered at the sudden flood Of waters to the main, then on the shore (Would it had slept for ever 'neath the deep) Seaborn Achilles' home Pharsalus rose; And Phylace (13) whence sailed that ship of old Whose keel first touched upon the beach of Troy; And Dorion mournful for the Muses' ire On Thamyris (14) vanquished: Trachis; Melibe Strong in the shafts (15) of Hercules, the price Of that most awful torch; Larissa's hold Potent of yore; and Argos, (16) famous erst, O'er which men pass the ploughshare: and the spot Fabled as Echionian Thebes, (17) where once Agave bore in exile to the pyre (Grieving 'twas all she had) the head and neck Of Pentheus massacred. The lake set free Flowed forth in many rivers: to the west Aeas, (18) a gentle stream; nor stronger flows The sire of Isis ravished from his arms; And Achelous, rival for the hand Of Oeneus' daughter, rolls his earthy flood (19) To silt the shore beside the neighbouring isles. Evenus (20) purpled by the Centaur's blood Wanders through Calydon: in the Malian Gulf Thy rapids fall, Spercheius: pure the wave With which Amphrysos (21) irrigates the meads Where once Apollo served: Anaurus (22) flows Breathing no vapour forth; no humid air Ripples his face: and whatever stream, Nameless itself, to Ocean gives its waves Through thee, Peneus: (23) whirled in eddies foams Apidanus; Enipeus lingers on Swift only when fresh streams his volume swell: And thus Asopus takes his ordered course, Phoenix and Melas; but Eurotas keeps His stream aloof from that with which he flows, Peneus, gliding on his top as though Upon the channel. Fable says that, sprung From darkest pools of Styx, with common floods He scorns to mingle, mindful of his source, So that the gods above may fear him still.

Soon as were sped the rivers, Boebian ploughs Dark with its riches broke the virgin soil; Then came Lelegians to press the share, And Dolopes and sons of Oeolus By whom the glebe was furrowed. Steed-renowned Magnetians dwelt there, and the Minyan race Who smote the sounding billows with the oar. There in the cavern from the pregnant cloud Ixion's sons found birth, the Centaur brood Half beast, half human: Monychus who broke The stubborn rocks of Pholoe, Rhoetus fierce Hurling from Oeta's top gigantic elms Which northern storms could hardly overturn; Pholus, Alcides' host: Nessus who bore The Queen across Evenus' (24) waves, to feel The deadly arrow for his shameful deed; And aged Chiron (25) who with wintry star Against the huger Scorpion draws his bow. Here sparkled on the land the warrior seed; (26) Here leaped the charger from Thessalian rocks (27) Struck by the trident of the Ocean King, Omen of dreadful war; here first he learned, Champing the bit and foaming at the curb, Yet to obey his lord. From yonder shore The keel of pine first floated, (28) and bore men To dare the perilous chance of seas unknown: And here Ionus ruler of the land First from the furnace molten masses drew Of iron and brass; here first the hammer fell To weld them, shapeless; here in glowing stream Ran silver forth and gold, soon to receive The minting stamp. 'Twas thus that money came Whereby men count their riches, cause accursed Of warfare. Hence came down that Python huge On Cirrha: hence the laurel wreath which crowns The Pythian victor: here Aloeus' sons Gigantic rose against the gods, what time Pelion had almost touched the stars supreme, And Ossa's loftier peak amid the sky Opposing, barred the constellations' way.

When in this fated land the chiefs had placed Their several camps, foreboding of the end Now fast approaching, all men's thoughts were turned Upon the final issue of the war. And as the hour drew near, the coward minds Trembling beneath the shadow of the fate Now hanging o'er them, deemed disaster near: While some took heart; yet doubted what might fall, In hope and fear alternate. 'Mid the throng Sextus, unworthy son of worthy sire Who soon upon the waves that Scylla guards, (29) Sicilian pirate, exile from his home, Stained by his deeds of shame the fights he won, Could bear delay no more; his feeble soul, Sick of uncertain fate, by fear compelled, Forecast the future: yet consulted not The shrine of Delos nor the Pythian caves; Nor was he satisfied to learn the sound Of Jove's brass cauldron, 'mid Dodona's oaks, By her primaeval fruits the nurse of men: Nor sought he sages who by flight of birds, Or watching with Assyrian care the stars And fires of heaven, or by victims slain, May know the fates to come; nor any source Lawful though secret. For to him was known That which excites the hate of gods above; Magicians' lore, the savage creed of Dis And all the shades; and sad with gloomy rites Mysterious altars. For his frenzied soul Heaven knew too little. And the spot itself Kindled his madness, for hard by there dwelt The brood of Haemon (30) whom no storied witch Of fiction e'er transcended; all their art In things most strange and most incredible; There were Thessalian rocks with deadly herbs Thick planted, sensible to magic chants, Funereal, secret: and the land was full Of violence to the gods: the Queenly guest (31) From Colchis gathered here the fatal roots That were not in her store: hence vain to heaven Rise impious incantations, all unheard; For deaf the ears divine: save for one voice Which penetrates the furthest depths of airs Compelling e'en th' unwilling deities To hearken to its accents. Not the care Of the revolving sky or starry pole Can call them from it ever. Once the sound Of those dread tones unspeakable has reached The constellations, then nor Babylon Nor secret Memphis, though they open wide The shrines of ancient magic and entreat The gods, could draw them from the fires that smoke Upon the altars of far Thessaly. To hearts of flint those incantations bring Love, strange, unnatural; the old man's breast Burns with illicit fire. Nor lies the power In harmful cup nor in the juicy pledge Of love maternal from the forehead drawn; (32) Charmed forth by spells alone the mind decays, By poisonous drugs unharmed. With woven threads Crossed in mysterious fashion do they bind Those whom no passion born of beauteous form Or loving couch unites. All things on earth Change at their bidding; night usurps the day; The heavens disobey their wonted laws; At that dread hymn the Universe stands still; And Jove while urging the revolving wheels Wonders they move not. Torrents are outpoured Beneath a burning sun; and thunder roars Uncaused by Jupiter. From their flowing locks Vapours immense shall issue at their call; When falls the tempest seas shall rise and foam (33) Moved by their spell; though powerless the breeze To raise the billows. Ships against the wind With bellying sails move onward. From the rock Hangs motionless the torrent: rivers run Uphill; the summer heat no longer swells Nile in his course; Maeander's stream is straight; Slow Rhone is quickened by the rush of Saone; Hills dip their heads and topple to the plain; Olympus sees his clouds drift overhead; And sunless Scythia's sempiternal snows Melt in mid-winter; the inflowing tides Driven onward by the moon, at that dread chant Ebb from their course; earth's axes, else unmoved, Have trembled, and the force centripetal Has tottered, and the earth's compacted frame Struck by their voice has gaped, (34) till through the void Men saw the moving sky. All beasts most fierce And savage fear them, yet with deadly aid Furnish the witches' arts. Tigers athirst For blood, and noble lions on them fawn With bland caresses: serpents at their word Uncoil their circles, and extended glide Along the surface of the frosty field; The viper's severed body joins anew; And dies the snake by human venom slain.

Whence comes this labour on the gods, compelled To hearken to the magic chant and spells, Nor daring to despise them? Doth some bond Control the deities? Is their pleasure so, Or must they listen? and have silent threats Prevailed, or piety unseen received So great a guerdon? Against all the gods Is this their influence, or on one alone Who to his will constrains the universe, Himself constrained? Stars most in yonder clime Shoot headlong from the zenith; and the moon Gliding serene upon her nightly course Is shorn of lustre by their poisonous chant, Dimmed by dark earthly fires, as though our orb Shadowed her brother's radiance and barred The light bestowed by heaven; nor freshly shines Until descending nearer to the earth She sheds her baneful drops upon the mead.

These sinful rites and these her sister's songs Abhorred Erichtho, fiercest of the race, Spurned for their piety, and yet viler art Practised in novel form. To her no home Beneath a sheltering roof her direful head Thus to lay down were crime: deserted tombs Her dwelling-place, from which, darling of hell, She dragged the dead. Nor life nor gods forbad But that she knew the secret homes of Styx And learned to hear the whispered voice of ghosts At dread mysterious meetings. (35) Never sun Shed his pure light upon that haggard cheek Pale with the pallor of the shades, nor looked Upon those locks unkempt that crowned her brow. In starless nights of tempest crept the hag Out from her tomb to seize the levin bolt; Treading the harvest with accursed foot She burned the fruitful growth, and with her breath Poisoned the air else pure. No prayer she breathed Nor supplication to the gods for help Nor knew the pulse of entrails as do men Who worship. Funeral pyres she loves to light And snatch the incense from the flaming tomb. The gods at her first utterance grant her prayer For things unlawful, lest they hear again Its fearful accents: men whose limbs were quick With vital power she thrust within the grave Despite the fates who owed them years to come: The funeral reversed brought from the tomb Those who were dead no longer; and the pyre Yields to her shameless clutch still smoking dust And bones enkindled, and the torch which held Some grieving sire but now, with fragments mixed In sable smoke and ceremental cloths Singed with the redolent fire that burned the dead. But those who lie within a stony cell Untouched by fire, whose dried and mummied frames No longer know corruption, limb by limb Venting her rage she tears, the bloodless eyes Drags from their cavities, and mauls the nail Upon the withered hand: she gnaws the noose By which some wretch has died, and from the tree Drags down a pendent corpse, its members torn Asunder to the winds: forth from the palms Wrenches the iron, and from the unbending bond Hangs by her teeth, and with her hands collects The slimy gore which drips upon the limbs.

Where lay a corpse upon the naked earth On ravening birds and beasts of prey the hag Kept watch, nor marred by knife or hand her spoil, Till on his victim seized some nightly wolf; (36) Then dragged the morsel from his thirsty fangs; Nor fears she murder, if her rites demand Blood from the living, or some banquet fell Requires the panting entrail. Pregnant wombs Yield to her knife the infant to be placed On flaming altars: and whene'er she needs Some fierce undaunted ghost, he fails not her Who has all deaths in use. Her hand has chased From smiling cheeks the rosy bloom of life; And with sinister hand from dying youth Has shorn the fatal lock: and holding oft In foul embraces some departed friend Severed the head, and through the ghastly lips, Held by her own apart, some impious tale Dark with mysterious horror hath conveyed Down to the Stygian shades.

When rumour brought Her name to Sextus, in the depth of night, While Titan's chariot beneath our earth Wheeled on his middle course, he took his way Through fields deserted; while a faithful band, His wonted ministers in deeds of guilt, Seeking the hag 'mid broken sepulchres, Beheld her seated on the crags afar Where Haemus falls towards Pharsalia's plain. (37) There was she proving for her gods and priests Words still unknown, and framing numbered chants Of dire and novel purpose: for she feared Lest Mars might stray into another world, And spare Thessalian soil the blood ere long To flow in torrents; and she thus forbade Philippi's field, polluted with her song, Thick with her poisonous distilments sown, To let the war pass by. Such deaths, she hopes, Soon shall be hers! the blood of all the world Shed for her use! to her it shall be given To sever from their trunks the heads of kings, Plunder the ashes of the noble dead, Italia's bravest, and in triumph add The mightiest warriors to her host of shades. And now what spoils from Magnus' tombless corse Her hand may snatch, on which of Caesar's limbs She soon may pounce, she makes her foul forecast And eager gloats.

To whom the coward son Of Magnus thus: "Thou greatest ornament Of Haemon's daughters, in whose power it lies Or to reveal the fates, or from its course To turn the future, be it mine to know By thy sure utterance to what final end Fortune now guides the issue. Not the least Of all the Roman host on yonder plain Am I, but Magnus' most illustrious son, Lord of the world or heir to death and doom. The unknown affrights me: I can firmly face The certain terror. Bid my destiny Yield to thy power the dark and hidden end, And let me fall foreknowing. From the gods Extort the truth, or, if thou spare the gods, Force it from hell itself. Fling back the gates That bar th' Elysian fields; let Death confess Whom from our ranks he seeks. No humble task I bring, but worthy of Erichtho's skill Of such a struggle fought for such a prize To search and tell the issue."

Then the witch Pleased that her impious fame was noised abroad Thus made her answer: "If some lesser fates Thy wish had been to change, against their wish It had been easy to compel the gods To its accomplishment. My art has power When of one man the constellations press The speedy death, to compass a delay; And mine it is, though every star decrees A ripe old age, by mystic herbs to shear The life midway. But should some purpose set From the beginning of the universe, And all the labouring fortunes of mankind, Be brought in question, then Thessalian art Bows to the power supreme. But if thou be Content to know the issue pre-ordained, That shall be swiftly thine; for earth and air And sea and space and Rhodopaean crags Shall speak the future. Yet it easiest seems Where death in these Thessalian fields abounds To raise a single corpse. From dead men's lips Scarce cold, in fuller accents falls the voice; Not from some mummied flame in accents shrill Uncertain to the ear."

Thus spake the hag And through redoubled night, a squalid veil Swathing her pallid features, stole among Unburied carcases. Fast fled the wolves, The carrion birds with maw unsatisfied Relaxed their talons, as with creeping step She sought her prophet. Firm must be the flesh As yet, though cold in death, and firm the lungs Untouched by wound. Now in the balance hung The fates of slain unnumbered; had she striven Armies to raise and order back to life Whole ranks of warriors, the laws had failed Of Erebus; and, summoned up from Styx, Its ghostly tenants had obeyed her call, And rising fought once more. At length the witch Picks out her victim with pierced throat agape Fit for her purpose. Gripped by pitiless hook O'er rocks she drags him to the mountain cave Accursed by her fell rites, that shall restore The dead man's life.

Close to the hidden brink The land that girds the precipice of hell Sinks towards the depths: with ever falling leaves A wood o'ershadows, and a spreading yew Casts shade impenetrable. Foul decay Fills all the space, and in the deep recess Darkness unbroken, save by chanted spells, Reigns ever. Not where gape the misty jaws Of caverned Taenarus, the gloomy bound Of either world, through which the nether kings Permit the passage of the dead to earth, So poisonous, mephitic, hangs the air. Nay, though the witch had power to call the shades Forth from the depths, 'twas doubtful if the cave Were not a part of hell. Discordant hues Flamed on her garb as by a fury worn; Bare was her visage, and upon her brow Dread vipers hissed, beneath her streaming locks In sable coils entwined. But when she saw The youth's companions trembling, and himself With eyes cast down, with visage as of death, Thus spake the witch: "Forbid your craven souls These fears to cherish: soon returning life This frame shall quicken, and in tones which reach Even the timorous ear shall speak the man. If I have power the Stygian lakes to show, The bank that sounds with fire, the fury band, And giants lettered, and the hound that shakes Bristling with heads of snakes his triple head, What fear is this that cringes at the sight Of timid shivering shades?"

Then to her prayer. First through his gaping bosom blood she pours Still fervent, washing from his wounds the gore. Then copious poisons from the moon distils Mixed with all monstrous things which Nature's pangs Bring to untimely birth; the froth from dogs Stricken with madness, foaming at the stream; A lynx's entrails: and the knot that grows Upon the fell hyaena; flesh of stags Fed upon serpents; and the sucking fish Which holds the vessel back (38) though eastern winds Make bend the canvas; dragon's eyes; and stones That sound beneath the brooding eagle's wings. Nor Araby's viper, nor the ocean snake Who in the Red Sea waters guards the shell, Are wanting; nor the slough on Libyan sands By horned reptile cast; nor ashes fail Snatched from an altar where the Phoenix died. And viler poisons many, which herself Has made, she adds, whereto no name is given: Pestiferous leaves pregnant with magic chants And blades of grass which in their primal growth Her cursed mouth had slimed. Last came her voice More potent than all herbs to charm the gods Who rule in Lethe. Dissonant murmurs first And sounds discordant from the tongues of men She utters, scarce articulate: the bay Of wolves, and barking as of dogs, were mixed With that fell chant; the screech of nightly owl Raising her hoarse complaint; the howl of beast And sibilant hiss of snake — all these were there; And more — the waft of waters on the rock, The sound of forests and the thunder peal. Such was her voice; but soon in clearer tones Reaching to Tartarus, she raised her song: "Ye awful goddesses, avenging power Of Hell upon the damned, and Chaos huge Who striv'st to mix innumerable worlds, And Pluto, king of earth, whose weary soul Grieves at his godhead; Styx; and plains of bliss We may not enter: and thou, Proserpine, Hating thy mother and the skies above, My patron goddess, last and lowest form (39) Of Hecate through whom the shades and I Hold silent converse; warder of the gate Who castest human offal to the dog: Ye sisters who shall spin the threads again; (40) And thou, O boatman of the burning wave, Now wearied of the shades from hell to me Returning, hear me if with voice I cry Abhorred, polluted; if the flesh of man Hath ne'er been absent from my proffered song, Flesh washed with brains still quivering; if the child Whose severed head I placed upon the dish But for this hand had lived — a listening ear Lend to my supplication! From the caves Hid in the innermost recess of hell I claim no soul long banished from the light. For one but now departed, lingering still Upon the brink of Orcus, is my prayer. Grant (for ye may) that listening to the spell Once more he seek his dust; and let the shade Of this our soldier perished (if the war Well at your hands has merited), proclaim The destiny of Magnus to his son."

Such prayers she uttered; then, her foaming lips And head uplifting, present saw the ghost. Hard by he stood, beside the hated corpse His ancient prison, and loathed to enter in. There was the yawning chest where fell the blow That was his death; and yet the gift supreme Of death, his right, (Ah, wretch!) was reft away. Angered at Death the witch, and at the pause Conceded by the fates, with living snake Scourges the moveless corse; and on the dead She barks through fissures gaping to her song, Breaking the silence of their gloomy home: "Tisiphone, Megaera, heed ye not? Flies not this wretched soul before your whips The void of Erebus? By your very names, She-dogs of hell, I'll call you to the day, Not to return; through sepulchres and death Your gaoler: from funereal urns and tombs I'll chase you forth. And thou, too, Hecate, Who to the gods in comely shape and mien, Not that of Erebus, appearst, henceforth Wasted and pallid as thou art in hell

At my command shalt come. I'll noise abroad The banquet that beneath the solid earth Holds thee, thou maid of Enna; by what bond Thou lov'st night's King, by what mysterious stain Infected, so that Ceres fears from hell To call her daughter. And for thee, base king, Titan shall pierce thy caverns with his rays And sudden day shall smite thee. Do ye hear? Or shall I summon to mine aid that god At whose dread name earth trembles; who can look Unflinching on the Gorgon's head, and drive The Furies with his scourge, who holds the depths Ye cannot fathom, and above whose haunts Ye dwell supernal; who by waves of Styx Forswears himself unpunished?"

Then the blood Grew warm and liquid, and with softening touch Cherished the stiffened wounds and filled the veins, Till throbbed once more the slow returning pulse And every fibre trembled, as with death Life was commingled. Then, not limb by limb, With toil and strain, but rising at a bound Leaped from the earth erect the living man. Fierce glared his eyes uncovered, and the life Was dim, and still upon his face remained The pallid hues of hardly parted death. Amazement seized upon him, to the earth Brought back again: but from his lips tight drawn No murmur issued; he had power alone When questioned to reply. "Speak," quoth the hag, "As I shall bid thee; great shall be thy gain If but thou answerest truly, freed for aye From all Haemonian art. Such burial place Shall now be thine, and on thy funeral pyre Such fatal woods shall burn, such chant shall sound, That to thy ghost no more or magic song Or spell shall reach, and thy Lethaean sleep Shall never more be broken in a death From me received anew: for such reward Think not this second life enforced in vain. Obscure may be the answers of the gods By priestess spoken at the holy shrine; But whose braves the oracles of death In search of truth, should gain a sure response. Then speak, I pray thee. Let the hidden fates Tell through thy voice the mysteries to come."

Thus spake she, and her words by mystic force Gave him his answer; but with gloomy mien, And tears swift flowing, thus he made reply: "Called from the margin of the silent stream I saw no fateful sisters spin the threads. Yet know I this, that 'mid the Roman shades Reigns fiercest discord; and this impious war Destroys the peace that ruled the fields of death. Elysian meads and deeps of Tartarus In paths diverse the Roman chieftains leave And thus disclose the fates. The blissful ghosts Bear visages of sorrow. Sire and son The Decii, who gave themselves to death In expiation of their country's doom, And great Camillus, wept; and Sulla's shade Complained of fortune. Scipio bewailed The scion of his race about to fall In sands of Libya: Cato, greatest foe To Carthage, grieves for that indignant soul Which shall disdain to serve. Brutus alone In all the happy ranks I smiling saw, First consul when the kings were thrust from Rome. The chains were fallen from boastful Catiline. Him too I saw rejoicing, and the pair Of Marii, and Cethegus' naked arm. (41) The Drusi, heroes of the people, joyed, In laws immoderate; and the famous pair (42) Of greatly daring brothers: guilty bands By bars eternal shut within the doors That close the prison of hell, applaud the fates, Claiming the plains Elysian: and the King Throws wide his pallid halls, makes hard the points Of craggy rocks, and forges iron chains, The victor's punishment. But take with thee This comfort, youth, that there a calm abode, And peaceful, waits thy father and his house. Nor let the glory of a little span Disturb thy boding heart: the hour shall come When all the chiefs shall meet. Shrink not from death, But glowing in the greatness of your souls, E'en from your humble sepulchres descend, And tread beneath your feet, in pride of place, The wandering phantoms of the gods of Rome. (43) Which of the chiefs by Tiber's yellow stream, And which by Nile shall rest (the leaders' fate) This fight decides, no more. Nor seek to know From me thy fortunes: for the fates in time Shall give thee all thy due; and thy great sire, (44) A surer prophet, in Sicilian fields Shall speak thy future — doubting even he What regions of the world thou should'st avoid And what should'st seek. O miserable race! Europe and Asia and Libya's plains, (45) Which saw your conquests, now shall hold alike Your burial-place — nor has the earth for you A happier land than this."

His task performed, He stands in mournful guise, with silent look Asking for death again; yet could not die Till mystic herb and magic chant prevailed. For nature's law, once used, had power no more To slay the corpse and set the spirit free. With plenteous wood she builds the funeral pyre To which the dead man comes: then as the flames Seized on his form outstretched, the youth and witch Together sought the camp; and as the dawn Now streaked the heavens, by the hag's command The day was stayed till Sextus reached his tent, And mist and darkness veiled his safe return.

ENDNOTES:

(1) Dyrrhachium (or Epidamnus) was a Corcyraean colony, but its founder was of Corinth, the metropolis of Corcyra. It stood some sixty miles north of the Ceraunian promontory (Book V., 747). About the year 1100 it was stormed and taken by Robert the Guiscard, after furious battles with the troops of the Emperor Alexius. Its modern name is Durazzo. It may be observed that, according to Caesar's account, he succeeded in getting between Pompey and Dyrrhachium, B.C. 3, 41, 42. (2) C. del Faro, the N.E. point of Sicily. (3) The shores of Kent. (4) Aricia was situated on the Via Appia, about sixteen miles from Rome. There was a temple of Diana close to it, among some woods on a small lake. Aricia was Horace's first halting place on his journey to Brundisium ("Satires", i. 5). As to Diana, see Book I., line 501. (5) An island in the Bay of Puteoli. (6) Typhon, the hundred-headed giant, was buried under Mount Etna. (7) This was Scaeva's name. (8) The vinewood staff was the badge of the centurion's office. (9) This giant, like Typhon, was buried under Mount Etna. (10) Juba and Petreius killed each other after the battle of Thepsus to avoid falling into Caesar's hands. See Book IV., line 5. (11) So Cicero: "Shall I, who have been called saviour of the city and father of my country, bring into it an army of Getae Armenians and Colchians?" ("Ep. ad Atticum," ix., 10.) (12) See Book VIII., line 3. (13) Protesilaus, from this place, first landed at Troy. (14) Thamyris challenged the Muses to a musical contest, and being vanquished, was by them deprived of sight. (15) The arrows given to Philoctetes by Hercules as a reward for kindling his funeral pyre. (16) This is the Pelasgic, not the historical, Argos. (17) Book I., line 632; Book VII., line 904. Agave was a daughter of Cadmus, and mother of Pentheus, king of the Boeotian Thebes. He was opposed to the mysterious worship of Dionysus, which his mother celebrated, and which he had watched from a tree. She tore him to pieces, being urged into a frenzy and mistaking him for a wild beast. She then retired to another Thebes, in Phthiotis, in triumph, with his head and shoulders. By another legend she did not leave the Boeotian Thebes. (See Grote, vol. i., p. 220. Edit. 1862.) (18) Aeas was a river flowing from the boundary of Thessaly through Epirus to the Ionian Sea. The sire of Isis, or Io, was Inachus; but the river of that name is usually placed in the Argive territory. (19) A river rising in Mount Pindus and flowing into the Ionian Sea nearly opposite to Ithaca. At its mouth the sea has been largely silted up. (20) The god of this river fought with Hercules for the hand of Deianira. After Hercules had been married to Deianira, and when they were on a journey, they came to the River Evenus. Here Nessus, a Centaur, acted as ferryman, and Hercules bade him carry Deianira across. In doing so he insulted her, and Hercules shot him with an arrow. (21) Admetus was King of Pherae in Thessaly, and sued for Alcestis, the daughter of Pelias, who promised her to him if he should come in a chariot drawn by lions and boars. With the assistance of Apollo, Admetus performed this. Apollo, for the slaughter of the Cyclops, was condemned to serve a mortal, and accordingly he tended the flocks of Admetus for nine years. The River Amphrysos is marked as flowing into the Pagasaean Gulf at a short distance below Pherae. (22) Anaurus was a small river passing into the Pagasaean Gulf past Iolcos. In this river Jason is said to have lost one of his slippers. (23) The River Peneus flowed into the sea through the pass of Tempe, cloven by Hercules between Olympus and Ossa (see line 406); and carried with it Asopus, Phoenix, Melas, Enipeus, Apidanus, and Titaresus (or Eurotas). The Styx is generally placed in Arcadia, but Lucan says that Eurotas rises from the Stygian pools, and that, mindful of this mysterious source, he refuses to mingle his streams with that of Peneus, in order that the gods may still fear to break an oath sworn upon his waters. (24) See on line 429. (25) Chiron, the aged Centaur, instructor of Peleus, Achilles, and others. He was killed by one of the poisoned arrows of Hercules, but placed by Zeus among the stars as the Archer, from which position he appears to be aiming at the Scorpion. His constellation appears in winter. (26) The teeth of the dragon slain by Cadmus; though this took place in Boeotia. (27) Poseidon and Athena disputed as to which of them should name the capital of Attica. The gods gave the reward to that one of them who should produce the thing most useful to man; whereupon Athena produced an olive tree, and Poseidon a horse. Homer also places the scene of this event in Thessaly. ("Iliad", xxiii., 247.) (28) The Argo. Conf. Book III., 223. (29) See Book VII., 1022. (30) Son of Pelasgus. From him was derived the ancient name of Thessaly, Haemonia. (31) Medea. (32) It was supposed that there was on the forehead of the new- born foal an excrescence, which was bitten off and eaten by the mother. If she did not do this she had no affection for the foal. (Virgil, "Aeneid", iv., 515.) (33) "When the boisterous sea, Without a breath of wind, hath knocked the sky." — Ben Jonson, "Masque of Queens". (34) The sky was supposed to move round, but to be restrained in its course by the planets. (See Book X., line 244.) (35) "Coatus audire silentum." To be present at the meetings of the dead and hear their voices. So, in the sixth Aeneid, the dead Greek warriors in feeble tones endeavour to express their fright at the appearance of the Trojan hero (lines 492, 493). (36) "As if that piece were sweeter which the wolf had bitten." Note to "The Masque of Queens", in which the first hag says: "I have been all day, looking after A raven feeding on a quarter, And soon as she turned her beak to the south I snatched this morsel out of her mouth." —Ben Jonson, "Masque of Queens". But more probably the meaning is that the wolf's bite gave the flesh magical efficacy. (37) Confusing Pharsalia with Philippi. (See line 684.) (38) One of the miraculous stories to be found in Pliny's "Natural History". See Lecky's "Augustus to Charlemagne", vol. i., p. 370. (39) The mysterious goddess Hecate was identified with Luna in heaven, Diana on earth, and Proserpine in the lower regions. The text is doubtful. (40) That is, for the second life of her victim. (41) See Book II., 609. (42) The Gracchi, the younger of whom aimed at being a perpetual tribune, and was in some sort a forerunner of the Emperors. (43) That is, the Caesars, who will be in Tartarus. (44) Referring probably to an episode intended to be introduced in a later book, in which the shade of Pompeius was to foretell his fate to Sextus. (45) Cnaeus was killed in Spain after the battle of Munda; Sextus at Miletus; Pompeius himself, of course, in Egypt.



BOOK VII

THE BATTLE

Ne'er to the summons of the Eternal laws More slowly Titan rose, (1) nor drave his steeds, Forced by the sky revolving, (2) up the heaven, With gloomier presage; wishing to endure The pangs of ravished light, and dark eclipse; And drew the mists up, not to feed his flames, (3) But lest his light upon Thessalian earth Might fall undimmed.

Pompeius on that morn, To him the latest day of happy life, In troubled sleep an empty dream conceived. For in the watches of the night he heard Innumerable Romans shout his name Within his theatre; the benches vied To raise his fame and place him with the gods; As once in youth, when victory was won O'er conquered tribes where swift Iberus flows, (4) And where Sertorius' armies fought and fled, The west subdued, with no less majesty Than if the purple toga graced the car, He sat triumphant in his pure white gown A Roman knight, and heard the Senate's cheer. Perhaps, as ills drew near, his anxious soul, Shunning the future wooed the happy past; Or, as is wont, prophetic slumber showed That which was not to be, by doubtful forms Misleading; or as envious Fate forbade Return to Italy, this glimpse of Rome Kind Fortune gave. Break not his latest sleep, Ye sentinels; let not the trumpet call Strike on his ear: for on the morrow's night Shapes of the battle lost, of death and war Shall crowd his rest with terrors. Whence shalt thou The poor man's happiness of sleep regain? Happy if even in dreams thy Rome could see Once more her captain! Would the gods had given To thee and to thy country one day yet To reap the latest fruit of such a love: Though sure of fate to come! Thou marchest on As though by heaven ordained in Rome to die; She, conscious ever of her prayers for thee Heard by the gods, deemed not the fates decreed Such evil destiny, that she should lose The last sad solace of her Magnus' tomb. Then young and old had blent their tears for thee, And child unbidden; women torn their hair And struck their bosoms as for Brutus dead. But now no public woe shall greet thy death As erst thy praise was heard: but men shall grieve In silent sorrow, though the victor's voice Amid the clash of arms proclaims thy fall; Though incense smoke before the Thunderer's shrine, And shouts of welcome bid great Caesar hail.

The stars had fled before the growing morn, When eager voices (as the fates drew on The world to ruin) round Pompeius' tent Demand the battle signal. What! by those So soon to perish, shall the sign be asked, Their own, their country's doom? Ah! fatal rage That hastens on the hour; no other sun Upon this living host shall rise again. "Pompeius fears!" they cry. "He's slow to act; Too 'kind to Caesar; and he fondly rules A world of subject peoples; but with peace Such rule were ended." Eastern kings no less, And peoples, eager for their distant homes, Already murmured at the lengthy war.

Thus hath it pleased the gods, when woe impends On guilty men, to make them seem its cause. We court disaster, crave the fatal sword. Of Magnus' camp Pharsalia was the prayer; For Tullius, of all the sons of Rome Chief orator, beneath whose civil rule Fierce Catiline at the peace-compelling axe Trembled and fled, arose, to Magnus' ear Bearing the voice of all. To him was war Grown hateful, and he longed once more to hear The Senate's plaudits; and with eloquent lips He lent persuasion to the weaker cause. "Fortune, Pompeius, for her gifts to thee Asks this one boon, that thou should'st use her now. Here at thy feet thy leading captains lie; And here thy monarchs, and a suppliant world Entreats thee prostrate for thy kinsman's fall. So long shall Caesar plunge the world in war? Swift was thy tread when these proud nations fell; How deep their shame, and justly, should delay Now mar thy conquests! Where thy trust in Fate, Thy fervour where? Ingrate! Dost dread the gods, Or think they favour not the Senate's cause? Thy troops unbidden shall the standards seize And conquer; thou in shame be forced to win. If at the Senate's orders and for us The war is waged, then give to us the right To choose the battle-field. Why dost thou keep From Caesar's throat the swords of all the world? The weapon quivers in the eager hand: Scarce one awaits the signal. Strike at once, Or without thee the trumpets sound the fray. Art thou the Senate's comrade or her lord? We wait your answer."

But Pompeius groaned; His mind was adverse, but he felt the fates Opposed his wish, and knew the hand divine. "Since all desire it, and the fates prevail, So let it be; your leader now no more, I share the labours of the battle-field. Let Fortune roll the nations of the earth In one red ruin; myriads of mankind See their last sun to-day. Yet, Rome, I swear, This day of blood was forced upon thy son. Without a wound, the prizes of the war Might have been thine, and he who broke the peace In peace forgotten. Whence this lust for crime? Shall bloodless victories in civil war Be shunned, not sought? We've ravished from our foe All boundless seas, and land; his starving troops Have snatched earth's crop half-grown, in vain attempt Their hunger to appease; they prayed for death, Sought for the sword-thrust, and within our ranks Were fain to mix their life-blood with your own. Much of the war is done: the conscript youth Whose heart beats high, who burns to join the fray (Though men fight hard in terror of defeat), The shock of onset need no longer fear. Bravest is he who promptly meets the ill When fate commands it and the moment comes, Yet brooks delay, in prudence; and shall we, Our happy state enjoying, risk it all? Trust to the sword the fortunes of the world? Not victory, but battle, ye demand. Do thou, O Fortune, of the Roman state Who mad'st Pompeius guardian, from his hands Take back the charge grown weightier, and thyself Commit its safety to the chance of war. Nor blame nor glory shall be mine to-day. Thy prayers unjustly, Caesar, have prevailed: We fight! What wickedness, what woes on men, Destruction on what realms this dawn shall bring! Crimson with Roman blood yon stream shall run. Would that (without the ruin of our cause) The first fell bolt hurled on this cursed day Might strike me lifeless! Else, this battle brings A name of pity or a name of hate. The loser bears the burden of defeat; The victor wins, but conquest is a crime." Thus to the soldiers, burning for the fray, He yields, forbidding, and throws down the reins. So may a sailor give the winds control Upon his barque, which, driven by the seas, Bears him an idle burden. Now the camp Hums with impatience, and the brave man's heart With beats tumultuous throbs against his breast; And all the host had standing in their looks (5) The paleness of the death that was to come. On that day's fight 'twas manifest that Rome And all the future destinies of man Hung trembling; and by weightier dread possessed, They knew not danger. Who would fear for self Should ocean rise and whelm the mountain tops, And sun and sky descend upon the earth In universal chaos? Every mind Is bent upon Pompeius, and on Rome. They trust no sword until its deadly point Glows on the sharpening stone; no lance will serve Till straightened for the fray; each bow is strung Anew, and arrows chosen for their work Fill all the quivers; horsemen try the curb And fit the bridle rein and whet the spur. If toils divine with human may compare, 'Twas thus, when Phlegra bore the giant crew, (6) In Etna's furnace glowed the sword of Mars, Neptunus' trident felt the flame once more; And great Apollo after Python slain Sharpened his darts afresh: on Pallas' shield Was spread anew the dread Medusa's hair; And broad Sicilia trembled at the blows Of Vulcan forging thunderbolts for Jove.