nus tread the dark domain
To meet me. Not in Tartarus' abyss,
Sad shades of sin and never-ending pain,
I dwell, but on the blest Elysian plain
Join with the just in fellowship. Now heed:
There the chaste Sibyl, if with victims slain,
Black sheep, ye seek her, shall thy footsteps lead,
And show thy destined walls and progeny decreed.

CI. "And now farewell; for dewy Night midway
Wheels on her course, and from the Orient sky
Fierce beats the breathing of the steeds of Day."
He spake, and melted as a mist on high.
"Ah, whither," cried AEneas, "wilt thou fly?
Who tears thee hence? Where hurriest thou again?"
So saying, he wakes the embers ere they die.
And offering frankincense and sacred grain,
Troy's household gods adores, and hoary Vesta's fane.

CII. Forthwith he tells Acestes, then the crews,
Jove's will, his father's counsel and his own.
All vote assent, nor doth his host refuse.
No tarrying now; they write the matrons down,
And all who faint or care not for renown
They leave behind,--the idlers of each crew,
But willing settlers in the new-planned town.
These the charred timbers and the thwarts renew,
Shape oars and fit the ropes; a gallant band, but few.

CIII. AEneas with a ploughshare marks the town,
And, homes allotting, gives each place a name,
Here Troy, there Ilion. Pleased to wear the crown,
A forum good Acestes hastes to frame,
And laws to gathered senators proclaim.
Rear'd high on Eryx, to the stars ascends
A temple, to Idalian Venus' fame.
A priest Anchises' sepulchre attends,
A grove's far sacred shade his hallowed dust defends.

CIV. The rites are paid, the nine-days' feast is o'er,
Smooth lies the deep, and Southern winds invite
The mariners. Along the winding shore
Loud rise the sounds of sorrow, day and night,
Where friends, clasped close in lingering undelight,
Weep at the thought of parting. Matrons, ay,
And men, who lately shuddered at the sight,
And loathed the name of Ocean, scorn to stay,
And willing hearts now brave the long, laborious way.

CV. Kindly AEneas cheers them, and with tears
Leaves to their King, then, parting, gives command
A lamb to slay to tempest, and three steers
To Eryx. So they loosen from the land.
He on the prow, a charger in his hand,
Flings forth the entrails, and outpours the wine,
And, crowned w