d greet with joy, uprising o'er the plain,
The Latin towers and homes, and now the walls attain.

XXII. Before the city, boys and youths contend
On horseback. Through the whirling dust they steer
Their chariots and the practised steeds, or bend
The tight-strung bow, or aim the limber spear,
Or urge fist-combat or the foot's career.
Now to their king a message quick has flown;
Tall men and strange, in foreign garb are here.
Latinus summons them within: anon,
Amidmost of his court he mounts the ancestral throne.

XXIII. Raised on a hundred columns, vast and tall,
Above the city reared its reverend head
A stately fabric, once the palace-hall
Of Picus. Dark woods shrouded, and the dread
Of ages filled, the precinct. Here, 'tis said,
Kings took the sceptre and the axe of fate,
Their senate house this temple; here were spread
The tables for the sacred feast, where sate,
What time the ram was slain, the elders of the State.

XXIV. In ancient cedar o'er the doors appear
The sculptured effigies of sires divine.
Grey Saturn, Italus, Sabinus here,
Curved hook in hand, the planter of the vine.
There two-faced Janus, and, in ordered line,
Old kings and patriot chieftains. Captive cars
Hang round, and arms upon the doorposts shine,
Curved axes, crests of helmets, towngates' bars,
Spears, shields and beaks of ships, the trophies of their wars.

XXV. There Picus sat, with his Quirinal wand,
Tamer of steeds. The augur's gown he wore,
Short, striped and belted; and his lifted hand
The sacred buckler on the left upbore.
Him Circe, his enamoured bride, of yore,
Wild with desire, so ancient legends say,
Smote with her golden rod, and sprinkling o'er
His limbs her magic poisons, made a jay,
And sent to roam the air, with dappled plumage gay.

XXVI. Such is the temple, in whose sacred dome
Latinus waits the Teucrians on his throne,
And kindly thus accosts them as they come:
'Speak, Dardans,--for the Dardan name ye own;
Nor strange your race and city, nor unknown
Sail ye the plains of Ocean--tell me now,
What seek ye? By the tempest tost, or blown
At random, needful of what help and how
Came ye to Latin shores the dark-blue deep to plough?

XXVII. "But, whether wandering from your course, or cast
By storms--such ills as oft-times on the main
O'ertake poor mariners--your ships at l