125
The sword of Aulus bites,
And all our city calls him
The man of seventy fights.
Then let him be Dictator
For six months and no more, 130
And have a Master of the Knights,[27]
And axes twenty-four."[28]

IX

So Aulus was Dictator,
The man of seventy fights
He made Aebutius Elva 135
His Master of the Knights.
On the third morn thereafter,
At dawning of the day,
Did Aulus and Aebutius
Set forth with their array. 140
Sempronius Atratinus
Was left in charge at home
With boys, and with grey-headed men,
To keep the walls of Rome.
Hard by the Lake Regillus 145
Our camp was pitched at night:
Eastward a mile the Latines lay,
Under the Porcian height.
Far over hill and valley
Their mighty host was spread; 150
And with their thousand watch-fires
The midnight sky was red.

[_The names of the towns which contributed to the Latin army of
threescore thousand men, and their order of battle. All Latium was
there to fight with Rome_.]

Up rose the golden morning
Over the Porcian height,
The proud Ides of Quintilis 155
Marked evermore with white.
Not without; secret trouble
Our bravest saw the foes;
For girt by threescore thousand spears
The thirty standards rose. 160
From every warlike city
That boasts the Latian name,
Foredoomed to dogs and vultures,
That gallant army came;
From Sofia's purple vineyards, 165
From Norba's ancient wall,
From the white streets of Tusculum,
The proudest town of all;
From where the Witch's Fortress[29]
O'erhangs the dark-blue seas; 170
From the still glassy lake that sleeps
Beneath Aricia's trees--
Those trees in whose dim shadow
The ghastly priest[30] doth reign,
The priest who slew the slayer, 175
And shall himself be slain;
From the drear banks of Ufens,[31]
Where nights of marsh-fowl play,
And buffaloes lie wallowing
Through the hot summer's day, 180
From the gigantic watch-towers,
No work of earthly men,
Whence Cora's sentinels o'erlook
The never-ending fen;
From the Laurentian[32] jungle,