s none else I sent, nor guilefully have sought,
Assaying of thee, but myself unto thyself I brought,
And mine own head; and here I stand a suppliant at thy door.
And that same Daunian folk of men drive us with bitter war
As fall on thee: if us they chase, what stay but utterly,
(So deem they) all the Westland earth beneath their yoke shall lie,
With all the upper flood of sea, and nether waters' wash.
Take troth and give it: hearts are we stout in the battle's clash, 150
High-counselled souls, men well beheld in deeds that try the man."

He ended: but Evander's look this long while overran
His face, his speaking eyes, and all his body fair to see;
Then in few words he answered thus:
"How sweet to welcome thee,
Best heart of Troy! and how I mind the words, and seem to hear
Anchises' voice, and see the face that mighty man did bear:
For I remember Priam erst, child of Laomedon,
Came to Hesione's abode, to Salamis passed on,
And thence would wend his ways to seek Arcadia's chilly place.
The blossom of the spring of life then bloomed upon my face, 160
When on the Teucrian lords I looked with joy and wonderment;
On Priam, too: but loftier there than any other went
Anchises; and his sight in me struck youthful love awake.
I yearned to speak unto the man, and hand in hand to take:
So fain I met him, led him in to Phineus' walled place;
And he, departing, gave to me a noble arrow-case
And Lycian shafts; a cloak thereto, all shot across with gold,
And golden bridles twain, that now Pallas, my son, doth hold.
Lo, then, the right hand that ye sought is joined in troth to thine;
And when tomorrow's light once more upon the world shall shine, 170
Glad, holpen, shall I send you forth and stay you with my store.
Meanwhile, since here ye come our friends, with us the Gods adore
At this our hallowed yearly feast, which ill it were to stay:
Be kind, and with your fellows' boards make friends without delay."

Therewith he bids bring forth once more the wine-cups and the meat,
And he himself sets down the men upon a grassy seat;
But chiefly to the bed bedight with shaggy lion's skin
He draws AEneas, bidding him the throne of maple win.
Then vie the chosen youth-at-arms, the altar-priest brings aid;
They bear in roasted flesh of bulls, an