HE GODS TAKE COUNSEL: AENEAS COMETH TO HIS FOLK AGAIN, AND DOETH MANY
GREAT DEEDS IN BATTLE.

Meanwhile is opened wide the door of dread Olympus' walls,
And there the Sire of Gods and Men unto the council calls,
Amid the starry place, wherefrom, high-throned, he looks adown
Upon the folk of Latin land and that beleaguered town.
There in the open house they sit, and he himself begins:

"O Dwellers in the House of Heaven, why backward thuswise wins
Your purpose? Why, with hearts unruled, raise ye the strife so sore?
I clean forbade that Italy should clash with Troy in war.
Now why the war that I forbade? who egged on these or those
To fear or fight, or drave them on with edge of sword to close? 10
Be not o'ereager in your haste: the hour of fight shall come,
When dreadful Carthage on a day against the walls of Rome,
Betwixt the opened doors of Alps, a mighty wrack shall send;
Then may ye battle, hate to hate, and reach and grasp and rend:
But now forbear, and joyfully knit fast the plighted peace."

Few words spake Jove; but not a few in answer unto these
Gave golden Venus back again:
"O Father, O eternal might of men and deeds of earth--
For what else may be left to me whereto to turn my prayers?--
Thou seest the Rutuli in pride, and Turnus, how he fares? 20
Amidst them, borne aloft by steeds, and, swelling, war-way sweeps
With Mars to aid: the fenced place no more the Teucrians keeps,
For now within the very gates and mound-heaped battlement
They blend in fight, and flood of gore adown the ditch is sent,
Unware AEneas is away.--Must they be never free
From bond of leaguer? lo, again the threatening enemy
Hangs over Troy new-born! Behold new host arrayed again
From Arpi, the AEtolian-built; against the Teucrian men
Tydides riseth. So for me belike new wounds in store,
And I, thy child, must feel the edge of arms of mortal war. 30
Now if without thy peace, without thy Godhead's will to speed,
The Trojans sought for Italy, let ill-hap pay ill deed,
Nor stay them with thine help: but if they followed many a word
Given forth by Gods of Heaven and Hell, by whom canst thou be stirred
To turn thy doom, or who to forge new fate may e'er avail?
Of ship-host burnt on Eryx shore why should I tell the tale?
Or of the king of wind and storm, or wild and w