The text is doubtful.
(40) That is, for the second life of her victim.
(41) See Book II., 609.
(42) The Gracchi, the younger of whom aimed at being a perpetual
tribune, and was in some sort a forerunner of the Emperors.
(43) That is, the Caesars, who will be in Tartarus.
(44) Referring probably to an episode intended to be introduced
in a later book, in which the shade of Pompeius was to
foretell his fate to Sextus.
(45) Cnaeus was killed in Spain after the battle of Munda; Sextus
at Miletus; Pompeius himself, of course, in Egypt.

BOOK VII

THE BATTLE

Ne'er to the summons of the Eternal laws
More slowly Titan rose, (1) nor drave his steeds,
Forced by the sky revolving, (2) up the heaven,
With gloomier presage; wishing to endure
The pangs of ravished light, and dark eclipse;
And drew the mists up, not to feed his flames, (3)
But lest his light upon Thessalian earth
Might fall undimmed.

Pompeius on that morn,
To him the latest day of happy life,
In troubled sleep an empty dream conceived.
For in the watches of the night he heard
Innumerable Romans shout his name
Within his theatre; the benches vied
To raise his fame and place him with the gods;
As once in youth, when victory was won
O'er conquered tribes where swift Iberus flows, (4)
And where Sertorius' armies fought and fled,
The west subdued, with no less majesty
Than if the purple toga graced the car,
He sat triumphant in his pure white gown
A Roman knight, and heard the Senate's cheer.
Perhaps, as ills drew near, his anxious soul,
Shunning the future wooed the happy past;
Or, as is wont, prophetic slumber showed
That which was not to be, by doubtful forms
Misleading; or as envious Fate forbade
Return to Italy, this glimpse of Rome
Kind Fortune gave. Break not his latest sleep,
Ye sentinels; let not the trumpet call
Strike on his ear: for on the morrow's night
Shapes of the battle lost, of death and war
Shall crowd his rest with terrors. Whence shalt thou
The poor man's happiness of sleep regain?
Happy if even in dreams thy Rome could see
Once more her captain! Would the gods had given
To thee and to thy country one day yet
To reap the latest fruit of such a love:
Though sure of fate to come! Thou marchest on
As though by heaven ordained in Rome to die;
She, conscious ever of her prayers for thee
Heard by the gods, deemed not the fates decreed
Such evil destiny, that she should lose
The l