nd thou dost avoid marriage, and dost not care to be united.
I {only} wish that thou wouldst desire it: Helen would not {then} be
wooed by more suitors, nor she who caused the battles of the Lapithae,
nor the wife of Ulysses, {so} bold against the cowards. Even now, while
thou dost avoid them courting thee, and dost turn away in disgust,
a thousand suitors desire thee; both Demigod and Gods, and the Deities
which inhabit the mountains of Alba.

"But thou, if thou art wise, {and} if thou dost wish to make a good
match, and to listen to an old woman, (who loves thee more than them
all, and more than thou dost believe) despise a common alliance, and
choose for thyself Vertumnus, as the partner of thy couch; and take me
as a surety {for him}. He is not better known, even to himself, than he
is to me. He is not wandering about, straying here and there, throughout
all the world; these spots only does he frequent; and he does not, like
a great part of thy wooers, fall in love with her whom he sees last.
Thou wilt be his first and his last love, and to thee alone does he
devote his life. Besides, he is young, he has naturally the gift of
gracefulness, he can readily change himself into every shape, and he
will become whatever he shall be bidden, even shouldst thou bid him be
everything. {And} besides, have you {not both} the same tastes? Is {not}
he the first to have the fruits which are thy delight? and does he {not}
hold thy gifts in his joyous right hand? But now he neither longs for
the fruit plucked from the tree, nor the herbs that the garden produces,
with their pleasant juices, nor anything else, but thyself. Have pity on
his passion! and fancy that he who wooes thee is here present, pleading
with my lips; fear, too, the avenging Deities, and the Idalian
{Goddess}, who abhors cruel hearts, and the vengeful anger of her of
Rhamnus.[55]

"And that thou mayst the more stand in awe of them, (for old age has
given me the opportunity of knowing many things) I will relate some
facts very well known throughout all Cyprus, by which thou mayst the
more easily be persuaded and relent."

[Footnote 50: _The two names._--Ver. 609. The other name of
Ascanius was Iuelus. Alba Longa was built by Ascanius.]

[Footnote 51: _Sylvius._--Ver. 610. See the lists of the Alban
kings, as given by Ovid, Livy, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, and
Eusebius, compared in the notes to the Translation of the Fasti,
Book IV. line