not, by the murder of the priest, extinguish the flames of Vesta."

Such expressions as these did Venus, full of anxiety, vainly let fall
throughout the heavens, and she moved the Gods above. Although they were
not able to frustrate the iron decrees of the aged sisters, yet they
afforded no unerring tokens of approaching woe. They say, that arms
resounding amid the black clouds, and dreadful {blasts of} the trumpet,
and clarions heard through the heavens, forewarned men of the crime. The
sad face too of the sun gave a livid light to the alarmed earth. Often
did torches seem to be burning in the midst of the stars; often did
drops of blood fall in the showers. The azure-coloured Lucifer had his
light tinted with a dark iron colour; the chariot of the moon was
besprinkled with blood. The Stygian owl gave omens of ill in a thousand
places; in a thousand places did the ivory statues shed tears; dirges,
too, are said to have been heard, and threatening expressions in the
sacred groves. No victim gave an omen of good; the entrails, too, showed
that great tumults were imminent; and the extremity {of the liver} was
found cut off among the entrails. They say, too, that in the Forum, and
around the houses and the temples of the Gods, the dogs were howling by
night; and that the ghosts of the departed were walking, and that the
City was shaken by earthquakes. But still the warnings of the Gods could
not avert treachery and the approach of Fate, and drawn swords were
carried into a temple; and no other place in the {whole} City than the
Senate-house pleased them for this crime and this atrocious murder.

But then did Cytherea beat her breast with both her hands, and attempt
to hide the descendant of AEneas in a cloud, in which, long since, Paris
was conveyed from the hostile son of Atreus,[85] and AEneas had escaped
from the sword of Diomedes. In such words as these {did} her father
{Jove address her}: "Dost thou, my daughter, unaided, attempt to change
the insuperable {decrees} of Fate? Thou, thyself, mayst enter the abode
of the three sisters, {and} there thou wilt behold the register of
{future} events, {wrought} with vast labour, of brass and of solid iron;
these, safe and destined for eternity, fear neither the {thundering}
shock of the heavens, nor the rage of the lightnings, nor any {source
of} destruction. There wilt thou find the destinies of thy descendants
engraved in everlasting adamant. I myself have read them, and I ha