Page:Aeneid (Conington 1866).djvu/313

Grant that their texture ne'er may fail
From, voyage long or stormy gale:
Such vantage let my favourites reap
From birth on our Idæan steep.'
Her son, the Mighty One, replies,
Who rolls the orbits of the skies:
'O mother! wherefore strive in vain
The course of destiny to strain?
Shall vessels made by mortal hand
The immortals' privilege command?
Shall man ride safe in danger's hour?
Claimed ever god so vast a power?
Nay rather, when, their service o'er,
They reach at length the Ausonian shore,
What ships, escaping wind and wave,
In Latium land the Dardan brave,
Shall change their mortal shape for ours
And swim the main as sea-god powers,
As Galatè and Doto sweep
O'er the broad surface of the deep.'
He said, and called to seal his vow
His Stygian brother's lake,
The banks where pitch and sand and mud
Together mix their murky flood,
And with the bending of his brow
Made all Olympus shake.

And now the promised time was come,
The fated years had filled their sum,
When Turnus' wrong reminds the dame
To shield her sacred ships from flame.
A sudden light strikes blind their eyes:
A cloud runs westward o'er the skies,
And Ida's choirs appear: