Page:Aeneid (Conington 1866).djvu/463

When lo! the faithless weapon breaks,
And mid the stroke its lord forsakes:
Flight, flight alone can aid:
Swifter than wings of wind he flees,
Soon as an unknown hilt he sees
Disfurnished of its blade.
'Tis said when with impatience blind
He first the battle sought,
Leaving his father's sword behind
Metiscus' steel he caught;
While routed Troy before him fled,
That sword full well his need bested:
Soon as 'twas tried on arms divine,
It snapped like ice in twain,
The mortal blade: the fragments shine,
Strewed on the yellow plain.
So Turnus traverses the ground,
Doubling' and circling round and round
In purposeless career,
For all about him stand his foes,
And here high walls the scene enclose,
And there a spacious mere.

Nor less, though whiles his stiffening knees,
Slacked by his wound, their work refuse,
Æneas follows as he flees
And step with step the foe pursues.
As tracks a hound with noise and din
A deer by river deep hemmed in
Or plume of crimson grain:
The straight steep bank, the threatening snare
The hunted beast from progress scare:
She winds and winds again:
The Umbrian keen forbids escape,
Hangs on her flank with jaws agape,