Your men shall be receiv'd, your fleet repair'd,
And sail, with ships of convoy for your guard:
Or, would you stay, and join your friendly pow'rs
To raise and to defend the Tyrian tow'rs,
My
wealth, my city, and myself are yours.
And would to Heav'n, the Storm, you felt, would bring
On Carthaginian coasts your wand'ring king.
My people shall, by my command, explore
The ports and creeks of ev'ry winding shore,
And towns, and wilds, and shady woods, in quest
Of so renown'd and so desir'd a guest."
Rais'd in his mind the Trojan hero stood,
And long'd to break from out his ambient cloud:
Achates found it, and thus urg'd his way:
"From
whence, O
goddess-born, this long delay?
What more can you desire, your
welcome sure,
Your fleet in safety, and your friends secure?
One only wants; and him we saw in vain
Oppose the Storm, and swallow'd in the main.
Orontes in his fate our
forfeit paid;
The rest agrees with what your mother said."
Scarce had he
spoken, when the cloud gave way,
The mists flew
upward and dissolv'd in day.
The Trojan chief appear'd in open sight,
August in
visage, and serenely bright.
His mother
goddess, with her hands divine,
Had form'd his curling locks, and made his temples shine,
And giv'n his rolling eyes a sparkling grace,
And breath'd a
youthful vigor on his face;
Like polish'd ivory,
beauteous to behold,
Or Parian
marble, when enchas'd in gold:
Thus
radiant from the circling cloud he broke,
And thus with manly
modesty he spoke:
"He whom you seek am I; by tempests toss'd,
And sav'd from
shipwreck on your Libyan coast;
Presenting,
gracious queen, before your throne,
A
prince that owes his life to you alone.
Fair
majesty, the
refuge and redress
Of those whom fate pursues, and wants oppress,
You, who your pious offices employ
To save the relics of abandon'd Troy;
Receive the
shipwreck'd on your friendly shore,
With
hospitable rites
relieve the poor;
Associate in your town a wand'ring train,
And strangers in your palace entertain:
What thanks can
wretched fugitives return,
Who, scatter'd thro' the world, in exile mourn?
The gods, if gods to
goodness are inclin'd;
If acts of mercy touch their heav'nly mind,
And, more than all the gods, your gen'rous heart.
Conscious of worth, requite its own desert!
In you this age is happy, and this earth,
And parents more than
mortal gave you birth.
While rolling rivers into seas shall run,
And round the space of heav'n the
radiant sun;
While trees the mountain tops with shades supply,
Your honor, name, and praise shall never die.
Whate'er abode my fortune has assign'd,
Your image shall be present in my mind."
Thus having said, he turn'd with pious haste,
And
joyful his expecting friends embrac'd:
With his right hand Ilioneus was grac'd,
Serestus with his left; then to his breast
Cloanthus and the noble Gyas press'd;
And so by turns descended to the rest.
The Tyrian queen stood fix'd upon his face,
Pleas'd with his motions, ravish'd with his grace;
Admir'd his fortunes, more admir'd the man;
Then recollected stood, and thus began:
"What fate, O
goddess-born; what angry pow'rs
Have cast you shipwrack'd on our
barren shores?
Are you the great Aeneas, known to fame,
Who from
celestial seed your lineage claim?
The same Aeneas whom fair Venus bore
To fam'd Anchises on th' Idaean shore?
It calls into my mind, tho' then a child,
When Teucer came, from Salamis exil'd,
And sought my father's aid, to be restor'd:
My father Belus then with fire and sword
Invaded Cyprus, made the region bare,
And, conqu'ring, finish'd the successful war.
From him the Trojan siege I understood,
The Grecian chiefs, and your
illustrious blood.
Your foe himself the Dardan valor prais'd,
And his own ancestry from Trojans rais'd.
Enter, my noble guest, and you shall find,
If not a
costlywelcome, yet a kind:
For I myself, like you, have been distress'd,
Till Heav'n afforded me this place of rest;
Like you, an alien in a land unknown,
I learn to pity woes so like my own."
She said, and to the palace led her guest;
Then offer'd
incense, and proclaim'd a feast.
Nor yet less careful for her
absent friends,
Twice ten fat oxen to the ships she sends;
Besides a hundred boars, a hundred lambs,
With bleating cries, attend their milky dams;
And jars of gen'rous wine and
spacious bowls
She gives, to cheer the sailors' drooping souls.
Now
purple hangings clothe the palace walls,
And
sumptuous feasts are made in splendid halls:
On Tyrian carpets,
richlywrought, they dine;
With loads of massy plate the sideboards shine,
And
antique vases, all of gold emboss'd
(The gold itself
inferior to the cost),
Of curious work, where on the sides were seen
The fights and figures of
illustrious men,
From their first
founder to the present queen.
The good Aeneas,
paternal care
Iulus'
absence could no longer bear,
Dispatch'd Achates to the ships in haste,
To give a glad relation of the past,
And,
fraught with precious gifts, to bring the boy,
Snatch'd from the ruins of
unhappy Troy:
A robe of
tissue, stiff with golden wire;
An upper vest, once Helen's rich attire,
From Argos by the fam'd adultress brought,
With golden flow'rs and winding
foliagewrought,
Her mother Leda's present, when she came
To ruin Troy and set the world on flame;
The
scepter Priam's
eldest daughter bore,
Her
orientnecklace, and the crown she wore
Of double
texture,
glorious to behold,
One order set with gems, and one with gold.
Instructed thus, the wise Achates goes,
And in his
diligence his duty shows.
But Venus,
anxious for her son's affairs,