“A dreadful plague from angry Juno came, To scourge the land that bore her rival’s name, Before her fatal anger was reveal’d, And teeming malice lay as yet conceal’d. At first we only felt th’ oppressive weight Of gloomy clouds, then teeming with our fate, And labouring to discharge the sultry heat: But ere four moons alternate changes knew, With deadly blasts the fatal south wind blew, Infected all the air, and poison’d as it flew. Our mountains, too, a dire infection yield, For crowds of vipers creep along the field, And with polluted gore and baneful teems Taint all the lakes and venom all the streams. The young disease with milder rage began, Seized on birds and beasts, approaching man; The labouring oxen fall before the plough-- The ploughmen wonder, stare, can’t imagine how; The tabid sheep, with sickly bleatings pine, Their wool decreasing as their strength decline; The warlike steeds, by inward foes compell’d, Neglect their honours and desert the field; Enerved and languid, seek a base retreat, And at the mangers groan, but wish’d a nobler fate. The stags forget their speed, the boars their rage, Nor can the bears the stronger herds engage: A common faintness now invades them all, In woods and fields promiscuously they fall. The air exhales the stench, and, strange to say, The ravenous birds and beasts avoid the prey; The putrid bodies rot upon the ground, And spread the dire contagion all around. Meanwhile the plague acquires a larger size, It feasts on men, and scorns a meaner prize. Intestine heats begin the civil war, And flushings first the latent flame declare, And fiery breath, which seem’d like burning air. Their black dry tongues are swell’d and scarcely move, And short thick sighs from panting lungs evolve: They gasp for air, with vainest hopes to sate Their raging flames, but that augments their heat. No bed, no covering, can the sicken’d bear-- All on the ground exposed to open air, They lie, and hope to find a pleasing coolness there. The burning earth, with hot oppression curst, Returns the heat which they imparted first. All remedies they try, all med’cines use, Which nature could supply or art produce: Invincible, it mocks the vain design, And art and nature foil’d--declare the cause divine.”