The day rose on Ariminum With War's shrill cry--They come! they come! Nor they unwelcomed came; Pisauram, Fanum's shrine, and thou, Ancon, with thy sea-fronting brow, Own'd the great soldier's name. And all Picenum's orchard-fields, And the strong-forted Asculum yields: And where, beyond high Apennine, Clitumnus feeds the white, white kine; And 'mid Pelignian hills-- Short time, with his Corfinian bands, Stout Aenobarbus stiffly stands Where urgent Caesar wills![17] Flee, Pompey, flee! the ancient awe Of magisterial rule and law, Authority and state, The Consul's name, the Lictor's rods, The pomp of Capitolian gods, Stem not the flooding fate. Beneath the Volscian hills, and near Where exiled Marius lurk'd in fear, 'Mid stagnant Liris' marshes, there Breathe first in that luxurious lair Where famous Hannibal lay;[18] Nor tarry; while the chance is thine. Hie o'er the Samnian Apennine To the far Calabrian bay! Wing thy sure speed! Who hounds thy path? Fierce as the Furies in their wrath The blood-stain'd wretch pursue, He comes, Rome's tempest-footed son, Victor, but deeming nothing done While aught remains to do. Above Brundusium's bosom'd bay He stands, lashing the Adrian spray. With piers of enterprise the sea Her fleet-wing'd chariot trims for thee, To the Greek coast to bear thee; There, where Enipeus rolls his flood Through storied fields made fat with blood,[19] For fate's last blow prepare thee. There will thy dwindled hosts, increased By kings and tetrarchs of the East, And sons of swarthy Nile; From Pontus and from Colchis far, The gather'd ranks of motley war, Let fortune seem to smile A moment, that with sterner frown, She, when she strikes, may strike thee down. A flattering fool shall be thy guide,[20] And hope shall whisper to thy pride Things that may not befall. Thy forward-springing wit shall boast The numbers of thy counted host-- That pride may have a fall. Hoar Pindus, from his rocky barriers, Looks on thy ranks of gay-plumed warriors, And sees an ominous sight: The leafy tent for victory graced, Foresnatching fate with impious haste From gods that rule the fight. Thus fools have perish'd; and thus thou, Spurr'd to sheer death, art blinded now. Feeble thy clouds of clattering horse To dash his steady ordered force; From twanging bow and sling Dintless the missile hail is pour'd, Where the Tenth Legion wields the sword, And Caesar leads the wing.[21]