Harpyiasque truces insopitisque refusum tractibus aurati custodem velleris anguem et iuga taurorum rapidis ambusta favillis et virides galeis sulcos fetasque novales 25 Martis et in segetem crescentis semina belli: nil veris aequale dabunt. prohibere rapaces scilicet Harpyias unaque excludere mensa nobilior titulus, quam tot potuisse paratas in Latii praedam Geticas avertere fauces? 30 anne ego terrigenas potius mirabor in ipsis procubuisse satis, vitae quibus attulit idem principium finemque dies, quam caesa Getarum agmina, quos tantis aluit Bellona tropaeis totaque sub galeis Mavortia canuit aetas? 35 Per te namque unum mediis exuta tenebris imperio sua forma redit, claustrisque solutae tristibus exangues audent procedere leges. iamque potestates priscus discriminat ordo iustitiae, quas ante pares effecerat una 40 nube timor. tua nos urgenti dextera leto eripuit, tectisque suis redduntur et agris damnati fato populi, virtute renati. iam non in pecorum morem formidine clausi prospicimus saevos campis ardentibus ignes 45 alta nec incertis metimur flumina votis excidio latura moram nec poscimus amnes * * * * * Page 129 young, though they tell of fierce Harpies, of the dragon whose unsleeping length lay curled in protecting folds about the golden fleece, of yoked bulls afire with flickering flames, of a springing crop of helmets, a field from out whose furrows grew a Martian race, of seeds of war whose increase yielded a harvest, too, of war, yet do these fictions fall short of the truth. Is it a nobler title to fame to have driven off the greedy Harpies and banished them from the table of a single man than to have had the strength to beat back those countless Getic maws that thirsted for the spoil of Latium? Am I to look with more admiration upon those earth-born warriors struck down in the very furrows from which they sprang, born and dying in a single day, than upon the slaughtered ranks of Getae whom the goddess of war reared on so many spoils and whose martial life came to grey hairs, passed ever beneath helmets?