And rumor flies about the little city Spreading the news of horsemen on their mission To Tarchon’s shores, and mothers, in a panic, Double their prayers, and fear comes nearer danger With Mars’ great image looming large. Evander Holds Pallas by the hand, cannot release him, Speaks through his tears:--“If Jupiter would only Bring me my lost years back, make me the man I used to be, I was once, at Praeneste Where I struck down the foremost ranks, and burned The piled up shields! That day I was a hero, A conqueror, and Erulus went down, By this right hand, to hell. His mother gave him Three lives, and threefold armor; I had to kill him Three times, and did, and thrice I stripped his armor. If I were what I used to be, my son, They would never take you from me; and Mezentius Would never have heaped those insults on his neighbor, Never have made a widow of the city. But you, great gods on high, and you, great king Of the high gods, take pity on a father, Hear the Arcadian king. I pray for life As long as Pallas lives, I pray to see him If you will spare him; if he comes back safely I pray to meet him once again. No more I ask; how hard my life may be, no matter. But if there is in fortune any menace, Something I cannot speak of, let me die Before I know the worst, while I can hope However I doubt, while still I have my Pallas, My late and only pleasure, here beside me, And never news for the worse!” And so they parted, And servants helped the old man into the palace. They had gone from the gates, the horsemen, and Aeneas, Achates and the Trojans, and in the centre Pallas, a blaze of light, like Lucifer Whom Venus loves beyond all fiery stars, The glory risen from the ocean wave, Dissolver of the shadows. On the walls The mothers, trembling, watched them go, the squadrons Bright in their bronze, and the cloud of dust behind them, So, out of sight, where the road turns off to forest, They go, the men in arms, and a shout arises, And the column forms, and the echo of the gallop Comes clopping back through the ground where the dust is rising. The cold stream, Caere, has a grove beside it, Much reverenced of old, where the curve of the hills And the dark firs make a shelter: the old people, So rumor says, held grove and feast-day sacred Here in Silvanus’ honor, god of the fields, God of the fold. Tarchon and his Etruscans Were camped not far from here, and from the hill-top Watchers could see their legions, tented safely Through the wide plain. In Caere’s grove Aeneas Rested his horses and his weary warriors.