Lurking about a sheep-fold, snarling at midnight Beside the pens, enduring wind and rain, While the bleating lambs are safe beneath the ewes, And he, unable to get at them, rages Fierce and dry-throated in the drive of hunger; So Turnus looks at wall and camp, and passion Burns hot within him, burns to his very bones. How to get in? or how to yank the Trojans Out of their cloister, smear them over the plain? Ah, but the fleet is there, beside the camp, Sheltered by earthworks and the flowing river: There lies the chance! He calls for fire, he hurls it, The burning torch, and his hand, almost, is burning, And all of them pitch in--Turnus has shown them, And Turnus eggs them on--they are armed with firebrands, They rob the hearths; the tar flares lurid yellow Against the grey of the cloud, the soot and ashes. What god, O Muses, turned the fire? Who saved The Trojan ships? Remind me--the story is old, Men have believed it long, its glory endless. When first Aeneas built the fleet on Ida, Preparing for deep seas, the mother of gods, Queen Cybele, spoke to Jove:--“Grant me, my son, Lord of Olympus now, a mother’s prayer. I had a pine-wood on the mountain-top, And men, for many years, brought offerings there, I loved that forest, dark with fir and maple, But when the Trojan lacked a fleet, I gave him My timber gladly; now my heart is troubled. Relieve my fear, and let a mother’s pleading Keep them from wreck on any course, unshaken By any whirlwind. Grown upon our mountains, They should have privilege.” Her son, the swayer Of the stars of the world, replied, “What call, O mother, Is this you make on fate? What are you seeking? Should keels laid down by mortal hand have title To life immortal? Should Aeneas travel Through danger, unendangered? Such power is given No god in heaven. But I make this promise: After their course is run, after the harbors In Italy receive them, safe from ocean, And with Aeneas landed in Laurentum, I will take away their mortal shape, I will make them Goddesses of the sea, like Nereus’ daughter, Like Galatea, the nymphs who breast the foam.” So Jupiter promised, and, as gods do, took oath, By the rivers of his brother under the world, The banks that seethe with the black pitchy torrent, And made Olympus tremble with his nod.