Here fortune changed, not keeping faith; for Juno, While the ritual of sport went on, sent Iris, With a fair wind, to the Trojan fleet. She was angry, Still, and the ancient grudge unsatisfied, And Iris, over her thousand-colored rainbow, Ran her swift path, unseen, beheld the crowd, Surveyed the shore, harbor and fleet deserted, While far off on the lonely coast the women Mourned for Anchises lost, weeping and watching The unfathomable deep. “For weary people, Alas! how much remains, of shoal and ocean!” So ran the common sigh. They crave a city, They are tired of bearing the vast toil of sailing, And into their midst came Iris, versed in mischief, Laying aside her goddess-guise, becoming Old Beroe, Doryclus’ wife, who sometime Had children, fame, and lineage. Now Iris, Resembling her, came down to the Trojan mothers. “Alas for us!” she cried, “on whom the Greeks Never laid hands, to drag us down to death Before our native walls! Unfortunate people, For what is fortune saving us, what doom, What dying? It is seven weary summers Since Troy’s destruction, and still we wander over All lands, all seas, with rocks and stars forever Implacable, as we go on pursuing A land that flees forever over the waters. Here lived our brother Eryx, here we find A welcomer, king Acestes; who forbids us To found the walls, to build our city here? O fatherland, O household gods in vain Saved from the Greeks, will there never be any walls For Troy again? No Simois or Xanthus, The rivers Hector loved? Come with me, burn These vessels of ill-omen. Let me tell you, I have been given warnings; in a dream I saw Cassandra, she was giving me firebrands, _Here seek your Troy, here is your home_, she told me; It is time for us to act, be quick about it! Neptune himself, with fire on these four altars, Provides the method, and the resolution.” She was the first to seize a brand; she raised it Above her head, and swung it, streaming and glowing, And flung it forth. The women, for a moment, Stood in bewilderment, and one, the oldest, Named Pyrgo, nurse to Priam’s many children, Cried out:--“This is no Beroe, I tell you, Mothers! Look at her flashing eyes, her spirit, Her stride, her features; every mark of the goddess Attends her presence. Beroe I myself Have just now come from; she lies ill and grieving All by herself, in sorrow for her absence From reverence for Anchises.”