Meanwhile unto the slopes of heaven the Western Star drew near, 280 And then the priests, and chief thereof, Potitius, thither came, All clad in skins, as due it was, and bearing forth the flame. New feast they dight, and gifts beloved of second service bring, And on the altar pile again the plates of offering. The Salii then to singing-tide heart-kindled go around The altars; every brow of them with poplar leafage bound: And here the youths, the elders there, set up the song of praise, And sing the deeds of Hercules: How, on his first of days, The monsters twain his stepdame sent, the snakes, he crushed in hand; And how in war he overthrew great cities of the land, 290 Troy and Oechalia: how he won through thousand toils o'ergreat, That King Eurystheus laid on him by bitter Juno's fate. "O thou Unconquered, thou whose hand beat down the cloud-born two, Pholeus, Hylæus, twin-wrought things, and Cretan monsters slew: O thou who slew'st the lion huge 'neath that Nemean steep, The Stygian mere hath quaked at thee, the ward of Orcus deep Quaked in his den above his bed of half-gnawed bones and blood. At nothing fashioned wert thou feared; not when Typhoeus stood Aloft in arms: nor from thine heart fell any rede away When round thee headed-manifold the Worm of Lerna lay. 300 O very child of Jupiter, O Heaven's new glory, hail! Fail not thy feast with friendly foot, nor us, thy lovers, fail!" With such-like song they sing the praise, and add to all the worth The cave of Cacus, and the beast that breathed the wildfire forth. The woods sing with them as they sing; the hills are light with song. So, all the holy things fulfilled, they wend their ways along Unto the city: the old king afoot was with them there, And bade Æneas and his son close to his side to fare, And as he went made light the way with talk of many a thing. Æneas wonders, and his eyes go lightly wandering 310 O'er all; but here and there they stay, as, joyful of his ways, He asks and hears of tokens left by men of earlier days.