Then on her long-drawn agony did Juno pity cast, Her hard departing; Iris then she sent from heaven on high, And bade her from the knitted limbs the struggling soul untie. For since by fate she perished not, nor waited death-doom given, But hapless died before her day by sudden fury driven, Not yet the tress of yellow hair had Proserpine off-shred, Nor unto Stygian Orcus yet had doomed her wandering head. So Iris ran adown the sky on wings of saffron dew, 700 And colours shifting thousandfold against the sun she drew, And overhead she hung: "So bid, from off thee this I bear, Hallowed to Dis, and charge thee now from out thy body fare." She spake and sheared the tress away; then failed the life-heat spent And forth away upon the wind the spirit of her went. BOOK V. ARGUMENT. ÆNEAS MAKING FOR ITALY IS STAYED BY CONTRARY WINDS, WHEREFORE HE SAILETH TO SICILY, AND, COMING TO THE TOMB OF HIS FATHER ANCHISES, HOLDETH SOLEMN GAMES THEREAT, AND IN THE END GOETH HIS WAY TO ITALY AGAIN. Meanwhile Æneas with his ships the mid-sea way did hold Steadfast, and cut the dusky waves before the north wind rolled, Still looking back upon the walls now litten by the flame Of hapless Dido: though indeed whence so great burning came They knew not; but the thought of grief that comes of love defiled How great it is, what deed may come of woman waxen wild, Through woeful boding of the sooth the Teucrians' bosoms bore. But when the ships the main sea held, nor had they any more The land in sight, but sea around and sky around was spread, A coal-blue cloud drew up to them, that hanging overhead 10 Bore night and storm: feared 'neath the dark the waters trembling lie. Then called the helmsman Palinure from lofty deck on high: "Ah, wherefore doth such cloud of storm gird all the heavens about? What will ye, Father Neptune, now?" Therewith he crieth out To gather all the tackling in, and hard on oars to lay, And slopeth sail across the wind; and so such word doth say: "Great-souled Æneas, e'en if Jove my borrow now should be, 'Neath such a sky I might not hope to make our Italy: The changed winds roar athwart our course, and from the west grown black They rise; while o'er the face of heaven gathers the cloudy rack. 20 Nor have we might to draw a-head, nor e'en to hold our own. Wherefore since Fortune hath prevailed, by way that she hath shown, Whither she calleth, let us turn: methinks the way but short To brother-land of Eryx leal and safe Sicanian port, If I may read the stars aright that erst I bare in mind."