O curst essay of arms! disastrous doom! Prelude of bloody fields, and fights to come! Hard elements of inauspicious war! Vain vows to heaven, and unavailing care! Thrice happy thou, dear partner of my bed! Whose holy soul the stroke of Fortune fled-- Præscious of ills, and leaving me behind, To drink the dregs of life by fate assigned. Beyond the goal of nature I have gone: My Pallas late set out, but reached too soon. If, for my league against the Ausonian state, Amidst their weapons I had found my fate, (Deserved from them,) then I had been returned A breathless victor, and my son had mourned. Yet will I not my Trojan friend upbraid, Nor grudge the alliance I so gladly made. 'Twas not his fault, my Pallas fell so young, But my own crime for having lived too long. Yet, since the gods had destined him to die, At least, he led the way to victory: First for his friends he won the fatal shore, } And sent whole herds of slaughtered foes before-- } A death too great, too glorious to deplore. } Nor will I add new honours to thy grave, Content with those the Trojan hero gave-- That funeral pomp thy Phrygian friends designed, In which the Tuscan chiefs and army joined. Great spoils and trophies, gained by thee, they bear: Then let thy own achievements be thy share. Even thou, O Turnus, hadst a trophy stood, Whose mighty trunk had better graced the wood, If Pallas had arrived, with equal length Of years, to match thy bulk with equal strength. But why, unhappy man! dost thou detain These troops, to view the tears thou shedd'st in vain? Go, friends! this message to your lord relate: Tell him, that, if I bear my bitter fate, And, after Pallas' death, live lingering on, 'Tis to behold his vengeance for my son. I stay for Turnus, whose devoted head Is owing to the living and the dead. My son and I expect it from his hand; 'Tis all that he can give, or we demand. Joy is no more; but I would gladly go, To greet my Pallas with such news below." The morn had now dispelled the shades of night, Restoring toils, when she restored the light. The Trojan king, and Tuscan chief, command To raise the piles along the winding strand. Their friends convey the dead to funeral fires; } Black smouldering smoke from the green wood expires; } The light of heaven is choked, and the new day retires. } Then thrice around the kindled piles they go; (For ancient custom had ordained it so;) Thrice horse and foot about the fires are led; And thrice, with loud laments, they hail the dead. Tears, trickling down their breasts, bedew the ground, And drums and trumpets mix their mournful sound. Amid the blaze, their pious brethren throw The spoils, in battle taken from the foe--