The fleet is scattered in all directions: some ships are cast on the rocks; one goes down with all its crew before their leader’s eyes. But Neptune, the sea-god, comes to the rescue. Friendly to the Trojans, as Juno is hostile to them, he resents the interference of the King of the Winds in his dominions--he knows by whose instance he has dared this outrage. He summons the offending winds, and chides them with stern authority:-- “Back to your master instant flee, And tell him, not to him but me The imperial trident of the sea Fell by the lot’s award; His is that prison-house of stone, A prison, Eurus, all your own; There let him lord it to his mind, The jailer-monarch of the wind, But keep its portal barred.” So the tempest is stilled, and Æneas, with seven ships, the survivors of his fleet of twenty, runs into a land-locked harbour on the coast of Carthage. The crews light a fire, and grind and parch their corn, while Æneas goes farther inland to reconnoitre, and kills deer to mend their meal. Wine they have good store of--the parting gift from King Acestes, late their host in Sicily. The chief, though in sad anxiety as to the fate of his absent comrades, speaks to the rest in words of good cheer:-- “You that have seen grim Scylla rave, And heard her monsters yell,-- You that have looked upon the cave Where savage Cyclops dwell,-- Come, cheer your souls, your fears forget; This suffering may yield us yet A pleasant tale to tell.” Æneas has his advocate, too, in the celestial council. His goddess-mother Venus pleads with her father Jupiter to have pity on her offspring. And Jupiter--very open to influence of this kind now, as in Homer’s story--reveals for her comfort the secrets of fate. Æneas shall reach Latium safely, and reign there three years. His son Iulus--or Ascanius, as he is otherwise called--shall succeed him, and transfer the seat of power from Lavinium to his own new-founded city, Alba Longa. Three hundred years his race shall rule there, till in due course the twin-brothers Romulus and Remus shall be born to the war-god Mars, and the elder brother shall lay the foundations of Rome. To the glories of this new capital the Father of the gods will assign neither limit nor end. The wrongs of Troy shall be redressed. The sons of the East, in their new home, shall avenge themselves on their enemies. “So stands my will. There comes a day, While Rome’s great ages hold their way, When old Assaracus’s sons Shall quit them on the Myrmidons, O’er Phthia and Mycenæ reign, And humble Argos to their chain. From Troy’s fair stock shall Cæsar rise, The limits of whose victories Are ocean, of his fame the skies; Great Julius, proud that style to bear, In name and blood Iulus’ heir.”