The spirit of the Latins is wellnigh broken--they feel that their cause is a failing one. And Turnus sees angry eyes bent upon him, as the cause of this ill-fated war. He will take all hazards, then, upon himself: there shall be no more blood shed of Latin or Rutulian--unless it be his own. He declares his intention to Latinus--he will meet Æneas in single combat. The old king is reluctant to allow it: Queen Amata, with tears and prayers, begs him to forego his resolution. Lavinia herself--such is the entire reticence of the maiden nature in epic story--speaks no word throughout the whole. But, as modern critics have long discovered, there is no question but that she has a sentiment for Turnus. She hardly could have a thought of Æneas, whom she had never seen. When she hears her mother’s appeal to the Rutulian prince, she does almost more than speak--she blushes, through her tears. “Deep crimson glows the sudden flame, And dyes her tingling cheek with shame. So blushes ivory’s Indian grain, When sullied with vermilion stain: So lilies set in roseate bed Enkindle with contagious red.” These last four lines, in Mr Conington’s version, read like a bit of Waller or Lovelace--and yet they are a fairly close translation of the original. The challenge is sent to Æneas, and by him joyfully accepted. There shall be solemn truce between Trojan and Rutulian, while the rival champions do battle for the princess and the kingdom. Turnus, too, has one weapon of Vulcan’s forging--his father’s sword. But now, in his haste for the combat, he snatches up and girds on a blade of less divine temper. The lists are set between the two lines, and the oaths duly sworn. Æneas calls the gods to witness, that if the victory falls to Turnus, the Trojans on their part shall retire at once to Evander’s colony, and make war no more on Latium. Or even if he himself be the conqueror, he will not treat the Latins as a conquered race:-- “I will not force Italia’s land To Teucrian rule to bow; I seek no sceptre for my hand, No diadem for my brow: Let race and race, unquelled and free, Join hands in deathless amity.”