Page:Aeneid (Conington 1866).djvu/146

122 Her charms can cure what souls she please,

Rob other hearts of healthful ease,

Turn rivers backward to their source,

And make the stars forget their course,

And call up ghosts from night:

The ground shall bellow 'neath your feet:

The mountain-ash shall quit its seat,

And travel down the height;

By heaven I swear, and your dear life,

Unwillingly these arms I wield,

And take, to meet the coming strife,

Enchantment's sword and shield.

You in the inner court prepare

A lofty pile 'neath open air:

There duly be the armour placed

Left by the traitor in his haste,

The doffed apparel of our foe,

The bridal bed that wrought my woe:

Whate'er was his is doomed to fire:

So magic bids, and I desire.'

She paused: a paleness as of death

Her ghastly features dyes:

Yet Anna dreams not that beneath

These rites a funeral lies:

The frenzy-pitch of love and pride

She knows not—dreams not worse may tide

Than in the hour Sychæus died:

So on her bidding hies.

And now within, beneath the sky,

The pile was rising, heaped on high

With oak and pinewood tree:

The queen enwreathes it round, and weaves

Long chaplets of funereal leaves:

There lays, devoted to the fire,

The sword forgot, the doffed attire,