Page:Aeneid (Conington 1866).djvu/148

124 All but the hapless queen: to rest

She yields not, nor with eye or breast

The gentle night receives:

Her cares redouble blow on blow:

Love storms, and tossing to and fro,

With billowy passion heaves.

And thus she breathes the thoughts that roll

Tumultuous through her lonely soul:

'What shall I do? make proof once more

Of those who sought my love before,

In suppliance to the Nomads turned,

Whose proffered hand so oft I spurned?

Or shall I tread the Trojan deck,

A menial slave at each one's beck?

As though of gratitude they reck,

Or think of favours done!

Nay, though I wished, what haughty lord

Would take a humbled queen on board?

And know you not, ah wretch forlorn,

The treachery of the seed forsworn

Of false Laomedon?

Then shall I join the shouting crew

Alone, or with my Tyrians true

Attach me to their train,

And hurry those, whom scarce I tore

From Sidon's town, to tempt once more

The perils of the main?

No, die as you deserve, and heal

This anguish with the sharp sure steel.

'Twas you, my sister, first, who, swayed

By my weak tears, my peace betrayed

And gave me to the foe.

Ah! had I lived estranged from love,

Like some wild ranger of the grove,

Nor tampered with this woe,

Or kept at least the faith I vowed

To my Sychæus' funeral skroud!'