Page:Aeneid (Conington 1866).djvu/304

280 Then to her son's embrace she flew:

The armour 'neath an oak in view

She placed, all dazzling bright.

He, glorying in the beauteous prize,

From point to point quick darts his eyes

With ever-new delight.

Now wondering 'twixt his hands he turns

The helm that like a meteor burns,

The sword that rules the war,

The breastplate shooting bloody rays,

As dusky clouds in sunlight blaze,

Refulgent from afar,

The polished greaves of molten gold,

The spear, the shield with fold on fold,

A prodigy of art untold.

There, prescient of the years to come,

Italia's times, the wars of Rome,

The fire's dark lord had wrought:

E'en from Ascanius' dawning days

The generations he portrays,

The fights in order fought.

There too the mother wolf he made

In Mars's cave supinely laid:

Around her udders undismayed

The gamesome infants hung,

While she, her loose neck backward thrown,

Caressed them fondly, one by one,

And shaped them with her tongue.

Hard by, the towers of Rome he drew

And Sabine maids in public view

Snatched 'mid the Circus games:

So 'twixt the fierce Romulean brood

And Tatius with his Cures rude

A sudden war upflames.

And now the kings, their conflict o'er,

Stand up in arms Jove's shrine before,