Page:Aeneid (Conington 1866).djvu/426

402 She spoke, and speaking, dropped her rein,

Perforce descending to the plain.

Then by degrees she slips away

From all that heavy load of clay:

Her languid neck, her drowsy head

She droops to earth, of vigour sped:

She lets her martial weapons go:

The indignant soul flies down below.

Loud clamours to the skies arose;

With fiercer heat the combat glows,

The Volscian princess slain;

On, on they push, the Teucrian power,

The Tyrrhene chiefs, their nation's flower,

The Arcad horseman train.

Meanwhile Diana's sentinel,

Fair Opis, sits on mountain fell

The scene of blood to view:

Soon as Camilla she espied

O'erborne in battle's raging tide,

From her deep bosom, as she sighed,

These piteous words she drew:

'Too stern requital, hapless maid,

For that your error have you paid,

That venturous daring, which essayed

To brave the Trojan power:

Your woodland life, to Dian sworn,

Those heavenly arms in combat borne,

Alas! they left you all forlorn

In need's extremest hour.

Yet not unhonoured in your end

She lets you lie, your queen and friend,

Nor unavenged shall you descend

A name to after time:

For he whose arm has stretched in death

That sacred form, his forfeit breath

Shall compensate his crime.'