Page:The Aeneid of Virgil JOHN CONINGTON 1917 V2.pdf/317



When Turnus sees that the War-god's enmity has broken the spirit of Latium, that men are beginning to claim his promise, and make him the mark of their eyes, he bursts at once into fury unappeasable, and swells his pride to the height. As in Punic land, when the hunters      5 have wounded him deep in the breast, the lion at last rouses himself to fight, tosses with fierce joy his mane from his neck, snaps fearlessly the brigand's spear in the wound, and roars from his gory mouth: even so, Turnus once kindled, his vehemence grows each moment. Then he            10 addresses the king, and dashes hotly into speech: "Turnus stops not the way: Æneas and his cowards have no plea for retracting their challenge or disowning their plighted word; I meet the combat; bring the sacred things, good father, and solemnize the truce. Either will I with my own      15 right hand send the Dardan down to Tartarus, the runaway from Asia—let the Latians sit by and see—and with my single weapon refute the slander of a nation; or let the vanquished own their master and Lavinia be the conqueror's bride." 20

With calm dignity of soul the king makes answer: "Gallant youth, the greater your impetuous valour, the more watchful must needs be my foresight, the more anxious my scrutiny of all that may happen. You have your father Daunus' kingdom, you have many a town          25 won by your own sword: I that speak have gold and a heart to give it; in Latium and Laurentum's land are other unwedded maidens, of no unworthy lineage. Suffer me without disguise to give voice to these unwelcome sayings, and take home what I speak further: I was forbidden by       30