Page:The Aeneid of Virgil JOHN CONINGTON 1917 V2.pdf/59

 find a king in Acestes." Such was the speech of Ilioneus; an accordant clamour burst at once from all the sons of Dardanus.

Then briefly Dido, with downcast look, makes reply:—"Teucrians! unburden your hearts of fear, lay your anxieties           5 aside. It is the stress of danger and the infancy of my kingdom that make me put this policy in motion and protect my frontiers with a guard all about. The men of Æneas and the city of Troy—who can be ignorant of them?—the deeds and the doers, and all the blaze of that   10 mighty war? Not so blunt are the wits we Punic folk carry with us, not so wholly does the sun turn his back on our Tyrian town when he harnesses his steeds. Whether you make your choice of Hesperia the great, and the old realm of Saturn, or of the borders of Eryx and their   15 king Acestes, I will send you on your way with an escort to protect you, and will supply you with stores. Or would you like to settle along with me in my kingdom here? Look at the city I am building, it is yours, lay up your ships, Trojan and Tyrian shall be dealt with by me without  20 distinction. Would to heaven your king were here too, driven by the gale that drove you hither—Æneas himself! For myself, I will send trusty messengers along the coast, with orders to traverse the furthest parts of Libya, in case he should be shipwrecked and wandering anywhere in  25 forest or town."

Excited by her words, brave Achates and father Æneas, too, were burning long ere this to break out of their cloud. Achates first accosts Æneas:—"Goddess-born, what purpose now is foremost in your mind? All you see is safe,  30 our fleet and our mates are restored to us. One is missing, whom our own eyes saw in the midst of the surge swallowed up, all the rest is even as your mother told us."

Scarce had he spoken when the cloud that enveloped them suddenly parts asunder and clears into the open sky. 35 Out stood Æneas, and shone[o] again in the bright sunshine, his face and his bust the image of a god, for his great mother had shed graceful tresses over her son's brow,