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172

So blushes ivory's Indian grain,

When sullied with vermilion stain:

So lilies set in roseate bed

Enkindle with contagious red."

These last four lines, in Mr Conington's version, read like a bit of Waller or Lovelace—and yet they are a fairly close translation of the original.

The challenge is sent to Æneas, and by him joyfully accepted. There shall be solemn truce between Trojan and Rutulian, while the rival champions do battle for the princess and the kingdom. Turnus, too, has one weapon of Vulcan's forging—his father's sword. But now, in his haste for the combat, he snatches up and girds on a blade of less divine temper. The lists are set between the two lines, and the oaths duly sworn. Æneas calls the gods to witness, that if the victory falls to Turnus, the Trojans on their part shall retire at once to Evander's colony, and make war no more on Latium. Or even if he himself be the conqueror, he will not treat the Latins as a conquered race:—

I will not force Italia's land

To Teucrian rule to bow;

I seek no sceptre for my hand,

No diadem for my brow:

Let race and race, unquelled and free,

Join hands in deathless amity."

But at once, before the rivals meet, by the instigation of Juno the truce is broken on the part of the Rutulians. They have a strong fear that their own champion, young and gallant as he is, is no equal