Apollo, pleas'd thy firft attempts to crown,
Gives to thy bow the glories of his own :
Now tempt no more the dangers of the war,
Too daring youth-he faid; and paft in air,
Past in a moment from his wond'ring eye;
And the loofe fhape diffolv'd into the sky.

885

The founding fhafts the leaders heard, o'er-aw'd
With the loud quiver, and confeft the god;

890

Then urge the fiery youth, no more to dare,
Since great Apollo's voice forbad the war.

While, prodigal of life, to fight they fly,

All nobly fixt, to conquer or to die;

895

899

Stones, fpears; and jav'lins, from the works they flung;
From tow'r to tow'r the shouts and clamours rung;
Helms clash with helms, the rattling fhields refound;
Thick fly the darts, and cover all the ground;
While loud the battle roars, and thunders all around:
Thick, as from western clouds, all charg'd with rain,
Pours the black ftorm, and smokes along the plain;
Thick as the gather'd hail, tempeftuous, flies
O'er the wide main, and rattles down the skies,
When all the frowning Heav'ns are blacken'd o'er; 905
When Jove discharges all his wrathful store,

And, deep from ev'ry cloud; the bursting thunders roar !
Pand'rus and Bitias at the portal stood,

Two giant brethren, born in Ida's wood;
From great Alcanor and Hiera fprung,

The champions rofe confpicuous o'er the throng.

The mighty champions, of prodigious frame,

910

Tow'r'd like the groves and mountains whence they came. Their prince, when parting from the Tuscan ftate, Appointed thefe, the guardians of the gate.

915

908. Pand'rus and Bitias.] Macrobius tells us, that this paffage is taken from the 15th book of Ennius's annals. Virgil (fays Fulvias Urfinus) has here, according to custom, expreffed Homer's ideas, in the words of Ennius. The paffage of Ennius is lat.

Freti armis, ultroque invitant moenibus hoftem.
Ipfi intus dextra ac laeva pro turribus adftant
Armati ferro, et criftis capita alta corufci :
Quales aëriae liquentia flumina circum,
Sive Padi ripis, Athefim feu propter amoenum,
Confurgunt geminae quercus, intonfaque caelo
Adtollunt capita, et fublimi vertice nutant.
Inrumpunt, aditus Rutuli ut videre patentis.
Continuo Quercens, et pulcher Aquicolus armis,

680

Et praeceps animi Tmaros, et Mavortius Haemón, 685 Agminibus totis aut verfi terga dedere,

Aut ipfo portae pofuere in limine vitam.

Tum magis increfcunt animis difcordibus irae,
Et jam conlecti Troës glomerantur eodem,

Et conferre manum, et procurrere longius audent.
Ductori Turno, diverfa in parte furenti,
Turbantique viros, perfertur nuncius, hoftem
Fervere caede nova, et portas praebere patentis.
Deferit inceptum, atque inmani concitus ira
Dardaniam ruit ad portam, fratrefque fuperbos:
Et primum Antiphaten (is enim fe primus agebat)
Thebana de matre nothum Sarpedonis alti,
Conjecto fternit jaculo. volat Itala cornus
Aëra per tenerum, ftomachoque infixa sub altum
Pectus abit reddit fpecus atri volneris undam
Spumantem, et fixo ferrum in pulmone tepefcit.

690

695

700

922. So where the fields.] Imitated from the 11th book of the Iliad. Dryden's two laft lines of this comparison, are, to the laft degree, mean and ridiculous.

And overpress'd with nature's heavy load,

Dance at the whistling winds, and at each other nod.

922. Fair Athefis.] This is now called the river Adige; which rifes in the Tirol, and difcharges itfelf into the Adriatic fea.

Proud of their strength, the daring heroes throw
Th' enormous folds wide open to the foe.
Within, all bright in arms, on either hand
Before the tow'rs the haughty warriors stand :

925

On their bright helms fat horror plum'd; on high 920
Their nodding erests float dreadful in the sky.
So where the fields fair Athefis divides,
Or Po tumultuous rolls his fwelling tides,
With heads unfhorn, two mighty oaks appear,
Wave to the winds, and nod fublime in air!
Soon as the foes an open entrance spy,
The war breaks in; but foon their leaders fly,
Repell'd by hofts; or in the portal die.
Quercens, Equicolus all-bright in steel,
Hæmon, and daring Tmarus, fled, or fell.
To dire extremes the rifing rage proceeds;
The flaughter fwells, and the fierce battle bleeds.
No more imprison'd in their walls they wait;
All Troy at once came pouring to the gate:
Now, flufh'd with blood, in bold excurfion far
Rufh the stern bands, and mix in clofer war.

2

But in a diftant quarter long engag'd, Amidft the foes the Daunian hero rag'd: When to the prince a meffenger relates,

930

935

That Troy had open'd wide her maffy gates;

940

And, heaps on heaps the late imprison'd train

Broke forth, and ftretch'd the flaughter o'er the plain.

This heard, with fury sparkling in his eyes,

Fierce to engage the giant chiefs he flies.

First, by his lance, Antiphates lay dead,

945

Sarpedon's off-fpring by a Theban bed;

The whizzing lance, with all his force addrefs'd,
Transfix'd the foe, and panted in his breaft :-

Warm'd in the lungs the heaving jav'lin flood:
Wide gapes the wound, and pours a purple flood.

950

Tum Meropem atque Erymantha manu, tum fternit

Aphidnum:

Tum Bitian ardentem oculis, animifque frementem,

Non jaculo: neque enim jaculo vitam ille dediffet;
Sed magnum ftridens contorta phalarica venit,
Fulminis acta modo: quam nec duo taurea terga
Nec duplici fquama lorica fidelis et auro
Suftinuit: conlabfa ruunt inmania membra.

705

710

Dat tellus gemitum, et clipeum fuperintonat ingens.
Qualis in Euboico Baiarum litore quondam
Saxea pila cadit; magnis quam molibus ante
Constructam ponto jaciunt: fic illa ruinam
Prona trahit, penitufque vadis inlifa recumbit.
Miscent fe maria, et nigrae ad tolluntur arenae.
Tum fonitu Prochyta alta tremit, durumque cubile 715
Inarime Jovis imperiis inpofta Typhoëo.

958. A fpear that roar'd.] Catrou renders phalarica, pertuifane, a kind of halberd. Servius tells us, it is a vast dart, with a turned handle; its iron is a cubit long, above which is a kind of ball plated with lead; this fometimes is wrapped round with pitch and tow, for firing buildings, &c. With this dart they used to fight from a fort of turrets called phala. Hence, in the circus, the divifions between the euripi and the meta, are called phala; because turrets were there erected, from whence they fought with this weapon. Juvenal fays,

Confulit ante phalas, delphinorumque columnas.

Hence hafta phalarica, as hafta muralis. It is plain from Lucan, that the phalarica was thrown by flings, or fome ma

chine:

gum

Hunc aut tortilibus vibrata phalarica nervis
Obruat.

.B. I.

Livy thus defcribes this weapon. "FALARICA erat Saguntinis miffile telum, haflili oblongo, et cætera tereti, præterquam ad extremum, unde ferrum extabat: id, ficut in pilo, quadratum : ftuppa circumligabant, linebantque pice: ferrum autem jus in lonhabebat pedes, et cum armis transfigere corpus poffit." Decad. 3. Lib. I. It does not appear that Turnus threw this weapon with his hand. It is faid-Phalarica VENIT. The remark of Servius is therefore groundless, who fays, that Virgil meant to extol the ftrength of Turnus, and reprefents him throwing it from his hand.

Now Erymanthus, now brave Merops fell;
Then funk Aphydnus to the fhades of hell.
Next, while he threats revenge with fiery eyes,
Beneath the chief the mighty Bitias dies:
No vulgar lance the valiant victor toft
(In that huge bulk a vulgar lance was loft);
A ftrong, vaft, weighty fpear, the hero threw,
A fpear that roar'd like thunder as it flew.
Not two bull-hides, within the buckler roll'd,

955

Nor double pond'rous plates, and scales of gold,

960

Th' impetuous weapon, wing'd with death, could stay;

But ftretch'd in duft the giant warrior lay:

As the huge champion falls, the fields refound,
And his broad buckler thunders on the ground.
So from the Baian mole, whose structures rife
High o'er the flood, a maffy fragment flies;
The rapid rolling pile all-headlong fweeps,
With one vaft length of ruin, to the deeps;
Thick boil the billows; and on ev'ry fide,
Work the dark fands, and blacken all the tide :
The trembling fhores of Prochyta resound,
And burning Arime shakes wide around;
The mafs, by Jove, o'er huge Typhoeus fpread;
The giant hears the peal; and, feiz'd with dread,
Starts, turns, and bellows on his fiery bed.

965

970

975

965. So from the Baian mole.] Now called Caftella di Baia, in the Terra Lavora. It was the place the Romans chofe for their winter retreat; and which they frequented upon account of its warm baths. Some few ruins of the beautiful villas, that once covered this delightful coaft, ftill remain: and nothing can give one an higher idea of the prodigious expence and magnificence of the Romans in their private buildings, than the manner in which fome of these were fituated. It appears from a letter of Pliny, Book 9. and from feveral other paffages of the claffic writers, that they actually projected into the fea; being erected upon vaft piles funk for that purpose. Virgil draws a beautiful fimile from this cuftom, where he compares the maffy spear which Turnus let fly at Bitias, to one of those enormous piles thrown into the Baian fea. MELMOTH's notes to his elegant tranflation of Pliny's epiftles, p. 510.

971. The shores of Prochyta refound.] Prochyta alta tremit is

F 3

difficult