Venus thinks that she can see Juno's hand in all this hospitality. Therefore she instructs her son Cupid to take Ascanius' place and cause Dido to fall deeply in love with Aeneas.
But Cytherea in her breast revolves
New wiles and new devices, that, for sweet
Ascanius, Cupid, changed in face and form,
May come, and with his gifts inflame the queen
To frenzy, and wrap all her frame in fire.
Ay, for in sooth she fears the treacherous house
And double-spoken Tyrians: Juno's hate
Sears her, and trouble at nightfall returns.
Thus, therefore, she bespeaks her wingèd Love:
Son, my sole strength and mighty power, O son, Who laughest_e'en at the Typhoïan bolts
Of the great Father, to thy feet I fly,
And suppliant sue thy godhead. How Aeneas,
Thy brother, is buffeted from shore to shore
Over the main by Juno's rancorous spite-
These things are known to thee, and with our grief
Oft hast thou grieved. Phoenician Dido now
Holds and enchains him with her flattering words;
And much I fear where Juno's welcome tends;
She will not idle where such hopes are hinged.
So to prevent the queen with guile and gird
With fire I purpose, that no power may change,
But strong love for Aeneas fix her mine.
Next how to achieve it hearken my device:
The royal boy, my chiefest care, e'en now
To the Sidonian town sets forth to go
At his loved father's bidding-in his hand
Gifts that escaped Troy's burning and the sea.
Him will I hide upon Cythera's height,
Or on Idalium in my sacred seat,
Lulled in deep slumber, that my stratagems
He may not know nor intervene to mar.
Then for one night-no more-feign thou his torm,
And don the well-known features, boy for boy,
That when with rapture at the royal board,
The wine-god brimming, Dido to her breast
Shall take thee and embrace, and on thy lips
Imprint sweet kisses, with the subtle fire
Thy breath may poison her at unawares.'
Obedient then to his dear mother's words,
Love doffed his wings, and with Iulus' step
Walked gaily forth. Meantime Ascanius,
While gentle slumber o'er his frame she pours,
Venus, to her immortal bosom clasped,
Bears upward to Idalia's wooded heights,
Where soft amaracus enfolds with flowers,
And fans him with the breath of odorous shade.
The banquet begins, and Cupid carries out his orders,
Dido mistaking him for Ascanius.
Iamque ibat dicto parens et dona Cupido
regia portabat Tyriis duce laetus Achate.
cum venit, aulaeis iam se regina superbis
aurea composuit sponda mediamque locavit,
iam pater Aeneas et iam Troiana iuventus.
conveniunt, stratoque super discumbitur ostro.
dant manibus famuli lymphas Cereremque canistris
expediunt tonsisque ferunt mantelia villis.
quinquaginta intus famulae, quibus ordine longam
cura penum struere et flammis adolere penatis ;
centum aliae totidemque pares aetate ministri,
qui dapibus mensas onerent et pocula ponant.
nec non et Tyrii per limina laeta frequentes
convenere, toris iussi discumbere pictis.
mirantur dona Aeneae, mirantur Iulum,
flagrantisque dei vultus simulataque verba,
pallamque et pictum croceo velamen acantho.
praecipue infelix, pesti devota futurae,
expleri mentem nequit ardescitque tuendo
Phoenissa, et pariter puero donisque movetur.
ille ubi complexu Aeneae colloque pependit
et magnum falsi implevit genitoris amorem,
reginam petit. haec oculis, haec pectore toto
haeret et interdum gremio fovet inscia Dido
insidat quantus miserae deus. at memor ille
matris Acidaliae paulatim abolere Sychaeum
incipit et vivo temptat praevertere amore
iam pridem resides animos desuetaque corda.
The wine begins to flow at the banquet; the minstrel Iopas sings, and Dido requests Aeneas to tell the tale of the capture of Troy and of his own wanderings.
When the first hush upon the banquet fell,
The board removed, they set on mighty bowls,
And crown the winecups. Loud the rafters ring,
As through the wide hall rolls the roar of tongues;
Down from the gilded roof hang lamps ablaze,
And flambeaux flaring put the night to rout.
And now a cup heavy with gems and gold
The queen bade bring, and filled it with pure wine,
As Belus used, and all from Belus sprung;
Then through the hall fell silence: Jupiter,
Of hospitable laws, men say, the giver,
To Tyrians and to travellers from Troy
Grant that this day propitious be, and that
Our children's children may remember it.
Let Bacchus, source of merriment, be near,
And bounteous Juno; and, ye Tyrians too,
Grace ye our gathering with goodwill.' She spake
And on the table poured the votive wine,
And, having made libation, with lip's edge
Herself first touched it, then to Bitias
Passed with a merry taunt; he, nothing loth,
Drank of the foaming goblet, and dived deep
Into the brimming gold; then other lords
In turn. Iopas of the flowing hair
Makes the hall echo with his gilded lyre,
Once taught of mightiest Atlas: and his song
Is of the wandering moon, the toiling sun,
Whence human kind and cattle, whence rain and fire;
Arcturus, and the showery Hyades,
And the twin Bears; why winter suns so haste
To dip themselves in Ocean, or what check
Retards the lingering nights. With shout on shout
Applaud the Tyrians, and the sons of Troy
Make answer: therewithal in varied talk
Unhappy Dido still spun out the night,
Drinking deep draughts of love; and much she asked
Of Priam, much of Hector, with what arms
Aurora's son came girded to the fray,
How fair the steeds of Diomede, or how vast
Achilles. 'Nay, but, O my guest,' said she,
'Come, tell us from the first the Danaan plots,
Thy comrades' woes, and thine own wanderings:
For lo! the seventh returning summer now
Bears thee a wanderer over land and wave.'
Aeneas, at the request of Dido, begins the story of the fall of Troy and his long wandering. The Greeks, disheartened by their failure to capture the city, resort to stratagem. Pretending to have abandoned the siege, they sail away to Tenedos, and leave behind them the Wooden Horse, full of armed men. The Trojans debate whether to destroy it or not.
ALL lips were hushed, all eyes attentive fixed:
Then Prince Aeneas from his lofty couch
Addressed him thus to speak:
O queen, the grief thou bid'st me to revive,
How Troy's magnificence and royal power,
Woe worth the day! the Danai overthrew;
Thrice piteous scenes which I myself beheld,
And was a mighty part of. Such a tale
Who or of Myrmidons or Dolopes
Or stern Ulysses' soldiery could tell,
And hold from weeping? Now too dewy night
Adown the sky falls headlong, and the stars
Sinking invite to sleep. But if to learn
Our woes such longing take thee, and to hear
Brief-told Troy's dying anguish, though my mind
At the remembrance shudders, from the grief
Recoils, I will attempt it.
'Broken in war And baffled by the fates, the Danaan chiefs, Now that so many grew the gliding years,
By Pallas' aid, artificer divine,
Build up a horse of mountain bulk, the ribs
Of pine-planks interwoven, feigning it
A votive offering for their home-return;
So runs the rumour. Into its dark side
Picked warriors stealthily by lot they stow,
And fill the deep vaults of its mighty womb
With armed soldiery.
An isle, fame-bruited, Tenedos, full-fraught
Of power, while yet stood Priam's empire-now
Mere bay and roadstead, ill for keels to trust.
Hither they sail, and on the barren shore
Lie hid. We deem them far upon their way,
Bound for Mycenae with a favouring gale.
Thereat all Teucria shuffles off the load
Of her long mourning. Wide are flung the gates;
Whence issuing forth with rapture we behold
The Dorian camp, the haunts now tenantless,
The shore left void: here the Dolopian band,
Here fierce Achilles pitched; here lay the fleet;
Here were they wont to meet us, host to host.
Some gape at Maid Minerva's doom-fraught gift,
And marvel at the monster-horse; and first
Thymoetes urged it within walls be haled,
And lodged in the fortress, or through treachery, or
That thither now the fates of Troy were set.
But Capys and the minds of saner bent
Bid either hurl it headlong in the sea-
This Danaan ambush, their suspicious gift,
Or fire it from beneath, or pierce and probe
The womb's dark hollows. With fierce party-cries
This way and that the wavering crowd is torn.
The priest Laocoon strongly urges the destruction of the Horse.
Primus ibi ante omnis magna comitante caterva
Laocoon ardens summa decurrit ab arce,
et procul 'o miseri, quae tanta insania, cives?
creditis avectos hostis? aut ulla putatis
dona carere dolis Danaum? sic notus Vlixes?
aut hoc inclusi ligno occultantur Achivi,
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