The Aeneid by Virgil — Read

Meanwhile Dawn arose forth of Ocean. Aeneas, though the charge presses to give a space for burial of his comrades, and his mind is in the tumult of death, began to pay the gods his vows of victory with the breaking of the East. He plants on a mound a mighty oak with boughs lopped away on every hand, and arrays it in the gleaming arms stripped from Mezentius the captain, a trophy to thee, mighty Lord of War; he fixes on it the plumes dripping with blood, the broken spears, and the corslet struck and pierced in twelve places; he ties the shield of brass on his left hand, and hangs from his neck the ivory sword. Then among his joyous comrades (for all the throng of his captains girt him close about) he begins in these words of cheer: 'The greatest deed is done, O men; be all fear gone for what remains. These are the spoils of a haughty king, the first-fruits won from him; my hands have set Mezentius here. Now our way lies to the walls of the Latin king. Prepare your arms in courage, and let your hopes anticipate the war; let no ignorant delay hinder or tardy thoughts of fear keep us back, so soon as heaven grant us to pluck up the standards and lead our army from the camp. Meanwhile let us commit to earth the unburied bodies of our comrades, since deep in Acheron this honour is left alone. Go,' says he, 'grace with the last gifts those noble souls whose blood won us this land for ours; and first let Pallas be sent to Evander's mourning city, he whose valour failed not when the day of darkness took him, and the bitter wave of death.'

So speaks he weeping, and retraces his steps to the door, where aged Acoetes watched Pallas' lifeless body laid out for burial; once armour-bearer to Evander in Parrhasia, but now gone forth with darker omens, appointed attendant to his darling foster-child. Around is the whole train of servants, with a crowd of Trojans, and the Ilian women with hair unbound in mourning after their fashion. When Aeneas entered at the high doorway they beat their breasts and raise a loud wail aloft, and the palace moans to their grievous lamentation. Himself, when he saw the pillowed head and fair face of Pallas, and on his smooth breast the gaping wound of the Ausonian spear-head, speaks thus with welling tears: 'Did Fortune in her joyous coming, ' he cries, 'O luckless boy, grudge thee the sight of our realm, and a triumphal entry to thy father's dwelling? Not this promise of thee had I given to Evander thy sire at my departure, when he embraced me as I went and bade me speed to a wide empire, and yet warned me in fear that the men were valiant, the people obstinate in battle. And now he, fast ensnared by empty hope, perchance offers vows and heaps gifts on his altars; we, a mourning train, go in hollow honour by his corpse, who now owes no more to aught in heaven. Unhappy! thou wilt see thy son cruelly slain; is this our triumphal return awaited? is this my strong assurance? Ah me, what a shield is lost, mine Iuelus, to Ausonia and to thee!'