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Such token give Strymonian cranes
Beneath a gloomy cloud,
What time they fly the autumnal rains
With clamour hoarse and loud.
With wonder strange the sudden change
The Rutule leaders note,
Till, backward as their eyes they bend,
They see the vessels shoreward tend,
And ocean all afloat.
There glows like furnace fiery red
The helmet on that noble head;
From the bossed shield, with gold ablaze,
A stream of living lightning plays;
So comets shoot athwart the night
A sullen sanguine glare;
So Sirius' star, that brings to man
Fierce calenture and sickness wan,
Lifts high in heaven his baleful light
And saddens all the air.

Yet Turnus still flames high with zeal
To front the invader with the steel
And drive him from the strand;
Still prompt to cheer or to upbraid
He clamours to his friends for aid:
'Lo, here the chance for which you prayed,
To crush them sword in hand!
A brave man's hand is Mars's seat;
The coward finds him in his feet.
Think, each and all, of home and wife,
Think of their deeds who gave you life,
Your gallant sires of old.
Haste to the water's brink; dispute
The land they challenge, foot to foot,
While still in helpless disarray
They slide and falter in the spray:
Fair fortune aids the bold.'