Page:Aeneid (Conington 1866).djvu/37

And give his veterans, worn with strife,
A city and a peaceful life,
Till summers three have seen him reign,
Three winters crowned the dire campaign.
But he, the father's darling child,
Ascanius, now Iulus styled
(Ilus the name the infant bore
Ere Ilium's sky was clouded o'er),
Shall thirty years of power complete,
Then from Lavinium's royal seat
Transfer the empire, and make strong
The walls of Alba named the Long.
Three hundred years in that proud town
Shall Hector's children wear the crown,
Till Ilia, priestess-princess, bear
By Mars' embrace a kingly pair.
Then, with his nurse's wolf-skin girt,
Shall Romulus the line assert,
Invite them to his new raised home,
And call the martial city Rome.
No date, no goal, I here ordain:
Theirs is an endless, boundless reign.
Nay Juno's self, whose wild alarms
Set ocean, earth, and heaven in arms,
Shall change for smiles her moody frown,
And vie with me in zeal to crown
Rome's sons, the nation of the gown.
So stands my will. There comes a day,
While Rome's great ages hold their way,
When old Assaracus's sons
Shall quit them on the Myrmidons,
O'er Phthia and Mycenæ reign,
And humble Argos to their chain.
From Troy's fair stock shall Cæsar rise,
The limits of whose victories
Are ocean, of his fame the skies;