Page:Aeneid (Conington 1866).djvu/53

Which, many a suffering overpast,
Has willed to fix me here at last.
Myself not ignorant of woe,
Compassion I have learned to show.'
She speaks, and speaking leads the way
To where her palace stands,
And through the fanes a solemn day
Of sacrifice commands.
Nor yet unmindful of his friends,
Her bounty to the shore she sends,
A hundred bristly swine,
A herd of twenty beeves, of lambs
A hundred, with their fleecy dams,
And spirit-cheering wine.

And now the palace they array
With all the state that kings display,
And through the central breadth of hall
Prepare the sumptuous festival:
There, wrought with many a fair design,
Rich coverlets of purple shine:
Bright silver loads the boards, and gold
Where deeds of hero-sires are told,
From chief to chief in sequence drawn,
E'en from proud Sidon's earliest dawn.

Meantime Æneas, loth to lose
The father in the king,
Sends down Achates to his crews:
'Haste, to Ascanius bear the news,
Himself to Carthage bring.'
A father's care, a father's joy
All centre in the darling boy.
Rich presents too he bids be brought,
Scarce saved when Troy's last fight was fought,
A pall with stiffening gold inwrought,