and Juno will take care that opportunity shall be given for the furtherance of Dido's passion. The royal hunt is again a striking picture, almost mediæval in its rich colouring:—
"The morn meantime from ocean rose:
Forth from the gates with daybreak goes
The silvan regiment:
Thin nets are there, and spears of steel,
And there Massylian riders wheel,
And dogs of keenest scent.
Before the chamber of her state
Long time the Punic nobles wait
The appearing of the queen:
With gold and purple housings fit
Stands her proud steed, and champs the bit
His foaming jaws between.
At length with long attendant train
She comes: her scarf of Tyrian grain,[1]
With broidered border decked:
Of gold her quiver: knots of gold
Confine her hair: her vesture's fold
By golden clasp is checked.
The Trojans and Iulus gay
In glad procession take their way.
Æneas, comeliest of the throng,
Joins their proud ranks, and steps along,
As when from Lycia's wintry airs
To Delos' isle Apollo fares;
The Agathyrsian, Dryop, Crete,
In dances round his altar meet:
He on the heights of Cynthus moves,
- ↑ This was the dye procured from the shell-fish called murex—especially costly, because each fish contained but a single drop of the precious tincture.
