Pharsalia
Pharsalia, [Civil War]
by Marcus Annaeus Lucanus
BOOK I
THE CROSSING OF THE RUBICON
Wars worse than civil on Emathian (1) plains, And crime let loose we sing; how Rome's high race Plunged in her vitals her victorious sword; Armies akin embattled, with the force Of all the shaken earth bent on the fray; And burst asunder, to the common guilt, A kingdom's compact; eagle with eagle met, Standard to standard, spear opposed to spear.
Whence, citizens, this rage, this boundless lust To sate barbarians with the blood of Rome? Did not the shade of Crassus, wandering still, (2) Cry for his vengeance? Could ye not have spoiled, To deck your trophies, haughty Babylon? Why wage campaigns that send no laurels home? What lands, what oceans might have been the prize Of all the blood thus shed in civil strife! Where Titan rises, where night hides the stars, 'Neath southern noons all quivering with heat, Or where keen frost that never yields to spring In icy fetters binds the Scythian main: Long since barbarians by the Eastern sea And far Araxes' stream, and those who know (If any such there be) the birth of Nile Had felt our yoke. Then, Rome, upon thyself With all the world beneath thee, if thou must, Wage this nefarious war, but not till then.
Now view the houses with half-ruined walls Throughout Italian cities; stone from stone Has slipped and lies at length; within the home No guard is found, and in the ancient streets so Scarce seen the passer by. The fields in vain, Rugged with brambles and unploughed for years, Ask for the hand of man; for man is not. Nor savage Pyrrhus nor the Punic horde E'er caused such havoc: to no foe was given To strike thus deep; but civil strife alone Dealt the fell wound and left the death behind. Yet if the fates could find no other way (3) For Nero coming, nor the gods with ease Gain thrones in heaven; and if the Thunderer Prevailed not till the giant's war was done, Complaint is silent. For this boon supreme Welcome, ye gods, be wickedness and crime; Thronged with our dead be dire Pharsalia's fields, Be Punic ghosts avenged by Roman blood; Add to these ills the toils of Mutina; Perusia's dearth; on Munda's final field The shock of battle joined; let Leucas' Cape Shatter the routed navies; servile hands Unsheath the sword on fiery Etna's slopes: Still Rome is gainer by the civil war. Thou, Caesar, art her prize. When thou shalt choose, Thy watch relieved, to seek divine abodes, All heaven rejoicing; and shalt hold a throne, Or else elect to govern Phoebus' car And light a subject world that shall not dread To owe her brightness to a different Sun; All shall concede thy right: do what thou wilt, Select thy Godhead, and the central clime Whence thou shalt rule the world with power divine. And yet the Northern or the Southern Pole We pray thee, choose not; but in rays direct Vouchsafe thy radiance to thy city Rome. Press thou on either side, the universe Should lose its equipoise: take thou the midst, And weight the scales, and let that part of heaven Where Caesar sits, be evermore serene And smile upon us with unclouded blue. Then may all men lay down their arms, and peace Through all the nations reign, and shut the gates That close the temple of the God of War. Be thou my help, to me e'en now divine! Let Delphi's steep her own Apollo guard, And Nysa keep her Bacchus, uninvoked. Rome is my subject and my muse art thou!
First of such deeds I purpose to unfold The causes -- task immense -- what drove to arms A maddened nation, and from all the world Struck peace away.
By envious fate's decrees
Abide not long the mightiest lords of earth; Beneath too heavy a burden great the fall. Thus Rome o'ergrew her strength. So when that hour, The last in all the centuries, shall sound The world's disruption, all things shall revert To that primaeval chaos, stars on stars Shall crash; and fiery meteors from the sky Plunge in the ocean. Earth shall then no more Front with her bulwark the encroaching sea: The moon, indignant at her path oblique, Shall drive her chariot 'gainst her brother Sun And claim the day for hers; and discord huge Shall rend the spheres asunder. On themselves Great powers are dashed: such bounds the gods have placed Upon the prosperous; nor doth Fortune lend To any nations, so that they may strike The sovereign power that rules the earth and sea, The weapons of her envy. Triple reign And baleful compact for divided power -- Ne'er without peril separate before -- Made Rome their victim. Oh! Ambition blind, That stirred the leaders so to join their strength In peace that ended ill, their prize the world! For while the Sea on Earth and Earth on Air Lean for support: while Titan runs his course, And night with day divides an equal sphere, No king shall brook his fellow, nor shall power Endure a rival. Search no foreign lands: These walls are proof that in their infant days A hamlet, not the world, was prize enough To cause the shedding of a brother's blood.
Concord, on discord based, brief time endured, Unwelcome to the rivals; and alone Crassus delayed the advent of the war. Like to the slender neck that separates The seas of Graecia: should it be engulfed Then would th' Ionian and Aegean mains (4) Break each on other: thus when Crassus fell, Who held apart the chiefs, in piteous death, And stained Assyria's plains with Latian blood, Defeat in Parthia loosed the war in Rome. More in that victory than ye thought was won, Ye sons of Arsaces; your conquered foes Took at your hands the rage of civil strife. The mighty realm that earth and sea contained, To which all peoples bowed, split by the sword, Could not find space for two (5). For Julia bore, Cut off by fate unpitying(6), the bond Of that ill-omened marriage, and the pledge Of blood united, to the shades below. Had'st thou but longer stayed, it had been thine To keep the husband and the sire apart, And, as the Sabine women did of old, Dash down the threatening swords and join the hands. With thee all trust was buried, and the chiefs Could give their courage vent, and rushed to war.
Lest newer glories triumphs past obscure, Late conquered Gaul the bays from pirates won, This, Magnus, was thy fear; thy roll of fame, Of glorious deeds accomplished for the state Allows no equal; nor will Caesar's pride A prior rival in his triumphs brook; Which had the right 'twere impious to enquire; Each for his cause can vouch a judge supreme; The victor, heaven: the vanquished, Cato, thee. (7) Nor were they like to like: the one in years Now verging towards decay, in times of peace Had unlearned war; but thirsting for applause Had given the people much, and proud of fame His former glory cared not to renew, But joyed in plaudits of the theatre, (8) His gift to Rome: his triumphs in the past, Himself the shadow of a mighty name. As when some oak, in fruitful field sublime, Adorned with venerable spoils, and gifts Of bygone leaders, by its weight to earth With feeble roots still clings; its naked arms And hollow trunk, though leafless, give a shade; And though condemned beneath the tempest's shock To speedy fall, amid the sturdier trees In sacred grandeur rules the forest still. No such repute had Ceesar won, nor fame; But energy was his that could not rest -- The only shame he knew was not to win. Keen and unvanquished (9), where revenge or hope Might call, resistless would he strike the blow With sword unpitying: every victory won Reaped to the full; the favour of the gods Pressed to the utmost; all that stayed his course Aimed at the summit of power, was thrust aside: Triumph his joy, though ruin marked his track. As parts the clouds a bolt by winds compelled, With crack of riven air and crash of worlds, And veils the light of day, and on mankind, Blasting their vision with its flames oblique, Sheds deadly fright; then turning to its home, ' Nought but the air opposing, through its path Spreads havoc, and collects its scattered fires.
Such were the hidden motives of the chiefs; But in the public life the seeds of war Their hold had taken, such as are the doom Of potent nations: and when fortune poured Through Roman gates the booty of a world, The curse of luxury, chief bane of states, Fell on her sons. Farewell the ancient ways! Behold the pomp profuse, the houses decked With ornament; their hunger loathed the food Of former days; men wore attire for dames Scarce fitly fashioned; poverty was scorned, Fruitful of warriors; and from all the world Came that which ruins nations; while the fields Furrowed of yore by great Camillus' plough, Or by the mattock which a Curius held, Lost their once narrow bounds, and widening tracts By hinds unknown were tilled. No nation this To sheathe the sword, with tranquil peace content And with her liberties; but prone to ire; Crime holding light as though by want compelled: And great the glory in the minds of men, Ambition lawful even at point of sword, To rise above their country: might their law: Decrees are forced from Senate and from Plebs: Consul and Tribune break the laws alike: Bought are the fasces, and the people sell For gain their favour: bribery's fatal curse Corrupts the annual contests of the Field. Then covetous usury rose, and interest Was greedier ever as the seasons came; Faith tottered; thousands saw their gain in war.
Caesar has crossed the Alps, his mighty soul Great tumults pondering and the coming shock. Now on the marge of Rubicon, he saw, In face most sorrowful and ghostly guise, His trembling country's image; huge it seemed Through mists of night obscure; and hoary hair Streamed from the lofty front with turrets crowned: Torn were her locks and naked were her arms. Then thus, with broken sighs the Vision spake: "What seek ye, men of Rome? and whither hence Bear ye my standards? If by right ye come, My citizens, stay here; these are the bounds; No further dare." But Caesar's hair was stiff With horror as he gazed, and ghastly dread Restrained his footsteps on the further bank. Then spake he, "Thunderer, who from the rock Tarpeian seest the wall of mighty Rome; Gods of my race who watched o'er Troy of old; Thou Jove of Alba's height, and Vestal fires, And rites of Romulus erst rapt to heaven, And God-like Rome; be friendly to my quest. Not with offence or hostfie arms I come, Thy Caesar, conqueror by land and sea, Thy soldier here and wheresoe'er thou wilt: No other's; his, his only be the guilt Whose acts make me thy foe.' He gives the word And bids his standards cross the swollen stream. So in the wastes of Afric's burning clime The lion crouches as his foes draw near, Feeding his wrath the while, his lashing tail Provokes his fury; stiff upon his neck Bristles his mane: deep from his gaping jaws Resounds a muttered growl, and should a lance Or javelin reach him from the hunter's ring, Scorning the puny scratch he bounds afield.
From modest fountain blood-red Rubicon In summer's heat flows on; his pigmy tide Creeps through the valleys and with slender marge Divides the Italian peasant from the Gaul. Then winter gave him strength, and fraught with rain The third day's crescent moon; while Eastern winds Thawed from the Alpine slopes the yielding snow. The cavalry first form across the stream ' To break the torrent's force; the rest with ease Beneath their shelter gain the further bank. When Csesar crossed and trod beneath his feet The soil of Italy's forbidden fields, "Here," spake he, "peace, here broken laws be left; Farewell to treaties. Fortune, lead me on; War is our judge, and in the fates our trust." Then in the shades of night he leads the troops Swifter than Balearic sling or shaft Winged by retreating Parthian, to the walls Of threatened Rimini, while fled the stars, Save Lucifer, before the coming sun, Whose fires were veiled in clouds, by south wind driven, Or else at heaven's command: and thus drew on The first dark morning of the civil war.
Now stand the troops within the captured town, Their standards planted; and the trumpet clang Rings forth in harsh alarums, giving note Of impious strife: roused from their sleep the men Rush to the hall and snatch the ancient arms Long hanging through the years of peace; the shield With crumbling frame; dark with the tooth of rust Their swords (10); and javelins with blunted point. But when the well-known signs and eagles shone, And Caesar towering o'er the throng was seen, They shook for terror, fear possessed their limbs, And thoughts unuttered stirred within their souls. "O miserable those to whom their home Denies the peace that all men else enjoy! Placed as we are beside the Northern bounds And scarce a footstep from the restless Gaul, We fall the first; would that our lot had been Beneath the Eastern sky, or frozen North, To lead a wandering life, rather than keep The gates of Latium. Brennus sacked the town And Hannibal, and all the Teuton hosts. For when the fate of Rome is in the scale By this path war advances." Thus they moan Their fears but speak them not; no sound is heard Giving their anguish utterance: as when In depth of winter all the fields are still, The birds are voiceless and no sound is heard To break the silence of the central sea. But when the day had broken through the shades Of chilly darkness, lo! the torch of war! For by the hand of Fate is swift dispersed All Caesar's shame of battle, and his mind Scarce doubted more; and Fortune toiled to make His action just and give him cause for arms. For while Rome doubted and the tongues of men Spoke of the chiefs who won them rights of yore, The hostile Senate, in contempt of right, Drove out the Tribunes. They to Caesar's camp With Curio hasten, who of venal tongue, Bold, prompt, persuasive, had been wont to preach Of Freedom to the people, and to call Upon the chiefs to lay their weapons down (11). And when he saw how deeply Caesar mused, "While from the rostrum I had power," he said, To call the populace to aid thy cause, By this my voice against the Senate's will Was thy command prolonged. But silenced now Are laws in war: we driven from our homes; Yet is our exile willing; for thine arms Shall make us citizens of Rome again. Strike; for no strength as yet the foe hath gained. Occasion calls, delay shall mar it soon: Like risk, like labour, thou hast known before, But never such reward. Could Gallia hold Thine armies ten long years ere victory came, That little nook of earth? One paltry fight Or twain, fought out by thy resistless hand, And Rome for thee shall have subdued the world: 'Tis true no triumph now would bring thee home; No captive tribes would grace thy chariot wheels Winding in pomp around the ancient hill. Spite gnaws the factions; for thy conquests won Scarce shalt thou be unpunished. Yet 'tis fate Thou should'st subdue thy kinsman: share the world With him thou canst not; rule thou canst, alone." As when at Elis' festival a horse In stable pent gnaws at his prison bars Impatient, and should clamour from without Strike on his ear, bounds furious at restraint, So then was Caesar, eager for the fight, Stirred by the words of Curio. To the ranks He bids his soldiers; with majestic mien And hand commanding silence as they come. "Comrades," he cried, "victorious returned, Who by my side for ten long years have faced, 'Mid Alpine winters and on Arctic shores, The thousand dangers of the battle-field -- Is this our country's welcome, this her prize For death and wounds and Roman blood outpoured? Rome arms her choicest sons; the sturdy oaks Are felled to make a fleet; -- what could she more If from the Alps fierce Hannibal were come With all his Punic host? By land and sea Caesar shall fly! Fly? Though in adverse war Our best had fallen, and the savage Gaul Were hard upon our track, we would not fly. And now, when fortune smiles and kindly gods Beckon us on to glory! -- Let him come Fresh from his years of peace, with all his crowd Of conscript burgesses, Marcellus' tongue (12) And Cato's empty name! We will not fly. Shall Eastern hordes and greedy hirelings keep Their loved Pompeius ever at the helm? Shall chariots of triumph be for him Though youth and law forbad them? Shall he seize On Rome's chief honours ne'er to be resigned? And what of harvests (13) blighted through the world And ghastly famine made to serve his ends? Who hath forgotten how Pompeius' bands Seized on the forum, and with glittering arms Made outraged justice tremble, while their swords Hemmed in the judgment-seat where Milo (14) stood? And now when worn and old and ripe for rest (15), Greedy of power, the impious sword again He draws. As tigers in Hyrcanian woods Wandering, or in the caves that saw their birth, Once having lapped the blood of slaughtered kine, Shall never cease from rage; e'en so this whelp Of cruel Sulla, nursed in civil war, Outstrips his master; and the tongue which licked That reeking weapon ever thirsts for more. Stain once the lips with blood, no other meal They shall enjoy. And shall there be no end Of these long years of power and of crime? Nay, this one lesson, e'er it be too late, Learn of thy gentle Sulla -- to retire! Of old his victory o'er Cilician thieves And Pontus' weary monarch gave him fame, By poison scarce attained. His latest prize Shall I be, Caesar, I, who would not quit My conquering eagles at his proud command? Nay, if no triumph is reserved for me, Let these at least of long and toilsome war 'Neath other leaders the rewards enjoy. Where shall the weary soldier find his rest? What cottage homes their joys, what fields their fruit Shall to our veterans yield? Will Magnus say That pirates only till the fields alight? Unfurl your standards; victory gilds them yet, As through those glorious years. Deny our rights! He that denies them makes our quarrel just. Nay! use the strength that we have made our own. No booty seek we, nor imperial power. This would-be ruler of subservient Rome We force to quit his grasp; and Heaven shall smile On those who seek to drag the tyrant down."
Thus Caesar spake; but doubtful murmurs ran Throughout the listening crowd, this way and that Their wishes urging them; the thoughts of home And household gods and kindred gave them pause: But fear of Caesar and the pride of war Their doubts resolved. Then Laelius, who wore The well-earned crown for Roman life preserved, The foremost Captain of the army, spake: "O greatest leader of the Roman name, If 'tis thy wish the very truth to hear 'Tis mine to speak it; we complain of this, That gifted with such strength thou did'st refrain From using it. Had'st thou no trust in us? While the hot life-blood fills these glowing veins, While these strong arms avail to hurl the lance, Wilt thou make peace and bear the Senate's rule? Is civil conquest then so base and vile? Lead us through Scythian deserts, lead us where The inhospitable Syrtes line the shore Of Afric's burning sands, or where thou wilt: This hand, to leave a conquered world behind, Held firm the oar that tamed the Northern Sea And Rhine's swift torrent foaming to the main. To follow thee fate gives me now the power: The will was mine before. No citizen I count the man 'gainst whom thy trumpets sound. By ten campaigns of victory, I swear, By all thy world-wide triumphs, though with hand Unwilling, should'st thou now demand the life Of sire or brother or of faithful spouse, Caesar, the life were thine. To spoil the gods And sack great Juno's temple on the hill, To plant our arms o'er Tiber's yellow stream, To measure out the camp, against the wall To drive the fatal ram, and raze the town, This arm shall not refuse, though Rome the prize."
His comrades swore consent with lifted hands And vowed to follow wheresoe'er he led. And such a clamour rent the sky as when Some Thracian blast on Ossa's pine-clad rocks Falls headlong, and the loud re-echoing woods, Or bending, or rebounding from the stroke, In sounding chorus lift the roar on high.
When Csesar saw them welcome thus the war And Fortune leading on, and favouring fates, He seized the moment, called his troops from Gaul, And breaking up his camp set on for Rome.
The tents are vacant by Lake Leman's side; The camps upon the beetling crags of Vosges No longer hold the warlike Lingon down, Fierce in his painted arms; Isere is left, Who past his shallows gliding, flows at last Into the current of more famous Rhone, To reach the ocean in another name. The fair-haired people of Cevennes are free: Soft Aude rejoicing bears no Roman keel, Nor pleasant Var, since then Italia's bound; The harbour sacred to Alcides' name Where hollow crags encroach upon the sea, Is left in freedom: there nor Zephyr gains Nor Caurus access, but the Circian blast (16) Forbids the roadstead by Monaecus' hold. And others left the doubtful shore, which sea And land alternate claim, whene'er the tide Pours in amain or when the wave rolls back -- Be it the wind which thus compels the deep From furthest pole, and leaves it at the flood; Or else the moon that makes the tide to swell, Or else, in search of fuel (17) for his fires, The sun draws heavenward the ocean wave; -- Whate'er the cause that may control the main I leave to others; let the gods for me Lock in their breasts the secrets of the world.
Those who kept watch beside the western shore Have moved their standards home; the happy Gaul Rejoices in their absence; fair Garonne Through peaceful meads glides onward to the sea. And where the river broadens, neath the cape Her quiet harbour sleeps. No outstretched arm Except in mimic war now hurls the lance. No skilful warrior of Seine directs The scythed chariot 'gainst his country's foe. Now rest the Belgians, and the Arvernian race That boasts our kinship by descent from Troy; And those brave rebels whose undaunted hands Were dipped in Cotta's blood, and those who wear Sarmatian garb. Batavia's warriors fierce No longer listen for the bugle call, Nor those who dwell where Rhone's swift eddies sweep Saone to the ocean; nor the mountain tribes Who dwell about its source. Thou, too, oh Treves, Rejoicest that the war has left thy bounds. Ligurian tribes, now shorn, in ancient days First of the long-haired nations, on whose necks Once flowed the auburn locks in pride supreme; And those who pacify with blood accursed Savage Teutates, Hesus' horrid shrines, And Taranis' altars cruel as were those Loved by Diana (18), goddess of the north; All these now rest in peace. And you, ye Bards, Whose martial lays send down to distant times The fame of valorous deeds in battle done, Pour forth in safety more abundant song. While you, ye Druids (19), when the war was done, To mysteries strange and hateful rites returned: To you alone 'tis given the gods and stars To know or not to know; secluded groves Your dwelling-place, and forests far remote. If what ye sing be true, the shades of men Seek not the dismal homes of Erebus Or death's pale kingdoms; but the breath of life Still rules these bodies in another age -- Life on this hand and that, and death between. Happy the peoples 'neath the Northern Star In this their false belief; for them no fear Of that which frights all others: they with hands And hearts undaunted rush upon the foe And scorn to spare the life that shall return. Ye too depart who kept the banks of Rhine Safe from the foe, and leave the Teuton tribes Free at their will to march upon the world.
Caesar, with strength increased and gathered troops New efforts daring, spreads his bands afar Through Italy, and fills the neighbouring towns. Then empty rumour to well-grounded fear Gave strength, and heralding the coming war In hundred voices 'midst the people spread. One cries in terror, "Swift the squadrons come Where Nar with Tiber joins: and where, in meads By oxen loved, Mevania spreads her walls, Fierce Caesar hurries his barbarian horse. Eagles and standards wave above his head, And broad the march that sweeps across the land." Nor is he pictured truly; greater far More fierce and pitiless -- from conquered foes Advancing; in his rear the peoples march. Snatched from their homes between the Rhine and Alps, To pillage Rome while Roman chiefs look on. Thus each man's panic thought swells rumour's lie: They fear the phantoms they themselves create. Nor does the terror seize the crowd alone: But fled the Fathers, to the Consuls (20) first Issuing their hated order, as for war; And doubting of their safety, doubting too Where lay the peril, through the choking gates, Each where he would, rushed all the people forth. Thou would'st believe that blazing to the torch Were men's abodes, or nodding to their fall. So streamed they onwards, frenzied with affright, As though in exile only could they find Hope for their country. So, when southern blasts From Libyan whirlpools drive the boundless main, And mast and sail crash down upon a ship With ponderous weight, but still the frame is sound, Her crew and captain leap into the sea, Each making shipwreck for himself. 'Twas thus They passed the city gates and fled to war. No aged parent now could stay his son; Nor wife her spouse, nor did they pray the gods To grant the safety of their fatherland. None linger on the threshold for a look Of their loved city, though perchance the last.
Ye gods, who lavish priceless gifts on men, Nor care to guard them, see victorious Rome Teeming with life, chief city of the world, With ample walls that all mankind might hold, To coming Caesar left an easy prey. The Roman soldier, when in foreign lands Pressed by the enemy, in narrow trench And hurried mound finds guard enough to make His slumber safe; but thou, imperial Rome, Alone on rumour of advancing foes Art left a desert, and thy battlements They trust not for one night. Yet for their fear This one excuse was left; Pompeius fled. Nor found they room for hope; for nature gave Unerring portents of worse ills to come. The angry gods filled earth and air and sea With frequent prodigies; in darkest nights Strange constellations sparkled through the gloom: The pole was all afire, and torches flew Across the depths of heaven; with horrid hair A blazing comet stretched from east to west And threatened change to kingdoms. From the blue Pale lightning flashed, and in the murky air The fire took divers shapes; a lance afar Would seem to quiver or a misty torch; A noiseless thunderbolt from cloudless sky Rushed down, and drawing fire in northern parts Plunged on the summit of the Alban mount. The stars that run their courses in the night Shone in full daylight; and the orbed moon, Hid by the shade of earth, grew pale and wan. The sun himself, when poised in mid career, Shrouded his burning car in blackest gloom And plunged the world in darkness, so that men Despaired of day -- like as he veiled his light From that fell banquet which Mycenae saw (21). The jaws of Etna were agape with flame That rose not heavenwards, but headlong fell In smoking stream upon the Italian flank. Then black Charybdis, from her boundless depth, Threw up a gory sea. In piteous tones Howled the wild dogs; the Vestal fire was snatched From off the altar; and the flame that crowned The Latin festival was split in twain, As on the Theban pyre (22), in ancient days; Earth tottered on its base: the mighty Alps From off their summits shook th' eternal snow (23). In huge upheaval Ocean raised his waves O'er Calpe's rock and Atlas' hoary head. The native gods shed tears, and holy sweat Dropped from the idols; gifts in temples fell: Foul birds defiled the day; beasts left the woods And made their lair among the streets of Rome. All this we hear; nay more: dumb oxen spake; Monsters were brought to birth and mothers shrieked At their own offspring; words of dire import From Cumae's prophetess were noised abroad. Bellona's priests with bleeding arms, and slaves Of Cybele's worship, with ensanguined hair, Howled chants of havoc and of woe to men. Arms clashed; and sounding in the pathless woods Were heard strange voices; spirits walked the earth: And dead men's ashes muttered from the urn. Those who live near the walls desert their homes, For lo! with hissing serpents in her hair, Waving in downward whirl a blazing pine, A fiend patrols the town, like that which erst At Thebes urged on Agave (24), or which hurled Lycurgus' bolts, or that which as he came From Hades seen, at haughty Juno's word, Brought terror to the soul of Hercules. Trumpets like those that summon armies forth Were heard re-echoing in the silent night: And from the earth arising Sulla's (25) ghost Sang gloomy oracles, and by Anio's wave All fled the homesteads, frighted by the shade Of Marius waking from his broken tomb.
In such dismay they summon, as of yore, The Tuscan sages to the nation's aid. Aruns, the eldest, leaving his abode In desolate Luca, came, well versed in all The lore of omens; knowing what may mean The flight of hovering bird, the pulse that beats In offered victims, and the levin bolt. All monsters first, by most unnatural birth Brought into being, in accursd flames He bids consume (26). Then round the walls of Rome Each trembling citizen in turn proceeds. The priests, chief guardians of the public faith, With holy sprinkling purge the open space That borders on the wall; in sacred garb Follows the lesser crowd: the Vestals come By priestess led with laurel crown bedecked, To whom alone is given the right to see Minerva's effigy that came from Troy (27). Next come the keepers of the sacred books And fate's predictions; who from Almo's brook Bring back Cybebe laved; the augur too Taught to observe sinister flight of birds; And those who serve the banquets to the gods; And Titian brethren; and the priest of Mars, Proud of the buckler that adorns his neck; By him the Flamen, on his noble head The cap of office. While they tread the path That winds around the walls, the aged seer Collects the thunderbolts that fell from heaven, And lays them deep in earth, with muttered words Naming the spot accursed. Next a steer, Picked for his swelling neck and beauteous form, He leads to the altar, and with slanting knife Spreads on his brow the meal, and pours the wine. The victim's struggles prove the gods averse; But when the servers press upon his horns
He bends the knee and yields him to the blow. No crimson torrent issued at the stroke, But from the wound a dark empoisoned stream Ebbed slowly downward. Aruns at the sight Aghast, upon the entrails of the beast Essayed to read the anger of the gods. Their very colour terrified the seer; Spotted they were and pale, with sable streaks Of lukewarm gore bespread; the liver damp With foul disease, and on the hostile part The angry veins defiant; of the lungs The fibre hid, and through the vital parts The membrane small; the heart had ceased to throb; Blood oozes through the ducts; the caul is split: And, fatal omen of impending ill, One lobe o'ergrows the other; of the twain The one lies flat and sick, the other beats And keeps the pulse in rapid strokes astir.
Disaster's near approach thus learned, he cries -- "Whate'er may be the purpose of the gods, 'Tis not for me to tell; this offered beast Not Jove possesses, but the gods below. We dare not speak our fears, yet fear doth make The future worse than fact. May all the gods Prosper the tokens, and the sacrifice Be void of truth, and Tages (famous seer) Have vainly taught these mysteries." Such his words Involved, mysterious. Figulus, to whom For knowledge of the secret depths of space And laws harmonious that guide the stars, Memphis could find no peer, then spake at large: "Either," he said, "the world and countless orbs Throughout the ages wander at their will; Or, if the fates control them, ruin huge Hangs o'er this city and o'er all mankind. Shall Earth yawn open and engulph the towns? Shall scorching heat usurp the temperate air And fields refuse their timely fruit? The streams Flow mixed with poison? In what plague, ye gods, In what destruction shall ye wreak your ire? Whate'er the truth, the days in which we live Shall find a doom for many. Had the star Of baleful Saturn, frigid in the height, Kindled his lurid fires, the sky had poured Its torrents forth as in Deucalion's time, And whelmed the world in waters. Or if thou, Phoebus, beside the Nemean lion fierce Wert driving now thy chariot, flames should seize The universe and set the air ablaze. These are at peace; but, Mars, why art thou bent On kindling thus the Scorpion, his tail Portending evil and his claws aflame? Deep sunk is kindly Jupiter, and dull Sweet Venus' star, and rapid Mercury Stays on his course: Mars only holds the sky. Why does Orion's sword too brightly shine? Why planets leave their paths and through the void Thus journey on obscure? 'Tis war that comes, Fierce rabid war: the sword shall bear the rule Confounding justice; hateful crime usurp The name of virtue; and the havoc spread Through many a year. But why entreat the gods? The end Rome longs for and the final peace Comes with a despot. Draw thou out thy chain Of lengthening slaughter, and (for such thy fate) Make good thy liberty through civil war."
The frightened people heard, and as they heard His words prophetic made them fear the more. But worse remained; for as on Pindus' slopes Possessed with fury from the Theban god Speeds some Bacchante, thus in Roman streets Behold a matron run, who, in her trance, Relieves her bosom of the god within.
"Where dost thou snatch me, Paean, to what shore Through airy regions borne? I see the snows Of Thracian mountains; and Philippi's plains Lie broad beneath. But why these battle lines, No foe to vanquish -- Rome on either hand? Again I wander 'neath the rosy hues That paint thine eastern skies, where regal Nile Meets with his flowing wave the rising tide. Known to mine eyes that mutilated trunk That lies upon the sand! Across the seas By changing whirlpools to the burning climes Of Libya borne, again I see the hosts From Thracia brought by fate's command. And now Thou bear'st me o'er the cloud-compelling Alps And Pyrenean summits; next to Rome. There in mid-Senate see the closing scene Of this foul war in foulest murder done. Again the factions rise; through all the world Once more I pass; but give me some new land, Some other region, Phoebus, to behold! Washed by the Pontic billows! for these eyes Already once have seen Philippi's plains!" (28)
The frenzy left her and she speechless fell.
ENDNOTES:
(1) The great Emathian conqueror' (Milton's sonnet). Emathia was part of Macedonia, but the word is used loosely for Thessaly or Macedonia. (2) Crassus had been defeated and slain by the Parthians in B.C. 53, four years before this period. (3) Mr. Froude in his essay entitled "Divus Caesar" hints that these famous lines may have been written in mockery. Probably the five years known as the Golden Era of Nero had passed when they were written: yet the text itself does not aid such a suggestion; and the view generally taken, namely that Lucan was in earnest, appears preferable. There were many who dreamed at the time that the disasters of the Civil War were being compensated by the wealth and prosperity of the empire under Nero; and the assurance of universal peace, then almost realised, which is expressed in lines 69-81, seems inconsistent with the idea that this passage was written in irony. (See Lecky's "European Morals from Augustus to Charlemagne", vol. i.p.240, who describes these latter verses as Written with all the fervour of a Christian poet. See also Merivale's "Roman Empire," chapter liv.) (4) See a similar passage in the final scene of Ben Jonson's "Catiline". The cutting of the Isthmus of Corinth was proposed in Nero's reign, and actually commenced in his presence; but abandoned because it was asserted that the level of the water in the Corinthian Gulf was higher than that in the Saronic Gulf, so that, if the canal were cut, the island of Aegina would be submerged. Merivale's "Roman Empire", chapter iv. (5) Compare: "Two stars keep not their motion in one sphere; Nor can one England brook a double reign Of Harry Percy and the Prince of Wales." -- "1 Henry IV", Act v., Scene 4. (6) This had taken place in B.C.54, about five years before the action of the poem opens. (7) This famous line was quoted by Lamartine when addressing the French Assembly in 1848. He was advocating, against the interests of his own party (which in the Assembly was all- powerful), that the President of the Republic should be chosen by the nation, and not by the Assembly; and he ended by saying that if the course he advocated was disastrous to himself,
Victrix causa Diis placuit, sed victa Catoni.'
(8) Plausuque sui gaudere theatri.' Quoted by Mr. Pitt, in his speech on the address in 1783, on the occasion of peace being made with France, Spain, and America; in allusion to Mr. Sheridan. The latter replied,
If ever I again engage
in the compositions he alludes to, I may be tempted to an
act of presumption -- to attempt an improvement on one of
Ben Jonson's best characters -- the character of the Angry
Boy in the "Alchymist."'
(9) Cicero wrote thus of Caesar: 1Have you ever read or heard of
a man more vigorous in action or more moderate in the use of
victory than our Caesar?' -- Epp. ad Diversos,' viii. 15.
(10) Marlowe has it:
"...And swords
With ugly teeth of black rust foully scarred."
(11) In the Senate, Curio had proposed and carried a resolution
that Pompeius and Caesar should lay their arms down
simultaneously; but this was resisted by the Oligarchal
party, who endeavoured, though unsuccessfully, to expel
Curio from the Senate, and who placed Pompeius in command of
the legions at Capua. This was in effect a declaration of
war; and Curio, after a last attempt at resistance, left the
city, and betook himself to Caesar. (See the close of Book
IV.)
(12) Marcus Marcellus, Consul in B.C. 51.
(13) Plutarch, "Pomp.", 49. The harbours and places of trade
were placed under his control in order that he might find a
remedy for the scarcity of grain. But his enemies said that
he had caused the scarcity in order to get the power.
(14) Milo was brought to trial for the murder of Clodius in
B.C.52, about three years before this. Pompeius, then sole
Consul, had surrounded the tribunal with soldiers, who at
one time charged the crowd. Milo was sent into exile at
Massilia.
(15) See Book II., 630.
(16) The north-west wind. Circius was a violent wind from about
the same quarter, but peculiar to the district.
(17) This idea that the sun found fuel in the clouds appears
again in Book VII., line 7; Book IX., line 379; and Book X.,
line 317.
(18) This Diana was worshipped by the Tauri, a people who dwelt
in the Crimea; and, according to legend, was propitiated by
human sacrifices. Orestes on his return from his expiatory
wanderings brought her image to Greece, and the Greeks
identified her with their Artemis. (Compare Book VI., 93.)
(19) The horror of the Druidical groves is again alluded to in
Book III., lines 462-489. Dean Merivale remarks (chapter
li.) on this passage, that in the despair of another life
which pervaded Paganism at the time, the Roman was
exasperated at the Druids' assertion of the transmigration
of souls. But the passage seems also to betray a lingering
suspicion that the doctrine may in some shape be true,
however horrible were the rites and sacrifices. The reality
of a future life was a part of Lucan's belief, as a state of
reward for heroes. (See the passage at the beginning of Book
IX.; and also Book VI., line 933). But all was vague and
uncertain, and he appears to have viewed the Druidical
transmigration rather with doubt and unbelief, as a possible
form of future or recurring life, than with scorn as an
absurdity.
(20) Plutarch says the Consuls fled without making the sacrifices
usual before wars. ("Pomp." 61.)
(21) Compare Ben Jonson's "Catiline," I. 1: --
Lecca: The day goes back,
Or else my senses.
Curius: As at Atreus' feast.
(22) When the Theban brothers, Eteocles and Polynices, were being
burned on the same pyre, the flame shot up in two separate
tongues, indicating that even in death they could not be
reconciled. (Mr. Haskins' note, citing Statius, "Thebiad")
(23) "Shook the old snow from off their trembling laps."
(Marlowe.) The Latin word is "jugis".
(24) Book VI., 420.
(25) Sulla was buried in the Campus Martius. (Plutarch,
"Sulla,".) The corpse of Marius was dragged from his tomb
by Sulla's order, and thrown into the Anio.
(26) Such a ceremonial took place in A.D. 56 under Nero, after
the temples of Jupiter and Minerva had been struck by
lightning, and was probably witnessed by Lucan himself.
(See Merivale's "History of the Roman Empire," chapter lii.)
(27) See Book IX., 1178.
(28) The confusion between the site of the battle of Philippi and
that of the battle of Pharsalia is common among the Roman
writers. (See the note to Merivale, chapter xxvi.)
BOOK II
THE FLIGHT OF POMPEIUS
This was made plain the anger of the gods; The universe gave signs Nature reversed In monstrous tumult fraught with prodigies Her laws, and prescient spake the coming guilt.
How seemed it just to thee, Olympus' king, That suffering mortals at thy doom should know By omens dire the massacre to come? Or did the primal parent of the world When first the flames gave way and yielding left Matter unformed to his subduing hand, And realms unbalanced, fix by stern decree' Unalterable laws to bind the whole (Himself, too, bound by law), so that for aye All Nature moves within its fated bounds? Or, is Chance sovereign over all, and we The sport of Fortune and her turning wheel? Whate'er be truth, keep thou the future veiled From mortal vision, and amid their fears May men still hope.
Thus known how great the woes
The world should suffer, from the truth divine, A solemn fast was called, the courts were closed, All men in private garb; no purple hem Adorned the togas of the chiefs of Rome; No plaints were uttered, and a voiceless grief Lay deep in every bosom: as when death Knocks at some door but enters not as yet, Before the mother calls the name aloud Or bids her grieving maidens beat the breast, While still she marks the glazing eye, and soothes The stiffening limbs and gazes on the face, In nameless dread, not sorrow, and in awe Of death approaching: and with mind distraught Clings to the dying in a last embrace.
The matrons laid aside their wonted garb: Crowds filled the temples -- on the unpitying stones Some dashed their bosoms; others bathed with tears The statues of the gods; some tore their hair Upon the holy threshold, and with shrieks And vows unceasing called upon the names Of those whom mortals supplicate. Nor all Lay in the Thunderer's fane: at every shrine Some prayers are offered which refused shall bring Reproach on heaven. One whose livid arms Were dark with blows, whose cheeks with tears bedewed And riven, cried, "Beat, mothers, beat the breast, Tear now the lock; while doubtful in the scales Still fortune hangs, nor yet the fight is won, You still may grieve: when either wins rejoice." Thus sorrow stirs itself.
Meanwhile the men
Seeking the camp and setting forth to war, Address the cruel gods in just complaint. "Happy the youths who born in Punic days On Cannae's uplands or by Trebia's stream Fought and were slain! What wretched lot is ours! No peace we ask for: let the nations rage; Rouse fiercest cities! may the world find arms To wage a war with Rome: let Parthian hosts Rush forth from Susa; Scythian Ister curb No more the Massagete: unconquered Rhine Let loose from furthest North her fair-haired tribes: Elbe, pour thy Suevians forth! Let us be foes Of all the peoples. May the Getan press Here, and the Dacian there; Pompeius meet The Eastern archers, Caesar in the West Confront th' Iberian. Leave to Rome no hand To raise against herself in civil strife. Or, if Italia by the gods be doomed, Let all the sky, fierce Parent, be dissolved And falling on the earth in flaming bolts, Their hands still bloodless, strike both leaders down, With both their hosts! Why plunge in novel crime To settle which of them shall rule in Rome? Scarce were it worth the price of civil war To hinder either." Thus the patriot voice Still found an utterance, soon to speak no more.
Meantime, the aged fathers o'er their fates In anguish grieved, detesting life prolonged That brought with it another civil war. And thus spake one, to justify his fears: "No other deeds the fates laid up in store When Marius (1), victor over Teuton hosts, Afric's high conqueror, cast out from Rome, Lay hid in marshy ooze, at thy behest, O Fortune! by the yielding soil concealed And waving rushes; but ere long the chains Of prison wore his weak and aged frame, And lengthened squalor: thus he paid for crime His punishment beforehand; doomed to die Consul in triumph over wasted Rome. Death oft refused him; and the very foe, In act to murder, shuddered in the stroke And dropped the weapon from his nerveless hand. For through the prison gloom a flame of light He saw; the deities of crime abhorred; The Marius to come. A voice proclaimed Mysterious, `Hold! the fates permit thee not That neck to sever. Many a death he owes To time's predestined laws ere his shall come; Cease from thy madness. If ye seek revenge For all the blood shed by your slaughtered tribes to Let this man, Cimbrians, live out all his days.' Not as their darling did the gods protect The man of blood, but for his ruthless hand Fit to prepare that sacrifice of gore Which fate demanded. By the sea's despite Borne to our foes, Jugurtha's wasted realm He saw, now conquered; there in squalid huts Awhile he lay, and trod the hostile dust Of Carthage, and his ruin matched with hers: Each from the other's fate some solace drew, And prostrate, pardoned heaven. On Libyan soil (2) Fresh fury gathering (3), next, when Fortune smiled The prisons he threw wide and freed the slaves. Forth rushed the murderous bands, their melted chains Forged into weapons for his ruffian needs. No charge he gave to mere recruits in guilt Who brought not to the camp some proof of crime. How dread that day when conquering Marius seized The city's ramparts! with what fated speed Death strode upon his victims! plebs alike And nobles perished; far and near the sword Struck at his pleasure, till the temple floors Ran wet with slaughter and the crimson stream Befouled with slippery gore the holy walls. No age found pity men of failing years, Just tottering to the grave, were hurled to death; From infants, in their being's earliest dawn (4), The growing life was severed. For what crime? Twas cause enough for death that they could die. The fury grew: soon 'twas a sluggard's part To seek the guilty: hundreds died to swell The tale of victims. Shamed by empty hands, The bloodstained conqueror snatched a reeking head From neck unknown. One way of life remained, To kiss with shuddering lips the red right hand (5). Degenerate people! Had ye hearts of men, Though ye were threatened by a thousand swords, Far rather death than centuries of life Bought at such price; much more that breathing space Till Sulla comes again (6). But time would fail In weeping for the deaths of all who fell. Encircled by innumerable bands Fell Baebius, his limbs asunder torn, His vitals dragged abroad. Antonius too, Prophet of ill, whose hoary head (7) was placed, Dripping with blood, upon the festal board. There headless fell the Crassi; mangled frames 'Neath Fimbria's falchion: and the prison cells Were wet with tribunes' blood. Hard by the fane Where dwells the goddess and the sacred fire, Fell aged Scaevola, though that gory hand (8) Had spared him, but the feeble tide of blood Still left the flame alive upon the hearth. That selfsame year the seventh time restored (9) The Consul's rods; that year to Marius brought The end of life, when he at Fortune's hands All ills had suffered; all her goods enjoyed.
"And what of those who at the Sacriport (10) And Colline gate were slain, then, when the rule Of Earth and all her nations almost left This city for another, and the chiefs Who led the Samnite hoped that Rome might bleed More than at Caudium's Forks she bled of old? Then came great Sulla to avenge the dead, And all the blood still left within her frame Drew from the city; for the surgeon knife Which shore the cancerous limbs cut in too deep, And shed the life stream from still healthy veins. True that the guilty fell, but not before All else had perished. Hatred had free course And anger reigned unbridled by the law. The victor's voice spake once; but each man struck Just as he wished or willed. The fatal steel Urged by the servant laid the master low. Sons dripped with gore of sires; and brothers fought For the foul trophy of a father slain, Or slew each other for the price of blood. Men sought the tombs and, mingling with the dead, Hoped for escape; the wild beasts' dens were full. One strangled died; another from the height Fell headlong down upon the unpitying earth, And from the encrimsoned victor snatched his death: One built his funeral pyre and oped his veins, And sealed the furnace ere his blood was gone. Borne through the trembling town the leaders' heads Were piled in middle forum: hence men knew Of murders else unpublished. Not on gates Of Diomedes (11), tyrant king of Thrace, Nor of Antaeus, Libya's giant brood, Were hung such horrors; nor in Pisa's hall Were seen and wept for when the suitors died. Decay had touched the features of the slain When round the mouldering heap, with trembling steps The grief-struck parents sought and stole their dead. I, too, the body of my brother slain Thought to remove, my victim to the peace Which Sulla made, and place his loved remains On the forbidden pyre. The head I found, But not the butchered corse.
"Why now renew
The tale of Catulus's shade appeased? And those dread tortures which the living frame Of Marius (12) suffered at the tomb of him Who haply wished them not? Pierced, mangled, torn -- Nor speech nor grasp was left: his every limb Maimed, hacked and riven; yet the fatal blow The murderers with savage purpose spared. 'Twere scarce believed that one poor mortal frame Such agonies could bear e'er death should come. Thus crushed beneath some ruin lie the dead; Thus shapeless from the deep are borne the drowned. Why spoil delight by mutilating thus, The head of Marius? To please Sulla's heart That mangled visage must be known to all. Fortune, high goddess of Praeneste's fane, Saw all her townsmen hurried to their deaths In one fell instant. All the hope of Rome, The flower of Latium, stained with blood the field Where once the peaceful tribes their votes declared. Famine and Sword, the raging sky and sea, And Earth upheaved, have laid such numbers low: But ne'er one man's revenge. Between the slain And living victims there was space no more, Death thus let slip, to deal the fatal blow. Hardly when struck they fell; the severed head Scarce toppled from the shoulders; but the slain Blent in a weighty pile of massacre Pressed out the life and helped the murderer's arm. Secure from stain upon his lofty throne, Unshuddering sat the author of the whole, Nor feared that at his word such thousands fell. At length the Tuscan flood received the dead The first upon his waves; the last on those That lay beneath them; vessels in their course Were stayed, and while the lower current flowed Still to the sea, the upper stood on high Dammed back by carnage. Through the streets meanwhile In headlong torrents ran a tide of blood, Which furrowing its path through town and field Forced the slow river on. But now his banks No longer held him, and the dead were thrown Back on the fields above. With labour huge At length he struggled to his goal and stretched In crimson streak across the Tuscan Sea.
"For deeds like these, shall Sulla now be styled
Darling of Fortune',
Saviour of the State'?
For these, a tomb in middle field of Mars
Record his fame? Like horrors now return
For us to suffer; and the civil war
Thus shall be waged again and thus shall end.
Yet worse disasters may our fears suggest,
For now with greater carnage of mankind
The rival hosts in weightier battle meet.
To exiled Marius, successful strife
Was Rome regained; triumphant Sulla knew
No greater joy than on his hated foes
To wreak his vengeance with unsparing sword.
But these more powerful rivals Fortune calls
To worse ambitions; nor would either chief
For such reward as Sulla's wage the war."
Thus, mindful of his youth, the aged man
Wept for the past, but feared the coming days.
Such terrors found in haughty Brutus' breast No home. When others sat them down to fear He did not so, but in the dewy night When the great wain was turning round the pole He sought his kinsman Cato's humble home. Him sleepless did he find, not for himself Fearing, but pondering the fates of Rome, And deep in public cares. And thus he spake: "O thou in whom that virtue, which of yore Took flight from earth, now finds its only home, Outcast to all besides, but safe with thee: Vouchsafe thy counsel to my wavering soul And make my weakness strength. While Caesar some, Pompeius others, follow in the fight, Cato is Brutus' guide. Art thou for peace, Holding thy footsteps in a tottering world Unshaken? Or wilt thou with the leaders' crimes And with the people's fury take thy part, And by thy presence purge the war of guilt? In impious battles men unsheath the sword; But each by cause impelled: the household crime; Laws feared in peace; want by the sword removed; And broken credit, that its ruin hides In general ruin. Drawn by hope of gain, And not by thirst for blood, they seek the camp. Shall Cato for war's sake make war alone? What profits it through all these wicked years That thou hast lived untainted? This were all Thy meed of virtue, that the wars which find Guilt in all else, shall make thee guilty too. Ye gods, permit not that this fatal strife Should stir those hands to action! When the clouds Of flying javelins hiss upon the air, Let not a dart be thine; nor spent in vain Such virtue! All the fury of the war Shall launch itself on thee, for who, when faint And wounded, would not rush upon thy sword, Take thence his death, and make the murder thine? Do thou live on thy peaceful life apart As on their paths the stars unshaken roll. The lower air that verges on the earth Gives flame and fury to the levin bolt; The deeps below the world engulph the winds And tracts of flaming fire. By Jove's decree Olympus rears his summit o'er the clouds: In lowlier valleys storms and winds contend, But peace eternal reigns upon the heights. What joy for Caesar, if the tidings come That such a citizen has joined the war? Glad would he see thee e'en in Magnus' tents; For Cato's conduct shall approve his own. Pompeius, with the Consul in his ranks, And half the Senate and the other chiefs, Vexes my spirit; and should Cato too Bend to a master's yoke, in all the world The one man free is Caesar. But if thou For freedom and thy country's laws alone Be pleased to raise the sword, nor Magnus then Nor Caesar shall in Brutus find a foe. Not till the fight is fought shall Brutus strike, Then strike the victor."
Brutus thus; but spake
Cato from inmost breast these sacred words: "Chief in all wickedness is civil war, Yet virtue in the paths marked out by fate Treads on securely. Heaven's will be the crime To have made even Cato guilty. Who has strength To gaze unawed upon a toppling world? When stars and sky fall headlong, and when earth Slips from her base, who sits with folded hands? Shall unknown nations, touched by western strife, And monarchs born beneath another clime Brave the dividing seas to join the war? Shall Scythian tribes desert their distant north, And Getae haste to view the fall of Rome, And I look idly on? As some fond sire, Reft of his sons, compelled by grief, himself Marshals the long procession to the tomb, Thrusts his own hand within the funeral flames, Soothing his heart, and, as the lofty pyre Rises on high, applies the kindled torch: Nought, Rome, shall tear thee from me, till I hold Thy form in death embraced; and Freedom's name, Shade though it be, I'll follow to the grave. Yea! let the cruel gods exact in full Rome's expiation: of no drop of blood The war be robbed. I would that, to the gods Of heaven and hell devoted, this my life Might satisfy their vengeance. Decius fell, Crushed by the hostile ranks. When Cato falls Let Rhine's fierce barbarous hordes and both the hosts Thrust through my frame their darts! May I alone Receive in death the wounds of all the war! Thus may the people be redeemed, and thus Rome for her guilt pay the atonement due. Why should men die who wish to bear the yoke And shrink not from the tyranny to come? Strike me, and me alone, of laws and rights In vain the guardian: this vicarious life Shall give Hesperia peace and end her toils. Who then will reign shall find no need for war. You ask, `Why follow Magnus? If he wins (13) He too will claim the Empire of the world.' Then let him, conquering with my service, learn Not for himself to conquer." Thus he spoke And stirred the blood that ran in Brutus' veins Moving the youth to action in the war.
Soon as the sun dispelled the chilly night, The sounding doors flew wide, and from the tomb Of dead Hortensius grieving Marcia came (14). First joined in wedlock to a greater man Three children did she bear to grace his home: Then Cato to Hortensius gave the dame To be a fruitful mother of his sons And join their houses in a closer tie. And now the last sad offices were done She came with hair dishevelled, beaten breast, And ashes on her brow, and features worn With grief; thus only pleasing to the man. "When youth was in me and maternal power I did thy bidding, Cato, and received A second husband: now in years grown old Ne'er to be parted I return to thee. Renew our former pledges undefiled: Give back the name of wife: upon my tomb Let `Marcia, spouse to Cato,' be engraved. Nor let men question in the time to come, Did'st thou compel, or did I willing leave My first espousals. Not in happy times, Partner of joys, I come; but days of care And labour shall be mine to share with thee. Nor leave me here, but take me to the camp, Thy fond companion: why should Magnus' wife Be nearer, Cato, to the wars than thine?"
Although the times were warlike and the fates Called to the fray, he lent a willing ear. Yet must they plight their faith in simple form Of law; their witnesses the gods alone. No festal wreath of flowers crowned the gate Nor glittering fillet on each post entwined; No flaming torch was there, nor ivory steps, No couch with robes of broidered gold adorned; No comely matron placed upon her brow The bridal garland, or forbad the foot (15) To touch the threshold stone; no saffron veil Concealed the timid blushes of the bride; No jewelled belt confined her flowing robe (16) Nor modest circle bound her neck; no scarf Hung lightly on the snowy shoulder's edge Around the naked arm. Just as she came, Wearing the garb of sorrow, while the wool Covered the purple border of her robe, Thus was she wedded. As she greets her sons So doth she greet her husband. Festal games Graced not their nuptials, nor were friends and kin As by the Sabines bidden: silent both They joined in marriage, yet content, unseen By any save by Brutus. Sad and stern On Cato's lineaments the marks of grief Were still unsoftened, and the hoary hair Hung o'er his reverend visage; for since first Men flew to arms, his locks were left unkempt To stream upon his brow, and on his chin His beard untended grew. 'Twas his alone Who hated not, nor loved, for all mankind To mourn alike. Nor did their former couch Again receive them, for his lofty soul E'en lawful love resisted. 'Twas his rule Inflexible, to keep the middle path Marked out and bounded; to observe the laws Of natural right; and for his country's sake To risk his life, his all, as not for self Brought into being, but for all the world: Such was his creed. To him a sumptuous feast Was hunger conquered, and the lowly hut, Which scarce kept out the winter, was a home Equal to palaces: a robe of price Such hairy garments as were worn of old: The end of marriage, offspring. To the State Father alike and husband, right and law He ever followed with unswerving step: No thought of selfish pleasure turned the scale In Cato's acts, or swayed his upright soul.
Meanwhile Pompeius led his trembling host To fields Campanian, and held the walls First founded by the chief of Trojan race (17). These chose he for the central seat of war, Some troops despatching who might meet the foe Where shady Apennine lifts up the ridge Of mid Italia; nearest to the sky Upsoaring, with the seas on either hand, The upper and the lower. Pisa's sands Breaking the margin of the Tuscan deep, Here bound his mountains: there Ancona's towers Laved by Dalmatian waves. Rivers immense, In his recesses born, pass on their course, To either sea diverging. To the left Metaurus, and Crustumium's torrent, fall And Sena's streams and Aufidus who bursts On Adrian billows; and that mighty flood Which, more than all the rivers of the earth, Sweeps down the soil and tears the woods away And drains Hesperia's springs. In fabled lore His banks were first by poplar shade enclosed: (18) And when by Phaethon the waning day Was drawn in path transverse, and all the heaven Blazed with his car aflame, and from the depths Of inmost earth were rapt all other floods, Padus still rolled in pride of stream along. Nile were no larger, but that o'er the sand Of level Egypt he spreads out his waves; Nor Ister, if he sought the Scythian main Unhelped upon his journey through the world By tributary waters not his own. But on the right hand Tiber has his source, Deep-flowing Rutuba, Vulturnus swift, And Sarnus breathing vapours of the night Rise there, and Liris with Vestinian wave Still gliding through Marica's shady grove, And Siler flowing through Salernian meads: And Macra's swift unnavigable stream By Luna lost in Ocean. On the Alps Whose spurs strike plainwards, and on fields of Gaul The cloudy heights of Apennine look down In further distance: on his nearer slopes The Sabine turns the ploughshare; Umbrian kine And Marsian fatten; with his pineclad rocks He girds the tribes of Latium, nor leaves Hesperia's soil until the waves that beat On Scylla's cave compel. His southern spurs Extend to Juno's temple, and of old Stretched further than Italia, till the main O'erstepped his limits and the lands repelled. But, when the seas were joined, Pelorus claimed His latest summits for Sicilia's isle.
Caesar, in rage for war, rejoicing found Foes in Italia; no bloodless steps Nor vacant homes had pleased him (19); so his march Were wasted: now the coming war was joined Unbroken to the past; to force the gates Not find them open, fire and sword to bring Upon the harvests, not through fields unharmed To pass his legions -- this was Caesar's joy; In peaceful guise to march, this was his shame. Italia's cities, doubtful in their choice, Though to the earliest onset of the war About to yield, strengthened their walls with mounds And deepest trench encircling: massive stones And bolts of war to hurl upon the foe They place upon the turrets. Magnus most The people's favour held, yet faith with fear Fought in their breasts. As when, with strident blast, A southern tempest has possessed the main And all the billows follow in its track: Then, by the Storm-king smitten, should the earth Set Eurus free upon the swollen deep, It shall not yield to him, though cloud and sky Confess his strength; but in the former wind Still find its master. But their fears prevailed, And Caesar's fortune, o'er their wavering faith. For Libo fled Etruria; Umbria lost Her freedom, driving Thermus (20) from her bounds; Great Sulla's son, unworthy of his sire, Feared at the name of Caesar: Varus sought The caves and woods, when smote the hostile horse The gates of Auximon; and Spinther driven From Asculum, the victor on his track, Fled with his standards, soldierless; and thou, Scipio, did'st leave Nuceria's citadel Deserted, though by bravest legions held Sent home by Caesar for the Parthian war (21); Whom Magnus earlier, to his kinsman gave A loan of Roman blood, to fight the Gaul.
But brave Domitius held firm his post (22) Behind Corfinium's ramparts; his the troops Who newly levied kept the judgment hall At Milo's trial (23). When from far the plain Rolled up a dusty cloud, beneath whose veil The sheen of armour glistening in the sun, Revealed a marching host. "Dash down," he cried, Swift; as ye can, the bridge that spans the stream; And thou, O river, from thy mountain source With all thy torrents rushing, planks and beams Ruined and broken on thy foaming breast Bear onward to the sea. The war shall stop Here, to our triumph; for this headlong chief Here first at our firm bidding shall be stayed." He bade his squadrons, speeding from the walls, Charge on the bridge: in vain: for Caesar saw They sought to free the river from his chains (24) And bar his march; and roused to ire, he cried: "Were not the walls sufficient to protect Your coward souls? Seek ye by barricades And streams to keep me back? What though the flood Of swollen Ganges were across my path? Now Rubicon is passed, no stream on earth Shall hinder Caesar! Forward, horse and foot, And ere it totters rush upon the bridge." Urged in their swiftest gallop to the front Dashed the light horse across the sounding plain; And suddenly, as storm in summer, flew A cloud of javelins forth, by sinewy arms Hurled at the foe; the guard is put to flight, And conquering Caesar, seizing on the bridge, Compels the enemy to keep the walls. Now do the mighty engines, soon to hurl Gigantic stones, press forward, and the ram Creeps 'neath the ramparts; when the gates fly back, And lo! the traitor troops, foul crime in war, Yield up their leader. Him they place before
His proud compatriot; yet with upright form, And scornful features and with noble mien, He asks his death. But Caesar knew his wish Was punishment, and pardon was his fear: "Live though thou would'st not," so the chieftain spake, "And by my gift, unwilling, see the day: Be to my conquered foes the cause of hope, Proof of my clemency -- or if thou wilt Take arms again -- and should'st thou conquer, count This pardon nothing." Thus he spake, and bade Let loose the bands and set the captive free. Ah! better had he died, and fortune spared The Roman's last dishonour, whose worse doom It is, that he who joined his country's camp And fought with Magnus for the Senate's cause Should gain for this -- a pardon! Yet he curbed His anger, thinking, "Wilt thou then to Rome And peaceful scenes, degenerate? Rather war, The furious battle and the certain end! Break with life's ties: be Caesar's gift in vain."
Pompeius, ignorant that his captain thus Was taken, armed his levies newly raised To give his legions strength; and as he thought To sound his trumpets with the coming dawn, To test his soldiers ere he moved his camp Thus in majestic tones their ranks addressed: "Soldiers of Rome! Avengers of her laws! To whom the Senate gives no private arms, Ask by your voices for the battle sign. Fierce falls the pillage on Hesperian fields, And Gallia's fury o'er the snowy Alps (25) Is poured upon us. Caesar's swords at last Are red with Roman blood. But with the wound We gain the better cause; the crime is theirs. No war is this, but for offended Rome We wreak the vengeance; as when Catiline Lifted against her roofs the flaming brand And, partner in his fury, Lentulus, And mad Cethegus (26) with his naked arm. Is such thy madness, Caesar? when the Fates With great Camillus' and Metellus' names Might place thine own, dost thou prefer to rank With Marius and Cinna? Swift shall be Thy fall: as Lepidus before the sword Of Catulus; or who my axes felt, Carbo (27), now buried in Sicanian tomb; Or who, in exile, roused Iberia's hordes, Sertorius -- yet, witness Heaven, with these I hate to rank thee; hate the task that Rome Has laid upon me, to oppose thy rage. Would that in safety from the Parthian war And Scythian steppes had conquering Crassus come! Then haply had'st thou fallen by the hand That smote vile Spartacus the robber foe. But if among my triumphs fate has said Thy conquest shall be written, know this heart Still sends the life blood coursing: and this arm (28) Still vigorously flings the dart afield. He deems me slothful. Caesar, thou shalt learn We brook not peace because we lag in war. Old, does he call me? Fear not ye mine age. Let me be elder, if his soldiers are. The highest point a citizen can reach And leave his people free, is mine: a throne Alone were higher; whoso would surpass Pompeius, aims at that. Both Consuls stand Here; here for battle stand your lawful chiefs: And shall this Caesar drag the Senate down? Not with such blindness, not so lost to shame Does Fortune rule. Does he take heart from Gaul: For years on years rebellious, and a life Spent there in labour? or because he fled Rhine's icy torrent and the shifting pools He calls an ocean? or unchallenged sought Britannia's cliffs; then turned his back in flight? Or does he boast because his citizens Were driven in arms to leave their hearths and homes? Ah, vain delusion! not from thee they fled: My steps they follow -- mine, whose conquering signs Swept all the ocean (29), and who, ere the moon Twice filled her orb and waned, compelled to flight The pirate, shrinking from the open sea, And humbly begging for a narrow home In some poor nook on shore. 'Twas I again Who, happier far than Sulla, drave to death (30) That king who, exiled to the deep recess Of Scythian Pontus, held the fates of Rome Still in the balances. Where is the land That hath not seen my trophies? Icy waves Of northern Phasis, hot Egyptian shores, And where Syene 'neath its noontide sun Knows shade on neither hand (31): all these have learned To fear Pompeius: and far Baetis' (32) stream, Last of all floods to join the refluent sea. Arabia and the warlike hordes that dwell Beside the Euxine wave: the famous land That lost the golden fleece; Cilician wastes, And Cappadocian, and the Jews who pray Before an unknown God; Sophene soft -- All felt my yoke. What conquests now remain, What wars not civil can my kinsman wage?"
No loud acclaim received his words, nor shout Asked for the promised battle: and the chief Drew back the standards, for the soldier's fears Were in his soul alike; nor dared he trust An army, vanquished by the fame alone Of Caesar's powers, to fight for such a prize. And as some bull, his early combat lost, Forth driven from the herd, in exile roams Through lonely plains or secret forest depths, Whets on opposing trunks his growing horn, And proves himself for battle, till his neck Is ribbed afresh with muscle: then returns, Defiant of the hind, and victor now Leads wheresoe'er he will his lowing bands: Thus Magnus, yielding to a stronger foe, Gave up Italia, and sought in flight Brundusium's sheltering battlements.
Here of old
Fled Cretan settlers when the dusky sail (33) Spread the false message of the hero dead; Here, where Hesperia, curving as a bow, Draws back her coast, a little tongue of land Shuts in with bending horns the sounding main. Yet insecure the spot, unsafe in storm, Were it not sheltered by an isle on which The Adriatic billows dash and fall, And tempests lose their strength: on either hand A craggy cliff opposing breaks the gale That beats upon them, while the ships within Held by their trembling cables ride secure. Hence to the mariner the boundless deep Lies open, whether for Corcyra's port He shapes his sails, or for Illyria's shore, And Epidamnus facing to the main Ionian. Here, when raging in his might Fierce Adria whelms in foam Calabria's coast, When clouds tempestuous veil Ceraunus' height, The sailor finds a haven.
When the chief
Could find no hope in battle on the soil He now was quitting, and the lofty Alps Forbad Iberia, to his son he spake, The eldest scion of that noble stock: "Search out the far recesses of the earth, Nile and Euphrates, wheresoe'er the fame Of Magnus lives, where, through thy father's deeds, The people tremble at the name of Rome. Lead to the sea again the pirate bands; Rouse Egypt's kings; Tigranes, wholly mine, And Pharnaces and all the vagrant tribes Of both Armenias; and the Pontic hordes, Warlike and fierce; the dwellers on the hills Rhipaean, and by that dead northern marsh Whose frozen surface bears the loaded wain. Why further stay thee? Let the eastern world Sound with the war, all cities of the earth Conquered by me, as vassals, to my camp Send all their levied hosts. And you whose names Within the Latian book recorded stand, Strike for Epirus with the northern wind; And thence in Greece and Macedonian tracts, (While winter gives us peace) new strength acquire For coming conflicts." They obey his words And loose their ships and launch upon the main.
But Caesar's might, intolerant of peace Or lengthy armistice, lest now perchance The fates might change their edicts, swift pursued The footsteps of his foe. To other men, So many cities taken at a blow, So many strongholds captured, might suffice; And Rome herself, the mistress of the world, Lay at his feet, the greatest prize of all. Not so with Caesar: instant on the goal He fiercely presses; thinking nothing done While aught remained to do. Now in his grasp Lay all Italia; -- but while Magnus stayed Upon the utmost shore, his grieving soul Deemed all was shared with him. Yet he essayed Escape to hinder, and with labour vain Piled in the greedy main gigantic rocks: Mountains of earth down to the sandy depths Were swallowed by the vortex of the sea; Just as if Eryx and its lofty top Were cast into the deep, yet not a speck Should mark the watery plain; or Gaurus huge Split from his summit to his base, were plunged In fathomless Avernus' stagnant pool. The billows thus unstemmed, 'twas Caesar's will To hew the stately forests and with trees Enchained to form a rampart. Thus of old (If fame be true) the boastful Persian king Prepared a way across the rapid strait 'Twixt Sestos and Abydos, and made one The European and the Trojan shores; And marched upon the waters, wind and storm Counting as nought, but trusting his emprise To one frail bridge, so that his ships might pass Through middle Athos. Thus a mighty mole Of fallen forests grew upon the waves, Free until then, and lofty turrets rose, And land usurped the entrance to the main.
This when Pompeius saw, with anxious care His soul was filled; yet hoping to regain The exit lost, and win a wider world Wherein to wage the war, on chosen ships He hoists the sails; these, driven by the wind And drawn by cables fastened to their prows, Scattered the beams asunder; and at night Not seldom engines, worked by stalwart arms, Flung flaming torches forth. But when the time For secret flight was come, no sailor shout Rang on the shore, no trumpet marked the hour, No bugle called the armament to sea. Already shone the Virgin in the sky Leading the Scorpion in her course, whose claws Foretell the rising Sun, when noiseless all They cast the vessels loose; no song was heard To greet the anchor wrenched from stubborn sand; No captain's order, when the lofty mast Was raised, or yards were bent; a silent crew Drew down the sails which hung upon the ropes, Nor shook the mighty cables, lest the wind Should sound upon them. But the chief, in prayer, Thus spake to Fortune: "Thou whose high decree Has made us exiles from Italia's shores, Grant us at least to leave them." Yet the fates Hardly permitted, for a murmur vast Came from the ocean, as the countless keels Furrowed the waters, and with ceaseless splash The parted billows rose again and fell. Then were the gates thrown wide; for with the fates The city turned to Caesar: and the foe, Seizing the town, rushed onward by the pier That circled in the harbour; then they knew With shame and sorrow that the fleet was gone And held the open: and Pompeius' flight Gave a poor triumph.
Yet was narrower far
The channel which gave access to the sea Than that Euboean strait (34) whose waters lave The shore by Chalcis. Here two ships stuck fast Alone, of all the fleet; the fatal hook Grappled their decks and drew them to the land, And the first bloodshed of the civil war Here left a blush upon the ocean wave. As when the famous ship (36) sought Phasis' stream The rocky gates closed in and hardly gripped Her flying stern; then from the empty sea The cliffs rebounding to their ancient seat Were fixed to move no more. But now the steps Of morn approaching tinged the eastern sky With roseate hues: the Pleiades were dim, The wagon of the Charioteer grew pale, The planets faded, and the silvery star Which ushers in the day, was lost in light.
Then Magnus, hold'st the deep; yet not the same Now are thy fates, as when from every sea Thy fleet triumphant swept the pirate pest. Tired of thy conquests, Fortune now no more Shall smile upon thee. With thy spouse and sons, Thy household gods, and peoples in thy train, Still great in exile, in a distant land Thou seek'st thy fated fall; not that the gods, Wishing to rob thee of a Roman grave, Decreed the strands of Egypt for thy tomb: 'Twas Italy they spared, that far away Fortune on shores remote might hide her crime, And Roman soil be pure of Magnus' blood.
ENDNOTES: (1) When dragged from his hiding place in the marsh, Marius was sent by the magistrates of Minturnae to the house of a woman named Fannia, and there locked up in a dark apartment. It does not appear that he was there long. A Gallic soldier was sent to kill him; "and the eyes of Marius appeared to him to dart a strong flame, and a loud voice issued from the gloom, `Man, do you dare to kill Caius Marius?'" He rushed out exclaiming, "I cannot kill Caius Marius." (Plutarch, "Marius", 38.) (2) The Governor of Libya sent an officer to Marius, who had landed in the neighbourhood of Carthage. The officer delivered his message, and Marius replied, "Tell the Governor you have seen Caius Marius, a fugitive sitting on the ruins of Carthage," a reply in which he not inaptly compared the fate of that city and his own changed fortune. (Plutarch, "Marius", 40.) (3) In the "gathering of fresh fury on Libyan soil", there appears to be an allusion to the story of Antruns, in Book IV. (4) See Ben Jonson's "Catiline", Act i., scene 1, speaking of the Sullan massacre. Cethegus: Not infants in the porch of life were free. .... Catiline: 'Twas crime enough that they had lives: to strike but only those that could do hurt was dull and poor: some fell to make the number as some the prey. (5) Whenever he did not salute a man, or return his salute, this was a signal for massacre. (Plutarch, "Marius", 49.) (6) The Marian massacre was in B.C. 87-86; the Sullan in 82-81. (7) The head of Antonius was struck off and brought to Marius at supper. He was the grandfather of the triumvir. (8) Scaevola, it would appear, was put to death after Marius the elder died, by the younger Marius. He was Pontifex Maximus, and slain by the altar of Vesta. (9) B.C. 86, Marius and Cinna were Consuls. Marius died seventeen days afterwards, in the seventieth year of his age. (10) The Battle of Sacriportus was fought between Marius the younger and the Sullan army in B.C. 82. Marius was defeated with great loss, and fled to Praeneste, a town which afterwards submitted to Sulla, who put all the inhabitants to death (line 216). At the Colline gate was fought the decisive battle between Sulla and the Saranires, who, after a furious contest, were defeated. (11) Diomedes was said to feed his horses on human flesh. (For Antaeus see Book IV., 660.) Enomaus was king of Pisa in Elis. Those who came to sue for his daughter's hand had to compete with him in a chariot race, and if defeated were put to death. (12) The brother of the Consul. (13) So Cicero: "Our Cnaeus is wonderfully anxious for such a royalty as Sulla's. I who tell you know it." ("Ep. ad Att.", ix. 7.) (14) Marcia was first married to Cato, and bore him three sons; he then yielded her to Hortensius. On his death she returned to Cato. (Plutarch, "Cato", 25, 52.) It was in reference to this that Caesar charged him with making a traffic of his marriage; but Plutarch says "to accuse Cato of filthy lucre is like upbraiding Hercules with cowardice." After the marriage Marcia remained at Rome while Cato hurried after Pompeius. (15) The bride was carried over the threshold of her new home, for to stumble on it would be of evil omen. Plutarch ("Romulus") refers this custom to the rape of the Sabine women, who were "so lift up and carried away by force." (North, volume i., p. 88, Edition by Windham.) I have read "vetuit" in this passage, though "vitat" appears to be a better variation according to the manuscripts. (16) The bride was dressed in a long white robe, bound round the waist with a girdle. She had a veil of bright yellow colour. ("Dict. Antiq.") (17) Capua, supposed to be founded by Capys, the Trojan hero. (Virgil, "Aeneid", x., 145.) (18) Phaethon's sisters, who yoked the horses of the Sun to the chariot for their brother, were turned into poplars. Phaethon was flung by Jupiter into the river Po. (19) See the note to Book I., 164. In reality Caesar found little resistance, and did not ravage the country. (20) Thermus. to whom Iguvium had been entrusted by the Senate, was compelled to quit it owing to the disaffection of the inhabitants. (Merivale, chapter xiv.) Auximon in a similar way rose against Varus. (21) After Caesar's campaign with the Nervii, Pompeius had lent him a legion. When the Parthian war broke out and the Senate required each of the two leaders to supply a legion for it, Pompeius demanded the return of the legion which he had sent to Gaul; and Caesar returned it, together with one of his own. They were, however, retained in Italy. (22) See Book VII., 695. (23) See Book I., 368. (24) That is to say, by the breaking of the bridge, the river would become a serious obstacle to Caesar. (25) See line 497. (26) This family is also alluded to by Horace ("Ars Poetica,") as having worn a garment of ancient fashion leaving their arms bare. (See also Book VI., 945.) (27) In B.C. 77, after the death of Sulla, Carbo had been defeated by Pompeius in 81 B.C., in which occasion Pompeius had, at the early age of twenty-five, demanded and obtained his first triumph. The war with Sertorius lasted till 71 B.C., when Pompeius and Metellus triumphed in respect of his overthrow. (28) See Book I., line 369. (29) In B.C. 67, Pompeius swept the pirates off the seas. The whole campaign did not last three months. (30) From B.C. 66 to B.C. 63, Pompeius conquered Mithridates, Syria and the East, except Parthia. (31) Being (as was supposed) exactly under the Equator. Syene (the modern Assouan) is the town mentioned by the priest of Sais, who told Herodotus that "between Syene and Elephantine are two hills with conical tops. The name of one of them is Crophi, and of the other, Mophi. Midway between them are the fountains of the Nile." (Herod., II., chapter 28.) And see "Paradise Regained," IV., 70: -- "Syene, and where the shadow both way falls, "Meroe, Nilotick isle;..." (32) Baetis is the Guadalquivir. (33) Theseus, on returning from his successful exploit in Crete, hoisted by mistake black sails instead of white, thus spreading false intelligence of disaster. (34) It seems that the Euripus was bridged over. (Mr. Haskins' note.) (35) The "Argo".
BOOK III
MASSILIA
With canvas yielding to the western wind The navy sailed the deep, and every eye Gazed on Ionian billows. But the chief Turned not his vision from his native shore Now left for ever, while the morning mists Drew down upon the mountains, and the cliffs Faded in distance till his aching sight No longer knew them. Then his wearied frame Sank in the arms of sleep. But Julia's shape, In mournful guise, dread horror on her brow, Rose through the gaping earth, and from her tomb Erect (1), in form as of a Fury spake: "Driven from Elysian fields and from the plains The blest inhabit, when the war began, I dwell in Stygian darkness where abide The souls of all the guilty. There I saw Th' Eumenides with torches in their hands Prepared against thy battles; and the fleets (2) Which by the ferryman of the flaming stream Were made to bear thy dead: while Hell itself Relaxed its punishments; the sisters three With busy fingers all their needful task Could scarce accomplish, and the threads of fate Dropped from their weary hands. With me thy wife, Thou, Magnus, leddest happy triumphs home: New wedlock brings new luck. Thy concubine, Whose star brings all her mighty husbands ill, Cornelia, weds in thee a breathing tomb. (3) Through wars and oceans let her cling to thee So long as I may break thy nightly rest: No moment left thee for her love, but all By night to me, by day to Caesar given. Me not the oblivious banks of Lethe's stream Have made forgetful; and the kings of death Have suffered me to join thee; in mid fight I will be with thee, and my haunting ghost Remind thee Caesar's daughter was thy spouse. Thy sword kills not our pledges; civil war Shall make thee wholly mine." She spake and fled. But he, though heaven and hell thus bode defeat, More bent on war, with mind assured of ill, "Why dread vain phantoms of a dreaming brain? Or nought of sense and feeling to the soul Is left by death; or death itself is nought."
Now fiery Titan in declining path Dipped to the waves, his bright circumference So much diminished as a growing moon Not yet full circled, or when past the full; When to the fleet a hospitable coast Gave access, and the ropes in order laid, The sailors struck the masts and rowed ashore.
When Caesar saw the fleet escape his grasp And hidden from his view by lengthening seas, Left without rival on Hesperian soil, He found no joy in triumph; rather grieved That thus in safety Magnus' flight was sped. Not any gifts of Fortune now sufficed His fiery spirit; and no victory won, Unless the war was finished with the stroke. Then arms he laid aside, in guise of peace Seeking the people's favour; skilled to know How to arouse their ire, and how to gain The popular love by corn in plenty given. For famine only makes a city free; By gifts of food the tyrant buys a crowd To cringe before him: but a people starved Is fearless ever.
Curio he bids
Cross over to Sicilian cities, where Or ocean by a sudden rise o'erwhelmed The land, or split the isthmus right in twain, Leaving a path for seas. Unceasing tides There labour hugely lest again should meet The mountains rent asunder. Nor were left Sardinian shores unvisited: each isle Is blest with noble harvests which have filled More than all else the granaries of Rome, And poured their plenty on Hesperia's shores. Not even Libya, with its fertile soil, Their yield surpasses, when the southern wind Gives way to northern and permits the clouds To drop their moisture on the teeming earth. This ordered, Caesar leads his legions on, Not armed for war, but as in time of peace Returning to his home. Ah! had he come With only Gallia conquered and the North (4), What long array of triumph had he brought! What pictured scenes of battle! how had Rhine And Ocean borne his chains! How noble Gaul, And Britain's fair-haired chiefs his lofty car Had followed! Such a triumph had he lost By further conquest. Now in silent fear They watched his marching troops, nor joyful towns Poured out their crowds to welcome his return. Yet did the conqueror's proud soul rejoice, Far more than at their love, at such a fear.
Now Anxur's hold was passed, the oozy road That separates the marsh, the grove sublime (5) Where reigns the Scythian goddess, and the path By which men bear the fasces to the feast On Alba's summit. From the height afar -- Gazing in awe upon the walls of Rome His native city, since the Northern war Unseen, unvisited -- thus Caesar spake: "Who would not fight for such a god-like town? And have they left thee, Rome, without a blow? Thank the high gods no eastern hosts are here To wreak their fury; nor Sarmatian horde With northern tribes conjoined; by Fortune's gift This war is civil: else this coward chief Had been thy ruin."
Trembling at his feet
He found the city: deadly fire and flame, As from a conqueror, gods and fanes dispersed; Such was the measure of their fear, as though His power and wish were one. No festal shout Greeted his march, no feigned acclaim of joy. Scarce had they time for hate. In Phoebus' hall Their hiding places left, a crowd appeared Of Senators, uncalled, for none could call. No Consul there the sacred shrine adorned Nor Praetor next in rank, and every seat Placed for the officers of state was void: Caesar was all; and to his private voice (6) All else were listeners. The fathers sat Ready to grant a temple or a throne, If such his wish; and for themselves to vote Or death or exile. Well it was for Rome That Caesar blushed to order what they feared. Yet in one breast the spirit of freedom rose Indignant for the laws; for when the gates Of Saturn's temple hot Metellus saw, Were yielding to the shock, he clove the ranks Of Caesar's troops, and stood before the doors As yet unopened. 'Tis the love of gold Alone that fears not death; no hand is raised For perished laws or violated rights: But for this dross, the vilest cause of all, Men fight and die. Thus did the Tribune bar The victor's road to rapine, and with voice Clear ringing spake: "Save o'er Metellus dead This temple opens not; my sacred blood Shall flow, thou robber, ere the gold be thine. And surely shall the Tribune's power defied Find an avenging god; this Crassus knew (7), Who, followed by our curses, sought the war And met disaster on the Parthian plains. Draw then thy sword, nor fear the crowd that gapes To view thy crimes: the citizens are gone. Not from our treasury reward for guilt Thy hosts shall ravish: other towns are left, And other nations; wage the war on them -- Drain not Rome's peace for spoil." The victor then, Incensed to ire: "Vain is thy hope to fall In noble death, as guardian of the right; With all thine honours, thou of Caesar's rage Art little worthy: never shall thy blood Defile his hand. Time lowest things with high Confounds not yet so much that, if thy voice Could save the laws, it were not better far They fell by Caesar." Such his lofty words.
But as the Tribune yielded not, his rage Rose yet the more, and at his soldiers' swords One look he cast, forgetting for the time What robe he wore; but soon Metellus heard These words from Cotta: "When men bow to power Freedom of speech is only Freedom's bane (8), Whose shade at least survives, if with free will Thou dost whate'er is bidden thee. For us Some pardon may be found: a host of ills Compelled submission, and the shame is less That to have done which could not be refused. Yield, then, this wealth, the seeds of direful war. A nation's anger is by losses stirred, When laws protect it; but the hungry slave Brings danger to his master, not himself."
At this Metellus yielded from the path; And as the gates rolled backward, echoed loud The rock Tarpeian, and the temple's depths Gave up the treasure which for centuries No hand had touched: all that the Punic foe And Perses and Philippus conquered gave, And all the gold which Pyrrhus panic-struck Left when he fled: that gold (9), the price of Rome, Which yet Fabricius sold not, and the hoard Laid up by saving sires; the tribute sent By Asia's richest nations; and the wealth Which conquering Metellus brought from Crete, And Cato (10) bore from distant Cyprus home; And last, the riches torn from captive kings And borne before Pompeius when he came In frequent triumph. Thus was robbed the shrine, And Caesar first brought poverty to Rome.
Meanwhile all nations of the earth were moved To share in Magnus' fortunes and the war, And in his fated ruin. Graecia sent, Nearest of all, her succours to the host. From Cirrha and Parnassus' double peak And from Amphissa, Phocis sent her youth: Boeotian leaders muster in the meads By Dirce laved, and where Cephisus rolls Gifted with fateful power his stream along: And where Alpheus, who beyond the sea (11) In fount Sicilian seeks the day again. Pisa deserted stands, and Oeta, loved By Hercules of old; Dodona's oaks Are left to silence by the sacred train, And all Epirus rushes to the war. And proud Athena, mistress of the seas, Sends three poor ships (alas! her all) to prove Her ancient victory o'er the Persian King. Next seek the battle Creta's hundred tribes Beloved of Jove and rivalling the east In skill to wing the arrow from the bow. The walls of Dardan Oricum, the woods Where Athamanians wander, and the banks Of swift Absyrtus foaming to the main Are left forsaken. Enchelaean tribes Whose king was Cadmus, and whose name records His transformation (12), join the host; and those Who till Penean fields and turn the share Above Iolcos in Thessalian lands." There first men steeled their hearts to dare the waves (13) And 'gainst the rage of ocean and the storm To match their strength, when the rude Argo sailed Upon that distant quest, and spurned the shore, Joining remotest nations in her flight, And gave the fates another form of death. Left too was Pholoe; pretended home Where dwelt the fabled race of double form (14); Arcadian Maenalus; the Thracian mount Named Haemus; Strymon whence, as autumn falls, Winged squadrons seek the banks of warmer Nile; And all the isles the mouths of Ister bathe Mixed with the tidal wave; the land through which The cooling eddies of Caicus flow Idalian; and Arisbe bare of glebe. The hinds of Pitane, and those who till Celaenae's fields which mourned of yore the gift Of Pallas (15), and the vengeance of the god, All draw the sword; and those from Marsyas' flood First swift, then doubling backwards with the stream Of sinuous Meander: and from where Pactolus leaves his golden source and leaps From Earth permitting; and with rival wealth Rich Hermus parts the meads. Nor stayed the bands Of Troy, but (doomed as in old time) they joined Pompeius' fated camp: nor held them back The fabled past, nor Caesar's claimed descent From their Iulus. Syrian peoples came From palmy Idumea and the walls Of Ninus great of yore; from windy plains Of far Damascus and from Gaza's hold, From Sidon's courts enriched with purple dye, And Tyre oft trembling with the shaken earth. All these led on by Cynosura's light (16) Furrow their certain path to reach the war.
Phoenicians first (if story be believed) Dared to record in characters; for yet Papyrus was not fashioned, and the priests Of Memphis, carving symbols upon walls Of mystic sense (in shape of beast or fowl) Preserved the secrets of their magic art.
Next Persean Tarsus and high Taurus' groves Are left deserted, and Corycium's cave; And all Cilicia's ports, pirate no more, Resound with preparation. Nor the East Refused the call, where furthest Ganges dares, Alone of rivers, to discharge his stream Against the sun opposing; on this shore (17) The Macedonian conqueror stayed his foot And found the world his victor; here too rolls Indus his torrent with Hydaspes joined Yet hardly feels it; here from luscious reed Men draw sweet liquor; here they dye their locks With tints of saffron, and with coloured gems Bind down their flowing garments; here are they, Who satiate of life and proud to die, Ascend the blazing pyre, and conquering fate, Scorn to live longer; but triumphant give The remnant of their days in flame to heaven. (18)
Nor fails to join the host a hardy band Of Cappadocians, tilling now the soil, Once pirates of the main: nor those who dwell Where steep Niphates hurls the avalanche, And where on Median Coatra's sides The giant forest rises to the sky. And you, Arabians, from your distant home Came to a world unknown, and wondering saw The shadows fall no longer to the left. (19) Then fired with ardour for the Roman war Oretas came, and far Carmania's chiefs, Whose clime lies southward, yet men thence descry Low down the Pole star, and Bootes runs Hasting to set, part seen, his nightly course; And Ethiopians from that southern land Which lies without the circuit of the stars, Did not the Bull with curving hoof advanced O'erstep the limit. From that mountain zone They come, where rising from a common fount Euphrates flows and Tigris, and did earth Permit, were joined with either name; but now While like th' Egyptian flood Euphrates spreads His fertilising water, Tigris first Drawn down by earth in covered depths is plunged And holds a secret course; then born again Flows on unhindered to the Persian sea.
But warlike Parthia wavered 'twixt the chiefs, Content to have made them two (20); while Scythia's hordes Dipped fresh their darts in poison, whom the stream Of Bactros bounds and vast Hyrcanian woods. Hence springs that rugged nation swift and fierce, Descended from the Twins' great charioteer. (21) Nor failed Sarmatia, nor the tribes that dwell By richest Phasis, and on Halys' banks, Which sealed the doom of Croesus' king; nor where From far Rhipaean ranges Tanais flows, On either hand a quarter of the world, Asia and Europe, and in winding course Carves out a continent; nor where the strait In boiling surge pours to the Pontic deep Maeotis' waters, rivalling the pride Of those Herculean pillar-gates that guard The entrance to an ocean. Thence with hair In golden fillets, Arimaspians came, And fierce Massagetae, who quaff the blood Of the brave steed on which they fight and flee.
Not when great Cyrus on Memnonian realms His warriors poured; nor when, their weapons piled, (22) The Persian told the number of his host; Nor when th' avenger (23) of a brother's shame Loaded the billows with his mighty fleet, Beneath one chief so many kings made war; Nor e'er met nations varied thus in garb And thus in language. To Pompeius' death Thus Fortune called them: and a world in arms Witnessed his ruin. From where Afric's god, Two-horned Ammon, rears his temple, came All Libya ceaseless, from the wastes that touch The bounds of Egypt to the shore that meets The Western Ocean. Thus, to award the prize Of Empire at one blow, Pharsalia brought 'Neath Caesar's conquering hand the banded world.
Now Caesar left the walls of trembling Rome And swift across the cloudy Alpine tops He winged his march; but while all others fled Far from his path, in terror of his name, Phocaea's (24) manhood with un-Grecian faith Held to their pledged obedience, and dared To follow right not fate; but first of all With olive boughs of truce before them borne The chieftain they approach, with peaceful words In hope to alter his unbending will And tame his fury. "Search the ancient books Which chronicle the deeds of Latian fame; Thou'lt ever find, when foreign foes pressed hard, Massilia's prowess on the side of Rome. And now, if triumphs in an unknown world Thou seekest, Caesar, here our arms and swords Accept in aid: but if, in impious strife Of civil discord, with a Roman foe Thou seek'st to join in battle, weeping then We hold aloof: no stranger hand may touch Celestial wounds. Should all Olympus' hosts Have rushed to war, or should the giant brood Assault the stars, yet men would not presume Or by their prayers or arms to help the gods: And, ignorant of the fortunes of the sky, Taught by the thunderbolts alone, would know That Jupiter supreme still held the throne. Add that unnumbered nations join the fray: Nor shrinks the world so much from taint of crime That civil wars reluctant swords require. But grant that strangers shun thy destinies And only Romans fight -- shall not the son Shrink ere he strike his father? on both sides Brothers forbid the weapon to be hurled? The world's end comes when other hands are armed (25) Than those which custom and the gods allow. For us, this is our prayer: Leave, Caesar, here Thy dreadful eagles, keep thy hostile signs Back from our gates, but enter thou in peace Massilia's ramparts; let our city rest Withdrawn from crime, to Magnus and to thee Safe: and should favouring fate preserve our walls Inviolate, when both shall wish for peace Here meet unarmed. Why hither turn'st thou now Thy rapid march? Nor weight nor power have we To sway the mighty conflicts of the world. We boast no victories since our fatherland We left in exile: when Phocaea's fort Perished in flames, we sought another here; And here on foreign shores, in narrow bounds Confined and safe, our boast is sturdy faith; Nought else. But if our city to blockade Is now thy mind -- to force the gates, and hurl Javelin and blazing torch upon our homes -- Do what thou wilt: cut off the source that fills Our foaming river, force us, prone in thirst, To dig the earth and lap the scanty pool; Seize on our corn and leave us food abhorred: Nor shall this people shun, for freedom's sake, The ills Saguntum bore in Punic siege; (26) Torn, vainly clinging, from the shrunken breast The starving babe shall perish in the flames. Wives at their husbands' hands shall pray their fate, And brothers' weapons deal a mutual death. Such be our civil war; not, Caesar, thine."
But Caesar's visage stern betrayed his ire Which thus broke forth in words: "Vain is the hope Ye rest upon my march: speed though I may Towards my western goal, time still remains To blot Massilia out. Rejoice, my troops! Unsought the war ye longed for meets you now: The fates concede it. As the tempests lose Their strength by sturdy forests unopposed, And as the fire that finds no fuel dies, Even so to find no foe is Caesar's ill. When those who may be conquered will not fight That is defeat. Degenerate, disarmed Their gates admit me! Not content, forsooth, With shutting Caesar out they shut him in! They shun the taint of war! Such prayer for peace Brings with it chastisement. In Caesar's age Learn that not peace, but war within his ranks Alone can make you safe."
Fearless he turns
His march upon the city, and beholds Fast barred the gate-ways, while in arms the youths Stand on the battlements. Hard by the walls A hillock rose, upon the further side Expanding in a plain of gentle slope, Fit (as he deemed it) for a camp with ditch And mound encircling. To a lofty height The nearest portion of the city rose, While intervening valleys lay between. These summits with a mighty trench to bind The chief resolves, gigantic though the toil. But first, from furthest boundaries of his camp, Enclosing streams and meadows, to the sea To draw a rampart, upon either hand Heaved up with earthy sod; with lofty towers Crowned; and to shut Massilia from the land.
Then did the Grecian city win renown Eternal, deathless, for that uncompelled Nor fearing for herself, but free to act She made the conqueror pause: and he who seized All in resistless course found here delay: And Fortune, hastening to lay the world Low at her favourite's feet, was forced to stay For these few moments her impatient hand.
Now fell the forests far and wide, despoiled Of all their giant trunks: for as the mound On earth and brushwood stood, a timber frame Held firm the soil, lest pressed beneath its towers The mass might topple down. There stood a grove Which from the earliest time no hand of man Had dared to violate; hidden from the sun (27) Its chill recesses; matted boughs entwined Prisoned the air within. No sylvan nymphs Here found a home, nor Pan, but savage rites And barbarous worship, altars horrible On massive stones upreared; sacred with blood Of men was every tree. If faith be given To ancient myth, no fowl has ever dared To rest upon those branches, and no beast Has made his lair beneath: no tempest falls, Nor lightnings flash upon it from the cloud. Stagnant the air, unmoving, yet the leaves Filled with mysterious trembling; dripped the streams From coal-black fountains; effigies of gods Rude, scarcely fashioned from some fallen trunk Held the mid space: and, pallid with decay, Their rotting shapes struck terror. Thus do men Dread most the god unknown. 'Twas said that caves Rumbled with earthquakes, that the prostrate yew Rose up again; that fiery tongues of flame Gleamed in the forest depths, yet were the trees Unkindled; and that snakes in frequent folds Were coiled around the trunks. Men flee the spot Nor dare to worship near: and e'en the priest Or when bright Phoebus holds the height, or when Dark night controls the heavens, in anxious dread Draws near the grove and fears to find its lord.
Spared in the former war, still dense it rose Where all the hills were bare, and Caesar now Its fall commanded. But the brawny arms Which swayed the axes trembled, and the men, Awed by the sacred grove's dark majesty, Held back the blow they thought would be returned. This Caesar saw, and swift within his grasp Uprose a ponderous axe, which downward fell Cleaving a mighty oak that towered to heaven, While thus he spake: "Henceforth let no man dread To fell this forest: all the crime is mine. This be your creed." He spake, and all obeyed, For Caesar's ire weighed down the wrath of Heaven. Yet ceased they not to fear. Then first the oak, Dodona's ancient boast; the knotty holm; The cypress, witness of patrician grief, The buoyant alder, laid their foliage low Admitting day; though scarcely through the stems Their fall found passage. At the sight the Gauls Grieved; but the garrison within the walls Rejoiced: for thus shall men insult the gods And find no punishment? Yet fortune oft Protects the guilty; on the poor alone The gods can vent their ire. Enough hewn down, They seize the country wagons; and the hind, His oxen gone which else had drawn the plough, Mourns for his harvest.
But the eager chief
Impatient of the combat by the walls Carries the warfare to the furthest west.
Meanwhile a giant mound, on star-shaped wheels Concealed, they fashion, crowned with double towers High as the battlements, by cause unseen Slow creeping onwards; while amazed the foe, Beheld, and thought some subterranean gust Had burst the caverns of the earth and forced The nodding pile aloft, and wondered sore Their walls should stand unshaken. From its height Hissed clown the weapons; but the Grecian bolts With greater force were on the Romans hurled; Nor by the arm unaided, for the lance Urged by the catapult resistless rushed Through arms and shield and flesh, and left a death Behind, nor stayed its course: and massive stones Cast by the beams of mighty engines fell; As from the mountain top some time-worn rock At length by winds dislodged, in all its track Spreads ruin vast: nor crushed the life alone Forth from the body, but dispersed the limbs In fragments undistinguished and in blood. But as protected by the armour shield The might of Rome drew nigh beneath the wall (The front rank with their bucklers interlaced And held above their helms), the missiles fell Behind their backs, nor could the toiling Greeks Deflect their engines, throwing still the bolts Far into space; but from the rampart top Flung ponderous masses down. Long as the shields Held firm together, like to hail that falls Harmless upon a roof, so long the stones Crushed down innocuous; but as the blows Rained fierce and ceaseless and the Romans tired, Some here and there sank fainting. Next the roof Advanced with earth besprinkled: underneath The ram conceals his head, which, poised and swung, They dash with mighty force upon the wall, Covered themselves with mantlets. Though the head Light on the lower stones, yet as the shock Falls and refalls, from battlement to base The rampart soon shall topple. But by balks And rocky fragments overwhelmed, and flames, The roof at length gave way; and worn with toil All spent in vain, the wearied troops withdrew And sought the shelter of their tents again.
Thus far to hold their battlements was all The Greeks had hoped; now, venturing attack, With glittering torches for their arms, by night Fearless they sallied forth: nor lance they bear Nor deadly bow, nor shaft; for fire alone Is now their weapon. Through the Roman works Driven by the wind the conflagration spread: Nor did the newness of the wood make pause The fury of the flames, which, fed afresh By living torches, 'neath a smoky pall Leaped on in fiery tongues. Not wood alone But stones gigantic crumbling into dust Dissolved beneath the heat; the mighty mound Lay prone, yet in its ruin larger seemed.
Next, conquered on the land, upon the main They try their fortunes. On their simple craft No painted figure-head adorned the bows Nor claimed protection from the gods; but rude, Just as they fell upon their mountain homes, The trees were knit together, and the deck Gave steady foot-hold for an ocean fight.
Meantime had Caesar's squadron kept the isles Named Stoechades (28), and Brutus (29) turret ship Mastered the Rhone. Nor less the Grecian host -- Boys not yet grown to war, and aged men, Armed for the conflict, with their all at stake. Nor only did they marshal for the fight Ships meet for service; but their ancient keels Brought from the dockyards. When the morning rays Broke from the waters, and the sky was clear, And all the winds were still upon the deep, Smoothed for the battle, swift on either part The fleets essay the open; and the ships Tremble beneath the oars that urge them on, By sinewy arms impelled. Upon the wings That bound the Roman fleet, the larger craft With triple and quadruple banks of oars Gird in the lesser: so they front the sea; While in their rear, shaped as a crescent moon, Liburnian galleys follow. Over all Towers Brutus' deck praetorian. Oars on oars Propel the bulky vessel through the main, Six ranks; the topmost strike the waves afar. When such a space remained between the fleets As could be covered by a single stroke, Innumerable voices rose in air Drowning with resonant din the beat of oars And note of trumpet summoning: and all Sat on the benches and with mighty stroke Swept o'er the sea and gained the space between. Then crashed the prows together, and the keels Rebounded backwards, and unnumbered darts Or darkened all the sky or, in their fall, The vacant ocean. As the wings grew wide, Less densely packed the fleet, some Grecian ships Pressed in between; as when with west and east The tide contends, this way the waves are driven And that the sea; so as they plough the deep In various lines converging, what the prow Throws up advancing, from the foemen's oars Falls back repelled. But soon the Grecian fleet Was handier found in battle, and in flight Pretended, and in shorter curves could round; More deftly governed by the guiding helm: While on the Roman side their steadier keels Gave vantage, as to men who fight on land. Then Brutus to the pilot of his ship: "Dost suffer them to range the wider deep, Contending with the foe in naval skill? Draw close the war and drive us on the prows Of these Phocaeans." Him the pilot heard; And turned his vessel slantwise to the foe. Then was the sea all covered with the war: Then Grecian ships attacking Brutus found Their ruin in the stroke, and vanquished lay Beside his bulwarks; while with grappling hooks Others laid fast the foe, themselves by oars Held back the while. And now no outstretched arm Hurls forth the javelin, but hand to hand With swords they wage the fight: each from his ship Leans forward to the stroke, and falls when slain Upon a foeman's deck. Deep flows the stream Of purple slaughter to the foamy main: By piles of floating corpses are the sides, Though grappled, kept asunder. Some, half dead, Plunge in the ocean, gulping down the brine Encrimsoned with their blood; some lingering still Draw their last struggling breath amid the wreck Of broken navies: weapons which have missed Find yet their victims, and the falling steel Fails not in middle deep to deal the wound. One vessel circled by Phocaean keels Divides her strength, and on the right and left On either side with equal war contends; On whose high poop while Tagus fighting gripped The stern Phocaean, pierced his back and breast Two fatal weapons; in the midst the steel Meets, and the blood, uncertain whence to flow, Stands still, arrested, till with double course Forth by a sudden gush it drives each dart, And sends the life abroad through either wound.
Here fated Telon also steered his ship: No pilot's hand upon an angry sea More deftly ruled a vessel. Well he knew, Or by the sun or crescent moon, how best To set his canvas fitted for the breeze To-morrow's light would bring. His rushing stem Shattered a Roman vessel: but a dart Hurled at the moment quivers in his breast. He falls, and in the fall his dying hand Diverts the prow. Then Gyareus, in act To climb the friendly deck, by javelin pierced, Still as he hung, by the retaining steel Fast to the side was nailed. Twin brethren stand A fruitful mother's pride; with different fates, But ne'er distinguished till death's savage hand Struck once, and ended error: he that lived, Cause of fresh anguish to their sorrowing souls, Called ever to the weeping parents back The image of the lost: who, as the oars Grecian and Roman mixed their teeth oblique, Grasped with his dexter hand the Roman ship; When fell a blow that shore his arm away. So died, upon the side it held, the hand, Nor loosed its grasp in death. Yet with the wound His noble courage rose, and maimed he dared Renew the fray, and stretched across the sea To grasp the lost -- in vain! another blow Lopped arm and hand alike. Nor shield nor sword Henceforth are his. Yet even now he seeks No sheltering hold, but with his chest advanced Before his brother armed, he claims the fight, And holding in his breast the darts which else Had slain his comrades, pierced with countless spears, He fails in death well earned; yet ere his end Collects his parting life, and all his strength Strains to the utmost and with failing limbs Leaps on the foeman's deck; by weight alone Injurious; for streaming down with gore And piled on high with corpses, while her sides Sounded to ceaseless blows, the fated ship Let in the greedy brine until her ways Were level with the waters -- then she plunged In whirling eddies downwards -- and the main First parted, then closed in upon its prey.
Full many wondrous deaths, with fates diverse, Upon the sea in that day's fight befell. Caught by a grappling-hook that missed the side, Had Lysidas been whelmed in middle deep; But by his feet his comrades dragged him back, And rent in twain he hung; nor slowly flowed As from a wound the blood; but all his veins (30) Were torn asunder and the stream of life Gushed o'er his limbs till lost amid the deep. From no man dying has the vital breath Rushed by so wide a path; the lower trunk Succumbed to death, but with the lungs and heart Long strove the fates, and hardly won the whole.
While, bent upon the fight, an eager crew Were gathered to the margin of their deck (Leaving the upper side as bare of foes), Their ship was overset. Beneath the keel Which floated upwards, prisoned in the sea, And powerless by spread of arms to float The main, they perished. One who haply swam Amid the battle, chanced upon a death Strange and unheard of; for two meeting prows Transfixed his body. At the double stroke Wide yawned his chest; blood issued from his mouth With flesh commingled; and the brazen beaks Resounding clashed together, by the bones Unhindered: now they part and through the gap Swift pours the sea and drags the corse below. Next, of a shipwrecked crew, the larger part Struggling with death upon the waters, reached A comrade bark; but when with elbows raised do They seized upon the bulwarks and the ship Rolled, nor could bear their weight, the ruthless crew Hacked off their straining arms; then maimed they sank Below the seething waves, to rise no more.
Now every dart was hurled and every spear, The soldier weaponless; yet their rage found arms: One hurls an oar; another's brawny arm Tugs at the twisted stern; or from the seats The oarsmen driving, swings a bench in air. The ships are broken for the fight. They seize The fallen dead and snatch the sword that slew. Nay, many from their wounds, frenzied for arms, Pluck forth the deadly steel, and pressing still Upon their yawning sides, hurl forth the spear Back to the hostile ranks from which it came; Then ebbs their life blood forth.
But deadlier yet
Was that fell force most hostile to the sea; For, thrown in torches and in sulphurous bolts Fire all-consuming ran among the ships, Whose oily timbers soaked in pitch and wax Inflammable, gave welcome to the flames. Nor could the waves prevail against the blaze Which claimed as for its own the fragments borne Upon the waters. Lo! on burning plank One hardly 'scapes destruction; one to save His flaming ship, gives entrance to the main. Of all the forms of death each fears the one That brings immediate dying: yet quails not Their heart in shipwreck: from the waves they pluck The fallen darts and furnishing the ship Essay the feeble stroke; and should that hope Still fail their hand, they call the sea to aid And seizing in their grasp some floating foe Drag him to mutual death.
But on that day
Phoceus above all others proved his skill. Well trained was he to dive beneath the main And search the waters with unfailing eye; And should an anchor 'gainst the straining rope Too firmly bite the sands, to wrench it free. Oft in his fatal grasp he seized a foe Nor loosed his grip until the life was gone. Such was his frequent deed; but this his fate: For rising, victor (as he thought), to air, Full on a keel he struck and found his death. Some, drowning, seized a hostile oar and checked The flying vessel; not to die in vain, Their single care; some on their vessel's side Hanging, in death, with wounded frame essayed To check the charging prow.
Tyrrhenus high
Upon the bulwarks of his ship was struck By leaden bolt from Balearic sling Of Lygdamus; straight through his temples passed The fated missile; and in streams of blood Forced from their seats his trembling eyeballs fell. Plunged in a darkness as of night, he thought That life had left him; yet ere long he knew The living rigour of his limbs; and cried, "Place me, O friends, as some machine of war Straight facing towards the foe; then shall my darts Strike as of old; and thou, Tyrrhenus, spend Thy latest breath, still left, upon the fight: So shalt thou play, not wholly dead, the part That fits a soldier, and the spear that strikes Thy frame, shall miss the living." Thus he spake, And hurled his javelin, blind, but not in vain; For Argus, generous youth of noble blood, Below the middle waist received the spear And failing drave it home. His aged sire From furthest portion of the conquered ship Beheld; than whom in prime of manhood none, More brave in battle: now no more he fought, Yet did the memory of his prowess stir Phocaean youths to emulate his fame. Oft stumbling o'er the benches the old man hastes To reach his boy, and finds him breathing still. No tear bedewed his cheek, nor on his breast One blow he struck, but o'er his eyes there fell A dark impenetrable veil of mist That blotted out the day; nor could he more Discern his luckless Argus. He, who saw His parent, raising up his drooping head With parted lips and silent features asks A father's latest kiss, a father's hand To close his dying eyes. But soon his sire, Recovering from his swoon, when ruthless grief Possessed his spirit, "This short space," he cried, "I lose not, which the cruel gods have given, But die before thee. Grant thy sorrowing sire Forgiveness that he fled thy last embrace. Not yet has passed thy life blood from the wound Nor yet is death upon thee -- still thou may'st (31) Outlive thy parent." Thus he spake, and seized The reeking sword and drave it to the hilt, Then plunged into the deep, with headlong bound, To anticipate his son: for this he feared A single form of death should not suffice.
Now gave the fates their judgment, and in doubt No longer was the war: the Grecian fleet In most part sunk; -- some ships by Romans oared Conveyed the victors home: in headlong flight Some sought the yards for shelter. On the strand What tears of parents for their offspring slain, How wept the mothers! 'Mid the pile confused Ofttimes the wife sought madly for her spouse And chose for her last kiss some Roman slain; While wretched fathers by the blazing pyres Fought for the dead. But Brutus thus at sea First gained a triumph for great Caesar's arms. (32)
ENDNOTES: (1) Reading adscenso, as Francken (Leyden, 1896). (2) So: "The rugged Charon fainted, And asked a navy, rather than a boat, To ferry over the sad world that came." (Ben Jonson, "Catiline", Act i., scene 1.) (3) I take "tepido busto" as the dative case; and, as referring to Pompeius, doomed, like Cornelia's former husband, to defeat and death. (4) It may be remarked that, in B.C. 46, Caesar, after the battle of Thapsus, celebrated four triumphs: for his victories over the Gauls, Ptolemaeus, Pharnaces, and Juba. (5) Near Aricia. (See Book VI., 92.) (6) He held no office at the time. (7) The tribune Ateius met Crassus as he was setting out from Rome and denounced him with mysterious and ancient curses. (Plutarch, "Crassus", 16.) (8) That is, the liberty remaining to the people is destroyed by speaking freely to the tyrant. (9) That is, the gold offered by Pyrrhus, and refused by Fabricius, which, after the final defeat of Pyrrhus, came into the possession of the victors. (10) See Plutarch, "Cato", 34, 39. (11) It was generally believed that the river Alpheus of the Peloponnesus passed under the sea and reappeared in the fountain of Arethusa at Syracuse. A goblet was said to have been thrown into the river in Greece, and to have reappeared in the Sicilian fountain. See the note in Grote's "History of Greece", Edition 1863, vol. ii., p. 8.) (12) As a serpent. XXXXX is the Greek word for serpent. (13) Conf. Book VI., 473. (14) The Centaurs. (15) Probably the flute thrown away by Pallas, which Marsyas picked up and then challenged Apollo to a musical contest. For his presumption the god had him flayed alive. (16) That is, the Little Bear, by which the Phoenicians steered, while the Greeks steered by the Great Bear. (See Sir G. Lewis's "Astronomy of the Ancients", p. 447.) In Book VI., line 193, the pilot declares that he steers by the pole star itself, which is much nearer to the Little than to the Great Bear, and is (I believe) reckoned as one of the stars forming the group known by that name. He may have been a Phoenician. (17) He did not in fact reach the Ganges, as is well known. (18) Perhaps in allusion to the embassy from India to Augustus in B.C. 19, when Zarmanochanus, an Indian sage, declaring that he had lived in happiness and would not risk the chance of a reverse, burnt himself publicly. (Merivale, chapter xxxiv.) (19) That is to say, looking towards the west; meaning that they came from the other side of the equator. (See Book IX., 630.) (20) See Book I., 117. (21) A race called Heniochi, said to be descended from the charioteer of Castor and Pollux. (22) "Effusis telis". I have so taken this difficult expression. Herodotus (7, 60) says the men were numbered in ten thousands by being packed close together and having a circle drawn round them. After the first ten thousand had been so measured a fence was put where the circle had been, and the subsequent ten thousands were driven into the enclosure. It is not unlikely that they piled their weapons before being so measured, and Lucan's account would then be made to agree with that of Herodotus. Francken, on the other hand, quotes a Scholiast, who says that each hundredth man shot off an arrow. (23) Agamemnon. (24) Massilia (Marseilles) was founded from Phocaea in Asia Minor about 600 B.C. Lucan (line 393) appears to think that the founders were fugitives from their city when it was stormed by the Persians sixty years later. See Thucydides I. 13; Grote, "History of Greece", chapter xxii. (25) A difficult passage, of which this seems to be the meaning least free from objection. (26) Murviedro of the present day. Its gallant defence against Hannibal has been compared to that of Saragossa against the French. (27) See note to Book I., 506. (28) Three islands off the coast near Toulon, now called the Isles d'Hyeres. (29) This was Decimus Brutus, an able and trusted lieutenant of Caesar, who made him one of his heirs in the second degree. He, however, joined the conspiracy, and it was he who on the day of the murder induced Caesar to go to the Senate House. Less than two years later, after the siege of Perasia, he was deserted by his army, taken and put to death. (30) According to some these were the lines which Lucan recited while bleeding to death; according to others, those at Book ix., line 952. (31) It was regarded as the greatest of misfortunes if a child died before his parent. (32) It was Brutus who gained the naval victory over the Veneti some seven years before; the first naval fight, that we know of, fought in the Atlantic Ocean.
BOOK IV
CAESAR IN SPAIN. WAR IN THE ADRIATIC SEA. DEATH OF CURIO.
But in the distant regions of the earth Fierce Caesar warring, though in fight he dealt No baneful slaughter, hastened on the doom To swift fulfillment. There on Magnus' side Afranius and Petreius (1) held command, Who ruled alternate, and the rampart guard Obeyed the standard of each chief in turn. There with the Romans in the camp were joined Asturians (2) swift, and Vettons lightly armed, And Celts who, exiled from their ancient home, Had joined "Iberus" to their former name. Where the rich soil in gentle slope ascends And forms a modest hill, Ilerda (3) stands, Founded in ancient days; beside her glides Not least of western rivers, Sicoris Of placid current, by a mighty arch Of stone o'erspanned, which not the winter floods Shall overwhelm. Upon a rock hard by Was Magnus' camp; but Caesar's on a hill, Rivalling the first; and in the midst a stream. Here boundless plains are spread beyond the range Of human vision; Cinga girds them in With greedy waves; forbidden to contend With tides of ocean; for that larger flood Who names the land, Iberus, sweeps along The lesser stream commingled with his own.
Guiltless of war, the first day saw the hosts In long array confronted; standard rose Opposing standard, numberless; yet none Essayed attack, in shame of impious strife. One day they gave their country and her laws. But Caesar, when from heaven fell the night, Drew round a hasty trench; his foremost rank With close array concealing those who wrought. Then with the morn he bids them seize the hill Which parted from the camp Ilerda's walls, And gave them safety. But in fear and shame On rushed the foe and seized the vantage ground, First in the onset. From the height they held Their hopes of conquest; but to Caesar's men Their hearts by courage stirred, and their good swords Promised the victory. Burdened up the ridge The soldier climbed, and from the opposing steep But for his comrade's shield had fallen back; None had the space to hurl the quivering lance Upon the foeman: spear and pike made sure The failing foothold, and the falchion's edge Hewed out their upward path. But Caesar saw Ruin impending, and he bade his horse By circuit to the left, with shielded flank, Hold back the foe. Thus gained his troops retreat, For none pressed on them; and the victor chiefs, Forced to withdrawal, gained the day in vain.
Henceforth the fitful changes of the year Governed the fates and fashioned out the war. For stubborn frost still lay upon the land, And northern winds, controlling all the sky, Prisoned the rain in clouds; the hills were nipped With snow unmelted, and the lower plains By frosts that fled before the rising sun; And all the lands that stretched towards the sky Which whelms the sinking stars, 'neath wintry heavens Were parched and arid. But when Titan neared The Ram, who, backward gazing on the stars, Bore perished Helle, (4) and the hours were held In juster balance, and the day prevailed, The earliest faded moon which in the vault Hung with uncertain horn, from eastern winds Received a fiery radiance; whose blasts Forced Boreas back: and breaking on the mists Within his regions, to the Occident Drave all that shroud Arabia and the land Of Ganges; all that or by Caurus (5) borne Bedim the Orient sky, or rising suns Permit to gather; pitiless flamed the day Behind them, while in front the wide expanse Was driven; nor on mid earth sank the clouds Though weighed with vapour. North and south alike Were showerless, for on Calpe's rock alone All moisture gathered; here at last, forbidden To pass that sea by Zephyr's bounds contained, And by the furthest belt (6) of heaven, they pause, In masses huge convolved; the widest breadth Of murky air scarce holds them, which divides Earth from the heavens; till pressed by weight of sky In densest volume to the earth they pour Their cataracts; no lightning could endure Such storm unquenched: though oft athwart the gloom Gleamed its pale fire. Meanwhile a watery arch Scarce touched with colour, in imperfect shape Embraced the sky and drank the ocean waves, So rendering to the clouds their flood outpoured.
And now were thawed the Pyrenaean snows Which Titan had not conquered; all the rocks Were wet with melting ice; accustomed springs Found not discharge; and from the very banks Each stream received a torrent. Caesar's arms Are shipwrecked on the field, his tottering camp Swims on the rising flood; the trench is filled With whirling waters; and the plain no more Yields corn or kine; for those who forage seek, Err from the hidden furrow. Famine knocks (First herald of o'erwhelming ills to come), Fierce at the door; and while no foe blockades The soldier hungers; fortunes buy not now The meanest measure; yet, alas! is found The fasting peasant, who, in gain of gold, Will sell his little all! And now the hills Are seen no more; and rivers whelmed in one; Beasts with their homes sweep downwards; and the tide Repels the foaming torrent. Nor did night Acknowledge Phoebus' rise, for all the sky Felt her dominion and obscured its face, And darkness joined with darkness. Thus doth lie The lowest earth beneath the snowy zone And never-ending winters, where the sky Is starless ever, and no growth of herb Sprouts from the frozen earth; but standing ice Tempers (7) the stars which in the middle zone Kindle their flames. Thus, Father of the world, And thou, trident-god who rul'st the sea Second in place, Neptunus, load the air With clouds continual; forbid the tide, Once risen, to return: forced by thy waves Let rivers backward run in different course, Thy shores no longer reaching; and the earth, Shaken, make way for floods. Let Rhine o'erflow And Rhone their banks; let torrents spread afield Unmeasured waters: melt Rhipaean snows: Spread lakes upon the land, and seas profound, And snatch the groaning world from civil war.
Thus for a little moment Fortune tried Her darling son; then smiling to his part Returned; and gained her pardon for the past By greater gifts to come. For now the air Had grown more clear, and Phoebus' warmer rays Coped with the flood and scattered all the clouds In fleecy masses; and the reddening east Proclaimed the coming day; the land resumed Its ancient marks; no more in middle air The moisture hung, but from about the stars Sank to the depths; the forest glad upreared Its foliage; hills again emerged to view And 'neath the warmth of day the plains grew firm.
When Sicoris kept his banks, the shallop light Of hoary willow bark they build, which bent On hides of oxen, bore the weight of man And swam the torrent. Thus on sluggish Po Venetians float; and on th' encircling sea (8) Are borne Britannia's nations; and when Nile Fills all the land, are Memphis' thirsty reeds Shaped into fragile boats that swim his waves. The further bank thus gained, they haste to curve The fallen forest, and to form the arch By which imperious Sicoris shall be spanned. Yet fearing he might rise in wrath anew, Not on the nearest marge they placed the beams, But in mid-field. Thus the presumptuous stream They tame with chastisement, parting his flood In devious channels out; and curb his pride.
Petreius, when he saw that Caesar's fates Swept all before them, left Ilerda's steep, His trust no longer in the Roman world; And sought for strength amid those distant tribes, Who, loving death, rush in upon the foe, (9) And win their conquests at the point of sword. But in the dawn, when Caesar saw the camp Stand empty on the hill, "To arms!" he cried: "Seek not the bridge nor ford: plunge in the stream And breast the foaming torrent." Then did hope Of coming battle find for them a way Which they had shunned in flight.
Their arms regained,
Their streaming limbs they cherished till the blood Coursed in their veins; until the shadows fell Short on the sward, and day was at the height. Then dashed the horsemen on, and held the foe 'Twixt flight and battle. In the plain arose Two rocky heights: from each a loftier ridge Of hills ranged onwards, sheltering in their midst A hollow vale, whose deep and winding paths Were safe from warfare; which, when Caesar saw: That if Petreius held, the war must pass To lands remote by savage tribes possessed; "Speed on," he cried, "and meet their flight in front; Fierce be your frown and battle in your glance: No coward's death be theirs; but as they flee Plunge in their breasts the sword." They seize the pass And place their camp. Short was the span between Th' opposing sentinels; with eager eyes Undimmed by space, they gazed on brothers, sons, Or friends and fathers; and within their souls They grasped the impious horror of the war. Yet for a little while no voice was heard, For fear restrained; by waving blade alone Or gesture, spake they; but their passion grew, And broke all discipline; and soon they leaped The hostile rampart; every hand outstretched (10) Embraced the hand of foeman, palm in palm; One calls by name his neighhour, one his host, Another with his schoolmate talks again Of olden studies: he who in the camp Found not a comrade, was no son of Rome. Wet are their arms with tears, and sobs break in Upon their kisses; each, unstained by blood, Dreads what he might have done. Why beat thy breast? Why, madman, weep? The guilt is thine alone To do or to abstain. Dost fear the man Who takes his title to be feared from thee? When Caesar's trumpets sound the call to arms Heed not the summons; when thou seest advance His standards, halt. The civil Fury thus Shall fold her wings; and in a private robe Caesar shall love his kinsman.
Holy Peace
That sway'st the world; thou whose eternal bands Sustain the order of material things, Come, gentle Concord! (11) these our times do now For good or evil destiny control The coming centuries! Ah, cruel fate! Now have the people lost their cloak for crime: Their hope of pardon. They have known their kin. Woe for the respite given by the gods Making more black the hideous guilt to come!
Now all was peaceful, and in either camp Sweet converse held the soldiers; on the grass They place the meal; on altars built of turf Pour out libations from the mingled cup; On mutual couch with stories of their fights, They wile the sleepless hours in talk away; "Where stood the ranks arrayed, from whose right hand The quivering lance was sped:" and while they boast Or challenge, deeds of prowess in the war, Faith was renewed and trust. Thus made the fates Their doom complete, and all the crimes to be; Grew with their love.
For when Petreius knew
The treaties made; himself and all his camp Sold to the foe; he stirs his guard to work An impious slaughter: the defenceless foe Flings headlong forth: and parts the fond embrace By stroke of weapon and in streams of blood. And thus in words of wrath, to stir the war: "Of Rome forgetful, to your faith forsworn! And could ye not with victory gained return, Restorers of her liberty, to Rome? Lose then! but losing call not Caesar lord. While still your swords are yours, with blood to shed In doubtful battle, while the fates are hid, Will you like cravens to your master bear Doomed eagles? Will you ask upon your knees That Caesar deign to treat his slaves alike, And spare, forsooth, like yours, your leaders' lives? (12) Nay! never shall our safety be the price Of base betrayal! Not for boon of life We wage a civil war. This name of peace Drags us to slavery. Ne'er from depths of earth, Fain to withdraw her wealth, should toiling men Draw store of iron; ne'er entrench a town; Ne'er should the war-horse dash into the fray Nor fleet with turret bulwarks breast the main, If freedom for dishonourable peace Could thus be bought. The foe are pledged to fight By their own guilt. But you, who still might hope For pardon if defeated -- what can match Your deep dishonour? Shame upon your peace. Thou callest, Magnus, ignorant of fate, From all the world thy powers, and dost entreat Monarchs of distant realms, while haply here We in our treaties bargain for thy life!"
Thus did he stir their minds and rouse anew The love of impious battle. So when beasts Grown strange to forests, long confined in dens, Their fierceness lose, and learn to bear with man; Once should they taste of blood, their thirsty jaws Swell at the touch, and all the ancient rage Comes back upon them till they hardly spare Their keeper. Thus they rush on every crime: And blows which dealt at chance, and in the night Of battle, had brought hatred on the gods, Though blindly struck, their recent vows of love Made monstrous, horrid. Where they lately spread The mutual couch and banquet, and embraced Some new-found friend, now falls the fatal blow Upon the self-same breast; and though at first Groaning at the fell chance, they drew the sword; Hate rises as they strike, the murderous arm Confirms the doubtful will: with monstrous joy Through the wild camp they smite their kinsmen down; And carnage raged unchecked; and each man strove, Proud of his crime, before his leader's face To prove his shamelessness of guilt.
But thou,
Caesar, though losing of thy best, dost know The gods do favour thee. Thessalian fields Gave thee no better fortune, nor the waves That lave Massilia; nor on Pharos' main Didst thou so triumph. By this crime alone Thou from this moment of the better cause Shalt be the Captain.
Since the troops were stained
With foulest slaughter thus, their leaders shunned All camps with Caesar's joined, and sought again Ilerda's lofty walls; but Caesar's horse Seized on the plain and forced them to the hills Reluctant. There by steepest trench shut in, He cuts them from the river, nor permits Their circling ramparts to enclose a spring.
By this dread path Death trapped his captive prey. Which when they knew, fierce anger filled their souls, And took the place of fear. They slew the steeds Now useless grown, and rushed upon their fate; Hopeless of life and flight. But Caesar cried: "Hold back your weapons, soldiers, from the foe, Strike not the breast advancing; let the war Cost me no blood; he falls not without price Who with his life-blood challenges the fray. Scorning their own base lives and hating light, To Caesar's loss they rush upon their death, Nor heed our blows. But let this frenzy pass, This madman onset; let the wish for death Die in their souls." Thus to its embers shrank The fire within when battle was denied, And fainter grew their rage until the night Drew down her starry veil and sank the sun. Thus keener fights the gladiator whose wound Is recent, while the blood within the veins Still gives the sinews motion, ere the skin Shrinks on the bones: but as the victor stands His fatal thrust achieved, and points the blade Unfaltering, watching for the end, there creeps Torpor upon the limbs, the blood congeals About the gash, more faintly throbs the heart, And slowly fading, ebbs the life away.
Raving for water now they dig the plains Seeking for hidden fountains, not with spade And mattock only searching out the depths, But with the sword; they hack the stony heights, In shafts that reach the level of the plain. No further flees from light the pallid wretch Who tears the bowels of the earth for gold. Yet neither riven stones revealed a spring, Nor streamlet whispered from its hidden source; To water trickled on the gravel bed, Nor dripped within the cavern. Worn at length With labour huge, they crawl to light again, After such toil to fall to thirst and heat The readier victims: this was all they won. All food they loathe; and 'gainst their deadly thirst Call famine to their aid. Damp clods of earth They squeeze upon their mouths with straining hands. Where'er on foulest mud some stagnant slime Or moisture lies, though doomed to die they lap With greedy tongues the draught their lips had loathed Had life been theirs to choose. Beast-like they drain The swollen udder, and where milk was not, They sucked the life-blood forth. From herbs and boughs Dripping with dew, from tender shoots they pressed, Say, from the pith of trees, the juice within.
Happy the host that onward marching finds Its savage enemy has fouled the wells With murderous venom; had'st thou, Caesar, cast The reeking filth of shambles in the stream, And henbane dire and all the poisonous herbs That lurk on Cretan slopes, still had they drunk The fatal waters, rather than endure Such lingering agony. Their bowels racked With torments as of flame; the swollen tongue And jaws now parched and rigid, and the veins; Each laboured breath with anguish from the lungs Enfeebled, moistureless, was scarcely drawn, And scarce again returned; and yet agape, Their panting mouths sucked in the nightly dew; They watch for showers from heaven, and in despair Gaze on the clouds, whence lately poured a flood. Nor were their tortures less that Meroe Saw not their sufferings, nor Cancer's zone, Nor where the Garamantian turns the soil; But Sicoris and Iberus at their feet, Two mighty floods, but far beyond their reach, Rolled down in measureless volume to the main.
But now their leaders yield; Afranius, Vanquished, throws down his arms, and leads his troops, Now hardly living, to the hostile camp Before the victor's feet, and sues for peace. Proud was his bearing, and despite of ills, His mien majestic, of his triumphs past Still mindful in disaster -- thus he stood, Though suppliant for grace, a leader yet; From fearless heart thus speaking: "Had the fates Thrown me before some base ignoble foe, Not, Caesar, thee; still had this arm fought on And snatched my death. Now if I suppliant ask, 'Tis that I value still the boon of life Given by a worthy hand. No party ties Roused us to arms against thee; when the war, This civil war, broke out, it found us chiefs; And with our former cause we kept the faith, So long as brave men should. The fates' decree No longer we withstand. Unto thy will We yield the western tribes: the east is thine And all the world lies open to thy march. Be generous! blood nor sword nor wearied arm Thy conquests bought. Thou hast not to forgive Aught but thy victory won. Nor ask we much. Give us repose; to lead in peace the life Thou shalt bestow; suppose these armed lines Are corpses prostrate on the field of war Ne'er were it meet that thy victorious ranks
Should mix with ours, the vanquished. Destiny Has run for us its course: one boon I beg; Bid not the conquered conquer in thy train."
Such were his words, and Caesar's gracious smile Granted his prayer, remitting rights that war Gives to the victor. To th' unguarded stream The soldiers speed: prone on the bank they lie And lap the flood or foul the crowded waves. In many a burning throat the sudden draught Poured in too copious, filled the empty veins And choked the breath within: yet left unquenched The burning pest which though their frames were full Craved water for itself. Then, nerved once more, Their strength returned. Oh, lavish luxury, Contented never with the frugal meal! Oh greed that searchest over land and sea To furnish forth the banquet! Pride that joy'st In sumptuous tables! learn what life requires, How little nature needs! No ruddy juice Pressed from the vintage in some famous year, Whose consuls are forgotten, served in cups With gold and jewels wrought restores the spark, The failing spark, of life; but water pure And simplest fruits of earth. The flood, the field Suffice for nature. Ah! the weary lot Of those who war! But these, their amour laid Low at the victor's feet, with lightened breast, Secure themselves, no longer dealing death, Beset by care no more, seek out their homes. What priceless gift in peace had they secured! How grieved it now their souls to have poised the dart With arm outstretched; to have felt their raving thirst; And prayed the gods for victory in vain! Nay, hard they think the victor's lot, for whom A thousand risks and battles still remain; If fortune never is to leave his side, How often must he triumph! and how oft Pour out his blood where'er great Caesar leads! Happy, thrice happy, he who, when the world Is nodding to its ruin, knows the spot Where he himself shall, though in ruin, lie! No trumpet call shall break his sleep again: But in his humble home with faithful spouse And sons unlettered Fortune leaves him free From rage of party; for if life he owes To Caesar, Magnus sometime was his lord. Thus happy they alone live on apart, Nor hope nor dread the event of civil war.
Not thus did Fortune upon Caesar smile In all the parts of earth; (13) but 'gainst his arms Dared somewhat, where Salona's lengthy waste Opposes Hadria, and Iadar warm Meets with his waves the breezes of the west. There brave Curectae dwell, whose island home Is girded by the main; on whom relied Antonius; and beleaguered by the foe, Upon the furthest margin of the shore, (Safe from all ills but famine) placed his camp. But for his steeds the earth no forage gave, Nor golden Ceres harvest; but his troops Gnawed the dry herbage of the scanty turf Within their rampart lines. But when they knew That Baslus was on th' opposing shore With friendly force, by novel mode of flight They aim to reach him. Not the accustomed keel They lay, nor build the ship, but shapeless rafts Of timbers knit together, strong to bear All ponderous weight; on empty casks beneath By tightened chains made firm, in double rows Supported; nor upon the deck were placed The oarsmen, to the hostile dart exposed, But in a hidden space, by beams concealed. And thus the eye amazed beheld the mass Move silent on its path across the sea, By neither sail nor stalwart arm propelled.
They watch the main until the refluent waves Ebb from the growing sands; then, on the tide Receding, launch their vessel; thus she floats With twin companions: over each uprose With quivering battlements a lofty tower. Octavius, guardian of Illyrian seas, Restrained his swifter keels, and left the rafts Free from attack, in hope of larger spoil From fresh adventures; for the peaceful sea May tempt them, and their goal in safety reached, To dare a second voyage. Round the stag Thus will the cunning hunter draw a line Of tainted feathers poisoning the air; Or spread the mesh, and muzzle in his grasp The straining jaws of the Molossian hound, And leash the Spartan pack; nor is the brake Trusted to any dog but such as tracks The scent with lowered nostrils, and refrains From giving tongue the while; content to mark By shaking leash the covert of the prey.
Ere long they manned the rafts in eager wish To quit the island, when the latest glow Still parted day from night. But Magnus' troops, Cilician once, taught by their ancient art, In fraudulent deceit had left the sea To view unguarded; but with chains unseen Fast to Illyrian shores, and hanging loose, They blocked the outlet in the waves beneath. The leading rafts passed safely, but the third Hung in mid passage, and by ropes was hauled Below o'ershadowing rocks. These hollowed out In ponderous masses overhung the main, And nodding seemed to fall: shadowed by trees Dark lay the waves beneath. Hither the tide Brings wreck and corpse, and, burying with the flow, Restores them with the ebb: and when the caves Belch forth the ocean, swirling billows fall In boisterous surges back, as boils the tide In that famed whirlpool on Sicilian shores.
Here, with Venetian settlers for its load, Stood motionless the raft. Octavius' ships Gathered around, while foemen on the land Filled all the shore. But well the captain knew, Volteius, how the secret fraud was planned, And tried in vain with sword and steel to burst The bands that held them; without hope he fights, Uncertain where to avoid or front the foe. Caught in this strait they strove as brave men should Against opposing hosts; nor long the fight, For fallen darkness brought a truce to arms.
Then to his men disheartened and in fear Of coming fate Volteius, great of soul, Thus spake in tones commanding: "Free no more, Save for this little night, consult ye now In this last moment, soldiers, how to face Your final fortunes. No man's life is short Who can take thought for death, nor is your fame Less than a conqueror's, if with breast advanced Ye meet your destined doom. None know how long The life that waits them. Summon your own fate, And equal is your praise, whether the hand Quench the last flicker of departing light, Or shear the hope of years. But choice to die Is thrust not on the mind -- we cannot flee; See at our throats, e'en now, our kinsmen's swords. Then choose for death; desire what fate decrees. At least in war's blind cloud we shall not fall; Nor when the flying weapons hide the day, And slaughtered heaps of foemen load the field, And death is common, and the brave man sinks Unknown, inglorious. Us within this ship, Seen of both friends and foes, the gods have placed; Both land and sea and island cliffs shall bear, From either shore, their witness to our death, In which some great and memorable fame Thou, Fortune, dost prepare. What glorious deeds Of warlike heroism, of noble faith, Time's annals show! All these shall we surpass. True, Caesar, that to fall upon our swords For thee is little; yet beleaguered thus, With neither sons nor parents at our sides, Shorn of the glory that we might have earned,
We give thee here the only pledge we may. Yet let these hostile thousands fear the souls That rage for battle and that welcome death, And know us for invincible, and joy That no more rafts were stayed. They'll offer terms And tempt us with a base unhonoured life. Would that, to give that death which shall be ours The greater glory, they may bid us hope For pardon and for life! lest when our swords Are reeking with our hearts'-blood, they may say This was despair of living. Great must be The prowess of our end, if in the hosts That fight his battles, Caesar is to mourn This little handful lost. For me, should fate Grant us retreat, -- myself would scorn to shun The coming onset. Life I cast away, The frenzy of the death that comes apace Controls my being. Those alone whose end Inspires them, know the happiness of death, Which the high gods, that men may bear to live, Keep hid from others." Thus his noble words Warmed his brave comrades' hearts; and who with fear And tearful eyes had looked upon the Wain, Turning his nightly course, now hoped for day, Such precepts deep within them. Nor delayed The sky to dip the stars below the main; For Phoebus in the Twins his chariot drave At noon near Cancer; and the hours of night (14) Were shortened by the Archer.
When day broke,
Lo! on the rocks the Istrians; while the sea Swarmed with the galleys and their Grecian fleet All armed for fight: but first the war was stayed And terms proposed: life to the foe they thought Would seem the sweeter, by delay of death Thus granted. But the band devoted stood, Proud of their promised end, and life forsworn, And careless of the battle: no debate Could shake their high resolve. (15) In numbers few 'Gainst foemen numberless by land and sea, They wage the desperate fight; then satiate Turn from the foe. And first demanding death Volteius bared his throat. "What youth," he cries, "Dares strike me down, and through his captain's wounds Attest his love for death?" Then through his side Plunge blades uncounted on the moment drawn. He praises all: but him who struck the first Grateful, with dying strength, he does to death. They rush together, and without a foe Work all the guilt of battle. Thus of yore, Rose up the glittering Dircaean band From seed by Cadmus sown, and fought and died, Dire omen for the brother kings of Thebes. And so in Phasis' fields the sons of earth, Born of the sleepless dragon, all inflamed By magic incantations, with their blood Deluged the monstrous furrow, while the Queen Feared at the spells she wrought. Devoted thus To death, they fall, yet in their death itself Less valour show than in the fatal wounds They take and give; for e'en the dying hand Missed not a blow -- nor did the stroke alone Inflict the wound, but rushing on the sword Their throat or breast received it to the hilt; And when by fatal chance or sire with son, Or brothers met, yet with unfaltering weight Down flashed the pitiless sword: this proved their love, To give no second blow. Half living now They dragged their mangled bodies to the side, Whence flowed into the sea a crimson stream Of slaughter. 'Twas their pleasure yet to see The light they scorned; with haughty looks to scan The faces of their victors, and to feel The death approaching. But the raft was now Piled up with dead; which, when the foemen saw, Wondering at such a chief and such a deed, They gave them burial. Never through the world Of any brave achievement was the fame More widely blazed. Yet meaner men, untaught By such examples, see not that the hand Which frees from slavery needs no valiant mind To guide the stroke. But tyranny is feared As dealing death; and Freedom's self is galled By ruthless arms; and knows not that the sword Was given for this, that none need live a slave. Ah Death! would'st thou but let the coward live And grant the brave alone the prize to die!
Nor less were Libyan fields ablaze with war.
For Curio rash from Lilybaean (16) coast
Sailed with his fleet, and borne by gentle winds
Betwixt half-ruined Carthage, mighty once,
And Clupea's cliff, upon the well-known shore
His anchors dropped. First from the hoary sea
Remote, where Bagra slowly ploughs the sand,
He placed his camp: then sought the further hills
And mazy passages of cavernous rocks,
Antaeus' kingdom called. From ancient days
This name was given; and thus a swain retold
The story handed down from sire to son:
"Not yet exhausted by the giant brood,
Earth still another monster brought to birth,
In Libya's caverns: huger far was he,
More justly far her pride, than Briareus
With all his hundred hands, or Typhon fierce,
Or Tityos: 'twas in mercy to the gods
That not in Phlegra's (17) fields Antaeus grew,
But here in Libya; to her offspring's strength,
Unmeasured, vast, she added yet this boon,
That when in weariness and labour spent
He touched his parent, fresh from her embrace
Renewed in rigour he should rise again.
In yonder cave he dwelt, 'neath yonder rock
He made his feast on lions slain in chase:
There slept he; not on skins of beasts, or leaves,
But fed his strength upon the naked earth.
Perished the Libyan hinds and those who came,
Brought here in ships, until he scorned at length
The earth that gave him strength, and on his feet
Invincible and with unaided might
Made all his victims. Last to Afric shores,
Drawn by the rumour of such carnage, came
Magnanimous Alcides, he who freed
Both land and sea of monsters. Down on earth
He threw his mantle of the lion's skin
Slain in Cleone; nor Antaeus less
Cast down the hide he wore. With shining oil,
As one who wrestles at Olympia's feast,
The hero rubs his limbs: the giant feared
Lest standing only on his parent earth
His strength might fail; and cast o'er all his bulk
Hot sand in handfuls. Thus with arms entwined
And grappling hands each seizes on his foe;
With hardened muscles straining at the neck
Long time in vain; for firm the sinewy throat
Stood column-like, nor yielded; so that each
Wondered to find his peer. Nor at the first
Divine Alcides put forth all his strength,
By lengthy struggle wearing out his foe,
Till chilly drops stood on Antaeas' limbs,
And toppled to its fall the stately throat,
And smitten by the hero's blows, the legs
Began to totter. Breast to breast they strive
To gain the vantage, till the victor's arms
Gird in the giant's yielding back and sides,
And squeeze his middle part: next 'twixt the thighs
He puts his feet, and forcing them apart,
Lays low the mighty monster limb by limb.
The dry earth drank his sweat, while in his veins
Warm ran the life-blood, and with strength refreshed,
The muscle swelled and all the joints grew firm,
And with his might restored, he breaks his bonds
And rives the arms of Hercules away.
Amazed the hero stood at such a strength.
Not thus he feared, though then unused to war,
That hydra fierce, which smitten in the marsh
Of Inachus, renewed its severed heads.
Again they join in fight, one with the powers
Which earth bestowed, the other with his own:
Nor did the hatred of his step-dame (18) find
In all his conflicts greater room for hope.
She sees bedewed in sweat the neck and limbs
Which once had borne the mountain of the gods
Nor knew the toil: and when Antaeus felt
His foeman's arms close round him once again,
He flung his wearying limbs upon the sand
To rise with strength renewed; all that the earth,
Though labouring sore, could breathe into her son
She gave his frame. But Hercules at last
Saw how his parent gave the giant strength.
Stand thou,' he cried;
no more upon the ground
Thou liest at thy will -- here must thou stay
Within mine arms constrained; against this breast,
Antaeus, shalt thou fall.' He lifted up
And held by middle girth the giant form,
Still struggling for the earth: but she no more
Could give her offspring rigour. Slowly came
The chill of death upon him, and 'twas long
Before the hero, of his victory sure,
Trusted the earth and laid the giant down.
Hence hoar antiquity that loves to prate
And wonders at herself (19), this region called
Antaeus' kingdom. But a greater name
It gained from Scipio, when he recalled
From Roman citadels the Punic chief.
Here was his camp; here can'st thou see the trace
Of that most famous rampart (20) whence at length
Issued the Eagles of triumphant Rome."
But Curio rejoiced, as though for him The fortunes of the spot must hold in store The fates of former chiefs: and on the place Of happy augury placed his tents ill-starred, Took from the hills their omens; and with force Unequal, challenged his barbarian foe.
All Africa that bore the Roman yoke Then lay 'neath Varus. He, though placing first Trust in his Latian troops, from every side And furthest regions, summons to his aid The nations who confessed King Juba's rule. Not any monarch over wider tracts Held the dominion. From the western belt (21) Near Gades, Atlas parts their furthest bounds; But from the southern, Hammon girds them in Hard by the whirlpools; and their burning plains Stretch forth unending 'neath the torrid zone, In breadth its equal, till they reach at length The shore of ocean upon either hand. From all these regions tribes unnumbered flock To Juba's standard: Moors of swarthy hue As though from Ind; Numidian nomads there And Nasamon's needy hordes; and those whose darts Equal the flying arrows of the Mede: Dark Garamantians leave their fervid home; And those whose coursers unrestrained by bit Or saddle, yet obey the rider's hand Which wields the guiding switch: the hunter, too, Who wanders forth, his home a fragile hut, And blinds with flowing robe (if spear should fail) The angry lion, monarch of the steppe.
Not eagerness alone to save the state Stirred Juba's spirit: private hatred too Roused him to war. For in the former year, When Curio all things human and the gods Polluted, he by tribune law essayed To ravish Libya from the tyrant's sway, And drive the monarch from his father's throne, While giving Rome a king. To Juba thus, Still smarting at the insult, came the war, A welcome harvest for his crown retained. These rumours Curio feared: nor had his troops (Ta'en in Corfinium's hold) (23) in waves of Rhine Been tested, nor to Caesar in the wars Had learned devotion: wavering in their faith, Their second chief they doubt, their first betrayed.
Yet when the general saw the spirit of fear Creep through his camp, and discipline to fail, And sentinels desert their guard at night, Thus in his fear he spake: "By daring much Fear is disguised; let me be first in arms, And bid my soldiers to the plain descend, While still my soldiers. Idle days breed doubt. By fight forestall the plot (24). Soon as the thirst Of bloodshed fills the mind, and eager hands Grip firm the sword, and pressed upon the brow The helm brings valour to the failing heart -- Who cares to measure leaders' merits then? Who weighs the cause? With whom the soldier stands, For him he fights; as at the fatal show No ancient grudge the gladiator's arm Nerves for the combat, yet as he shall strike He hates his rival." Thinking thus he leads His troops in battle order to the plain. Then victory on his arms deceptive shone Hiding the ills to come: for from the field Driving the hostile host with sword and spear, He smote them till their camp opposed his way. But after Varus' rout, unseen till then, All eager for the glory to be his, By stealth came Juba: silent was his march; His only fear lest rumour should forestall His coming victory. In pretended war He sends Sabura forth with scanty force To tempt the enemy, while in hollow vale He holds the armies of his realm unseen. Thus doth the sly ichneumon (25) with his tail Waving, allure the serpent of the Nile Drawn to the moving shadow: he, with head Turned sideways, watches till the victim glides Within his reach, then seizes by the throat Behind the deadly fangs: forth from its seat Balked of its purpose, through the brimming jaws Gushes a tide of poison. Fortune smiled On Juba's stratagem; for Curio (The hidden forces of the foe unknown) Sent forth his horse by night without the camp To scour more distant regions. He himself At earliest peep of dawn bids carry forth His standards; heeding not his captains' prayer Urged on his ears: "Beware of Punic fraud, The craft that taints a Carthaginian war." Hung over him the doom of coming death And gave the youth to fate; and civil strife Dragged down its author.
On the lofty tops
Where broke the hills abruptly to their fall He ranks his troops and sees the foe afar: Who still deceiving, simulated flight, Till from the height in loose unordered lines The Roman forces streamed upon the plain, In thought that Juba fled. Then first was known The treacherous fraud: for swift Numidian horse On every side surround them: leader, men -- All see their fate in one dread moment come. No coward flees, no warrior bravely strides To meet the battle: nay, the trumpet call Stirs not the charger with resounding hoof To spurn the rock, nor galling bit compels To champ in eagerness; nor toss his mane And prick the ear, nor prancing with his feet To claim his share of combat. Tired, the neck Droops downwards: smoking sweat bedews the limbs: Dry from the squalid mouth protrudes the tongue, Hoarse, raucous panting issues from their chests; Their flanks distend: and every curb is dry With bloody foam; the ruthless sword alone Could move them onward, powerless even then To charge; but giving to the hostile dart A nearer victim. But when the Afric horse First made their onset, loud beneath their hoofs Rang the wide plain, and rose the dust in air As by some Thracian whirlwind stirred; and veiled The heavens in darkness. When on Curio's host The tempest burst, each footman in the rank Stood there to meet his fate -- no doubtful end Hung in the balance: destiny proclaimed Death to them all. No conflict hand to hand Was granted them, by lances thrown from far And sidelong sword-thrusts slain: nor wounds alone, But clouds of weapons falling from the air By weight of iron o'erwhelmed them. Still drew in The straightening circle, for the first pressed back On those behind; did any shun the foe, Seeking the inner safety of the ring, He needs must perish by his comrades' swords. And as the front rank fell, still narrower grew The close crushed phalanx, till to raise their swords Space was denied. Still close and closer forced The armed breasts against each other driven Pressed out the life. Thus not upon a scene Such as their fortune promised, gazed the foe. No tide of blood was there to glut their eyes, No members lopped asunder, though the earth so Was piled with corpses; for each Roman stood In death upright against his comrade dead.
Let cruel Carthage rouse her hated ghosts By this fell offering; let the Punic shades, And bloody Hannibal, from this defeat Receive atonement: yet 'twas shame, ye gods, That Libya gained not for herself the day; And that our Romans on that field should die To save Pompeius and the Senate's cause.
Now was the dust laid low by streams of blood, And Curio, knowing that his host was slain. Chose not to live; and, as a brave man should. He rushed upon the heap, and fighting fell.
In vain with turbid speech hast thou profaned The pulpit of the forum: waved in vain From that proud (26) citadel the tribune flag: And armed the people, and the Senate's rights Betraying, hast compelled this impious war Betwixt the rival kinsmen. Low thou liest Before Pharsalus' fight, and from thine eyes Is hid the war. 'Tis thus to suffering Rome, For arms seditious and for civil strife Ye mighty make atonement with your blood. Happy were Rome and all her sons indeed, Did but the gods as rigidly protect As they avenge, her violated laws! There Curio lies; untombed his noble corpse, Torn by the vultures of the Libyan wastes. Yet shall we, since such merit, though unsung, Lives by its own imperishable fame, Give thee thy meed of praise. Rome never bore Another son, who, had he right pursued, Had so adorned her laws; but soon the times, Their luxury, corruption, and the curse Of too abundant wealth, in transverse stream Swept o'er his wavering mind: and Curio changed, Turned with his change the scale of human things. True, mighty Sulla, cruel Marius, And bloody Cinna, and the long descent Of Caesar and of Caesar's house became Lords of our lives. But who had power like him? All others bought the state: he sold alone. (27)
ENDNOTES: (1) Both of these generals were able and distinguished officers. Afranius was slain by Caesar's soldiers after the battle of Thapsus. Petreius, after the same battle, escaped along with Juba; and failing to find a refuge, they challenged each other to fight. Petreius was killed, and Juba, the survivor, put an end to himself. (2) These are the names of Spanish tribes. The Celtiberi dwelt on the Ebro. (3) Lerida, on the river Segre, above its junction with the Ebro. Cinga is the modern Cinca, which falls into the Segre (Sicoris). (4) Phrixus and Helle, the children of Nephele, were to be sacrificed to Zeus: but Nephele rescued them, and they rode away through the air on the Ram with the golden fleece. But Helle fell into the sea, which from her was named the Hellespont. (See Book IX., 1126.) The sun enters Aries about March 20. The Ram is pictured among the constellations with his head averse. (5) See Book I., 463. (6) See Mr. Heitland's introduction, upon the meaning of the word "cardo". The word "belt" seems fairly to answer to the two great circles or four meridians which he describes. The word occurs again at line 760; Book V., 80; Book VII., 452. (7) The idea is that the cold of the poles tempers the heat of the equator. (8) Fuso: either spacious, outspread; or, poured into the land (referring to the estuaries) as Mr. Haskins prefers; or, poured round the island. Portable leathern skiffs seem to have been in common use in Caesar's time in the English Channel. These were the rowing boats of the Gauls. (Mommsen, vol. iv., 219.) (9) Compare Book I., 519. (10) Compare the passage in Tacitus, "Histories", ii., 45, in which the historian describes how the troops of Otho and Vitellius wept over each other after the battle and deplored the miseries of a civil war. "Victi victoresque in lacrumas effusi, sortem civilium armorum misera laetitia detestantes." (11) "Saecula nostra" may refer either to Lucan's own time or to the moment arrived at in the poem; or it may, as Francken suggests, have a more general meaning. (12) "Petenda est"? -- "is it fit that you should beg for the lives of your leaders?" Mr. Haskins says, "shall you have to beg for them?" But it means that to do so is the height of disgrace. (13) The scene is the Dalmatian coast of the Adriatic. Here was Diocletian's palace. (Described in the 13th chapter of Gibbon.) (14) That is, night was at its shortest. (15) On the following passage see Dean Merivale's remarks, "History of the Roman Empire", chapter xvi. (16) That is, Sicilian. (17) For Phlegra, the scene of the battle between the giants and the gods, see Book VII., 170, and Book IX., 774. Ben Jonson ("Sejanus", Act v., scene 10) says of Sejanus: -- "Phlegra, the field where all the sons of earth Mustered against the gods, did ne'er acknowledge So proud and huge a monster." (18) Juno. (19) That is, extols ancient deeds. (20) Referring to the battle of Zama. (21) See line 82. (22) Curio was tribune in B.C. 50. His earlier years are stated to have been stained with vice. (23) See Book II., 537. (24) Preferring the reading "praeripe", with Francken. (25) Bewick ("Quadrupeds," p. 238) tells the following anecdote of a tame ichneumon which had never seen a serpent, and to which he brought a small one. "Its first emotion seemed to be astonishment mixed with anger; its hair became erect; in an instant it slipped behind the reptile, and with remarkable swiftness and agility leaped upon its head, seized it and crushed it with its teeth." (26) Reading "arce", not "arte". The word "signifer" seems to favour the reading I have preferred; and Dean Merivale and Hosius adopted it. (27) For the character and career of Curio, see Merivale's "History of the Roman Empire", chapter xvi. He was of profligate character, but a friend and pupil of Cicero; at first a rabid partisan of the oligarchy, he had, about the period of his tribuneship (B.C. 50-49), become a supporter of Caesar. How far Gaulish gold was the cause of this conversion we cannot tell. It is in allusion to this change that he was termed the prime mover of the civil war. His arrival in Caesar's camp is described in Book I., line 303. He became Caesar's chief lieutenant in place of the deserter Labienus; and, as described in Book III., was sent to Sardinia and Sicily, whence he expelled the senatorial forces. His final expedition to Africa, defeat and death, form the subject of the latter part of this book. Mommsen describes him as a man of talent, and finds a resemblance between him and Caesar. (Vol. iv., p. 393.)
BOOK V
THE ORACLE. THE MUTINY. THE STORM
Thus had the smiles of Fortune and her frowns Brought either chief to Macedonian shores Still equal to his foe. From cooler skies Sank Atlas' (1) daughters down, and Haemus' slopes Were white with winter, and the day drew nigh Devoted to the god who leads the months, And marking with new names the book of Rome, When came the Fathers from their distant posts By both the Consuls to Epirus called (2) Ere yet the year was dead: a foreign land Obscure received the magistrates of Rome, And heard their high debate. No warlike camp This; for the Consul's and the Praetor's axe Proclaimed the Senate-house; and Magnus sat One among many, and the state was all.
When all were silent, from his lofty seat Thus Lentulus began, while stern and sad The Fathers listened: "If your hearts still beat With Latian blood, and if within your breasts Still lives your fathers' vigour, look not now On this strange land that holds us, nor enquire Your distance from the captured city: yours This proud assembly, yours the high command In all that comes. Be this your first decree, Whose truth all peoples and all kings confess; Be this the Senate. Let the frozen wain Demand your presence, or the torrid zone Wherein the day and night with equal tread For ever march; still follows in your steps The central power of Imperial Rome. When flamed the Capitol with fires of Gaul When Veii held Camillus, there with him Was Rome, nor ever though it changed its clime Your order lost its rights. In Caesar's hands Are sorrowing houses and deserted homes, Laws silent for a space, and forums closed In public fast. His Senate-house beholds Those Fathers only whom from Rome it drove, While Rome was full. Of that high order all Not here, are exiles. (3) Ignorant of war, Its crimes and bloodshed, through long years of peace, Ye fled its outburst: now in session all Are here assembled. See ye how the gods Weigh down Italia's loss by all the world Thrown in the other scale? Illyria's wave Rolls deep upon our foes: in Libyan wastes Is fallen their Curio, the weightier part (4) Of Caesar's senate! Lift your standards, then, Spur on your fates and prove your hopes to heaven. Let Fortune, smiling, give you courage now As, when ye fled, your cause. The Consuls' power Fails with the dying year: not so does yours; By your commandment for the common weal Decree Pompeius leader." With applause They heard his words, and placed their country's fates, Nor less their own, within the chieftain's hands.
Then did they shower on people and on kings Honours well earned -- Rhodes, Mistress of the Seas, Was decked with gifts; Athena, old in fame, Received her praise, and the rude tribes who dwell On cold Taygetus; Massilia's sons Their own Phocaea's freedom; on the chiefs Of Thracian tribes, fit honours were bestowed. They order Libya by their high decree To serve King Juba's sceptre; and, alas! On Ptolemaeus, of a faithless race The faithless sovereign, scandal to the gods, And shame to Fortune, placed the diadem Of Pella. Boy! thy sword was only sharp Against thy people. Ah if that were all! The fatal gift gave, too, Pompeius' life; Bereft thy sister of her sire's bequest, (5) Half of the kingdom; Caesar of a crime. Then all to arms.
While soldier thus and chief,
In doubtful sort, against their hidden fate Devised their counsel, Appius (6) alone Feared for the chances of the war, and sought Through Phoebus' ancient oracle to break The silence of the gods and know the end.
Between the western belt and that which bounds (7) The furthest east, midway Parnassus rears His double summit: to the Bromian god And Paean consecrate, to whom conjoined The Theban band leads up the Delphic feast On each third year. This mountain, when the sea Poured o'er the earth her billows, rose alone, By one high peak scarce master of the waves, Parting the crest of waters from the stars. There, to avenge his mother, from her home Chased by the angered goddess while as yet She bore him quick within her, Paean came (When Themis ruled the tripods and the spot) (8) And with unpractised darts the Python slew. But when he saw how from the yawning cave A godlike knowledge breathed, and all the air Was full of voices murmured from the depths, He took the shrine and filled the deep recess; Henceforth to prophesy.
Which of the gods
Has left heaven's light in this dark cave to hide? What spirit that knows the secrets of the world And things to come, here condescends to dwell, Divine, omnipotent? bear the touch of man, And at his bidding deigns to lift the veil? Perchance he sings the fates, perchance his song, Once sung, is fate. Haply some part of Jove Sent here to rule the earth with mystic power, Balanced upon the void immense of air, Sounds through the caves, and in its flight returns To that high home of thunder whence it came. Caught in a virgin's breast, this deity Strikes on the human spirit: then a voice Sounds from her breast, as when the lofty peak Of Etna boils, forced by compelling flames, Or as Typheus on Campania's shore Frets 'neath the pile of huge Inarime. (9)
Though free to all that ask, denied to none, No human passion lurks within the voice That heralds forth the god; no whispered vow, No evil prayer prevails; none favour gain: Of things unchangeable the song divine; Yet loves the just. When men have left their homes To seek another, it hath turned their steps Aright, as with the Tyrians; (10) and raised The hearts of nations to confront their foe, As prove the waves of Salamis: (11) when earth Hath been unfruitful, or polluted air Has plagued mankind, this utterance benign Hath raised their hopes and pointed to the end. No gift from heaven's high gods so great as this Our centuries have lost, since Delphi's shrine Has silent stood, and kings forbade the gods (12) To speak the future, fearing for their fates. Nor does the priestess sorrow that the voice Is heard no longer; and the silent fane To her is happiness; for whatever breast Contains the deity, its shattered frame Surges with frenzy, and the soul divine Shakes the frail breath that with the god receives, As prize or punishment, untimely death.
These tripods Appius seeks, unmoved for years These soundless caverned rocks, in quest to learn Hesperia's destinies. At his command To loose the sacred gateways and permit The prophetess to enter to the god, The keeper calls Phemonoe; (13) whose steps Round the Castalian fount and in the grove Were wandering careless; her he bids to pass The portals. But the priestess feared to tread The awful threshold, and with vain deceits Sought to dissuade the chieftain from his zeal To learn the future. "What this hope," she cried, "Roman, that moves thy breast to know the fates? Long has Parnassus and its silent cleft Stifled the god; perhaps the breath divine Has left its ancient gorge and thro' the world Wanders in devious paths; or else the fane, Consumed to ashes by barbarian (14) fire, Closed up the deep recess and choked the path Of Phoebus; or the ancient Sibyl's books Disclosed enough of fate, and thus the gods Decreed to close the oracle; or else Since wicked steps are banished from the fane, In this our impious age the god finds none Whom he may answer." But the maiden's guile Was known, for though she would deny the gods Her fears approved them. On her front she binds A twisted fillet, while a shining wreath Of Phocian laurels crowns the locks that flow Upon her shoulders. Hesitating yet The priest compelled her, and she passed within. But horror filled her of the holiest depths From which the mystic oracle proceeds; And resting near the doors, in breast unmoved She dares invent the god in words confused, Which proved no mind possessed with fire divine; By such false chant less injuring the chief Than faith in Phoebus and the sacred fane. No burst of words with tremor in their tones, No voice re-echoing through the spacious vault Proclaimed the deity, no bristling locks Shook off the laurel chaplet; but the grove Unshaken, and the summits of the shrine, Gave proof she shunned the god. The Roman knew The tripods yet were idle, and in rage, "Wretch," he exclaimed, "to us and to the gods, Whose presence thou pretendest, thou shalt pay For this thy fraud the punishment; unless Thou enter the recess, and speak no more, Of this world-war, this tumult of mankind, Thine own inventions." Then by fear compelled, At length the priestess sought the furthest depths, And stayed beside the tripods; and there came Into her unaccustomed breast the god, Breathed from the living rock for centuries Untouched; nor ever with a mightier power Did Paean's inspiration seize the frame Of Delphic priestess; his pervading touch Drove out her former mind, expelled the man, And made her wholly his. In maddened trance She whirls throughout the cave, her locks erect With horror, and the fillets of the god Dashed to the ground; her steps unguided turn To this side and to that; the tripods fall O'erturned; within her seethes the mighty fire Of angry Phoebus; nor with whip alone He urged her onwards, but with curb restrained; Nor was it given her by the god to speak All that she knew; for into one vast mass (15) All time was gathered, and her panting chest Groaned 'neath the centuries. In order long All things lay bare: the future yet unveiled Struggled for light; each fate required a voice; The compass of the seas, Creation's birth, Creation's death, the number of the sands, All these she knew. Thus on a former day The prophetess upon the Cuman shore, (16) Disdaining that her frenzy should be slave To other nations, from the boundless threads Chose out with pride of hand the fates of Rome. E'en so Phemonoe, for a time oppressed With fates unnumbered, laboured ere she found, Beneath such mighty destinies concealed, Thine, Appius, who alone had'st sought the god In land Castalian; then from foaming lips First rushed the madness forth, and murmurs loud Uttered with panting breath and blent with groans; Till through the spacious vault a voice at length Broke from the virgin conquered by the god: "From this great struggle thou, O Roman, free Escap'st the threats of war: alive, in peace, Thou shalt possess the hollow in the coast Of vast Euboea." Thus she spake, no more.
Ye mystic tripods, guardians of the fates And Paean, thou, from whom no day is hid By heaven's high rulers, Master of the truth, Why fear'st thou to reveal the deaths of kings, Rome's murdered princes, and the latest doom Of her great Empire tottering to its fall, And all the bloodshed of that western land? Were yet the stars in doubt on Magnus' fate Not yet decreed, and did the gods yet shrink From that, the greatest crime? Or wert thou dumb That Fortune's sword for civil strife might wreak Just vengeance, and a Brutus' arm once more Strike down the tyrant?
From the temple doors
Rushed forth the prophetess in frenzy driven, Not all her knowledge uttered; and her eyes, Still troubled by the god who reigned within, Or filled with wild affright, or fired with rage Gaze on the wide expanse: still works her face Convulsive; on her cheeks a crimson blush With ghastly pallor blent, though not of fear. Her weary heart throbs ever; and as seas Boom swollen by northern winds, she finds in sighs, All inarticulate, relief. But while She hastes from that dread light in which she saw The fates, to common day, lo! on her path The darkness fell. Then by a Stygian draught Of the forgetful river, Phoebus snatched Back from her soul his secrets; and she fell Yet hardly living.
Nor did Appius dread
Approaching death, but by dark oracles Baffled, while yet the Empire of the world Hung in the balance, sought his promised realm In Chalcis of Euboea. Yet to escape All ills of earth, the crash of war -- what god Can give thee such a boon, but death alone? Far on the solitary shore a grave Awaits thee, where Carystos' marble crags (17) Draw in the passage of the sea, and where The fane of Rhamnus rises to the gods Who hate the proud, and where the ocean strait Boils in swift whirlpools, and Euripus draws Deceitful in his tides, a bane to ships, Chalcidian vessels to bleak Aulis' shore.
But Caesar carried from the conquered west His eagles to another world of war; When envying his victorious course the gods Almost turned back the prosperous tide of fate. Not on the battle-field borne down by arms But in his tents, within the rampart lines, The hoped-for prize of this unholy war Seemed for a moment gone. That faithful host, His comrades trusted in a hundred fields, Or that the falchion sheathed had lost its charm; Or weary of the mournful bugle call Scarce ever silent; or replete with blood, Well nigh betrayed their general and sold For hope of gain their honour and their cause. No other perilous shock gave surer proof How trembled 'neath his feet the dizzy height From which great Caesar looked. A moment since His high behest drew nations to the field: Now, maimed of all, he sees that swords once drawn Are weapons for the soldier, not the chief. From the stern ranks no doubtful murmur rose; Not silent anger as when one conspires, His comrades doubting, feared himself in turn; Alone (he thinks) indignant at the wrongs Wrought by the despot. In so great a host Dread found no place. Where thousands share the guilt Crime goes unpunished. Thus from dauntless throats They hurled their menace: "Caesar, give us leave To quit thy crimes; thou seek'st by land and sea The sword to slay us; let the fields of Gaul And far Iberia, and the world proclaim How for thy victories our comrades fell. What boots it us that by an army's blood The Rhine and Rhone and all the northern lands Thou hast subdued? Thou giv'st us civil war For all these battles; such the prize. When fled The Senate trembling, and when Rome was ours What homes or temples did we spoil? Our hands Reek with offence! Aye, but our poverty Proclaims our innocence! What end shall be Of arms and armies? What shall be enough If Rome suffice not? and what lies beyond? Behold these silvered locks, these nerveless hands And shrunken arms, once stalwart! In thy wars Gone is the strength of life, gone all its pride! Dismiss thine aged soldiers to their deaths. How shameless is our prayer! Not on hard turf To stretch our dying limbs; nor seek in vain, When parts the soul, a hand to close our eyes; Not with the helmet strike the stony clod: (19) Rather to feel the dear one's last embrace, And gain a humble but a separate tomb. Let nature end old age. And dost thou think We only know not what degree of crime Will fetch the highest price? What thou canst dare These years have proved, or nothing; law divine Nor human ordinance shall hold thine hand. Thou wert our leader on the banks of Rhine; Henceforth our equal; for the stain of crime Makes all men like to like. Add that we serve A thankless chief: as fortune's gift he takes The fruits of victory our arms have won. We are his fortunes, and his fates are ours To fashion as we will. Boast that the gods Shall do thy bidding! Nay, thy soldiers' will Shall close the war." With threatening mien and speech Thus through the camp the troops demand their chief.
When faith and loyalty are fled, and hope For aught but evil, thus may civil war In mutiny and discord find its end! What general had not feared at such revolt? But mighty Caesar trusting on the throw, As was his wont, his fortune, and o'erjoyed To front their anger raging at its height Unflinching comes. No temples of the gods, Not Jove's high fane on the Tarpeian rock, Not Rome's high dames nor maidens had he grudged To their most savage lust: that they should ask The worst, his wish, and love the spoils of war. Nor feared he aught save order at the hands Of that unconquered host. Art thou not shamed That strife should please thee only, now condemned Even by thy minions? Shall they shrink from blood, They from the sword recoil? and thou rush on Heedless of guilt, through right and through unright, Nor learn that men may lay their arms aside Yet bear to live? This civil butchery Escapes thy grasp. Stay thou thy crimes at length; Nor force thy will on those who will no more.
Upon a turfy mound unmoved he stood And, since he feared not, worthy to be feared; And thus while anger stirred his soul began: "Thou that with voice and hand didst rage but now Against thine absent chief, behold me here; Here strike thy sword into this naked breast, To stay the war; and flee, if such thy wish. This mutiny devoid of daring deed Betrays your coward souls, betrays the youth Who tires of victories which gild the arms Of an unconquered chief, and yearns for flight. Well, leave me then to battle and to fate! I cast you forth; for every weapon left, Fortune shall find a man, to wield it well. Shall Magnus in his flight with such a fleet Draw nations in his train; and not to me as My victories bring hosts, to whom shall fall The prize of war accomplished, who shall reap Your laurels scorned, and scathless join the train That leads my chariot to the sacred hill? While you, despised in age and worn in war, Gaze on our triumph from the civic crowd. Think you your dastard flight shall give me pause? If all the rivers that now seek the sea Were to withdraw their waters, it would fail By not one inch, no more than by their flow It rises now. Have then your efforts given Strength to my cause? Not so: the heavenly gods Stoop not so low; fate has no time to judge Your lives and deaths. The fortunes of the world Follow heroic souls: for the fit few The many live; and you who terrified With me the northern and Iberian worlds, Would flee when led by Magnus. Strong in arms For Caesar's cause was Labienus; (20) now That vile deserter, with his chief preferred, Wanders o'er land and sea. Nor were your faith One whit more firm to me if, neither side Espoused, you ceased from arms. Who leaves me once, Though not to fight against me with the foe, Joins not my ranks again. Surely the gods Smile on these arms who for so great a war Grant me fresh soldiers. From what heavy load Fortune relieves me! for the hands which aimed At all, to which the world did not suffice, I now disarm, and for myself alone Reserve the conflict. Quit ye, then, my camp, `Quirites', (21) Caesar's soldiers now no more, And leave my standards to the grasp of men! Yet some who led this mad revolt I hold, Not as their captain now, but as their judge. Lie, traitors, prone on earth, stretch out the neck And take th' avenging blow. And thou whose strength Shall now support me, young and yet untaught, Behold the doom and learn to strike and die."
Such were his words of ire, and all the host Drew back and trembled at the voice of him They would depose, as though their very swords Would from their scabbards leap at his command Themselves unwilling; but he only feared Lest hand and blade to satisfy the doom Might be denied, till they submitting pledged Their lives and swords alike, beyond his hope. To strike and suffer (22) holds in surest thrall The heart inured to guilt; and Caesar kept, By dreadful compact ratified in blood, Those whom he feared to lose.
He bids them march
Upon Brundusium, and recalls the ships From soft Calabria's inlets and the point Of Leucas, and the Salapinian marsh, Where sheltered Sipus nestles at the feet Of rich Garganus, jutting from the shore In huge escarpment that divides the waves Of Hadria; on each hand, his seaward slopes Buffeted by the winds; or Auster borne From sweet Apulia, or the sterner blast Of Boreas rushing from Dalmatian strands.
But Caesar entered trembling Rome unarmed, Now taught to serve him in the garb of peace. Dictator named, to grant their prayers, forsooth: Consul, in honour of the roll of Rome. Then first of all the names by which we now Lie to our masters, men found out the use: For to preserve his right to wield the sword He mixed the civil axes with his brands; With eagles, fasces; with an empty word Clothing his power; and stamped upon the time A worthy designation; for what name Could better mark the dread Pharsalian year Than "Caesar, Consul"? (23) Now the famous field Pretends its ancient ceremonies: calls The tribes in order and divides the votes In vain solemnity of empty urns. Nor do they heed the portents of the sky: Deaf were the augurs to the thunder roll; The owl flew on the left; yet were the birds Propitious sworn. Then was the ancient name Degraded first; and monthly Consuls, (24) Shorn of their rank, are chosen to mark the years. And Trojan Alba's (25) god (since Latium's fall Deserving not) beheld the wonted fires Blaze from his altars on the festal night.
Then through Apulia's fallows, that her hinds Left all untilled, to sluggish weeds a prey Passed Caesar onward, swifter than the fire Of heaven, or tigress dam: until he reached Brundusium's winding ramparts, built of old By Cretan colonists. There icy winds Constrained the billows, and his trembling fleet Feared for the winter storms nor dared the main. But Caesar's soul burned at the moments lost For speedy battle, nor could brook delay Within the port, indignant that the sea Should give safe passage to his routed foe: And thus he stirred his troops, in seas unskilled, With words of courage: "When the winter wind Has seized on sky and ocean, firm its hold; But the inconstancy of cloudy spring Permits no certain breezes to prevail Upon the billows. Straight shall be our course. No winding nooks of coast, but open seas Struck by the northern wind alone we plough, And may he bend the spars, and bear us swift To Grecian cities; else Pompeius' oars, Smiting the billows from Phaeacian (26) coasts, May catch our flagging sails. Cast loose the ropes From our victorious prows. Too long we waste Tempests that blow to bear us to our goal."
Now sank the sun to rest; the evening star Shone on the darkening heaven, and the moon Reigned with her paler light, when all the fleet Freed from retaining cables seized the main. With slackened sheet the canvas wooed the breeze, Which rose and fell and fitful died away, Till motionless the sails, and all the waves Were still as deepest pool, where never wind Ripples the surface. Thus in Scythian climes Cimmerian Bosphorus restrains the deep Bound fast in frosty fetters; Ister's streams (27) No more impel the main, and ships constrained Stand fast in ice; and while in depths below The waves still murmur, loud the charger's hoof Sounds on the surface, and the travelling wheel Furrows a track upon the frozen marsh. Cruel as tempest was the calm that lay In stagnant pools upon the mournful deep: Against the course of nature lay outstretched A rigid ocean: 'twas as if the sea Forgat its ancient ways and knew no more The ceaseless tides, nor any breeze of heaven, Nor quivered at the image of the sun, Mirrored upon its wave. For while the fleet Hung in mid passage motionless, the foe Might hurry to attack, with sturdy stroke Churning the deep; or famine's deadly grip Might seize the ships becalmed. For dangers new New vows they find. "May mighty winds arise And rouse the ocean, and this sluggish plain Cast off stagnation and be sea once more." Thus did they pray, but cloudless shone the sky, Unrippled slept the surface of the main; Until in misty clouds the moon arose And stirred the depths, and moved the fleet along Towards the Ceraunian headland; and the waves And favouring breezes followed on the ships, Now speeding faster, till (their goal attained) They cast their anchors on Palaeste's (28) shore.
This land first saw the chiefs in neighbouring camps Confronted, which the streams of Apsus bound And swifter Genusus; a lengthy course Is run by neither, but on Apsus' waves Scarce flowing from a marsh, the frequent boat Finds room to swim; while on the foamy bed Of Genusus by sun or shower compelled The melted snows pour seawards. Here were met (So Fortune ordered it) the mighty pair; And in its woes the world yet vainly hoped That brought to nearer touch their crime itself Might bleed abhorrence: for from either camp Voices were clearly heard and features seen. Nor e'er, Pompeius, since that distant day When Caesar's daughter and thy spouse was reft By pitiless fate away, nor left a pledge, Did thy loved kinsman (save on sands of Nile) So nearly look upon thy face again.
But Caesar's mind though frenzied for the fight Was forced to pause until Antonius brought The rearward troops; Antonius even now Rehearsing Leucas' fight. With prayers and threats Caesar exhorts him. "Why delay the fates, Thou cause of evil to the suffering world? My speed hath won the major part: from thee Fortune demands the final stroke alone. Do Libyan whirlpools with deceitful tides Uncertain separate us? Is the deep Untried to which I call? To unknown risks Art thou commanded? Caesar bids thee come, Thou sluggard, not to leave him. Long ago I ran my ships midway through sands and shoals To harbours held by foes; and dost thou fear My friendly camp? I mourn the waste of days Which fate allotted us. Upon the waves And winds I call unceasing: hold not back Thy willing troops, but let them dare the sea; Here gladly shall they come to join my camp, Though risking shipwreck. Not in equal shares The world has fallen between us: thou alone Dost hold Italia, but Epirus I And all the lords of Rome." Twice called and thrice Antonius lingered still: but Caesar thought To reap in full the favour of the gods, Not sit supine; and knowing danger yields To whom heaven favours, he upon the waves Feared by Antonius' fleets, in shallow boat Embarked, and daring sought the further shore.
Now gentle night had brought repose from arms; And sleep, blest guardian of the poor man's couch, Restored the weary; and the camp was still. The hour was come that called the second watch When mighty Caesar, in the silence vast With cautious tread advanced to such a deed (29) As slaves should dare not. Fortune for his guide, Alone he passes on, and o'er the guard Stretched in repose he leaps, in secret wrath At such a sleep. Pacing the winding beach, Fast to a sea-worn rock he finds a boat On ocean's marge afloat. Hard by on shore Its master dwelt within his humble home. No solid front it reared, for sterile rush And marshy reed enwoven formed the walls, Propped by a shallop with its bending sides Turned upwards. Caesar's hand upon the door Knocks twice and thrice until the fabric shook. Amyclas from his couch of soft seaweed Arising, calls: "What shipwrecked sailor seeks My humble home? Who hopes for aid from me, By fates adverse compelled?" He stirs the heap Upon the hearth, until a tiny spark Glows in the darkness, and throws wide the door. Careless of war, he knew that civil strife Stoops not to cottages. Oh! happy life That poverty affords! great gift of heaven Too little understood! what mansion wall, What temple of the gods, would feel no fear When Caesar called for entrance? Then the chief: "Enlarge thine hopes and look for better things. Do but my bidding, and on yonder shore Place me, and thou shalt cease from one poor boat To earn thy living; and in years to come Look for a rich old age: and trust thy fates To those high gods whose wont it is to bless The poor with sudden plenty." So he spake E'en at such time in accents of command, For how could Caesar else? Amyclas said, "'Twere dangerous to brave the deep to-night. The sun descended not in ruddy clouds Or peaceful rays to rest; part of his beams Presaged a southern gale, the rest proclaimed A northern tempest; and his middle orb, Shorn of its strength, permitted human eyes To gaze upon his grandeur; and the moon Rose not with silver horns upon the night Nor pure in middle space; her slender points Not drawn aright, but blushing with the track Of raging tempests, till her lurid light Was sadly veiled within the clouds. Again The forest sounds; the surf upon the shore; The dolphin's mood, uncertain where to play; The sea-mew on the land; the heron used To wade among the shallows, borne aloft And soaring on his wings -- all these alarm; The raven, too, who plunged his head in spray, As if to anticipate the coming rain, And trod the margin with unsteady gait. But if the cause demands, behold me thine. Either we reach the bidden shore, or else Storm and the deep forbid -- we can no more."
Thus said he loosed the boat and raised the sail. No sooner done than stars were seen to fall In flaming furrows from the sky: nay, more; The pole star trembled in its place on high: Black horror marked the surging of the sea; The main was boiling in long tracts of foam, Uncertain of the wind, yet seized with storm. Then spake the captain of the trembling bark: "See what remorseless ocean has in store! Whether from east or west the storm may come Is still uncertain, for as yet confused The billows tumble. Judged by clouds and sky A western tempest: by the murmuring deep A wild south-eastern gale shall sweep the sea. Nor bark nor man shall reach Hesperia's shore In this wild rage of waters. To return Back on our course forbidden by the gods, Is our one refuge, and with labouring boat To reach the shore ere yet the nearest land Way be too distant."
But great Caesar's trust
Was in himself, to make all dangers yield. And thus he answered: "Scorn the threatening sea, Spread out thy canvas to the raging wind; If for thy pilot thou refusest heaven, Me in its stead receive. Alone in thee One cause of terror just -- thou dost not know Thy comrade, ne'er deserted by the gods, Whom fortune blesses e'en without a prayer. Break through the middle storm and trust in me. The burden of this fight fails not on us But on the sky and ocean; and our bark Shall swim the billows safe in him it bears. Nor shall the wind rage long: the boat itself Shall calm the waters. Flee the nearest shore, Steer for the ocean with unswerving hand: Then in the deep, when to our ship and us No other port is given, believe thou hast Calabria's harbours. And dost thou not know The purpose of such havoc? Fortune seeks In all this tumult of the sea and sky A boon for Caesar." Then a hurricane Swooped on the boat and tore away the sheet: The fluttering sail fell on the fragile mast: And groaned the joints. From all the universe Commingled perils rush. In Atlas' seas First Corus (30) lifts his head, and stirs the depths To fury, and had forced upon the rocks Whole seas and oceans; but the chilly north Drove back the deep that doubted which was lord. But Scythian Aquilo prevailed, whose blast Tossed up the main and showed as shallow pools Each deep abyss; and yet was not the sea Heaped on the crags, for Corus' billows met The waves of Boreas: such seas had clashed Even were the winds withdrawn; Eurus enraged Burst from the cave, and Notus black with rain, And all the winds from every part of heaven Strove for their own; and thus the ocean stayed Within his boundaries. No petty seas Rapt in the storm are whirled. The Tuscan deep Invades th' Aegean; in Ionian gulfs Sounds wandering Hadria. How long the crags Which that day fell, the Ocean's blows had braved! What lofty peaks did vanquished earth resign! And yet on yonder coast such mighty waves Took not their rise; from distant regions came Those monster billows, driven on their course By that great current which surrounds the world. (31) Thus did the King of Heaven, when length of years Wore out the forces of his thunder, call His brother's trident to his help, what time The earth and sea one second kingdom formed And ocean knew no limit but the sky. Now, too, the sea had risen to the stars In mighty mass, had not Olympus' chief Pressed down its waves with clouds: came not from heaven That night, as others; but the murky air Was dim with pallor of the realms below; (32) The sky lay on the deep; within the clouds The waves received the rain: the lightning flash Clove through the parted air a path obscured By mist and darkness: and the heavenly vaults Re-echoed to the tumult, and the frame That holds the sky was shaken. Nature feared Chaos returned, as though the elements Had burst their bonds, and night had come to mix Th' infernal shades with heaven.
In such turmoil
Not to have perished was their only hope. Far as from Leucas point the placid main Spreads to the horizon, from the billow's crest They viewed the dashing of th' infuriate sea; Thence sinking to the middle trough, their mast Scarce topped the watery height on either hand, Their sails in clouds, their keel upon the ground. For all the sea was piled into the waves, And drawn from depths between laid bare the sand. The master of the boat forgot his art, For fear o'ercame; he knew not where to yield Or where to meet the wave: but safety came From ocean's self at war: one billow forced The vessel under, but a huger wave Repelled it upwards, and she rode the storm Through every blast triumphant. Not the shore Of humble Sason (33), nor Thessalia's coast Indented, not Ambracia's scanty ports Dismay the sailors, but the giddy tops Of high Ceraunia's cliffs.
But Caesar now,
Thinking the peril worthy of his fates: "Are such the labours of the gods?" exclaimed, "Bent on my downfall have they sought me thus, Here in this puny skiff in such a sea? If to the deep the glory of my fall Is due, and not to war, intrepid still Whatever death they send shall strike me down. Let fate cut short the deeds that I would do And hasten on the end: the past is mine. The northern nations fell beneath my sword; My dreaded name compels the foe to flee. Pompeius yields me place; the people's voice Gave at my order what the wars denied. And all the titles which denote the powers Known to the Roman state my name shall bear. Let none know this but thou who hear'st my prayers, Fortune, that Caesar summoned to the shades, Dictator, Consul, full of honours, died Ere his last prize was won. I ask no pomp Of pyre or funeral; let my body lie Mangled beneath the waves: I leave a name That men shall dread in ages yet to come And all the earth shall honour." Thus he spake, When lo! a tenth gigantic billow raised The feeble keel, and where between the rocks A cleft gave safety, placed it on the shore. Thus in a moment fortune, kingdoms, lands, Once more were Caesar's.
But on his return
When daylight came, he entered not the camp Silent as when he parted; for his friends Soon pressed around him, and with weeping eyes In accents welcome to his ears began: "Whither in reckless daring hast thou gone, Unpitying Caesar? Were these humble lives Left here unguarded while thy limbs were given, Unsought for, to be scattered by the storm? When on thy breath so many nations hang For life and safety, and so great a world Calls thee its master, to have courted death Proves want of heart. Was none of all thy friends Deserving held to join his fate with thine? When thou wast tossed upon the raging deep We lay in slumber! Shame upon such sleep! And why thyself didst seek Italia's shores? 'Twere cruel (such thy thought) to speak the word That bade another dare the furious sea. All men must bear what chance or fate may bring, The sudden peril and the stroke of death; But shall the ruler of the world attempt The raging ocean? With incessant prayers Why weary heaven? is it indeed enough To crown the war, that Fortune and the deep Have cast thee on our shores? And would'st thou use The grace of favouring deities, to gain Not lordship, not the empire of the world, But lucky shipwreck!" Night dispersed, and soon The sun beamed on them, and the wearied deep, The winds permitting, lulled its waves to rest. And when Antonius saw a breeze arise Fresh from a cloudless heaven, to break the sea, He loosed his ships which, by the pilots' hands And by the wind in equal order held, Swept as a marching host across the main. But night unfriendly from the seamen snatched All governance of sail, parting the ships In divers paths asunder. Like as cranes Deserting frozen Strymon for the streams Of Nile, when winter falls, in casual lines Of wedge-like figures (34) first ascend the sky; But when in loftier heaven the southern breeze Strikes on their pinions tense, in loose array Dispersed at large, in flight irregular, They wing their journey onwards. Stronger winds With day returning blew the navy on, Past Lissus' shelter which they vainly sought, Till bare to northern blasts, Nymphaeum's port, But safe in southern, gave the fleet repose, For favouring winds came on.
When Magnus knew
That Caesar's troops were gathered in their strength And that the war for quick decision called Before his camp, Cornelia he resolved To send to Lesbos' shore, from rage of fight Safe and apart: so lifting from his soul The weight that burdened it. Thus, lawful Love. Thus art thou tyrant o'er the mightiest mind! His spouse was the one cause why Magnus stayed Nor met his fortunes, though he staked the world And all the destinies of Rome. The word He speaks not though resolved; so sweet it seemed, When on the future pondering, to gain A pause from Fate! But at the close of night, When drowsy sleep had fled, Cornelia sought To soothe the anxious bosom of her lord And win his kisses. Then amazed she saw His cheek was tearful, and with boding soul She shrank instinctive from the hidden wound, Nor dared to rouse him weeping. But he spake: "Dearer to me than life itself, when life Is happy (not at moments such as these); The day of sorrow comes, too long delayed, Nor long enough! With Caesar at our gates With all his forces, a secure retreat Shall Lesbos give thee. Try me not with prayers. This fatal boon I have denied myself. Thou wilt not long be absent from thy lord. Disasters hasten, and things highest fall With speediest ruin. 'Tis enough for thee To hear of Magnus' peril; and thy love (35) Deceives thee with the thought that thou canst gaze Unmoved on civil strife. It shames my soul On the eve of war to slumber at thy side, And rise from thy dear breast when trumpets call A woeful world to misery and arms. I fear in civil war to feel no loss To Magnus. Meantime safer than a king Lie hid, nor let the fortune of thy lord Whelm thee with all its weight. If unkind heaven Our armies rout, still let my choicest part Survive in thee; if fated is my flight, Still leave me that whereto I fain would flee."
Hardly at first her senses grasped the words In their full misery; then her mind amazed Could scarce find utterance for the grief that pressed. "Nought, Magnus, now is left wherewith to upbraid The gods and fates of marriage; 'tis not death That parts our love, nor yet the funeral pyre, Nor that dread torch which marks the end of all. I share the ignoble lot of vulgar lives: My spouse rejects me. Yes, the foe is come! Break we our bonds and Julia's sire appease! -- Is this thy consort, Magnus, this thy faith In her fond loving heart? Can danger fright Her and not thee? Long since our mutual fates Hang by one chain; and dost thou bid me now The thunder-bolts of ruin to withstand Without thee? Is it well that I should die Even while you pray for fortune? And suppose I flee from evil and with death self-sought Follow thy footsteps to the realms below -- Am I to live till to that distant isle Some tardy rumour of thy fall may come? Add that thou fain by use would'st give me strength To bear such sorrow and my doom. Forgive Thy wife confessing that she fears the power. And if my prayers shall bring the victory, The joyful tale shall come to me the last In that lone isle of rocks. When all are glad, My heart shall throb with anguish, and the sail Which brings the message I shall see with fear, Not safe e'en then: for Caesar in his flight Might seize me there, abandoned and alone To be his hostage. If thou place me there, The spouse of Magnus, shall not all the world Well know the secret Mitylene holds? This my last prayer: if all is lost but flight, And thou shalt seek the ocean, to my shores Turn not thy keel, ill-fated one: for there, There will they seek thee." Thus she spoke distraught, Leaped from the couch and rushed upon her fate; No stop nor stay: she clung not to his neck Nor threw her arms about him; both forego The last caress, the last fond pledge of love, And grief rushed in unchecked upon their souls; Still gazing as they part no final words Could either utter, and the sweet Farewell Remained unspoken. This the saddest day Of all their lives: for other woes that came More gently struck on hearts inured to grief. Borne to the shore with failing limbs she fell And grasped the sands, embracing, till at last Her maidens placed her senseless in the ship.
Not in such grief she left her country's shores When Caesar's host drew near; for now she leaves, Though faithful to her lord, his side in flight And flees her spouse. All that next night she waked; Then first what means a widowed couch she knew, Its cold, its solitude. When slumber found Her eyelids, and forgetfulness her soul, Seeking with outstretched arms the form beloved, She grasps but air. Though tossed by restless love, She leaves a place beside her as for him Returning. Yet she feared Pompeius lost To her for ever. But the gods ordained Worse than her fears, and in the hour of woe Gave her to look upon his face again.
ENDNOTES: (1) The Pleiades, said to be daughters of Atlas. (2) These were the Consuls for the expiring year, B.C. 49 -- Caius Marcellus and L. Lentulus Crus. (3) That is to say, Caesar's Senate at Rome could boast of those Senators only whom it had, before Pompeius' flight, declared public enemies. But they were to be regarded as exiles, having lost their rights, rather than the Senators in Epirus, who were in full possession of theirs. (4) Dean Merivale says that probably Caesar's Senate was not less numerous than his rival's. Duruy says there were senators in Pompeius' camp, out of a total of between 500 and 600. Mommsen says, "they were veritably emigrants. This Roman Coblentz presented a pitiful spectacle of the high pretensions and paltry performances of the grandees of Rome." (Vol. iv., p. 397.) Almost all the Consulars were with Pompeius. (5) By the will of Ptolemy Auletes, Cleopatra had been appointed joint sovereign of Egypt with her young brother. Lucan means that Caesar would have killed Pompeius if young Ptolemy had not done so. She lost her hare of the kingdom, and Caesar was clear of the crime. (6) Appius was Proconsul, and in command of Achaia, for the Senate. (7) See Book IV., 82. (8) Themis, the goddess of law, was in possession of the Delphic oracle, previous to Apollo. (Aesch., "Eumenides", line 2.) (9) The modern isle of Ischia, off the Bay of Naples. (10) The Tyrians consulted the oracle in consequence of the earthquakes which vexed their country (Book III., line 225), and were told to found colonies. (11) See Herodotus, Book VII., 140-143. The reference is to the answer given by the oracle to the Athenians that their wooden walls would keep them safe; which Themistocles interpreted as meaning their fleet. (12) Cicero, on the contrary, suggests that the reason why the oracles ceased was this, that men became less credulous. ("De Div.", ii., 57) Lecky, "History of European Morals from Augustus to Charlemagne", vol. i., p. 368. (13) This name is one of those given to the Cumaean Sibyl mentioned at line 210. She was said to have been the daughter of Apollo. (14) Probably by the Gauls under Brennus, B.C. 279. (15) These lines form the Latin motto prefixed to Shelley's poem, "The Demon of the World". (16) Referring to the visit of Aeneas to the Sibyl. (Virgil, "Aeneid", vi., 70, &c.) (17) Appius was seized with fever as soon as he reached the spot; and there he died and was buried, thus fulfilling the oracle. (18) That is, Nemesis. (19) Reading "galeam", with Francken; not "glebam". (20) Labienus left Caesar's ranks after the Rubicon was crossed, and joined his rival. In his mouth Lucan puts the speech made at the oracle of Hammon in Book IX. He was slain at Munda, B.C. 45. (21) That is, civilians; no longer soldiers. This one contemptuous expression is said to have shocked and abashed the army. (Tacitus, "Annals", I., 42.) (22) Reading "tenet", with Hosius and Francken; not "timet", as Haskins. The prospect of inflicting punishment attracted, while the suffering of it subdued, the mutineers. (23) Caesar was named Dictator while at Massilia. Entering Rome, he held the office for eleven days only, but was elected Consul for the incoming year, B.C. 48, along with Servilius Isauricus. (Caesar, "De Bello Civili", iii., 1; Merivale, chapter xvi.) (24) In the time of the Empire, the degraded Consulship, preserved only as a name, was frequently transferred monthly, or even shorter, intervals from one favourite to another. (25) Caesar performed the solemn rites of the great Latin festival on the Alban Mount during his Dictatorship. (Compare Book VII., line 471.) (26) Dyrrhachium was founded by the Corcyreams, with whom the Homeric Phaeacians have been identified. (27) Apparently making the Danube discharge into the Sea of Azov. See Mr. Heitland's Introduction, p. 53. (28) At the foot of the Acroceraunian range. (29) Caesar himself says nothing of this adventure. But it is mentioned by Dion, Appian and Plutarch ("Caesar", 38). Dean Merivale thinks the story may have been invented to introduce the apophthegm used by Caesar to the sailor, "Fear nothing: you carry Caesar and his fortunes" (lines 662-665). Mommsen accepts the story, as of an attempt which was only abandoned because no mariner could be induced to undertake it. Lucan colours it with his wildest and most exaggerated hyperbole. (30) See Book I., 463. (31) The ocean current, which, according to Hecataeus, surrounded the world. But Herodotus of this theory says, "For my part I know of no river called Ocean, and I think that Homer or one of the earlier poets invented the name and introduced it into his poetry." (Book II., 23, and Book IV., 36.) In "Oceanus" Aeschylus seems to have intended to personify the great surrounding stream. ("Prom. Vinc.", lines 291, 308.) (32) Comp. VI., 615. (33) Sason is a small island just off the Ceraunian rocks, the point of which is now called Cape Linguetta, and is nearly opposite to Brindisi. (34) Compare "Paradise Lost", VII., 425. (35) Reading "Teque tuus decepit amor", as preferred by Hosius.
BOOK VI
THE FIGHT NEAR DYRRHACHIUM. SCAEVA'S EXPLOITS. THE WITCH OF THESSALIA
Now that the chiefs with minds intent on fight Had drawn their armies near upon the hills And all the gods beheld their chosen pair, Caesar, the Grecian towns despising, scorned To reap the glory of successful war Save at his kinsman's cost. In all his prayers He seeks that moment, fatal to the world, When shall be cast the die, to win or lose, And all his fortune hang upon the throw. Thrice he drew out his troops, his eagles thrice, Demanding battle; thus to increase the woe Of Latium, prompt as ever: but his foes, Proof against every art, refused to leave The rampart of their camp. Then marching swift By hidden path between the wooded fields He seeks, and hopes to seize, Dyrrhachium's (1) fort; But Magnus, speeding by the ocean marge, First camped on Petra's slopes, a rocky hill Thus by the natives named. From thence he keeps Watch o'er the fortress of Corinthian birth Which by its towers alone without a guard Was safe against a siege. No hand of man In ancient days built up her lofty wall, No hammer rang upon her massive stones: Not all the works of war, nor Time himself Shall undermine her. Nature's hand has raised Her adamantine rocks and hedged her in With bulwarks girded by the foamy main: And but for one short bridge of narrow earth Dyrrhachium were an island. Steep and fierce, Dreaded of sailors, are the cliffs that bear Her walls; and tempests, howling from the west, Toss up the raging main upon the roofs; And homes and temples tremble at the shock.
Thirsting for battle and with hopes inflamed Here Caesar hastes, with distant rampart lines Seeking unseen to coop his foe within, Though spread in spacious camp upon the hills. With eagle eye he measures out the land Meet to be compassed, nor content with turf Fit for a hasty mound, he bids his troops Tear from the quarries many a giant rock: And spoils the dwellings of the Greeks, and drags Their walls asunder for his own. Thus rose A mighty barrier which no ram could burst Nor any ponderous machine of war. Mountains are cleft, and level through the hills The work of Caesar strides: wide yawns the moat, Forts show their towers rising on the heights, And in vast circle forests are enclosed And groves and spacious lands, and beasts of prey, As in a line of toils. Pompeius lacked Nor field nor forage in th' encircled span Nor room to move his camp; nay, rivers rose Within, and ran their course and reached the sea; And Caesar wearied ere he saw the whole, And daylight failed him. Let the ancient tale Attribute to the labours of the gods The walls of Ilium: let the fragile bricks Which compass in great Babylon, amaze The fleeting Parthian. Here a larger space Than those great cities which Orontes swift And Tigris' stream enclose, or that which boasts In Eastern climes, the lordly palaces Fit for Assyria's kings, is closed by walls Amid the haste and tumult of a war Forced to completion. Yet this labour huge Was spent in vain. So many hands had joined Or Sestos with Abydos, or had tamed With mighty mole the Hellespontine wave, Or Corinth from the realm of Pelops' king Had rent asunder, or had spared each ship Her voyage round the long Malean cape, Or had done anything most hard, to change The world's created surface. Here the war Was prisoned: blood predestinate to flow In all the parts of earth; the host foredoomed To fall in Libya or in Thessaly Was here: in such small amphitheatre The tide of civil passion rose and fell.
At first Pompeius knew not: so the hind Who peaceful tills the mid-Sicilian fields Hears not Pelorous (2) sounding to the storm; So billows thunder on Rutupian shores (3), Unheard by distant Caledonia's tribes. But when he saw the mighty barrier stretch O'er hill and valley, and enclose the land, He bade his columns leave their rocky hold And seize on posts of vantage in the plain; Thus forcing Caesar to extend his troops On wider lines; and holding for his own Such space encompassed as divides from Rome Aricia, (4) sacred to that goddess chaste Of old Mycenae; or as Tiber holds From Rome's high ramparts to the Tuscan sea, Unless he deviate. No bugle call Commands an onset, and the darts that fly Fly though forbidden; but the arm that flings For proof the lance, at random, here and there Deals impious slaughter. Weighty care compelled Each leader to withhold his troops from fight; For there the weary earth of produce failed Pressed by Pompeius' steeds, whose horny hoofs Rang in their gallop on the grassy fields And killed the succulence. They strengthless lay Upon the mown expanse, nor pile of straw, Brought from full barns in place of living grass, Relieved their craving; shook their panting flanks, And as they wheeled Death struck his victim down. Then foul contagion filled the murky air Whose poisonous weight pressed on them in a cloud Pestiferous; as in Nesis' isle (5) the breath Of Styx rolls upwards from the mist-clad rocks; Or that fell vapour which the caves exhale From Typhon (6) raging in the depths below. Then died the soldiers, for the streams they drank Held yet more poison than the air: the skin Was dark and rigid, and the fiery plague Made hard their vitals, and with pitiless tooth Gnawed at their wasted features, while their eyes Started from out their sockets, and the head Drooped for sheer weariness. So the disease Grew swifter in its strides till scarce was room, 'Twixt life and death, for sickness, and the pest Slew as it struck its victim, and the dead Thrust from the tents (such all their burial) lay Blent with the living. Yet their camp was pitched Hard by the breezy sea by which might come All nations' harvests, and the northern wind Not seldom rolled the murky air away. Their foe, not vexed with pestilential air Nor stagnant waters, ample range enjoyed Upon the spacious uplands: yet as though In leaguer, famine seized them for its prey. Scarce were the crops half grown when Caesar saw How prone they seized upon the food of beasts, And stripped of leaves the bushes and the groves, And dragged from roots unknown the doubtful herb. Thus ate they, starving, all that teeth may bite Or fire might soften, or might pass their throats Dry, parched, abraded; food unknown before Nor placed on tables: while the leaguered foe Was blessed with plenty.
When Pompeius first
Was pleased to break his bonds and be at large, No sudden dash he makes on sleeping foe Unarmed in shade of night; his mighty soul Scorns such a path to victory. 'Twas his aim, To lay the turrets low; to mark his track, By ruin spread afar; and with the sword To hew a path between his slaughtered foes. Minucius' (7) turret was the chosen spot Where groves of trees and thickets gave approach Safe, unbetrayed by dust.
Up from the fields