Meantime the bright constellation of the Dolphin rises above the sea, and from his native waters puts forth his face.
IV. Id. 10th
The morrow marks midwinter; what remains of winter will be equal to what has gone before.
III. Id. 11th
When next Aurora quits Tithonus’ couch, she shall behold the rite pontifical of the Arcadian goddess. Thee, too, sister of Turnus, the same morn enshrined at the spot where the Virgin Water circles the Field of Mars. Whence shall I learn the causes and manner of these rites? Who will pilot my bark in mid ocean? Thyself, enlighten me, O thou (Carmentis), who dost take thy name from song (carmen) be kind to my emprise, lest I should fail to give thee honour due. The land that rose before the moon (if we may take its word for it) derives its name from the great Areas. In that land Evander was, who, though illustrious on both sides, yet was the nobler for the blood of his sacred mother (Carmentis), who, soon as her soul conceived the heavenly fire, chanted with swelling voice true strains divine. She had foretold that troubles were at hand for her son and for herself, and much beside she had forecast, which time proved true. Too true, indeed, the mother proved when, banished with her, the youth forsook Arcadia and the god of his Parrhasian home. He wept, but she, his mother, said, “Check, prithee, thy tears; bear like a man thy fortune. ’Twas fated so; no fault of thine has banished thee, the deed is God’s; an offended god has driven thee from the city. What thou dost endure is not the punishment of sin but heaven’s ire: in great misfortunes it is something to be unstained by crime. As each man’s conscience is, so doth it, for his deeds, conceive within his breast or hope or fear. Nor mourn these sufferings as if thou wert the first to suffer; such storms have whelmed the mighty.
Cadmus endured the same, he, who of old, driven from Tyrian coasts, halted an exile on Aonian soil. Tydeus endured the same, and Pagasaean Jason too, and others more of whom it were long to tell. Every land is to the brave his country, as to the fish the sea, as to the bird whatever place stands open in the void world. Nor does the wild tempest rage the whole year long; for thee, too, trust me, there will be springtime yet.” Cheered by his parent’s words, Evander cleft in his ship the billows and made the Hesperian land. And now at sage Carmentis’ bidding he had steered his bark into a river and was stemming the Tuscan stream. Carmentis spied the river bank, where it is bordered by Tarentum’s shallow pool; she also spied the huts dotted about these solitudes. And even as she was, with streaming hair she stood before the poop and sternly stayed the steersman’s hand; then stretching out her arms to the right bank, she thrice stamped wildly on the pinewood deck. Hardly, yea hardly did Evander hold her back from leaping in her haste to land. “All hail!” she cried, “Gods of the Promised Land! And hail I thou country that shalt give new gods to heaven! Hail rivers and fountains, which to this hospitable land pertain! Hail nymphs of the groves and bands of Naiads! May the sight of you be of good omen to my son and me! And happy be the foot that touches yonder bank! Am I deceived? or shall yon hills by stately walls be hid, and from this spot of earth shall all the earth take law? The promise runs that the whole world shall one day belong to yonder mountains.
Who could believe that the place was big with such a fate? Anon Dardanian barks shall ground upon these shores: here, too, a woman shall be the source of a new war. Pallas, my grandson dear, why don those fatal arms? Ah, put them on! By no mean champion shalt thou be avenged. Howbeit, conquered Troy, thou shalt yet conquer and from thy fall shalt rise again: thy very ruin shall o’erwhelm the dwellings of thy foes. Ye conquering flames, consume Neptunian Pergamum! Shall that prevent its ashes from o’ertopping all the world? Anon pious Aeneas shall hither bring his sacred burden, and, burden no whit less sacred, his own sire; Vesta, admit the gods of Ilium! The time will come when the same hand shall guard you and the world, and when a god shall in his own person hold the sacred rites. In the line of Augustus the guardianship of the fatherland shall abide: it is decreed that his house shall hold the reins of empire. Thereafter the god’s son and grandson, despite his ovni refusal, shall support with heavenly mind the weight his father bore; and even as I myself shall one day be sanctified at eternal altars, so shall Julia Augusta be a new divinity.” When in these words she had brought her story down to our own time, her prophetic tongue stopped short at the middle of her discourse. Landing from his ships, Evander stood an exile on the Latian sward, fortunate indeed to have that ground for place of exile! But little time elapsed until new dwellings rose, and of all the Ausonian mounts not one surpassed the Arcadian.
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