HKB
She said. The faithful nymph descends from high With rapid flight, and cuts the sounding sky: Black clouds and stormy winds around her body fly.
By this, the Trojan and the Tuscan horse, Drawn up in squadrons, with united force, Approach the walls: the sprightly coursers bound, Press forward on their bits, and shift their ground. Shields, arms, and spears flash horribly from far; And the fields glitter with a waving war. Oppos’d to these, come on with furious force Messapus, Coras, and the Latian horse; These in the body plac’d, on either hand Sustain’d and clos’d by fair Camilla’s band. Advancing in a line, they couch their spears; And less and less the middle space appears. Thick smoke obscures the field; and scarce are seen The neighing coursers, and the shouting men. In distance of their darts they stop their course; Then man to man they rush, and horse to horse. The face of heav’n their flying jav’lins hide, And deaths unseen are dealt on either side. Tyrrhenus, and Aconteus, void of fear, By mettled coursers borne in full career, Meet first oppos’d; and, with a mighty shock, Their horses’ heads against each other knock. Far from his steed is fierce Aconteus cast, As with an engine’s force, or lightning’s blast: He rolls along in blood, and breathes his last. The Latin squadrons take a sudden fright, And sling their shields behind, to save their backs in flight Spurring at speed to their own walls they drew; Close in the rear the Tuscan troops pursue, And urge their flight: Asylas leads the chase; Till, seiz’d, with shame, they wheel about and face, Receive their foes, and raise a threat’ning cry. The Tuscans take their turn to fear and fly. So swelling surges, with a thund’ring roar, Driv’n on each other’s backs, insult the shore, Bound o’er the rocks, incroach upon the land, And far upon the beach eject the sand; Then backward, with a swing, they take their way, Repuls’d from upper ground, and seek their mother sea; With equal hurry quit th’ invaded shore, And swallow back the sand and stones they spew’d before.
Twice were the Tuscans masters of the field, Twice by the Latins, in their turn, repell’d. Asham’d at length, to the third charge they ran; Both hosts resolv’d, and mingled man to man. Now dying groans are heard; the fields are strow’d With falling bodies, and are drunk with blood. Arms, horses, men, on heaps together lie: Confus’d the fight, and more confus’d the cry. Orsilochus, who durst not press too near Strong Remulus, at distance drove his spear, And stuck the steel beneath his horse’s ear. The fiery steed, impatient of the wound, Curvets, and, springing upward with a bound, His helpless lord cast backward on the ground. Catillus pierc’d Iolas first; then drew His reeking lance, and at Herminius threw, The mighty champion of the Tuscan crew. His neck and throat unarm’d, his head was bare, But shaded with a length of yellow hair: Secure, he fought, expos’d on ev’ry part, A spacious mark for swords, and for the flying dart. Across the shoulders came the feather’d wound; Transfix’d he fell, and doubled to the ground. The sands with streaming blood are sanguine dyed, And death with honour sought on either side.