The triple dog had never felt his chain,
Nor Styx been crossed, nor hell explored in vain.
Averse to me of all his heaven of gods,
At Thetis' suit the partial Thunderer nods.
To grace her gloomy, fierce, resenting son,
My hopes are frustrate, and my Greeks undone.
Some future day, perhaps, he may be moved
To call his blue-eyed Maid his best-beloved.
Haste, launch thy chariot, through yon ranks to ride;
Myself will arm, and thunder at thy side.
Then, goddess! say, shall Hector glory then,
That terror of the Greeks, that man of men,
When Juno's self, and Pallas shall appear,
All dreadful in the crimson walks of war?
What mighty Trojan[1] then, on yonder shore,
Expiring, pale, and terrible no more,
Shall feast the fowls, and glut the dogs with gore?"
She ceased, and Juno reined the steeds with care,
Heaven's awful empress, Saturn's other heir:
Pallas, meanwhile, her various veil unbound,
With flowers adorned, with art immortal crowned;
The radiant robe her sacred fingers wove
Floats in rich waves, and spreads the court of Jove.
Her father's arms her mighty limbs invest,
His cuirass blazes on her ample breast.
The vigorous Power the trembling car ascends;
Shook by her arm, the massy javelin bends;
Huge, ponderous, strong, that, when her fury burns,
Proud tyrants humbles, and whole hosts o'erturns.
Saturnia lends the lash; the coursers fly;
Smooth glides the chariot through the liquid sky.
Heaven's gates spontaneous open to the powers,
Heaven's golden gates, kept by the winged Hours:
Commissioned in alternate watch they stand,
The sun's bright portals and the skies command;
Close or unfold the eternal gates of day,
Bar heaven with clouds, or roll those clouds away:
The sounding hinges ring, the clouds divide;
Prone down the steep of heaven their course they guide.
But Jove, incensed, from Ida's top surveyed,
And thus enjoined the many-coloured Maid:
"Thaumantia! mount the winds, and stop their ear;
Against the highest who shall wage the war?
If furious yet they dare the vain debate,
Thus have I spoke, and what I speak is fate.
Their coursers crushed beneath the wheels shall lie,
- ↑ Hector is meant. The goddess seems to shrink from directly predicting the death of a hero whom her father so manifestly favoured.
