Page:The Aeneid of Virgil JOHN CONINGTON 1917 V2.pdf/180

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his realm in the sky. I saw too Salmoneus, smitten with cruel vengeance, while mimicking the fires of Jove and the rumblings of Olympus. Borne in a four-horse car, a flaring torch in hand, he was making his triumphal progress 5 through the tribes of Greece, and the midst of Elis' city, and bidding men accord him a god's homage. Madman! to counterfeit the storm-cloud and the unrivalled thunderbolt with the rattle of brass and the beat of horses' horny hoofs. But the almighty sire from the depth of his cloudy dwelling hurled his weapon—no 10 futile firebrand his, no pinewood's smoky glare—and dashed him headlong down with that tremendous blast. Tityos, too, the foster-child of Earth's common breast, it was mine to see: his body lies extended over nine whole acres, and there is a monstrous vulture with hooked beak 15 shearing away his imperishable liver, and reaping a harvest of suffering from his vitals, as it digs deep for its meal, and burrows in the cavern of his breast, nor gives the new-growing filaments rest or respite. What need to tell of the Lapithæ, of Ixion and Pirithous—men who live 20 under a black crag, ever falling, and just in act to drop? The lofty couch is spread for the banquet, and the pillar of gold gleams underneath: the feast is before them, served in kingly luxury; but the eldest of the Furies is couched at their side: she will not let them stretch a hand 25 to the board: she starts up with torch uplifted and thunder in her tones. Here are they who lived in hatred with their brethren while life yet was; who smote a parent or wove for a client the web of fraud; who gained a treasure and brooded over it alone, and never shared it 30 with their kin—a mighty number these—adulterers, who were slain for their crime; citizens who followed the standard of treason; slaves who shrunk not from breaking their troth to their lords: all in prison awaiting their doom. Ask not what doom is theirs, what 35 phase, what fate has whelmed them so deep. Others roll the huge stone up the hill, or hang dispread from the spokes of the wheel: there sits, as he will sit for ever-