canvas on which the younger artist might work; but the tale of Troy taken forms no part of the narrative of the Odyssey; it is briefly sung by a bard, whose strains move the tears of Ulysses, as the Trojan portraits of Carthage have moved those of Aeneas; but that is all. It was open to Virgil to make his hero tell the whole story of the destruction of Troy without trespassing on Homer's ground; and he seized the opportunity. The subject could not fail to be most impressive, and it is introduced with perfect propriety. Dido, it is true, knew the main incidents of the siege; but for that very reason she would wish to hear them from the chief living witness on the side of Troy. Virgil, too, has shown his wisdom not only in what he has said, but in what he has left unsaid. Dido's curiosity would naturally extend over the whole ten years; but the poet knew that a detail of the siege, natural as it might be, would weary his readers. He tells us that the queen asked of Priam and Hector, of Diomedes and Achilles ; but he does not require us to listen to Aeneas till he can concentrate our attention on "the last agony of Troy," the one night in which the city was taken and sacked.

ARGUMENT.

AENEAS, in compliance with Dido's request, details the particulars of the capture of Troy, so far as he had witnessed them. After expressing reluctance to fight his disagreeable battles over again, the hero goes on to tell of the despondency of the Greeks in the tenth year of the war, together with their stratagem of the horse. Lurking in Tenedos, they send a cunning fellow, Sinon, to prepare the way for the reception of the wooden horse, which they pretended to be a return for the stolen Palladium. The Trojans are credulous, and believe the whole, but Laocoon sees through the deceit, and exposes it. His warnings, however, are vain; and he is himself slain by two serpents sent against him by Minerva (1-249). The Greeks return from Tenedos, the horse is opened, and the city is taken (250-267). Aeneas is warned by Hector's shade to consult for his safety, but he is too valiant to follow the suggestion before he has tried what might can do. He makes an attempt, and is for a while successful, till, having assumed the armor of some Greeks, whom they had slain, his associates are mistaken by the Trojans, and many of them killed by their own friends (268-437). Then follows the sack of Priam's palace, and the murder of the king himself (438-558). Aeneas, on his way homeward to save his father, is prevented from slaying Helen by a vision (559-631). Anchises refuses to seek safety, but at last, encouraged by heavenly signs, consents (632 - 704). The flight (705

735). Creusa, the wife of Aeneas, is lost in the confusion (736–746). Aeneas, returning in search of her to the city, finds it wholly occupied by the Greeks (747-767). The ghost of Creusa appears to him, consoles, and counsels him to depart (768–794). He returns to his father and followers, and takes shelter in Mount Ida (795 – 804).

=

1. Conticuere... tenebant. Mark the change of tense, and also the intense interest expressed by intenti. — 2. Toro; the couch on which he was reclining at the banquet. 3. Infandum. See on I. 525. Notice the emphatic position of the word. -4. Ut (= how. See on I. 466) follows renovare dolorem, which is practically equivalent to narrare. Translate: to revive unutterable sorrow by relating how, &c. Lamentabile is proleptic. - 5. Quaeque and (the things) which. The clause is epexegetical of dolorem, which is first explained generally by the clause Trojanas... Danai, and then limited to the scenes which Aeneas witnessed and those in which he took an active part. — 6. Fando= in the course of speaking, while uttering. Gr. 566. 3; 426 and 1. A. & S. 275, R. 4, N. 2; 253 and N. 1. — 7. Myrmidonum Dolopumve; with quis, not miles. The Myrmidones and Dolopes were the soldiers of. Achilles. So the epithet duri is intended to mark the soldier by the general. Ulixd. Gr. 69. 5. A. & S. 73, R. Ulysses, the son of Laertes and Anticlea, king of the islands of Ithaca and Dulichium, and the husband of Penelope, was distinguished among the Grecian chiefs for superior prudence and cunning. He is the hero of Homer's Odyssey. 8. Temperet (sc. sibi) = could refrain. Gr. 486. II.; 476. A. & S. 260, R. 5; 145, N. 4. Et jam and besides already: an additional reason for declining the task. Coelo. Gr. 422. 2. A. & S. 255, R. 3 (6). 9. Praecipitatis hurrying down; i. e. midnight being past. The verb is here intransitive. Cf. avertit, I. 104, 402. — 10. Amor = desire. Sc. est tibi. Cf. VI. 133, where amor is immediately explained by cupido. Cognoscere... audire. Gr. 563. 6. A. & S. 275, III. N. 1. 11. Laborem. See on I. 460. Meminisse at the remembrance. Horret... refugit. Mark the change of tense: is shuddering... and has already shrunk from it through grief. See on G. I. 330. — 13. Incipiam=I will undertake. -13-39. Despairing of reducing Troy by siege, the Greeks feign departure, having first built a wooden horse, which they fill with armed men, and leave behind them as a pretended offering to Pallas. The Trojans pour out of the town, and question what should be done with the horse, some being for taking it in, others for destroying it. -13. Fracti; nearly the same as fessi, v. 109, but stronger. Repulsi; i. e. beaten back from the attack on Troy. - 14. Labentibus; not = lapsis, the point of completion not having yet been

-12.

...

--

=

reached. — 15. Instar montis; with reference to the height rather than to the bulk. Cf. vv. 185, 186. Gr. 363. A. & S. 204. Palladis. Pallas is selected from the deities favorable to the Greeks as the patroness of art. See on G. I. 18.-16. Intexunt for texunt= build, construct. Abiete. Gr. 669. II. and 3; 414 and 4. A. & S. 306. 1 and (3); 247 and 3. · - 17. Votum (sc. esse) that it is a votive offering; i. e. to Pallas for a safe return to their country. Serv. says there was an inscription on the horse to this effect.-18. Huc caeco lateri = into this, namely, within its dark side. See on E. I. 54. Gr. 386. A. & S. 224. Delecta virum... corpora; poetically for delectos viros. Sortiti = having cast lots (for them). — 19. Penitus; with complent. —20. Milite. See on I. 564. - 21. Tenedos; a small but fertile island in the Aegean sea, opposite Troy, and about five miles from the shore. Dives opum. See on I. 14 - 23. Tantum sinus there is only a bay; i. e. the bay being all for which the place was then remarkable. Male fida= hardly safe, unsafe. Cf. G. I. 105.-24. Huc; with provecti, though it may go with condunt.-25. Abiisse rati; sc. eos sumus. Mycenas; for Gracciam. — 26. Teucria. See on I. 1.-27. Dorica; for Graeca.-29. Tendebat pitched his tent. For the implied anachronism see on I. 469.-30. Classibus hic locus. The ships were drawn up on the shore, and the tents pitched among them. The contrast is between classibus and acie: here they encamped; here they fought with us. Acie. Gr. 414 and 3. A. & S. 247 and 31. Minervae to Minerva: the objective gen. The offering was made to Minerva as one of the tutelary deities of Troy, whom the Greeks had outraged, and as such it was virtually an offering to Troy and the Trojans, -a consideration which reconciles the present passage with those where it is spoken of as a gift to the Trojans (vv. 36, 44, 49), and accounts for the epithet exitiale. That some such object was pretended before Sinon came forward to develop the story, we have seen in v. 17. — 32. Mirantur. Gr. 461 and 1. A. & S. 209, R. 11 (2). Thymoetes; one of the elders of Troy. sayer had predicted, that on a certain day a boy should be whom Troy should be destroyed. On that day Paris was born to Priam, and Munippus to Thymoetes. Priam ordered Munippus and his mother Cilla to be killed. Hence Aeneas says that it was doubtful whether Thymoetes, in order to revenge himself, treacherously (dolo) advised to draw the wooden horse into the city, or whether he was so directed by fate.—33. Duci - locari. Gr. 558. VI. 3. A. & S. 273. 2 and (6).—34. Seu - ferebant or (because) now at last the destiny of Troy thus directed.—35. Capys; a companion of Aeneas. Cf. I. 183. Quorum . . . menti = (those) to whose mind; sc. erat. 36. Aut... aut. Two plans are proposed: one

2.

A soothborn, by

=

to destroy, the other to examine the horse. These two propositions are separated by aut... aut. For the execution of the first plan two methods are suggested,― sinking and burning; some are in favor of the one, and some of the other. This view of the case shows the propriety of the word que in v. 37, which is the reading of the MSS., rather than ve, which Heyne introduced, and which several later editors have adopted. Pelago. Gr. 379. 5. A. & S. 225. IV. R. 2. Insidias; for the horse itself, like doli, v. 264.-38. Tentare to search. 39. Incertum fickle. Studia = opinions; implying that they maintain their different views with warmth. - 41. Laocoon; a priest of Apollo, and at this time acting priest of Neptune (v. 201). 44. Sic notus Ulixes. Has this been your experience of Ulysses? Ulysses is not mentioned as having actually been the principal in the plot, which the Trojans could not have known, but as the natural author of fraud. Cf. V. 164. — 45, 46. Aut... aut. The two cases put in these lines are that the horse is a receptacle of soldiers, and that it is a means of scaling the walls. In the former case it would be fatal if admitted within the city; in the latter, even if left outside. — 45. Achivi; for Graeci.—46. In for, against. —47. Inspectura to overlook. Gr. 578. V. A. & S. 274, R. 6 (a). Ventura-urbi to come down on the city from above; i. e. not the machine, but those in it. Urbi; for in urbem. See on pelago, v. 36. 48. Aliquis alius quis, some -49. Et = etiam. Dona. See on v. 31. -51. In alvum; i. e. the spear pierced through the latus into the alvus. Gr. 47. 2. 2). A. & S. 49. I. Feri of the beast. Ferus Cf. V. 818. Compagibus. Illa; i. e. the spear. Refrom the blow. 53. InGemitum; merely of the

other. Error

= deceit.

=

=

is sometimes used of a tame animal. Gr. 414 and 2. A. & S. 247 and 1. — 52. cusso; expressing the shock resulting sonuere cavae=sounded as hollow. hollow noise: not of the arms, as in v. 243; much less of those within. 54. Si fata (sc. fuissent) : if the fates had so willed. Non laeva. See on E. I. 16. 55. Impulerat he had impelled. See on G. II. 133. Foedare to mutilate, cut in pieces. -57. Manus. Gr. 380. A. & S. 234. II. -59. Ignotum=a stranger. Venientibus. Gr. 386. A. & S. 224. Ultro; i. e. he had purposely thrown himself in their way. — 60. Hoc -strueret= to compass this very thing; i. e. to be brought to the king. — 61 Fidens animi = confident of soul. Gr. 399. 3. 4). A. & S. 213 and R. 1 (2). -62. Versare dolos to carry out his wily plot. The infinitives are in apposition with utrumque.· -64. Circumfusa ruit throng around. Certant vie with one another. Mark the change of number. 65. Crimine- omnes; i. e. learn from a single act of guilt what all of them (the Greeks) are.-68. Cir

cumspexit. The spondaic termination admirably suits the sense, marking as it does Sinon's cautious gaze. — 69, 70. Nunc ... jam denique now, at the present time. . . now at last, after all. -71. Super. See on I. 29.-73. Quo gemitu. See on G. I. 329. 74. Sanguine. Gr. 425. 3. 1). A. & S. 246. — Cretus; sc. sit.75. Quidve ferat what (information) he brings. Gr. 525. A. & S. 265. Memoret = (bidding) him tell. All after fari is to be taken as an oratio obliqua: memora quo sanguine cretus sis, etc. See on I. 645. Quae-capto=what he has to rely on as a captive; i. e. why he should not meet the captive's doom. - 77-104. He says his name is Sinon, a relation of Palamedes, whose death he resented, and thus incurred the enmity of Ulysses. -77. Fuerit quodcumque whatever shall come of it, whatever the result shall be. Gr. 473. I. A. & S. 259, R. 1 (5). — 78. Vera truly. It adheres to fatebor. -79. Hoc primum (sc. fatebor); a sort of parenthesis, like hoc tantum, v. 690. "This to begin with."-80. Finxit is stronger than fecit. Cf. VI. 80; G. II. 407. Vanum. See on I. 392. Improba. Observe the position and translate with last clause only: malicious as she is, she shall not go so far as to make me a liar.-31. Fando. See on v. 6. Aliquod; for alicubi or aliquo tempore anywhere or at any time. See on E. I. 54. · 82. Belidae the descendant of Belus; who is said to have been a very remote ancestor of Palamedes. Palamedis; the son of Nauplius, king of Euboea. 83. Falsa sub proditione under a false discovery, a false information. The editors generally take it to mean, under a false charge of treason, a sense which the words will hardly bear, proditio being equivalent to indicium. There is no reference whatever to the pretended treason of Palamedes, though that happened to be the subject of the charge. The story goes thus: Agamemnon, Diomedes, and Ulysses, having become envious of his fame, caused a captive Phrygian to write to Palamedes a letter in the name of Priam, and then bribed a servant of Palamedes to conceal the letter under his master's bed. Hereupon they accused Palamedes of treachery; they searched his tent, found the letter, and caused him to be stoned to death. 84. Infando indicio = by an iniquitous disclosure; referring, like falsa sub proditione, to the production of the false letter. Sinon purposely dwells on the horror of the transaction. - 85. Lumine; the light of day or life. Gr. 419. III. A. & S. 250. 2 (1). 86. The apodosis of the sentence commencing at v. 81 begins here. In case you ever heard of Palamedes, I was his companion in arms and near kinsman. Illi is the emphatic word. Gr. 398. 5. A. & S. 211, R. 5.87. Pauper may be intended to excite the commiseration of the hearers, or, as war was a lucrative calling in Virgil's time, to account for his being sent from his early youth (primis ab annis). In