Classic Poem

THE REALMS OF THE DEAD .

Cerberus, stretching his monstrous bulk in an opposite cavern,
Makes these regions resound with the noise of his three-throated howling.
Now, as she sees his neck upbristling with serpents, the seeress
Flings him a sop imbrued with honey and somnolent juices.
He, with hunger mad, his three throats widely distending,
Catches it ere it falls, and, relaxing his powerful haunches,
Prone on the earth lies huge along the whole length of the cavern.
Seizing the pass, while its keeper is buried in slumber, Æneas
Swiftly withdraws from the brink of the river none ever recrosses.
Presently cries are heard, and the sound of a great lamentation,
And, at the outer gate, the wailing spirits of children,
Babes unsharing in life's delight, and torn from the bosom,
Whom a dark day bore away, and plunged into Death's bitter waters.
Next abide those condemned to death upon false accusation;
Nor are these places assigned without formal allotment of judges;
Minos, presiding, impanels a jury, assembling a silent
Council of ghosts, and investigates fully their lives and transgressions.
Stations next these are reserved for the sorrowing spirits, who guiltless,
By their own hands found death, and hurled their souls into darkness,
Loathing the light. But, ah! how willingly now would they suffer
Hunger and bitter toil, if restored to the land of the living!
Heaven forbids, and the mournful ooze of desolate marshes
Holds, and the Styx restrains, nine times enfolded around them.
Near by, also, are shown the Plains of Lamentation, —
Such is the name they bear, — extending far over the valley.
Here lone pathways hide, and groves of myrtle o'er-shadow
Those whom pitiless love hath wasted with cruel repining;
Not in death itself are they freed from the thraldom of passion.
Phaedra and Procris he saw, and there he saw sad Eryphyle,
Showing the wounds received from her cruel son; and Evadne,
Pasiphai, also; with whom Laodamia went as companion;
Caeneus, too, now changed once more from a man to a maiden,
Dowered again by fate with the vanished grace of her girlhood;
Compassed about by whom, her bosom still bleeding, Phaenician
Dido came wandering on in the boundless wood, and the Trojan
Hero, soon as he stood by her side and distinguished her shadowed
Form, as one who sees, or thinks he hath seen, in the early
Dawn of the month, amid clouds, a glimmer of silvery moonlight,
Burst into tears, and spoke with tenderest words of affection:
" Then were the tidings true that reached me, unfortunate Dido?
" Dido is dead; by the sword she hath ended her life and her trouble."
Ah, and have I been the cause of thy death? I swear by the heavens,
By the great gods above, by whatsoe'er oath Hell regardeth,
Not of mine own desire, O Queen, did I loose from thy harbour;
But the commands of the gods, that are driving me now through these shadows,
Through this wilderness tangle of thorn and midnight darkness,
By their own power constrained; nor could I at all have imagined
That I should bring thee by going so grievous a burden of sorrow.
Stay thine impatient feet! withdraw thyself not from our presence.
Whom dost thou flee? These words are the last fate grants us forever. "
Thus did Æneas endeavour to soothe her implacable spirit,
And bring tears to the eyes where fierce indignation was burning.
She, with averted face, remained looking fixedly downward,
Changed in expression no more, as Æneas began to entreat her,
Than if hard flint she stood, or a rock on the mount of Marpessa.
Finally, breaking away, unrelenting, she hurries for refuge
Into the shadowy grove, and there her first lover, Sychaeus,
Comforts her every care, and answers her heart's deepest longing.
Nevertheless, dismayed by her undeserved anguish, Æneas
Follows her far on her way with tears of compassion and sorrow.