Classic Poem

DISPLAY OF THE CAVALIERS .

Now Aneas the father, or ever the festival ends,
Summons Epytides, comrade and guardian true, who attends
Youthful Iulus, and speaks in his faithful ear the command:
" Hasten to Ascan the prince; if his boyish cavalry band
Ready he hold, with his steeds for the pageant ranged at his side,
Bid him parade his troop in his grandsire's honour, and ride
Forth in his armour. " Himself the invading throng he ordains
All to depart from the course, and to clear free space on the plains.
In Troy's children march, and before their sires in a line
Mounted on well-reined horses, a glittering company, shine.
Murmured applause breaks forth from the allied hosts, as they go;
Hair bound down, as the wont is, with leaflets stript from the bough.
Lances of cornel tipped with steel each carries in rest,
Some on the shoulder a quiver smooth. High set on the breast
Round each throat run twisted a flexible golden chain.
Companies three, — three chiefs in command, — prick over the plain
Twice six glorious children behind each leader arrayed —
Equal divisions, a captain for each, — in splendour parade.
One young squadron is led by a youthful Priam in glee, —
Named from his grandsire's name, and begotten, Polites, of thee,
Troy's illustrious son, ere long to be Italy's pride, —
Borne on a Thracian courser with white all dappled and pied;
White on his pasterns, white on his forehead shines as a star.
Next rides Atys, from whom our Latin Atians are,
Atys, tender of years, and beloved of Iulus the boy.
Last, but before all others in beauty, Iulus of Troy,
Set on a Sidon steed which Dido lovely of yore
Gave him as token and pledge of a love to endure evermore.
Mounted on Sicily's chargers the rest, and by Sicily's king
Horsed for the pageant. A cheer from the gathered Teucrian ring
Breaks as the shy band enters. The scene with pleasure they view,
Find in the looks of the children the fathers' faces anew.

After the joyous riders have made their round of the throng
Under the eyes of the sires, Troy's herald, standing apart,
Shouts the expected signal, and lashes his thundering thong.
Every company gallops asunder, the three troops part
Into retiring halves; — at a sign each, suddenly, lo!
Wheels to the front, and, with weapons couched, bears down on the foe.
Now once more they retire — once more with the lance they meet —
Turn and return their paces — the field to the enemy bar —
Circles alternate weave upon circles still incomplete, —
Waking with battle armour the shadowy image of war.
Backs now bare in retreat — now point their steel to the breast —
Now plight truce and together are pacing, lances in rest.
Even as the fabled road in the Labyrinth olden of Crete
Ran through sunless walls and a thousand paths of deceit,
Till all tracks for retracing the journey failed in a maze
Whence none came that had entered, for none found clew to its ways;
So with inwoven paces the Trojan chivalry bright
Ride, and in sportive tangle involve gay battle and flight;
Like some dolphin shoal, that afloat on the watery plain
Cleaves Carpathia's billows and distant Libya's main.

This fair fashion of handling the steed, these trials of skill,
Ascan revived when he circled with ramparts Alba the Long;
Taught old Latium's father to keep this festival still,
As he had kept it himself, and his Trojan chivalry young.
Alba her people tutored; from these, imperial Rome
Held the tradition, preserving the rites ancestral of home.
Troy are the children called; Troy's squadron the bright cavalcade.
Thus far funeral games in a father's honour were played.