O fly from this unhofpitable shore,
Warn'd by my fate; for I am Polydore!
Here loads of lances, in my blood embrued,
Again fhoot upward, by my blood renew'd.
My faltering tongue and fhivering limbs declare
My horror, and in briftles rofe my hair.
When Troy with Grecian arms was closely pent, 70
Old Priam, fearful of the war's event,
This hapless Polydore to Thracia fent.
Loaded with gold, he sent his darling far
From noise and tumults, and deftructive war:
Committed to the faithless tyrant's care:
Who, when he saw the power of Troy decline,
Forfook the weaker, with the ftrong to join:
Broke every bond of nature, and of truth:
And murder'd, for his wealth, the royal youth.
O facred hunger of pernicious gold,
What bands of faith can impious lucre hold!
Now, when my foul had fhaken off her fears,
I call my father, and the Trojan peers:
Relate the prodigies of heaven, require
What he commands, and their advice defire.
All vote to leave that execrable shore,
Polluted with the blood of Polydore.
But ere we fail, his funeral rites prepare;
Then, to his ghoft, a tomb and altars rear.
In mournful pomp the matrons walk the round: 901
With baleful cyprefs and blue fillets crown'd;
With eyes dejected, and with hair unbound.
Then bowls of tepid milk and blood we pour,
And thrice invoke the foul of Polydore.
Now when the raging ftorms no longer reign;
But fouthern gales invite us to the main;
We launch our veffels, with a profperous wind;
And leave the cities and the fhores behind.
An island in th' Ægean main appears;
Neptune and watery Doris claim it theirs.
It floated once, till Phoebus fix'd the fides
To rooted earth, and now it braves the tides.
Here, borne by friendly winds, we come ashore,
With needful ease our weary limbs restore:
And the fun's temple and his town adore.
Anius the priest, and king, with laurel crown'd,
His hoary locks with purple fillets bound,
Who faw my fire the Delian fhore afcend,
Came forth with eager hafte to meet his friend:
Invites him to his palace: and in fign
Of ancient love, their plighted hands they join.
Then to the temple of the god I went;
And thus before the shrine my vows prefent:
Give, O Thymbræus, give a resting-place
To the fad relicks of the Trojan race:
A feat fecure, a region of their own,
A lafting empire, and a happier town.
Where shall we fix, where fhall our labours end,
Whom shall we follow, and what fate attend?
Let not my prayers a doubtful answer find,
But in clear auguries unveil thy mind.
Scarce had I faid; he shook the holy ground,
The laurels, and the lofty hills around:
And from the tripos rush'd a bellowing found.
Proftrate we fell, confefs'd the prefent god;
Who give this answer from his dark abode:
Undaunted youths, go feek that mother earth
From which your ancestors derive their birth,
The foil that fent you forth, her ancient race,
In her old bofom, shall again embrace.
Through the wide world th' Æneian house shall reign,
And childrens children fhall the crown sustain.
Thus Phoebus did our future fates difclofe:
A mighty tumult, mix'd with joy, arose.
All are concern'd to know what place the god 135
Affign'd, and where determin'd our abode.
My father, long revolving in his mind
The race and lineage of the Trojan kind,
Thus anfwer'd their demands: he princes, hear
Your pleafing fortune; and difpel your fear.
The fruitful ifle of Crete, well known to fame,
Sacred of old to Jove's imperial name,
In the mid ocean lies with large command;
And on its plains a hundred cities stand.
Another Ida rifes there; and we
From thence derive our Trojan ancestry.
From thence, as 'tis divulg'd by certain fame,
To the Rhatean fhores old Teucer came:
There fix'd, and there the feat of empire chofe,
Ere Ilium and the Trojan towers arose.
In humble vales they built their soft abodes:
Till Cybele, the mother of the gods,
With tinkling cymbals, charm'd th' Idean woods.
She fecret rites and ceremonies taught,
And to the yoke the favage lions brought.
Let us the land, which heaven appoints, explore;
Appease the winds, and seek the Gnoffian shore.
If Jove affift the paffage of our fleet,
The third propitious dawn discovers Crete.
Thus having faid, the facrifices laid
On finoaking altars, to the gods he paid.
A bull to Neptune, an oblation due,
Another bull to bright Apollo flew :
A milk-white ewe the western winds to please:
And one coal black to calm the ftormy feas.
Ere this, a flying rumour had been spread,
That fierce Idomeneus from Crete was fled;
Expell'd and exil'd; that the coaft was free
From foreign or domestic enemy:
We leave the Delian ports, and put to fea.
By Naxos, fam'd for vintage, make our way:
Then green Donyfa pafs; and fail in fight
Of Paros ifle, with marble quarries white.
We pass the scatter'd ifles of Cyclades,
That, fcarce diftinguish'd feem to ftud the feas,
The fhouts of failors double near the fhores;
They stretch their canvas, and they ply their oars.
All hands aloft, for Crete, for Crete they cry,
And swiftly through the foamy billows fly.
Full on the promis'd land at length we bore,
With joy descending on the Cretan shore.
With eager hafte a rifing town I frame,
Which from the Trojan Pergamus I name:
The name itself was grateful; I exhort
To found their houses, and erect a fort.
Our ships are haul'd upon the yellow ftrand.
The youth begin to till the labour'd land.
And I myself new marriages promote,
Give laws; and dwellings I divide by lot.
When rifing vapours choke the wholesom air,
And blafts of noisom winds corrupt the year:
The trees, devouring caterpillars burn:
Parch'd was the grass, and blighted was the corn.
Nor scape the beafts: for Sirius from on high
With peftilential heat infects the sky:
fome fall, the rest in fevers fry. Again my father bids me feek the shore
Of facred Delos and the god implore:
To learn what end of woes we might expect,
And to what clime our weary courfe direct.
'Twas night, when every creature, void of cares, The common gift of balmy slumber shares: The ftatues of my gods (for fuch they feem'd) Those gods whom I from flaming Troy redeem'd, Before me ftood; majestically bright,
Full in the beams of Phoebe's entering light.
Then thus they spoke; and eas'd my troubled mind: What from the Delian god thou go'ft to find,
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