Book 3
smote my astonished eyes: for the first tree,
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which from the earth with broken roots I drew,
dripped black with bloody drops, and gave the ground
dark stains of gore. Cold horror shook my frame,
and every vein within me froze for fear.
Once more I tried from yet another stock
the pliant stem to tear, and to explore
the mystery within,—but yet again
the foul bark oozed with clots of blackest gore!
From my deep-shaken soul I made a prayer
to all the woodland nymphs and to divine
Gradivus, patron of the Thracian plain,
to bless this sight, to lift its curse away.
But when at a third sheaf of myrtle spears
I fell upon my knees, and tugged amain
against the adverse ground (I dread to tell!),
a moaning and a wail from that deep grave
burst forth and murmured in my listening ear:
“Why wound me, great Aeneas, in my woe?
O, spare the dead, nor let thy holy hands
do sacrilege and sin! I, Trojan-born,
was kin of thine. This blood is not of trees.
Haste from this murderous shore, this land of greed.
O, I am Polydorus! Haste away!
Here was I pierced; a crop of iron spears
has grown up o'er my breast, and multiplied
to all these deadly javelins, keen and strong.”
Then stood I, burdened with dark doubt and fear
I quailed, my hair rose and my utterance choked.
For once this Polydorus, with much gold,
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ill-fated Priam sent by stealth away
for nurture with the Thracian king, what time
Dardania's war Iooked hopeless, and her towers
were ringed about by unrelenting siege.
That king, when Ilium's cause was ebbing low,
and fortune frowned, gave o'er his plighted faith
to Agamemnon's might and victory;
he scorned all honor and did murder foul
on Polydorus, seizing lawlessly
on all the gold. O, whither at thy will,
