Can Mars rebel, and does no thunder roll? What lawless rage on yon forbidden plain, What rash destruction! and what heroes slain! Venus, and Phoebus with the dreadful bow, Smile on the slaughter, and enjoy my woe. Mad, furious power! whose unrelenting mind No god can govern, and no justice bind. Say, mighty father! shall we scourge this pride, And drive from fight the impetuous homicide?" To whom assenting, thus the Thunderer said: "Go! and the great Minerva be thy aid. To tame the monster-god Minerva knows, And oft afflicts his brutal breast with woes." He said; Saturnia, ardent to obey, Lash'd her white steeds along the aerial way Swift down the steep of heaven the chariot rolls, Between the expanded earth and starry poles Far as a shepherd, from some point on high,(157) O'er the wide main extends his boundless eye, Through such a space of air, with thundering sound, At every leap the immortal coursers bound Troy now they reach'd and touch'd those banks divine, Where silver Simois and Scamander join There Juno stopp'd, and (her fair steeds unloosed) Of air condensed a vapour circumfused For these, impregnate with celestial dew, On Simois, brink ambrosial herbage grew. Thence to relieve the fainting Argive throng, Smooth as the sailing doves they glide along. The best and bravest of the Grecian band (A warlike circle) round Tydides stand. Such was their look as lions bathed in blood, Or foaming boars, the terror of the wood Heaven's empress mingles with the mortal crowd, And shouts, in Stentor's sounding voice, aloud; Stentor the strong, endued with brazen lungs,(158) Whose throats surpass'd the force of fifty tongues. "Inglorious Argives! to your race a shame, And only men in figure and in name! Once from the walls your timorous foes engaged, While fierce in war divine Achilles raged; Now issuing fearless they possess the plain, Now win the shores, and scarce the seas remain