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CHAPTER THE ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FOURTH.
Petronius Arbiter · about 3 minutes
CHAPTER THE ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FOURTH.
“So great a misfortune disrupted the concord of heaven
And gods swelled the rout in their panic! Behold through creation
The gentle divinities flee from the ravening earth; in
Their loathing they turn from humanity, doomed to destruction!
And first of all, Peace, with her snowy white arms, hides her visage
Defeated, her helmet beneath and, abandoning earth, flees
To seek out the realm of implacable Dis, as a refuge
Meek Faith her companion, and Justice with locks loosely flowing,
And Concord, in tears, and her raiment in tatters, attend her.
The minions of Pluto pour forth from the portals of darkness
That yawn: the serpent-haired Fury, Bellona the Savage,
Megoera with firebrands, destruction, and treachery, livid
Death’s likeness! Among them is Frenzy, as, free, with her lashings
Snapped short, she now raises her gory head, shielding her features
Deep scarred by innumerous wounds ‘neath her helmet blood-clotted.
Her left arm she guards with a battle-scarred shield scored by
weapons,
And numberless spear-heads protrude from its surface: her right hand
A flaming torch brandishes, kindling a flame that will burn up
The world! Now the gods are on earth and the skies note their
absence;
The planets disordered their orbits attempt! Into factions
The heavens divide; first Dione espouses the cause of
Her Caesar. Minerva next steps to her side and the great son
Of Ares, his mighty spear brandishing! Phoebus espouses
The cause of Great Pompey: his sister and Mercury also
And Hercules like unto him in his travels and labors.
The trumpets call! Discord her Stygian head lifts to heaven
Her tresses disheveled, her features with clotted blood covered,
Tears pour from her bruised eyes, her iron fangs thick coated
with rust,
Her tongue distils poison, her features are haloed with serpents,
Her hideous bosom is visible under her tatters,
A torch with a blood red flame waves from her tremulous right hand.
Emerging from Cocytus dark and from Tartarus murky
She strode to the crests of the Apennines noble, the prospect
Of earth to survey, spread before her the world panorama
Its shores and the armies that march on its surface: these words
then
Burst out of her bosom malignant: ‘To arms, now, ye nations,
While anger seethes hot, seize your arms, set the torch to the
cities,
Who skulks now is lost; neither woman nor child nor the aged
Bowed down with their years shall find quarter: the whole world will
tremble
And rooftrees themselves shall crash down and take part in the
struggle.
Marcellus, hold firm for the law! And thou, Curio, madden
The rabble! Thou, Lentulus, strive not to check valiant Ares!
Thou, Cesar divine, why delayest thou now thine invasion?
Why smash not the gates, why not level the walls of the cities,
Their treasures to pillage? Thou, Magnus, dost not know the secret
Of holding the hills of Rome? Take thou the walls of Dyrrachium,
Let Thessaly’s harbors be dyed with the blood of the Romans!’
On earth was obeyed every detail of Discord’s commandment.”
When Eumolpus had, with great volubility, poured out this flood of words, we came at last to Crotona. Here we refreshed ourselves at a mean inn, but on the following day we went in search of more imposing lodgings and fell in with a crowd of legacy hunters who were very curious as to the class of society to which we belonged and as to whence we had come. Thereupon, in accord with our mutual understanding, such ready answers did we make as to who we might be or whence we had come that we gave them no cause for doubt. They immediately fell to wrangling in their desire to heap their own riches upon Eumolpus and every fortune-hunter solicited his favor with presents.
ETEXT EDITOR’S BOOKMARKS:
Desire no possession unless the world envies me for possessing Either ‘take-in,’ or else they are ‘taken-in’ Platitudes by which anguished minds are recalled to sanity They seize what they dread to lose most
VOLUME 5.--AFFAIRS AT CROTONA