The Metamorphoses of Ovid, Book XIV (Fable. 7 and 8)

Turnus having demanded succour from Diomedes against Æneas, the Grecian prince, fearing the resentment of Venus, refuses to send him assistance; and relates how some of his followers have been transformed by Venus into birds. An Apulian shepherd surprising some Nymphs, insults them, on which he is changed into a wild olive tree.

Macareus had concluded. And the nurse of Æneas, now buried in a marble urn, had this short inscription on her tomb:— “My foster-child, of proved piety, here burned me, Caieta, preserved from the Argive flames, with that fire which was my due.” The fastened cable is loosened from the grassy bank, and they leave far behind the wiles and the dwelling of the Goddess, of whom so ill a report has been given, and seek the groves where the Tiber, darkened with the shade of trees, breaks into the sea with his yellow sands. Æneas, too, gains the house and the daughter of Latinus, the son of Faunus;37 but not without warfare. A war is waged with a fierce nation, and Turnus is indignant on account of the wife that had been betrothed to him.38 All Etruria meets in battle with Latium, and long is doubtful victory struggled for with ardent arms. Each side increases his strength with foreign forces, and many take the part of the Rutulians, many that of the Trojan side. 501 xiv. 456-485. Nor had Æneas arrived in vain at the thresholds of Evander,39 but Venulus came in vain to the great city, of the exiled Diomedes. He, indeed, had founded a very great city under the Iapygian Daunus, and held the lands given to him in dower.

But after Venulus had executed the commands of Turnus, and had asked for aid, the Ætolian hero pleaded his resources as an excuse: that he was not wishful to commit the subjects of his father-in-law to a war, and that he had no men to arm of the nation of his own countrymen; “And that ye may not think this a pretext, although my grief be renewed at the bitter recollection, yet I will endure the recital of it. After lofty Ilion was burnt, and Pergamus had fed the Grecian flames, and the Narycian hero,40 having ravished the virgin, distributed that vengeance upon all, which he alone merited, on account of the virgin; we were dispersed and driven by the winds over the hostile seas; we Greeks had to endure lightning, darkness, rain, and the wrath both of the heavens and of the sea, and Caphareus, the completion of our misery. And not to detain you by relating these sad events in their order, Greece might then have appeared even to Priam, worthy of a tear. Yet the care of the armed universe preserved me, rescued from the waves.

“But again was I driven from Argos, the land of my fathers; and genial Venus exacted satisfaction in vengeance for her former wound: and so great hardships did I endure on the deep ocean, so great amid arms on shore, that many a time were they pronounced happy by me, whom the storm, common to all, and Caphareus, swallowed up in the threatening41 waves; and I wished that I had been one of them. My companions having now endured the utmost extremities, both in war and on the ocean, lost courage, and demanded an end of their wanderings. But Agmon, of impetuous temper, and then embittered as well by misfortunes, said, ‘What does there remain now, ye men, for your patience to refuse to endure? What has Cytherea, (supposing her to desire it), that she can do beyond this? For so long as greater evils are dreaded, there is room for prayers; but where one’s lot is the most wretched possible, fear is trampled under foot, and the extremity of misfortune is free from apprehensions. Let Venus herself hear it, if she likes; let her hate, as she does hate, all the men under the rule of Diomedes. Yet all of us despise her hate, and this our great power is bought by us at great price.’

“With such expressions does the Pleuronian42 Agmon provoke Venus against her will, and revive her former anger. His words are approved of by a few. We, the greater number of his friends, rebuke Agmon: and as he is preparing to answer, his voice and the passage of his voice together become diminished; his hair changes into feathers; his neck newly formed, his breast and his back are covered with down; his arms assume longer feathers; and his elbows curve out into light wings. A great part of his foot receives toes; his mouth becomes stiff and hardened with horn, and has its end in a point. Lycus and Idas, and Nycteus, together with Rhetenor, and Abas, are all astounded at him; and while they are astounded, they assume a similar form; and the greater portion of my company fly off, and resound around the oars with the flapping of their wings. Shouldst thou inquire what was the form of these birds so suddenly made; although it was not that of swans, yet it was approaching to that of white swans. With difficulty, for my part, do I, the son-in-law of the Iapygian Daunus, possess these abodes and the parched fields with a very small remnant of my companions.”

Thus far the grandson of Œneus. Venulus leaves the Calydonian43 realms and the Peucetian44 bays, and the Messapian45 fields. In these he beholds a cavern, which, overshadowed by a dense grove, and trickling with a smooth stream, the God Pan, the half goat, occupies; but once on a time the Nymphs possessed it. An Apulian shepherd alarmed them, scared away from that spot; and, at first, he terrified them with a sudden fear; afterwards, when their presence of mind returned, and they despised him as he followed, they formed dances, moving their feet to time. The shepherd abused them; and imitating them with grotesque capers, he added rustic abuse in filthy language. Nor was he silent, before the growing tree closed his throat. But from this tree and its sap you may understand what were his manners. For the wild olive, by its bitter berries, indicates the infamy of his tongue; the coarseness of his words passed into them.

Footnotes:

37. Son of Faunus.]—Ver. 449. The parents of Latinus were Faunus and Marica.

38. Betrothed to him.]—Ver. 451. Amata, the mother of Lavinia, had promised her to Turnus, in spite of the oracle of Faunus, which had declared that she was destined for a foreign husband.

39. Evander.]—Ver. 456. His history is given by Ovid in the first Book of the Fasti.

40. Narycian hero.]—Ver. 468. Naryx, which was also called Narycium and Naryce, was a city of Locris. He alludes to the divine vengeance which punished Ajax Oïleus, who had ravished Cassandra in the temple of Minerva. For this reason the Greeks were said to have been afflicted with shipwreck, on their return after the destruction of Troy.

41. Threatening.]—Ver. 481. ‘Importunis’ is translated by Clarke, ‘plaguy.’ For some account of Caphareus, see the Tristia, or Lament, Book I. El. 1. l. 83. and note.

42. Pleuronian.]—Ver. 494. Pleuron was a town of Ætolia, adjoining to Epirus.

43. Calydonian.]—Ver. 512. That part of Apulia, which Diomedes received from Daunus, as a dower with his wife, was called Calydon, from the city of Calydon, in his native Ætolia.

44. Peucetian.]—Ver. 513. Apulia was divided by the river Aufidus into two parts, Peucetia and Daunia. Peucetia was to the East, and Daunia lay to the West. According to Antoninus Liberalis, Daunus, Iapyx, and Peucetius, the sons of Lycaon, were the first to colonize these parts.

45. Messapian.]—Ver. 513. Messapia was a name given to a part of Calabria, from its king Messapus, who aided Turnus against Æneas.