south and the
south-west with squall upon squall fell upon the sea at once,
whipping it up from its bottom-most depths and rolling huge
waves towards its shores. Men shouted, ropes screamed, clouds
suddenly blotted out the light of the sky from the eyes of the
Trojans and black night brooded on the sea as the heavens
90 thundered and lightning flashed again and again across the sky.
Wherever the Trojans looked, death stared them in the face. A
sudden chill went through Aeneas and his limbs grew weak.
Groaning, he lifted his hands palms upward to the stars and
cried: ‘Those whose fate it was to die beneath the high walls of
Troy with their fathers looking down on them were many, many
times more fortunate than I. O Diomede, bravest of the Greeks,
why could I not have fallen to your right hand and breathed out
my life on the plains of Troy, where fierce Hector fell by the
100 sword of Achilles, where great Sarpedon lies and where the river
Simois caught up so many shields and helmets and bodies of
brave men and rolled them down its current?’
Even as he threw out these words, a squall came howling
from the north, catching his sail full on and raising the waves to
the stars. The oars broke, the prow was wrenched round, and
as they lay beam on to the seas, there came towering over them
a sheer mountain of water. Some of the ships were hanging on
the crests of the waves; for others the waters opened and in the
troughs could be seen the sea-bed and the seething sand. Three
of them were caught by the south wind and driven off course
on to a reef hidden in mid-ocean – Italians know it as the Altars
110 – a huge spine of rock just under the surface; three of them the
southeaster took and carried helplessly from the high sea on to
the sandbanks of the Syrtes, ran them aground and blocked
them in with walls of sand; before the very eyes of Aeneas, the
ship that carried the faithful Orontes and his Lycians was struck
on the stern by a great sea and the helmsman was swept away
head first into the water. Three times she spun round on the
same spot till the swift whirlpool sucked her down. Here and
there men could be seen swimming in the vast ocean, and with
them in the waves their armour, spars of wood and the treasures
120 of Troy. One by one the stout ships of Ilioneus and brave
Achates, then Abas and old Aletes, succumbed to the storm.
The fastenings of the ships’ sides were loosened, the deadly
water poured in and the timbers sprang.
Neptune, meanwhile, observed the loud disturbance of the
ocean, the rampaging of storms, the draining of his deepest
pools, and was moved to anger. Rising from the depths, he
south-west with squall upon squall fell upon the sea at once,
whipping it up from its bottom-most depths and rolling huge
waves towards its shores. Men shouted, ropes screamed, clouds
suddenly blotted out the light of the sky from the eyes of the
Trojans and black night brooded on the sea as the heavens
90 thundered and lightning flashed again and again across the sky.
Wherever the Trojans looked, death stared them in the face. A
sudden chill went through Aeneas and his limbs grew weak.
Groaning, he lifted his hands palms upward to the stars and
cried: ‘Those whose fate it was to die beneath the high walls of
Troy with their fathers looking down on them were many, many
times more fortunate than I. O Diomede, bravest of the Greeks,
why could I not have fallen to your right hand and breathed out
my life on the plains of Troy, where fierce Hector fell by the
100 sword of Achilles, where great Sarpedon lies and where the river
Simois caught up so many shields and helmets and bodies of
brave men and rolled them down its current?’
Even as he threw out these words, a squall came howling
from the north, catching his sail full on and raising the waves to
the stars. The oars broke, the prow was wrenched round, and
as they lay beam on to the seas, there came towering over them
a sheer mountain of water. Some of the ships were hanging on
the crests of the waves; for others the waters opened and in the
troughs could be seen the sea-bed and the seething sand. Three
of them were caught by the south wind and driven off course
on to a reef hidden in mid-ocean – Italians know it as the Altars
110 – a huge spine of rock just under the surface; three of them the
southeaster took and carried helplessly from the high sea on to
the sandbanks of the Syrtes, ran them aground and blocked
them in with walls of sand; before the very eyes of Aeneas, the
ship that carried the faithful Orontes and his Lycians was struck
on the stern by a great sea and the helmsman was swept away
head first into the water. Three times she spun round on the
same spot till the swift whirlpool sucked her down. Here and
there men could be seen swimming in the vast ocean, and with
them in the waves their armour, spars of wood and the treasures
120 of Troy. One by one the stout ships of Ilioneus and brave
Achates, then Abas and old Aletes, succumbed to the storm.
The fastenings of the ships’ sides were loosened, the deadly
water poured in and the timbers sprang.
Neptune, meanwhile, observed the loud disturbance of the
ocean, the rampaging of storms, the draining of his deepest
pools, and was moved to anger. Rising from the depths, he
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