Ascanius

They built a town, which Aeneas called Lavinium, from the name of his wife.

In a short time after, his new consort bore him a son, who was named by his parents Ascanius.

The aborigines, in conjunction with the Trojans, soon found themselves engaged in a war.

Turnus, king of the Rutulians, to whom Lavinia had been affianced before the arrival of Aeneas, enraged at seeing a stranger preferred to him, declared war against both Aeneas and Latinus.

He, by whatever appellation the laws of gods and men require him to be called, is deposited on the bank of the river Numicus.

The people gave him the title of Jupiter Indiges.

His son Ascanius was as yet too young to assume the government.

Nevertheless, his title to the sovereignty remained unimpeached until he arrived at maturity.

He thought of his father, Anchises, who at this time lived with him in the city and was nearly the same age as Priam the king, whom he had just seen so cruelly slain.

He thought of his wife, too, whom he had left at home, and of his little son Ascanius, and he began now to be overwhelmed with the apprehension that the besiegers had found their way to his dwelling and were perhaps at that very moment plundering and destroying it and perpetrating cruel deeds of violence and outrage upon his wife and family.

He determined immediately to hasten home.

He looked around to see who of his companions remained with him.

If one was to die, they would all die, he said, together.

He called for his armor and began to put it on, resolving to go out again into the streets of the city and die, since he must die, in the act of destroying his destroyers.

He was, however, prevented from carrying this determination into effect by Cruesa's intervention, who fell down before him at the threshold of the door, almost frantic with excitement and terror, and holding her little son, Ascanius, with one arm, and clasping her husband's knees with the other.

She begged him not to leave them.

The twelve labors of Hercules were trifling in comparison with those which my neighbors have undertaken, for they were only twelve and had an end, but I could never see that these men slew or captured any monster or finished any labor.

They had no friend, Iulus, to burn with a hot iron the root of the hydra's head, but as soon as one head is crushed, two spring up.

I see young men, my townsmen, whose misfortune it is to have inherited farms, houses, barns, cattle, and farming tools, for these are more easily acquired than got rid of.

Better if they had been born in the open pasture and suckled by a wolf that they might have seen with clearer eyes what field they were called to labor in.