Aeneid Bibliomancy Reading

This oracle points to a randomly selected line from The Aeneid. The surrounding passages are provided for context.

 

Your passage is from BOOK XI: THE LATINS’ LAST STAND: A WOMAN WARRIOR.

 

For Context:

BOOK XI: THE LATINS’ LAST STAND: A WOMAN WARRIOR

With her drawn sword defies him to the field,
And, marching, lifts aloft her maiden shield.

The youth, who thought his cunning did succeed,
Reins round his horse, and urges all his speed;

Adds the remembrance of the spur, and hides
The goring rowels in his bleeding sides.

“Vain fool, and coward!” cries the lofty maid,
“Caught in the train which thou thyself hast laid!

On others practice thy Ligurian arts;
Thin stratagems and tricks of little hearts

Are lost on me: nor shalt thou safe retire,
With vaunting lies, to thy fallacious sire.”

At this, so fast her flying feet she sped,
That soon she strain’d beyond his horse’s head:

Then turning short, at once she seiz’d the rein,
And laid the boaster grov’ling on the plain.

Not with more ease the falcon, from above,
Trusses in middle air the trembling dove,

Then plumes the prey, in her strong pounces bound:
The feathers, foul with blood, come tumbling to the ground.

Now mighty Jove, from his superior height,
With his broad eye surveys th’ unequal fight.