“Arms And The Man I Sing, The First Who Bore”

The following version of the first few lines of the Æneid were copied by Professor Reed of Philadelphia, with Mrs. Wordsworth’s permission, during a visit to Rydal Mount in 1854, four years after the poet’s death. Mrs. Reed kindly sent them to me.--ED.

Arms and the Man I sing, the first who bore His course to Latium from the Trojan shore, A fugitive of fate. Long time was he By powers celestial tossed on land and sea Thro’ wrathful Juno’s far-famed enmity; Much too from war endured till new abodes He planted, and in Latium fixed his Gods, Whence flows the Latin people, whence have come The Alban Sites and walls of lofty Rome.

1826