Then Nisus: "Is it that the Gods inspire, Euryalus, this fever of the breast?
Or make we gods of but a wild desire?
Battle I seek, or some adventurous quest, And scorn to dally with inglorious rest, See yonder the Rutulians, stretched supine, What careless confidence is theirs, oppressed With wine and slumber; how the watch-fires shine, Faint, few, and far between; what silence holds the line.
XXV.

"Learn now the plan and purpose of my mind, 'AEneas should be summoned,' one and all,-- Camp, council,--cry, and messengers would find To take sure tidings and our chief recall.
If thee the meed I ask for shall befall,-- Bare fame be mine--methink the pathway lies By yonder mound to Pallanteum's wall." Then, fired with zeal and smitten with surprise, Thus to his ardent friend Euryalus replies: XXVI.

"Me, me would Nisus from such deeds debar?
Am I to send thee singly to thy fate?
Not thus my sire Opheltes, bred to war, Brought up and taught me, when in evil strait Was Troy, and Argives battered at her gate.
Not thus to great AEneas was I known, His trusty follower through the paths of Fate.
Here dwells a soul that dares the light disown, And counteth life well sold, to purchase such renown." XXVII.

"For _thee_ I feared not," Nisus made reply, "'Twere shame, indeed, to doubt a friend so tried.
So may great Jove, or whosoe'er on high With equal eyes this exploit shall decide, Restore me soon in triumph to thy side.
But if--for divers hazards underlie So bold a venture--evil chance betide, Or angry deity my hopes bely, Thee Heaven preserve, whose youth far less deserves to die.
XXVIII.

"Mine be a friend to lay me, if I fall, Rescued or ransomed, in my native ground; Or, if hard fortune grudge a boon so small, To make fit honour to my shade redound, And o'er the lost one rear an empty mound.
Ne'er let a childless mother owe to me A pang so keen, and such a cureless wound.
She, who, alone of mothers, dared for thee Acestes' walls to leave, and braved the stormy sea." XXIX.