Series 1 > Grameid: an heroic poem descriptive of the campaign of Viscount Dundee in 1689, and other pieces

203
207-225] SCOTI GRAMEIDOS LIB. V.
Auriacus cervice precor luat omnia princeps,
Impius in socerum qui sustulit arma verendum;
Qualia terrigenas sumpsisse et fama gigantes
In superos, celsi peterent dum culmina coeli.
Hos pater omnipotens injecto fulmine fratres
Aethere Phlegraeos Stygias detrusit ad umbras.
Sic cadat in Batavi caput exitiale tyranni
Caelestum gravis ira deum, telisque petitum
Obruat, et Stygio damnatum mittat Averno.’
Haec secum, et surdas suspiria misit in auras.
Texerat umbra polum gravis, et jam nocte silenti
Tarda Lycaonius volvebat plaustra Bootes.
Scaurius optatis rerum successibus usus
Flectere cornipedes in praelia mandat anhelos,
Ocyus atque acies una jubet ire pedestres.
Ipse praeit laeto testatus gaudia vultu,
Acceleratque gradum, sub tegmine noctis opacae
Hostica furtivis ut castra lacesseret armis.
Urget et acer iter, rapidoque simillimus euro
neck, he who raised his hand against his venerated father-in-law ;
a deed like that, as goes the tale, which the earthly giants essayed
against the gods, when they assailed the heights of heaven.
These brethren the Almighty father, with lightning hurled, drove
from the air of heaven into the shades of Stygian Phlegethon.
So may the punishment of the heavenly gods fall on the execrable
head of the Batavian tyrant, and stricken with their bolts may he
be crushed and sent to Stygian Avemus.’ These things with
himself he uttered, and sent forth his breath to the deaf air.
The deep shades had covered the poles, and already the
Lycaonian1 Bootes was driving his tardy wagon through the
silent night. Scourie, availing himself of his wished-for succours,
bids his panting cavalry turn again for the fight, and with them,
commands his foot to advance at speed. He himself goes before
them, witnessing to his satisfaction with glad countenance, and he
hastens their pace, that under the cover of. a dark night he might
attack the hostile camp by surprise.2 Swiftly he presses on his
way, and, like the east wind, he crosses the lofty heights of cloud-
1 See article ‘ Arctos ’ in Smith’s Clas. Diet.
2 Mackay hardly hoped to surprise the Highland army in a body because
of the shortness of the night, and the good service in daylight done by the High¬
land sentries upon the tops of the hills. He, however, hoped that if he could
not get them in a body, he might catch some of them and discourage the whole.