And now there came ambassadors from the city, having olive branches about their heads, praying for a truce, that they might bury their dead. Then Æneas made answer, “Ye ask peace for the dead; fain would I give it to the living. I had not come to this land but for the bidding of the Fates. And if your King changeth from me and my friendship to Turnus, I am blameless. Yet methinks Turnus should rather have taken this danger upon himself. And even now, if he be willing to fight with me, man to man, so be it. But now bury ye your dead.”
Then they made a truce for twelve days. And the men of Troy and the Latins labored together, hewing wood upon the hills, pine and cedar and mountain ash. And the men of Troy built great piles upon the shore, and burned the dead bodies of their companions thereon, and their arms with them. And the Latins did likewise. Also they that had been chosen to do this thing carried the body of Pallas to his city. And King Evander and the Arcadians made a great mourning for him.
After these things there was again battle between the Trojans and the Latins; and many were slain on either side, but at the last the men of Troy prevailed. Then Prince Turnus, seeing that the Latins had fled in the battle, and that men looked to him that he should perform that which he had promised, even to meet Æneas face to face, was filled with rage. Even as a lion which a hunter hath wounded breaketh the arrow wherewith he hath been stricken, and rouseth himself to battle, shaking his mane and roaring, so Turnus arose. And first he spake to King Latinus, saying, “Not for me, my father, shall these cowards of Troy go back from that which they have covenanted. I will meet this man face to face, and slay him while ye look on; or, if the gods will that he vanquish me so, he shall rule over you, and have Lavinia to wife.”
But King Latinus made answer: “Yet think awhile, my son. Thou hast the kingdom of thy father Daunus; and there are other noble virgins in Latium whom thou mayest have to wife. Wilt thou not then be content? For to give my daughter to any husband of this nation I was forbidden, as thou knowest. Yet did I disobey, being moved by love of thee, my wife also beseeching me with many tears. Thou seest what troubles I and my people, and thou more than all, have suffered from that time. Twice have we fled in the battle, and now the city only is left to us. If I must yield me to these men, let me yield whilst thou art yet alive. For what doth it profit me that thou shouldst die? Nay, but all men would cry shame on me if I gave thee to death!”