In the last place, for the dira, or flying pest which, flapping on
the shield of Turnus and fluttering about his head, disheartened him
in the duel, and presaged to him his approaching death--I might have
placed it more properly amongst the objections, for the critics who
lay want of courage to the charge of Virgil's hero quote this
passage as a main proof of their assertion. They say our author had
not only secured him before the duel, but also in the beginning of
it had given him the advantage in impenetrable arms and in his
sword; for that of Turnus was not his own (which was forged by
Vulcan for his father), but a weapon which he had snatched in haste,
and by mistake, belonging to his charioteer Metiscus. That after
all this Jupiter, who was partial to the Trojan, and distrustful of
the event, though he had hung the balance and given it a jog of his
hand to weigh down Turnus, thought convenient to give the Fates a
collateral security by sending the screech-owl to discourage him;
for which they quote these words of Virgil:-
"Non me tua turbida virtus
Terret, ait; dii me terrent, et Jupiter hostis.
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