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Aeneas grieved at recollecting some of his own companions who had
perished in the storm. At that moment he beheld Palinurus, his
pilot, who fell overboard and was drowned. He addressed him and
asked him the cause of his misfortune. Palinurus replied that the
rudder was carried away, and he, clinging to it, was swept away
with it. He besought Aeneas most urgently to extend to him his
hand and take him in company to the opposite shore. But the Sibyl
rebuked him for the wish thus to transgress the laws of Pluto; but
consoled him by informing him that the people of the shore where
his body had been wafted by the waves should be stirred up by
prodigies to give it due burial, and that the promontory should
bear the name of Cape Palinurus, which it does to this day.
Leaving Palinurus consoled by these words, they approached the
boat. Charon, fixing his eyes sternly upon the advancing warrior,
demanded by what right he, living and armed, approached that
shore. To which the Sibyl replied that they would commit no
violence, that Aeneas's only object was to see his father, and
finally exhibited the golden branch, at sight of which Charon's
wrath relaxed, and he made haste to turn his bark to the shore,
and receive them on board. The boat, adapted only to the light
freight of bodiless spirits, groaned under the weight of the hero.
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