like a virgilian: part i

In the front of the entrance hall, and right in the gateway of the palace, stood Pyrrhus, a figure of armed insolence sparkling in a sheen of bronze; like a snake which after a winter spent hidden below ground, swollen from a fare of poisonous weeds, now emerges into the light, and shedding its slough becomes shiningly fresh and young, then raises its breast tall to the sun, coils a slithering back, and sets flickering a triple tongue.

The Aeneid | W.F. Jackson Knight (trans.)