The Complete Poetical Works of George Chapman
Page 106
Was us’d of all hands. Priam sat amaz’d to see the prime
Of Thetis’ son, accomplish’d so with stature, looks, and grace,
In which the fashion of a God he thought had chang’d his place.
Achilles fell to him as fast, admir’d as much his years
Told in his grave and good aspect; his speech ev’n charm’d his ears,
So order’d, so material. With this food feasted too,
Old Priam spake thus: “Now, Jove’s seed, command that I may go,
And add to this feast grace of rest. These lids ne’er clos’d mine eyes,
Since under thy hands fled the soul of my dear son; sighs, cries,
And woes, all use from food and sleep have taken; the base courts
Of my sad palace made my beds, where all the abject sorts
Of sorrow I have variéd, tumbled in dust, and hid;
No bit, no drop, of sust’nance touch’d.” Then did Achilles bid
His men and women see his bed laid down, and coveréd
With purple blankets, and on them an arras coverlid,
Waistcoats of silk plush laying by. The women straight took lights,
And two beds made with utmost speed, and all the other rites
Their lord nam’d us’d, who pleasantly the king in hand thus bore:
“Good father, you must sleep without; lest any counsellor
Make his access in depth of night, as oft their industry
Brings them t’ impart our war-affairs; of whom should any eye
Discern your presence, his next steps to Agamemnon fly,
And then shall I lose all these gifts. But go to, signify,
And that with truth, how many days you mean to keep the state
Of Hector’s funerals; because so long would I rebate
Mine own edge set to sack your town, and all our host contain
From interruption of your rites.” He answer’d: “If you mean
To suffer such rites to my son, you shall perform a part
Of most grace to me. But you know with how dismay’d a heart
Our host took Troy; and how much fear will therefore apprehend
Their spirits to make out again, so far as we must send
For wood to raise our heap of death; unless I may assure
That this your high grace will stand good, and make their pass secure;
Which if you seriously confirm, nine days I mean to mourn;
The tenth keep funeral and feast; th’ eleventh raise and adorn
My son’s fit sepulchre; the twelfth, if we must needs, we’ll fight.”
“Be it,” replied Æacides, “do Hector all this right;
I’ll hold war back those whole twelve days; of which, to free all fear,
Take this my right hand.” This confirm’d, the old king rested there;
His herald lodg’d by him; and both in forepart of the tent;
Achilles in an inmost room of wondrous ornament,
Whose side bright-cheek’d Briseis warm’d. Soft sleep tam’d Gods and men,
All but most-useful Mercury; sleep could not lay one chain
On his quick temples, taking care for getting off again
Engagéd Priam undiscern’d of those that did maintain
The sacred watch. Above his head he stood with this demand:
“O father, sleep’st thou so secure, still lying in the hand
Of so much ill, and being dismiss’d by great Æacides?
’Tis true thou hast redeem’d the dead; but for thy life’s release,
Should Agamemnon hear thee here, three times the price now paid
Thy sons’ hands must repay for thee.” This said, the king, afraid,
Start from his sleep, Idæus call’d, and, for both, Mercury
The horse and mules, before loos’d, join’d so soft and curiously
That no ear heard, and through the host drave; but when they drew
To gulfy Xanthus’ bright-wav’d stream, up to Olympus flew
Industrious Mercury. And now the saffron Morning rose,
Spreading her white robe over all the world; when, full of woes,
They scourg’d on with the corse to Troy, from whence no eye had seen,
Before Cassandra, their return. She, like love’s golden Queen,
Ascending Pergamus, discern’d her father’s person nigh,
His herald, and her brother’s corse; and then she cast this cry
Round about Troy: “O Trojans, if ever ye did greet
Hector return’d from fight alive, now look ye out and meet
His ransom’d person. Then his worth was all your city’s joy,
Now do it honour.” Out all rush’d; woman nor man in Troy
Was left, a most unmeasur’d cry took up their voices. Close
To Scæa’s ports they met the corse; and to it headlong goes
The rev’rend mother, the dear wife; upon it strow their hair,
And lie entrancéd. Round about the people broke the air
In lamentations; and all day had stay’d the people there,
If Priam had not cried “Give way, give me but leave to bear
The body home, and mourn your fills.” Then cleft the press, and gave
Way to the chariot. To the court herald Idæus drave
Where on a rich bed they bestow’d the honour’d person, round
Girt it with singers that the woe with skilful voices crown’d.
A woeful elegy they sung, wept singing, and the dames
Sigh’d as they sung. Andromache the downright prose exclaims
Began to all; she on the neck of slaughter’d Hector fell,
And cried out: “O my husband, thou in youth bad’st youth farewell,
Left’st me a widow, thy sole son an infant; ourselves curs’d
In our birth made him right our child: for all my care that nurs’d
His infancy will never give life to his youth, ere that
Troy from her top will be destroy’d; thou guardian of our state,
Thou ev’n of all her strength the strength, thou, that in care wert past
Her careful mothers of their babes, being gone, how can she last?
Soon will the swoln fleet fill her womb with all their servitude,
Myself with them, and thou with me, dear son, in labours rude
Shalt be employ’d, sternly survey’d by cruel conquerors;
Or, rage not suff’ring life so long, some one, whose hate abhors
Thy presence (putting him in mind of his sire slain by thine,
His brother, son, or friend) shall work thy ruin before mine,
Toss’d from some tow’r, for many Greeks have ate earth from the hand
Of thy strong father; in sad fight his spirit was too much mann’d,
And therefore mourn his people; we, thy parents, my dear lord,
For that thou mak’st endure a woe, black, and to be abhorr’d.
Of all yet thou hast left me worst, not dying in thy bed,
And reaching me thy last-rais’d hand, in nothing counselléd
Nothing commanded by that pow’r thou hadst of me to do
Some deed for thy sake. O for these never will end my woe,
Never my tears cease.” Thus wept she, and all the ladies clos’d
Her passion with a gen’ral shriek. Then Hecuba dispos’d
Her thoughts in like words; “O my son, of all mine much most dear,
Dear while thou liv’dst too ev’n to Gods, and after death they were
Careful to save thee. Being best, thou most wert envied;
My other sons Achilles sold; but thee he left not dead.
Imber and Samos, the false ports of Lemnos entertain’d
Their persons; thine, no port but death. Nor there in rest remain’d
Thy violated corse, the tomb of his great friend was spher’d
With thy dragg’d person; yet from death he was not therefore rear’d
But, all his rage us�
�d, so the Gods have tender’d thy dead state,
Thou liest as living, sweet and fresh, as he that felt the fate
Of Phœbus’ holy shafts.” These words the queen us’d for her moan,
And, next her, Helen held that state of speech and passión:
“O Hector, all my brothers more were not so lov’d of me
As thy most virtues. Not my lord I held so dear, as thee,
That brought me hither; before which I would I had been brought
To ruin; for what breeds that wish (which is the mischief wrought
By my access) yet never found one harsh taunt, one word’s ill,
From thy sweet carriage. Twenty years do now their circles fill
Since my arrival; all which time thou didst not only bear
Thyself without check, but all else, that my lord’s brothers were,
Their sisters’ lords, sisters themselves, the queen my mother-in-law,
(The king being never but most mild) when thy man’s spirit saw
Sour and reproachful, it would still reprove their bitterness
With sweet words, and thy gentle soul. And therefore thy decease
I truly mourn for; and myself curse as the wretched cause;
All broad Troy yielding me not one, that any human laws
Of pity or forgiveness mov’d t’entreat me humanly,
But only thee, all else abhorr’d me for my destiny.”
These words made ev’n the commons mourn; to whom the king said:
“Friends,
Now fetch wood for our fun’ral fire, nor fear the foe intends
Ambush, or any violence; Achilles gave his word,
At my dismission, that twelve days he would keep sheath’d his sword,
And all men’s else.” Thus oxen, mules, in chariots straight they put,
Went forth and an unmeasur’d pile of sylvan matter cut;
Nine days employ’d in carriage, but when the tenth morn shin’d
On wretched mortals, then they brought the fit-to-be-divin’d
Forth to be burn’d. Troy swum in tears. Upon the pile’s most height
They laid the person, and gave fire. All day it burn’d, all night.
But when th’ elev’nth morn let on earth her rosy fingers shine,
The people flock’d about the pile, and first with blackish wine
Quench’d all the flames. His brothers then, and friends, the snowy bones
Gather’d into an urn of gold, still pouring on their moans.
Then wrapt they in soft purple veils the rich urn, digg’d a pit,
Grav’d it, ramm’d up the grave with stones, and quickly built to it
A sepulchre. But, while that work and all the fun’ral rites
Were in performance, guards were held at all parts, days and nights,
For fear of false surprise before they had impos’d the crown
To these solemnities. The tomb advanc’d once, all the town
In Jove-nurs’d Priam’s Court partook a passing sumptuous feast.
And so horse-taming Hector’s rites gave up his soul to rest.
THE END OF THE TWENTY-FOURTH BOOK.
ENDNOTES.
1 Shame a quality that hurts and helps men exceedingly.
EPILOGUE TO HOMER’S ILIADS
Thus far the Ilian ruins I have laid
Open to English eyes. In which, repaid
With thine own value, go, unvalued book,
Live, and be lov’d. If any envious look
Hurt thy clear fame, learn that no state more high
Attends on virtue than pin’d envy’s eye.
Would thou wert worth it that the best doth wound.
Which this age feeds, and which the last shall bound!
Thus, with labour enough, though with more comfort in the merits of my divine author, I have brought my translation of his Iliads to an end. If, either therein, or in the harsh utterance or matter of my Comment before, I have, for haste, scattered with my burthen (less than fifteen weeks being the whole time that the last Twelve Books’ translation stood me in) I desire my present will (and I doubt not hability, if God give life, to reform and perfect all hereafter) may be ingenuously accepted for the absolute work. The rather, considering the most learned, with all their helps and time, have been so often, and unanswerably, miserably taken halting. In the mean time, that most assistful and unspeakable Spirit, by Whose thrice sacred conduct and inspiration I have finished this labour, diffuse the fruitful horn of His blessings through these goodness-thirsting watchings; without which, utterly dry and bloodless is whatsoever mortality soweth.
But where our most diligent Spondanus ends his work with a prayer to be taken out of these Mæanders and Euripian rivers (as he terms them) of Ethnic and Profane Writers (being quite contrary to himself at the beginning) I thrice humbly beseech the Most Dear and Divine Mercy (ever most incomparably preferring the great light of His Truth in His direct and infallible Scriptures) I may ever be enabled, by resting wondering in His right comfortable shadows in these, to magnify the clearness of His Almighty apparance in the other.
And with this salutation of Poesy given by our Spondanus in his Preface to these Iliads (“All hail saint-sacred Poesy that, under so much gall of fiction, such abundance of honey doctrine hast hidden, not revealing them to the unworthy worldly! Wouldst thou but so much make me, that amongst thy novices I might be numbered, no time should ever come near my life that could make me forsake thee.”) I will conclude with this my daily and nightly prayer, learned of the most learned Simplicius; —
“Supplico tibi, Domine, Pater, et Dux rationis nostræ, ut nostræ nobilitatis recordemur quâ Tu nos ornasti; et ut Tu nobis præstò sis ut iis qui per sese moventur; ut et à corporis contagio brutorumque affectuum repurgemur, eosque superemus et regamus, et, sicut decet, pro instrumentis iis utamur. Deinde ut nobis adjumento sis, ad accuratam rationis nostræ correctionem, et conjunctionem cum iis qui verè sunt per lucem veritatis. Et tertium, Salvatori supplex oro, ut ab oculis animorum nostrorum caliginem prorsus abstergas, ut (quod apud Homerum est) norimus bene qui Deus, aut mortalis, habendus. Amen.”
FINIS
THE ODYSSEYS
CONTENTS
TO THE MOST WORTHILY HONOURED, MY SINGULAR GOOD LORD, ROBERT, EARL OF SOMERSET, LORD CHAMBERLAIN, ETC.
CERTAIN ANCIENT GREEK EPIGRAMS TRANSLATED
THE FIRST BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE SECOND BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE THIRD BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE FOURTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE FIFTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE SIXTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
THE SEVENTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
THE EIGHTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE NINTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE TENTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE ELEVENTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE TWELFTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
FINIS DUODECIMI LIBRI HOM. ODYSS.
THE THIRTEENTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
THE FOURTEENTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE FIFTEENTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE SIXTEENTH
BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE SEVENTEENTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE TWENTIETH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE TWENTY-FIRST BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE TWENTY-SECOND BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE TWENTY-THIRD BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
THE TWENTY-FOURTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
“SO WROUGHT DIVINE ULYSSES”
TO THE RUINS OF TROY AND GREECE
TO THE MOST WORTHILY HONOURED, MY SINGULAR GOOD LORD, ROBERT, EARL OF SOMERSET, LORD CHAMBERLAIN, ETC.
I have adventured, right noble Earl, out of my utmost and ever-vowed service to your virtues, to entitle their merits to the patronage of Homer’s English life, whose wished natural life the great Macedon would have protected as the spirit of his empire,
That he to his unmeasur’d mighty acts
Might add a fame as vast; and their extracts,
In fires as bright and endless as the stars,
His breast might breathe and thunder out his wars.
But that great monarch’s love of fame and praise
Receives an envious cloud in our foul days;
For since our great ones ceased themselves to do,
Deeds worth their praise, they hold it folly too
To feed their praise in others. But what can,
Of all the gifts that are, be giv’n to man
More precious than Eternity and Glory,
Singing their praises in unsilenc’d story?
Which no black day, no nation, nor no age,
No change of time or fortune, force nor rage,
Shall ever rase? All which the monarch knew,
Where Homer liv’d entitled, would ensue:
Cujus de gurgite vivo
Combibit arcanos vatum omnis turba furores, etc.
From whose deep fount of life the thirsty rout
Of Thespian prophets have lien sucking out
Their sacred rages. And as th’ influent stone
Of Father Jove’s great and laborious son
Lifts high the heavy iron, and far implies