by Virgil
First slumber, sweetest that celestials pour.
Methought I saw poor Hector, as I slept,
All bathed in tears and black with dust and gore,
Dragged by the chariot and his swoln feet sore
With piercing thongs. Ah me! how sad to view,
How changed from him, that Hector, whom of yore
Returning with Achilles’ spoils we knew, 316
When on the ships of Greece his Phrygian fires he threw.
XXXVII . “Foul is his beard, his hair is stiff with gore,
And fresh the wounds, those many wounds, remain,
Which erst around his native walls he bore.
Then, weeping too, I seem in sorrowing strain
To hail the hero, with a voice of pain.
‘O light of Troy, our refuge! why and how
This long delay? Whence comest thou again,
Long-looked-for Hector? How with aching brow, 325
Worn out by toil and death, do we behold thee now!
XXXVIII . “‘But oh! what dire indignity hath marred
The calmness of thy features? Tell me, why
With ghastly wounds do I behold thee scarred?’
To such vain quest he cared not to reply,
But, heaving from his breast a deep-drawn sigh,
‘Fly, Goddess-born! and get thee from the fire!
The foes,’ he said, ‘are on the ramparts. Fly!
All Troy is tumbling from her topmost spire. 334
No more can Priam’s land, nor Priam’s self require.
XXXIX . “‘Could Troy be saved by mortal prowess, mine,
Yea, mine had saved her. To thy guardian care
She doth her Gods and ministries consign.
Take them, thy future destinies to share,
And seek for them another home elsewhere,
That mighty city, which for thee and thine
O’er traversed ocean shall the Fates prepare.’
He spake, and quickly snatched from Vesta’s shrine 343
The deathless fire and wreaths and effigy divine.
XL . “Meanwhile a mingled murmur through the street
Rolls onward, — wails of anguish, shrieks of fear,
And though my father’s mansion stood secrete,
Embowered in foliage, nearer and more near
Peals the dire clang of arms, and loud and clear,
Borne on fierce echoes that in tumult blend,
War-shout and wail come thickening on the ear.
I start from sleep, the parapet ascend, 352
And from the sloping roof with eager ears attend.
XLI . “Like as a fire, when Southern gusts are rude,
Falls on the standing harvest of the plain,
Or torrent, hurtling with a mountain flood,
Whelms field and oxens’ toil and smiling grain,
And rolls whole forests headlong to the main,
While, weetless of the noise, on neighbouring height,
Tranced in mute wonder, stands the listening swain,
Then, then I see that Hector’s words were right, 361
And all the Danaan wiles are naked to the light.
XLII . “And now, Deiphobus, thy halls of pride,
Bowed by the flames, come ruining through the air;
Next burn Ucalegon’s, and far and wide
The broad Sigean reddens with the glare.
Then come the clamour and the trumpet’s blare.
Madly I rush to arms; though vain the fight,
Yet burns my soul, in fury and despair,
To rally a handful and to hold the height: 370
Sweet seems a warrior’s death and danger a delight.
XLIII . “Lo, Panthus, flying from the Grecian bands,
Panthus, the son of Othrys, Phoebus’ seer,
Bearing the sacred vessels in his hands,
And vanquished home-gods, to the door draws near,
His grandchild clinging to his side in fear.
‘Panthus,’ I cry, ‘how fares the fight? what tower
Still hold we?’ — Sighing, he replies ‘’Tis here,
The final end of all the Dardan power, 379
The last, sad day has come, the inevitable hour.
XLIV . “‘Troy was, and we were Trojans, now, alas!
No more, for perished is the Dardan fame.
Fierce Jove to Argos biddeth all to pass,
And Danaans rule a city wrapt in flame.
High in the citadel the monstrous frame
Pours forth an armed deluge to the day,
And Sinon, puffed with triumph, spreads the flame.
Part throng the gates, part block each narrow way; 388
Such hosts Mycenæ sends, such thousands to the fray.
XLV . “‘Athwart the streets stands ready the array
Of steel, and bare is every blade and bright.
Scarce the first warders of the gates essay
To stand and battle in the blinding night.’
So spake the son of Othrys, and forthright,
My spirit stirred with impulse from on high,
I rush to arms amid the flames and fight,
Where yells the war-fiend and the warrior’s cry, 397
Mixt with the din of strife, mounts upward to the sky.
XLVI . “Here warlike Epytus, renowned in fight,
And valiant Rhipeus gather to our side,
And Hypanis and Dymas, matched in might,
Join with us, by the glimmering moon descried.
Here Mygdon’s son, Coroebus, we espied,
Who came to Troy, — Cassandra’s love to gain,
And now his troop with Priam’s hosts allied;
Poor youth and heedless! whom in frenzied strain 406
His promised bride had warned, but warned, alas! in vain.
XLVII . “So when the bold and compact band I see,
‘Brave hearts,’ I cry, ‘but brave, alas! in vain;
If firm your purpose holds to follow me
Who dare the worst, our present plight is plain.
Troy’s guardian gods have left her; altar, fane,
All is deserted, every temple bare.
The town ye aid is burning. Forward, then,
To die and mingle in the tumult’s blare. 415
Sole hope to vanquished men of safety is despair.’
XLVIII . “Then fury spurred their courage, and behold,
As ravening wolves, when darkness hides the day,
Stung with mad fire of famine uncontrolled,
Prowl from their dens, and leave the whelps to stay,
With jaws athirst and gaping for the prey.
So to sure death, amid the darkness there,
Where swords, and spears, and foemen bar the way,
Into the centre of the town we fare. 424
Night with her shadowy cone broods o’er the vaulted air.
XLIX . “Oh, who hath tears to match our grief withal?
What tongue that night of havoc can make known
An ancient city totters to her fall,
Time-honoured empress and of old renown;
And senseless corpses, through the city strown,
Choke house and temple. Nor hath vengeance found
None save the Trojans; there the victors groan,
And valour fires the vanquished. All around 433
Wailings, and wild affright and shapes of death abound.
L . “First of the Greeks approaches, with a crowd,
Androgeus; friends he deems us unaware,
And thus, with friendly summons, cries aloud:
‘Haste, comrades, forward; from the fleet ye fare
With lagging steps but now, while yonder glare
Troy’s towers, and others sack and share the spoils?’
Then straight — for doubtful was our answer there —
He knew him taken in the foemen’s toils; 442
Shuddering, he checks his voice, and back his foot
recoils.
LI . “As one who, in a tangled brake apart,
On some lithe snake, unheeded in the briar,
Hath trodden heavily, and with backward start
Flies, trembling at the head uplift in ire
And blue neck, swoln in many a glittering spire.
So slinks Androgeus, shuddering with dismay;
We, massed in onset, make the foe retire,
And slay them, wildered, weetless of the way. 451
Fortune, with favouring smile, assists our first essay.
LII . “Flushed with success and eager for the fray,
‘Friends,’ cries Coroebus, ‘forward; let us go
Where Fortune newly smiling, points the way.
Take we the Danaans’ bucklers; with a foe
Who asks, if craft or courage guide the blow?
Themselves shall arm us.’ — Then he takes the crest,
The shield and dagger of Androgeus; so
Doth Rhipeus, so brave Dymas and the rest; 460
All in the new-won spoils their eager limbs invest.
LIII . “Thus we, elate, but not with Heaven our friend,
March on and mingle with the Greeks in fight,
And many a Danaan to the shades we send,
And many a battle in the blinding night
We join with those that meet us. Some in flight
Rush diverse to the ships and trusty tide;
Some, craven-hearted, in ignoble fright,
Make for the horse and, clambering up the side, 469
Deep in the treacherous womb, their well-known refuge, hide.
LIV . “Ah! vain to boast, if Heaven refuse to aid!
Dragged by her tresses from Minerva’s fane,
Cassandra comes, the Priameian maid,
Stretching to heaven her burning eyes in vain,
Her eyes, for bonds her tender hands constrain.
That sight Coroebus brooked not. Stung with gall
And mad with rage, nor fearing to be slain,
He plunged amid their columns. One and all, 478
With weapons massed, press on and follow at his call.
LV . “Here first with missiles, from a temple’s height
Hurled by our comrades, we are crushed and slain,
And piteous is the slaughter, at the sight
Of Argive helms for Argive foes mista’en.
Now too, with shouts of fury and disdain
To see the maiden rescued, here and there
The Danaans gathering round us, charge amain;
Fierce-hearted Ajax, the Atridan pair, 487
And all Thessalia’s host our scanty band o’erbear.
LVI . “So, when the tempest bursting wakes the war,
The justling winds in conflict rave and roar,
South, West and East upon his orient car,
The lashed woods howl, and with his trident hoar
Nereus in foam upheaves the watery floor.
Those too, whom late we scattered through the town,
Tricked in the darkness, reappear once more.
At once the falsehood of our guise is known, 496
The shields, the lying arms, the speech of different tone.
LVII . “O’erwhelmed with odds, we perish; first of all,
Struck down by fierce Peneleus by the fane
Of warlike Pallas, doth Coroebus fall.
Next, Rhipeus dies, the justest, but in vain,
The noblest soul of all the Trojan train.
Heaven deemed him otherwise; then Dymas brave
And Hypanis by comrades’ hands are slain.
Nor, Panthus, thee thy piety can save, 505
Nor e’en Apollo’s wreath preserve thee from the grave.
LVIII . “Witness, ye ashes of our comrades dear,
Ye flames of Troy, that in your hour of woe
Nor darts I shunned, nor shock of Danaan spear.
If Fate my life had called me to forego,
This hand had earned it, forfeit to the foe.
Thence forced away, brave Iphitus, and I,
And Pelias, — Iphitus with age was slow,
And Pelias by Ulysses lamed — we fly 514
Where round the palace rings the war-shout’s rallying cry.
LIX . “There raged a fight so fierce, as though no fight
Raged elsewhere, nor the city streamed with gore.
We see the War-God glorying in his might;
Up to the roof we see the Danaans pour;
Their shielded penthouse drives against the door.
Close cling their ladders to the walls; these, fain
To clutch the doorposts, climb from floor to floor,
Their right hands strive the battlements to gain, 523
Their left with lifted shield the arrowy storm sustain.
LX . “There, roof and pinnacle the Dardans tear —
Death standing near — and hurl them on the foe,
Last arms of need, the weapons of despair;
And gilded beams and rafters down they throw,
Ancestral ornaments of days ago.
These, stationed at the gates, with naked glaive,
Shoulder to shoulder, guard the pass below.
Hearts leap afresh the royal halls to save, 532
And cheer our vanquished friends and reinspire the brave.
LXI . “Behind the palace, unobserved and free,
There stood a door, a secret thoroughfare
Through Priam’s halls. Here poor Andromache
While Priam’s kingdom flourished and was fair,
To greet her husband’s parents would repair
Alone, or carrying with tendance fain
To Hector’s father Hector’s son and heir.
By this I reached the roof-top, whence in vain 541
The luckless Teucrians hurled their unavailing rain.
LXII . “Sheer o’er the highest roof-top to the sky,
Skirting the parapet, a watch-tower rose,
Whence camp and fleet and city met the eye.
Here plying levers, where the flooring shows
Weak joists, we heave it over. Down it goes
With sudden crash upon the Danaan train,
Dealing wide ruin. But anon new foes
Come swarming up, while ever and again 550
Fast fall the showers of stones, and thick the javelins rain.
LXIII . “Just on the threshold of the porch, behold
Fierce Pyrrhus stands, in glittering brass bedight:
As when a snake, that through the winter’s cold
Lay swoln and hidden in the ground from sight,
Gorged with rank herbs, forth issues to the light,
And sleek with shining youth and newly drest,
Wreathing its slippery volumes, towers upright
And, glorying, to the sunbeam rears its breast, 559
And darts a three-forked tongue, and points a flaming crest.
LXIV . “With him, Achilles’ charioteer and squire,
Automedon, huge Periphas and all
The Scyrian youth rush up, and flaming fire
Hurl to the roof, and thunder at the wall.
He in the forefront, tallest of the tall,
Poleaxe in hand, unhinging at a stroke
The brazen portals, made the doorway fall,
And wide-mouthed as a window, through the oak, 568
A panelled plank hewn out, a yawning rent he broke.
LXV . “Bared stands the inmost palace, and behold,
The stately chambers and the courts appear
Of Priam and the Trojan Kings of old,
And warders at the door with shield and spear.
Moaning and tumult in the house we hear,
Wailings of misery, and shouts that smite
The golden stars, and women’s shrieks of fear,
And trembling matrons, hurrying left and right, 577
Cling to and kiss the doors, made frantic by affright.
&
nbsp; LXVI . “Strong as his father, Pyrrhus onward pushed,
Nor bars nor warders can his strength sustain.
Down sinks the door, with ceaseless battery crushed.
Force wins a footing, and, the foremost slain,
In, like a deluge, pours the Danaan train.
So when the foaming river, uncontrolled,
Bursts through its banks and riots on the plain,
O’er dyke and dam the gathering deluge rolled, 586
From field to field sweeps on with cattle, flock and fold.
LXVII . “These eyes saw Pyrrhus, rioting in blood,
Saw on the threshold the Atridæ twain,
Saw where among a hundred daughters, stood
Pale Hecuba, saw Priam’s life-blood stain
The fires his hands had hallowed in the fane.
Those fifty bridal chambers I behold
(So fair the promise of a future reign)
And spoil-deckt pillars of barbaric gold, 595
A wreck; where fails the flame, its place the Danaans hold.
LXVIII . “Haply the fate of Priam thou would’st know.
Soon as he saw the captured city fall,
The palace-gates burst open, and the foe
Dealing wild riot in his inmost hall,
Up sprang the old man and, at danger’s call,
Braced o’er his trembling shoulders in a breath
His rusty armour, took his belt withal,
And drew the useless falchion from its sheath, 604
And on their thronging spears rushed forth to meet his death.
LXIX . “Within the palace, open to the day,
There stood a massive altar. Overhead,
With drooping boughs, a venerable bay
Its shadowy foliage o’er the home-gods spread.
Here, with her hundred daughters, pale with dread,
Poor Hecuba and all her female train,
As doves, that from the low’ring storm have fled,
And cower for shelter from the pelting rain, 613
Crouch round the silent gods, and cling to them in vain.
LXX . “But when in youthful arms came Priam near,
‘Ah, hapless lord!’ she cries, ‘what mad desire
Arms thee for battle? Why this sword and spear?
And whither art thou hurrying? Times so dire
Not such defenders nor such help require.
