All breathed in silence, and intensely gazed
SECOND BOOK
All breathed in silence, and intensely gazed,
When from the lofty couch his voice Aeneas raised,
And thus began: " The task which you impose
O Queen, revives unutterable woes;
How by the Grecians Troy was overturned,
And her power fell — to be for ever mourned;
Calamities which with a pitying heart
I saw, of which I formed no common part.
Oh! 'twas a miserable end! What One
Of all our Foes, Dolopian, Myrmidon,
Or Soldier bred in stern Ulysses' train
Such things could utter, and from tears refrain?
And hastens now from Heaven the dewy night,
And the declining stars to sleep invite.
But since such strong desire prevails to know
Our wretched fate, and Troy's last overthrow
I will attempt the theme though in my breast
Memory recoils and shudders at the test.
The Grecian Chiefs, exhausted of their strength
By war protracted to such irksome length,
And, from the siege repulsed, new schemes devise;
A wooden horse they build of mountain size.
Assisted by Minerva's art divine,
They frame the work, and sheathe its ribs with pine,
An offering to the Gods — that they may gain
Their home in safety; this they boldly feign,
And spread the Tale abroad; — meanwhile they hide
Selected Warriors in its gloomy side;
Throng the huge concave to its utmost den,
And fill that mighty Womb with armed Men.
In sight of Troy, an Island lies, by Fame
Amply distinguished, Tenedos its name;
Potent and rich while Priam's sway endured,
Now a bare hold for keels, unsafely moored.
Here did the Greeks, when for their native land
We thought them sailed, lurk on the desart strand.
From her long grief at once the Realm of Troy
Broke loose; — the gates are opened, and with joy
We seek the Dorian Camp, and wander o'er
The spots forsaken, the abandoned shore.
Here, the Dolopian ground its lines presents;
And here the dread Achilles pitched his tents;
There lay the Ships drawn up along the coast,
And here we oft encountered host with host.
Meanwhile, the rest an eye of wonder lift,
Unwedded Pallas! on the fatal Gift
To thee devoted. First, Thymoetes calls
For its free ingress through disparted walls
To lodge within the Citadel — thus He
Treacherous, or such the course of destiny.
Capys, with some of wiser mind, would sweep
The insidious Grecian offering to the Deep,
Or to the flames subject it; or advise
To perforate and search the cavities;
Into conflicting judgements break and split
The crowd, as random thoughts the fancy hit.
Down from the Citadel a numerous throng
Hastes with Laocoon; they sweep along,
And He, the foremost, crying from afar,
" What would ye? wretched Maniacs, as ye are!
Think ye the Foe departed? Or that e'er
A boon from Grecian hands can prove sincere?
Thus do ye read Ulysses? Foes unseen
Lurk in these chambers; or the huge Machine
Against the ramparts brought, by pouring down
Force from aloft, will seize upon the Town.
Let not a fair pretence your minds enthrall;
For me, I fear the Greeks and most of all
When they are offering gifts." With mighty force
This said, he hurled a spear against the Horse;
It smote the curved ribs, and quivering stood
While groans made answer through the hollow wood.
We too, upon this impulse, had not Fate
Been adverse, and our minds infatuate,
We too, had rushed the den to penetrate,
Streams of Argolic blood our swords had stained,
Troy, thou mightst yet have stood, and Priam's Towers remained.
But lo! an unknown Youth with hand to hand
Bound fast behind him, whom a boisterous Band
Of Dardan Swains with clamour hurrying
Force to the shore and place before the King.
Such his device when he those chains had sought
A voluntary captive, fixed in thought
Either the City to betray, or meet
Death, the sure penalty of foiled deceit.
The curious Trojans, pouring in, deride
And taunt the Prisoner, with an emulous pride.
Now see the cunning of the Greeks exprest
By guilt of One, true image of the rest!
For, while with helpless looks, from side to side
Anxiously cast, the Phrygian throng he eyed,
" Alas! what Land," he cries, " can now, what Sea,
Can offer refuge? what resource for me?
Who 'mid the Greeks no breathing-place can find,
And whom ye, Trojans, have to death consigned!"
Thus were we wrought upon; and now, with sense
Of pity touched, that checked all violence,
We cheered and urged him boldly to declare
His origin, what tidings he may bear,
And on what claims he ventures to confide;
Then, somewhat eased of fear, he thus replied:
" O King, a plain confession shall ensue
On these commands, in all things plain and true.
And first, the tongue that speaks shall not deny
My origin; a Greek by birth am I.
Fortune made Sinon wretched; — to do more,
And make him false, — that lies not in her power.
In converse, haply, ye have heard the name
Of Palamedes, and his glorious fame;
A Chief with treason falsely charged, and whom
The Achaians crushed by a nefarious doom,
And now lament when covered with the tomb.
His kinsman I; and hither by his side
Me my poor Father sent, when first these fields were tried.
While yet his voice the Grecian Chieftains swayed
And due respect was to his counsel paid,
Ere that high influence was with life cut short,
I did not walk ungraced by fair report.
Ulysses, envy rankling in his breast,
(And these are things which thousands can attest)
Thereafter turned his subtlety to give
That fatal injury, and he ceased to live.
I dragged my days in sorrow and in gloom,
And mourned my guiltless Friend, indignant at his doom;
This inwardly; and yet not always mute,
Rashly I vowed revenge — my sure pursuit,
If e'er the shores of Argos I again
Should see, victorious with my Countrymen.
Sharp hatred did these open threats excite;
Hence the first breathings of a deadly blight;
Hence, to appal me, accusations came,
Which still Ulysses was at work to frame;
Hence would he scatter daily 'mid the crowd
Loose hints, at will sustained or disavowed,
Beyond himself for instruments he looked,
And in this search of means no respite brooked
Till Calchas his accomplice — but the chain
Of foul devices why untwist in vain?
Why should I linger? if ye Trojans place
On the same level all of Argive race,
And 'tis enough to know that I am one,
Punish me; would Ulysses might look on!
And let the Atridae hear, rejoiced with what is done!"
This stirred us more, whose judgements were asleep
To all suspicion of a crime so deep
And craft so fine. Our questions we renewed;
And, trembling, thus the fiction he pursued.
" Oft did the Grecian Host the means prepare
To flee from Troy, tired with so long a war;
Would they had fled! but winds as often stopped
Their going, and the twisted sails were dropped;
And when this pine-ribbed Horse of monstrous size
Stood forth, a finished Work, before their eyes,
Then chiefly pealed the storm through blackened skies.
So that the Oracle its aid might lend
To quell our doubts, Eurypylus we send,
Who brought the answer of the voice divine
In these sad words given from the Delphic shrine.
— " Blood flowed, a Virgin perished to appease
The winds, when first for Troy ye passed the seas;
O Grecians! for return across the Flood,
Life must be paid, a sacrifice of blood. "
— With this response an universal dread
Among the shuddering multitude was spread;
All quaked to think at whom the Fates had aimed
This sentence, who the Victim Phoebus claimed.
Then doth the Ithacan with tumult loud
Bring forth the Prophet Calchas to the crowd;
Asks what the Gods would have; and some, meanwhile,
Discern what end the Mover of the guile
Is compassing; and do not hide from me
The crime which they in mute reserve foresee.
Ten days refused he still with guarded breath
To designate the Man, to fix the death;
The Ithacan still urgent for the deed;
At last the unwilling voice announced that I must bleed.
All gave assent, each happy to be cleared,
By one Man's fall, of what himself had feared.
Now came the accursed day; the salted cates
Are spread, — the Altar for the Victim waits;
The fillets bind my temples — I took flight
Bursting my chains, I own, and through the night
Lurked among oozy swamps, and there lay hid
Till winds might cease their voyage to forbid.
And now was I compelled at once to part
With all the dear old longings of the heart,
Never to see my Country, Children, Sire,
Whom they, perchance, will for this flight require
For this offence of mine of them will make
An expiation, punished for my sake.
But Thee, by all the Powers who hold their seat
In Heaven, and know the truth, do I entreat
O King! and by whate'er may yet remain
Among mankind of faith without a stain,
Have pity on my woes; commiserate
A mind that ne'er deserved this wretched fate."
His tears prevail, we spare the Suppliant's life
Pitying the man we spare, without a strife;
Even Priam's self, He first of all commands
To loose the fetters and unbind his hands,
Then adds these friendly words; — " Whoe'er thou be
Henceforth forget the Grecians, lost to thee;
We claim thee now, and let me truly hear
Who moved them first this monstrous Horse to rear?
And why? Was some religious vow the aim?
Or for what use in war the Engine might they frame?"
Straight were these artful words in answer given
While he upraised his hands, now free, to Heaven.
" Eternal Fires, on you I call; O Ye!
And your inviolable Deity!
Altars, and ruthless swords from which I fled!
Ye fillets, worn round my devoted head!
Be it no crime if Argive sanctions cease
To awe me, — none to hate the men of Greece!
The law of Country forfeiting its hold,
Mine be the voice their secrets to unfold!
And ye, O Trojans! keep the word ye gave;
Save me, if truth I speak, and Ilium save!
The Grecian Host on Pallas still relied;
Nor hope had they but what her aid supplied;
But all things drooped since that ill-omened time
In which Ulysses, Author of the crime,
Was leagued with impious Diomed, to seize
That Image pregnant with your destinies;
Tore the Palladium from the Holy Fane,
The Guards who watched the Citadel first slain.
And, fearing not the Goddess, touched the Bands
Wreathed round her virgin brow, with gory hands.
Hope ebbed, strength failed the Grecians since that day,
From them the Goddess turned her mind away.
This by no doubtful signs Tritonia showed,
The uplifted eyes with flames coruscant glowed,
Soon as they placed her Image in the Camp;
And trickled o'er its limbs a briny damp;
And from the ground, the Goddess (strange to hear!)
Leapt thrice, with buckler grasped, and quivering spear.
— Then Calchas bade to stretch the homeward sail,
And prophesied that Grecian Arms would fail,
Unless we for new omens should repair
To Argos, thither the Palladium bear;
And thence to Phrygian Shores recross the Sea,
Fraught with a more propitious Deity.
They went; but only to return in power
With favouring Gods, at some unlooked-for hour.
— So Calchas read those signs; the Horse was built
To soothe Minerva, and atone for guilt.
Compact in strength you see the Fabric rise,
A pile stupendous, towering to the skies!
This was ordained by Calchas, with intent
That the vast bulk its ingress might prevent,
And Ilium ne'er within her Walls enfold
Another Safeguard reverenced like the old.
For if, unawed by Pallas, ye should lift
A sacrilegious hand against the Gift,
The Phrygian Realm shall perish (May the Gods
Turn on himself the mischief he forebodes!)
But if your Town it enter — by your aid
Ascending — Asia, then, in arms arrayed
Shall storm the walls of Pelops, and a fate
As dire on our posterity await."
Even so the arts of perjured Sinon gained
Belief for this, and all that he had feigned;
Thus were they won by wiles, by tears compelled
Whom not Tydides, not Achilles quelled;
Who fronted ten years' war with safe disdain,
'Gainst whom a thousand Ships had tried their strength in vain.
To speed our fate, a thing did now appear
Yet more momentous, and of instant fear.
Laocoon, Priest by lot to Neptune, stood
Where to his hand a Bull poured forth its blood,
Before the Altar, in high offering slain; —
But lo! two Serpents, o'er the tranquil Main
Incumbent, roll from Tenedos, and seek
Our Coast together (shuddering do I speak);
Between the waves, their elevated breasts,
Upheaved in circling spires, and sanguine crests,
Tower o'er the flood; the parts that follow, sweep
In folds voluminous and vast, the Deep.
The agitated brine, with noisy roar
Attends their coming, till they touch the shore;
Sparkle their eyes suffused with blood, and quick
The tongues shot forth their hissing mouths to lick.
Dispersed with fear we fly; in close array
These move, and towards Laocoon point their way,
But first assault his Sons, their youthful prey.
— A several Snake in tortuous wreaths engrasps
Each slender frame; and fanging what it clasps
Feeds on the limbs; the Father rushes on,
Arms in his hand, for rescue; but anon
Himself they seize; and, coiling round his waist
Their scaly backs, they bind him, twice embraced
With monstrous spires, as with a double zone;
And, twice around his neck in tangles thrown,
High o'er the Father's head each Serpent lifts its own.
His priestly fillets then are sprinkled o'er
With sable venom and distained with gore;
And while his labouring hands the knots would rend
The cries he utters to the Heavens ascend;
Loud as a Bull — that, wounded by the axe
Shook off the uncertain steel, and from the altar breaks,
To fill with bellowing voice the depths of air!
— But toward the Temple slid the Hydra Pair,
Their work accomplished, and there lie concealed,
Couched at Minerva's feet, beneath her orbed Shield.
Nor was there One who trembled not with fear,
Or deemed the expiation too severe,
For him whose lance had pierced the votive Steed,
Which to the Temple they resolve to lead;
There to be lodged with pomp of service high
And supplication, such the general cry.
Shattering the Walls, a spacious breach we make,
We cleave the bulwarks — toil which all partake,
Some to the feet the rolling wheels apply,
Some round the lofty neck the cables tie;
The Engine, pregnant with our deadly foes,
Mounts to the breach; and ever, as it goes,
Boys, mixed with Maidens, chaunt a holy song
And press to touch the cords, a happy throng.
The Town it enters thus, and threatening moves along.
My Country, glorious Ilium! and ye Towers,
Loved habitation of celestial Powers!
Four times it halted 'mid the gates, — a din
Of armour four times warned us from within;
Yet towards the sacred Dome with reckless mind
We still press on, and in the place assigned
Lodge the portentous Gift, through frenzy blind.
Nor failed Cassandra now to scatter wide
Words that of instant ruin prophesied.
— But Phoebus willed that none should heed her voice,
And we, we miserable men, rejoice,
And hang our Temples round with festal boughs,
Upon that day, the last that Fate allows.
Meanwhile had Heaven revolved with rapid flight,
And fast from Ocean climbs the punctual Night,
With boundless shade involving earth and sky
And Myrmidonian frauds; — the Trojans lie
Scattered throughout the weary Town, and keep
Unbroken quiet in the embrace of sleep.
This was the time when, furnished and arrayed,
Nor wanting silent moonlight's friendly aid,
From Tenedos the Grecian Navy came,
Led by the royal Galley's signal flame,
And Sinon now, our hostile fates his guard,
By stealth the dungeon of the Greeks unbarred.
Straight, by a pendant rope adown the side
Of the steep Horse, the armed Warriors glide.
The Chiefs Thersander, Sthenelus are there,
With joy delivered to the open air;
Ulysses, Thoas, Achamas the cord
Lets down to earth and Helen's injured Lord,
— Pyrrhus, who from Pelides drew his birth,
And bold Machaon, first to issue forth,
Nor him forget whose skill had framed the Pile
Epeus, glorying in his prosperous wile.
They rush upon the City that lay still,
Buried in sleep and wine; the Warders kill;
And at the wide-spread Gates in triumph greet
Expectant Comrades crowding from the Fleet.
It was the earliest hour of slumbrous rest,
Gift of the Gods to Man with toil opprest,
When, present to my dream, did Hector rise
And stood before me with fast-streaming eyes;
Such as he was when horse had striven with horse,
Whirling along the plain his lifeless Corse,
The thongs that bound him to the Chariot thrust
Through his swoln feet, and black with gory dust, —
A spectacle how pitiably sad!
How changed from that returning Hector, clad
In glorious spoils, Achilles' own attire!
From Hector hurling shipward the red Phrygian fire!
— A squalid beard, hair clotted thick with gore,
And that same throng of patriot wounds he bore,
In front of Troy received; and now, methought,
That I myself was to a passion wrought
Of tears, which to my voice this greeting brought.
" O Light of Dardan Realms! most faithful Stay
To Trojan courage, why these lingerings of delay?
Where hast thou tarried, Hector? From what coast
Com'st thou, long wished-for? That so many lost
Thy kinsmen or thy friends, — such travail borne
By this afflicted City — we outworn
Behold thee. Why this undeserved disgrace?
Who thus defiled with wounds that honoured face?"
He naught to this — unwilling to detain
One, who had asked vain things, with answer vain;
But, groaning deep, " Flee, Goddess-born," he said,
" Snatch thyself from these flames around thee spread;
Our Enemy is master of the Walls;
Down from her elevation Ilium falls.
Enough for Priam; the long strife is o'er,
Nor doth our Country ask one effort more.
Could Pergamus have been defended — hence,
Even from this hand, had issued her defence;
Troy her Penates doth to thee commend,
Her sacred stores, — let these thy fates attend!
Sail under their protection for the Land
Where mighty Realms shall grow at thy command!"
— No more was uttered, but his hand he stretched,
And from the inmost Sanctuary fetched
The consecrated wreaths, the potency
Of Vesta, and the fires that may not die.
Meantime, wild tumult through the streets is poured,
And though apart, and 'mid thick trees embowered,
My Father's mansion stood, the loud alarms
Came pressing thither, and the clash of Arms.
Sleep fled; I climb the roof and where it rears
Its loftiest summit, stand with quickened ears.
So, when a fire by raging south winds borne
Lights on a billowy sea of ripened corn,
Or rapid torrent sweeps with mountain flood
The fields, the harvest prostrates, headlong bears the wood;
High on a rock, the unweeting Shepherd, bound,
In blank amazement, listens to the sound.
Then was apparent to whom faith was due,
And Grecian plots lie bare to open view.
Above the spacious palace where abode
Deiphobus, the flames in triumph rode;
Ucalegon burns next; through lurid air
Sigean Friths reflect a widening glare.
Clamour and clangour to the heavens arise,
The blast of trumpets mixed with vocal cries;
Arms do I snatch — weak reason scarcely knows
What aid they promise, but my spirit glows;
I burn to gather Friends, whose firm array
On to the Citadel shall force its way.
Precipitation works with desperate charms;
It seems a lovely thing to die in Arms.
Lo Pantheus! fugitive from Grecian spears,
Apollo's Priest; — his vanquished Gods he bears;
The other hand his little Grandson leads,
While from the Sovereign Fort, he toward my threshold speeds.
" Pantheus, what hope? Which Fortress shall we try?
Where plant resistance?" He in prompt reply
Said, deeply moved, — " 'Tis come — the final hour;
The inevitable close of Dardan power
Hath come: — we have been Trojans, Ilium was,
And the great name of Troy; now all things pass
To Argos; so wills angry Jupiter:
Within the burning Town the Grecians domineer.
Forth from its central stand the enormous Horse
Pours in continual stream an armed Force;
Sinon, insulting victor, aggravates
The flames; and thousands hurry through the Gates,
Thronged, as might seem, with press of all the Hosts
That e'er Mycenae sent to Phrygian Coasts.
Others with spears in serried files blockade
The passes; — hangs, with quivering point, the blade
Unsheathed for slaughter, — scarcely to the foes
A blind and baffled fight the Warders can oppose."
Urged by these words, and as the Gods inspire,
I rush into the battle and the fire,
Where sad Erinnys, where the shock of fight,
The roar, the tumult, and the groans invite;
Rypheus is with me, Epytus, the pride
Of battles, joins his aid, and to my side
Flock Dymas, Hypanis, the moon their guide;
With young Coroebus, who had lately sought
Our walls, by passion for Cassandra brought;
He led to Priam an auxiliar train,
His Son by wedlock, miserable Man
For whom a raving Spouse had prophesied in vain.
When these I saw collected, and intent
To face the strife with deeds of hardiment,
I thus began: " O Champions, vainly brave
If, like myself, to dare extremes ye crave,
You see our lost condition, — not a God,
Of all the Powers by whom this Empire stood,
But hath renounced his Altar — fled from his abode.
— Ye would uphold a City wrapped in fire;
Die rather; — let us rush, in battle to expire.
At least one safety shall the vanquished have
If they no safety seek but in the grave."
— Thus to their minds was fury added, — then,
Like wolves driven forth by hunger from the den,
To prowl amid blind vapours, whom the brood
Expect, their jaws all parched with thirst for blood,
Through flying darts, through pressure of the Foe,
To death, to not uncertain death, we go.
Right through the Town our midway course we bear,
Aided by hovering darkness, strengthened by despair.
Can words the havoc of that night express?
What power of tears may equal the distress?
An ancient City sinks to disappear;
She sinks who ruled for ages, — Far and near
The Unresisting through the streets, the abodes
Of Men and hallowed Temples of the Gods,
Are felled by massacre that takes no heed;
Nor are the Trojans only doomed to bleed;
The Vanquished sometimes to their hearts recall
Old virtues, and the conquering Argives fall.
Sorrow is everywhere and fiery skaith,
Fear, Anguish struggling to be rid of breath,
And Death still crowding on the shape of Death.
Androgeus, whom a numerous Force attends,
Was the first Greek we met; he rashly deems us Friends.
" What sloth," he cries, " retards you? Warriors haste!
Troy blazes, sacked by others, and laid waste;
And ye come lagging from your Ships the last!"
Thus he; and straight mistrusting our replies,
He felt himself begirt with enemies;
Voice failed — step faltered, at the dire mistake;
Like one who through a deeply tangled brake
Struggling, hath trod upon a lurking Snake,
And shrunk in terror from the unlooked-for Pest
Lifting his blue-swoln neck and wrathful crest.
Even so Androgeus, smit with sudden dread,
Recoils from what he saw, and would have fled,
Forward we rush, with arms the Troop surround,
The Men, surprised and ignorant of the ground,
Subdued by fear, become an easy prey;
So are we favoured in our first essay.
With exultation here Coroebus cries,
" Behold, O Friends, how bright our destinies!
Advance; — the road which they point out is plain;
Shields let us change, and bear the insignia of the Slain,
Grecians in semblance; wiles are lawful — who
To simple valour would restrict a foe?
Themselves shall give us Arms." When this was said
The Leader's helmet nods upon his head,
The emblazoned buckler on his arm is tied,
He fits an Argive falchion to his side.
The like doth Rypheus, Dymas, — all put on,
With eager haste, the spoils which they had won.
Then in the combat mingling, Heaven averse,
Amid the gloom a multitude we pierce,
And to the shades dismiss them. Others flee,
Appalled by this imagined treachery;
Some to the Ships — some to the Horse would hide.
Ah! what reap they but sorrow who confide
In aught to which the Gods their sanction have denied?
Behold Cassandra, Priam's royal Child,
By sacrilegious men, with hair all wild,
Dragged from Minerva's Temple! Toward the skies
The Virgin lifts in vain her glowing eyes,
Her eyes, she could no more, for Grecian bands
Had rudely manacled her tender hands.
The intolerable sight to madness stung
Coroebus; and his desperate self he flung
For speedy death the ruthless Foe among!
We follow, and with general shock assail
The hostile Throng: — here first our efforts fail:
While, from the summit of the lofty Fane
Darts, by the People flung, descend amain;
In miserable heaps their Friends are laid,
By show of Grecian Arms and Crests betrayed.
Wroth for the Virgin rescued, by defeat
Provoked, the Grecians from all quarters meet.
With Ajax combat there the Brother Kings;
And the Dolopian Squadron thither brings
Its utmost rage. Thus Winds break forth and fly
To conflict from all regions of the sky;
Notus and Zephyrus, while Eurus feeds
The strife, exulting in his orient steeds;
Woods roar, and foaming Nereus stirs the waves
Roused by his trident from their lowest caves.
They also whomsoe'er through shades of night
Our stratagem had driven to scattered flight
Now reappear — by them our Shields are known;
The simulating Javelins they disown,
And mark our utterance of discordant tone.
Numbers on numbers bear us down; and first
Coroebus falls; him Peneleus hath pierced
Before Minerva's Altar; next, in dust
Sinks Rhypeus, one above all Trojans just,
And righteous above all; but heavenly Powers
Ordain by lights that ill agree with ours.
Then Dymas, Hypanis are slain by Friends;
— Nor thee abundant piety defends,
O Pantheus! falling with the garland wound,
As fits Apollo's Priest, thy brows around.
Ashes of Ilium! and ye duteous fires,
Lit for my Friends upon their funeral pyres;
Amid your fall bear witness to my word!
I shunned no hazards of the Grecian sword,
No turns of war; with hand unsparing fought;
And earned, had Fate so willed, the death I sought.
Thence am I hurried by the rolling tide,
With Iphitus and Pelias at my side;
One bowed with years; and Pelias, from a wound
Given by Ulysses, halts along the ground.
New clamours rise; the Abode of Priam calls,
Besieged by thousands swarming round the walls;
Concourse how thick! as if, throughout the space
Of the whole City, war in other place
Were hushed — no death elsewhere. The Assailants wield
Above their heads shield, shell-wise locked in shield;
Climb step by step the ladders, near the side
Of the strong portal daringly applied;
The weaker hand its guardian shield presents;
The right is stretched to grasp the battlements.
The Dardans tug at roof and turrets high,
Rend fragments off, and with these weapons try
Life to preserve in such extremity,
Roll down the massy rafters decked with gold,
Magnific splendours raised by Kings of old;
Others with naked weapons stand prepared
In thick array, the doors below to guard.
A bolder hope inspirits me to lend
My utmost aid the Palace to defend,
And strengthen those afflicted. From behind,
A gateway opened, whence a passage blind
The various Mansions of the Palace joined.
— Unblest Andromache, while Priam reigned
Oft by this way the royal Palace gained,
A lonely Visitant; this way would tread
With young Astyanax, to his Grandsire led.
Entering the gate, I reached the roof, where stand
The Trojans, hurling darts with ineffectual hand.
A Tower there was; precipitous the site,
And the Pile rose to an unrivalled height;
Frequented Station, whence, in circuit wide
Troy might be seen, the Argive Fleet descried,
And all the Achaian Camp. This sovereign Tower
With irons grappling where the loftiest floor
Pressed with its beams the wall we shake, we rend,
And, in a mass of thundering ruin, send
To crush the Greeks beneath. But numbers press
To new assault with reckless eagerness:
Weapons and missiles from the ruins grow,
And what their hasty hands can seize they throw!
In front stands Pyrrhus, glorying in the might
Of his own weapons, while his armour bright
Casts from the portal gleams of brazen light,
So shines a Snake, when kindling, he hath crept
Forth from the winter bed in which he slept,
Swoln with a glut of poisonous herbs, — but now
Fresh from the shedding of his annual slough,
Glittering in youth, warm with instinctive fires,
He, with raised breast, involves his back in gyres,
Darts with his forked tongue, and toward the sun aspires.
Joined with redoubted Periphas, comes on
To storm the Palace fierce Automedon,
Who drove the Achillean Car; — the Bands
Of Scyros follow hurling fiery brands.
Pyrrhus himself hath seized an axe, would cleave
The ponderous doors, or from their hinges heave;
And now, reiterating stroke on stroke
Hath hewn, through plates of brass and solid oak,
A broad-mouthed entrance; — to their inmost seats
The long-drawn courts lie open; the retreats
Of Priam and ancestral Kings are bared
To instantaneous view; and Lo! the Guard
Stands at the threshold, for defence prepared.
But tumult spreads through all the space within;
The vaulted roofs repeat the mournful din
Of female Ululation, a strange vent
Of agony, that strikes the starry firmament!
The Matrons range with wildering step the floors;
Embrace, and print their kisses on, the doors.
Pyrrhus, with all his Father's might, dispels
Barriers and bolts, and living obstacles;
Force shapes her own clear way; — the doors are thrown
Off from their hinges; gates are battered down
By the onrushing Soldiery, who kill
Whom first they meet, and the broad area fill.
— Less irresistibly, o'er dams and mounds,
Burst by its rage, a foaming River bounds,
Herds sweeping with their stalls along the ravaged grounds.
Pyrrhus I saw with slaughter desperate;
The two Atridae near the Palace gate
Did I behold; and by these eyes were seen
The hundred Daughters with the Mother Queen,
And hoary-headed Priam, where he stood
Beside the Altar, staining with his blood
Fires which himself had hallowed. Hope had he
Erewhile, none equal hope, of large posterity.
There, fifty bridal chambers might be told —
Superb with trophies and barbaric gold,
All, in their pomp, lie level with the ground,
And where the fire is not, are Grecian Masters found.
Ask ye the fate of Priam? On that night
When captured Ilium blazed before his sight,
And the Foe, bursting through the Palace gate
Spread through the privacies of royal state,
In vain to tremulous shoulders he restored
Arms which had long forgot their ancient Lord,
And girt upon his side a useless sword;
Then, thus accoutred, forward did he hie,
As if to meet the Enemy and die.
— Amid the Courts, an Altar stood in view
Of the wide heavens, near which a long-lived Laurel grew
And, bending over this great Altar, made
For its Penates an embracing shade.
With all her Daughters, thronged like Doves that lie
Cowering, when storms have driven them from the sky,
Hecuba shelters in that sacred place
Where they the Statues of the Gods embrace.
But when she saw in youthful Arms arrayed
Priam himself; " What ominous thought," she said,
" Hangs, wretched Spouse, this weight on limbs decayed?
And wither wouldst thou hasten? If we were
More helpless still, this succour we might spare.
Not such Defenders doth the time demand;
Profitless here would be even Hector's hand.
Retire; this Altar can protect us all,
Or thou wilt not survive when we must fall."
This to herself: and toward the sacred spot
She drew the aged Man, to wait their common lot.
But see Polites, one of Priam's Sons,
Charged with the death which he in terror shuns!
The wounded Youth, escaped from Pyrrhus, flies
Through showers of darts, through press of enemies,
Where the long Porticos invite; the space
Of widely-vacant Courts his footsteps trace.
Him, Pyrrhus, following near and still more near,
Hath caught at with his hand, and presses with his spear;
But when at length this unremitting flight
Had brought him full before his Father's sight,
He fell — and scarcely prostrate on the ground,
Poured forth his life from many a streaming wound.
Here Priam, scorning death and self-regard,
His voice restrained not, nor his anger spared;
But " Shall the Gods," he cries, " if Gods there be
Who note such acts, and care for piety,
Requite this heinous crime with measure true,
Nor one reward withhold that is thy due;
Who thus a Father's presence hast defiled,
And forced upon his sight the murder of a Child!
Not thus Achilles' self, from whom a tongue
Versed in vainglorious falsehood boasts thee sprung,
Dealt with an enemy; my prayer he heard;
A Suppliant's rights in Priam he revered,
Gave Hector back to rest within the tomb,
And me remitted to my royal home."
This said, the aged Man a javelin cast;
With weak arm — faltering to the shield it past;
The tinkling shield the harmless point repelled,
Which, to the boss it hung from, barely held.
— Then Pyrrhus, " To my Sire, Pelides, bear
These feats of mine, ill relished as they are,
Tidings of which I make thee messenger!
To him a faithful history relate
Of Neoptolemus degenerate.
Now die!" So saying, towards the Altar, through
A stream of filial blood, the tottering Sire he drew;
His left hand locked within the tangled hair
Raised, with the right, a brandished sword in air,
Then to the hilt impelled it through his side;
Thus, 'mid a blazing City, Priam died.
Troy falling round him, thus he closed his fate,
Once proud Lord of many an Asian State!
Upon the shore lies stretched his mangled frame,
Head from the shoulders torn, a Body without name.
Then first it was, that Horror girt me round;
Chilled my frail heart, and all my senses bound;
The image of my Father crossed my mind;
Perchance in fate with slaughtered Priam joined;
Equal in age, thus may He breathe out life,
Creusa also, my deserted Wife!
The Child Iülus left without defence,
And the whole House laid bare to violence!
Backward I looked, and cast my eyes before;
My Friends had failed, and courage was no more;
All, wearied out, had followed desperate aims,
Self-dashed to earth, or stifled in the flames.
Thus was I left alone; such light my guide
As the conflagrant walls and roofs supplied;
When my far-wandering eyesight chanced to meet
Helen sequestered on a lonely seat
Amid the Porch of Vesta; She, through dread
Of Trojan vengeance amply merited,
Of Grecian punishment, and what the ire
Of a deserted Husband might require,
Thither had flown — there sate, the common bane
Of Troy and of her Country — to obtain
Protection from the Altar, or to try
What hope might spring from trembling secrecy.
Methought my falling Country cried aloud,
And the revenge it seemed to ask, I vowed;
" What! shall she visit Sparta once again?
In triumph enter with a loyal Train?
Consort, and Home, and Sires and Children view
By Trojan Females served, a Phrygian retinue?
For this was Priam slain? Troy burnt? The shore
Of Dardan Seas so often drenched in gore?
Not so; for though such victory can claim
In its own nature no reward of fame,
The punishment that ends the guilty days
Even of a Woman, shall find grateful praise;
My soul, at least, shall of her weight be eased,
The ashes of my Countrymen appeased."
Such words broke forth; and in my own despite
Onward I bore, when through the dreary night
Appeared my gracious Mother, vested in pure light;
Never till now before me did she shine
So much herself, so thoroughly divine;
Goddess revealed in all her beauty, love,
And majesty, as she is wont to move,
A Shape familiar to the Courts of Jove!
The hand she seized her touch sufficed to stay,
Then through her roseate mouth these words found easy way.
" O Son! what pain excites a wrath so blind?
Or could all thought of me desert thy mind?
Where now is left thy Parent worn with age?
Wilt thou not rather in that search engage?
Learn with thine eyes if yet Creusa live,
And if the Boy Ascanius still survive.
Them do the Greeks environ: — that they spare,
That swords so long abstain, and flames forbear,
Is through the intervention of my care.
Not Spartan Helen's beauty, so abhorred
By thee, not Paris, her upbraided Lord —
The hostile Gods have laid this grandeur low,
Troy from the Gods receives her overthrow.
Look! for the impediment of misty shade
With which thy mortal sight is overlaid
I will disperse; nor thou refuse to hear
Parental mandates, nor resist through fear!
There, where thou seest block rolling upon block,
Mass rent from mass, and dust condensed with smoke
In billowy intermixture, Neptune smites
The walls, with labouring Trident disunites
From their foundation — tearing up, as suits
His anger, Ilium from her deepest roots.
Fiercest of all, before the Scaean Gate,
Armed Juno stands, beckoning to animate
The Bands she summons from the Argive Fleet,
Tritonian Pallas holds her chosen seat
High on the Citadel, — look back! see there
Her Aegis beaming forth a stormy glare!
The very Father, Jove himself, supplies
Strength to the Greeks, sends heaven-born enemies
Against the Dardan Arms. My Son, take flight,
And close the struggle of this dismal night!
I will not quit thy steps whate'er betide,
But to thy Father's House will safely guide."
She ceased, and did in shades her presence hide.
Dire Faces still are seen and Deities
Adverse to Troy appear, her mighty Enemies.
Now was all Ilium, far as sight could trace,
Settling and sinking in the Fire's embrace,
Neptunian Troy subverted from her base.
Even so, a Mountain-Ash, long tried by shock
Of storms endured upon the native rock,
When He is doomed from rustic arms to feel
The rival blows of persevering steel,
Nods high with threatening forehead, till at length
Wounds unremitting have subdued his strength;
With groans the ancient Tree foretells his end;
He falls; and fragments of the mountain blend
With the precipitous ruin. — I descend
And, as the Godhead leads, 'twixt foe and fire
Advance: — the darts withdraw, the flames retire.
But when beneath her guidance I had come
Far as the Gates of the paternal Dome,
My Sire, whom first I sought and wished to bear
For safety to the Hills, disdains that care;
Nor will he now, since Troy hath fallen, consent
Life to prolong, or suffer banishment.
" Think Ye ," he says, " the current of whose blood
Is unimpaired, whose vigour unsubdued,
Think Ye of flight; — that I should live, the Gods
Wish not, or they had saved me these Abodes.
Not once, but twice, this City to survive,
What need against such destiny to strive?
While thus, even thus disposed the body lies,
Depart! pronounce my funeral obsequies!
Not long shall I have here to wait for death,
A pitying Foe will rid me of my breath,
Will seek my spoils; and should I lie forlorn
Of sepulture, the loss may well be borne.
Full long obnoxious to the Powers divine
Life lingers out these barren years of mine;
Even since the date when me the eternal Sire
Swept with the thunderbolt, and scathed with fire."
Thus he persists; — Creusa and her Son
Second the counter-prayer by me begun;
The total House with weeping deprecate
This weight of wilful impulse given to Fate;
He, all unmoved by pleadings and by tears,
Guards his resolve, and to the spot adheres.
Arms once again attract me, hurried on
In misery, and craving death alone.
" And hast thou hoped that I could move to find
A place of rest, thee, Father, left behind?
How could parental lips the guilty thought unbind?
If in so great a City Heaven ordain
Utter extinction; if thy soul retain
With stedfast longing that abrupt design
Which would to falling Troy add thee and thine;
That way to Death lies open; — soon will stand
Pyrrhus before thee with the reeking brand
That drank the blood of Priam; He whose hand
The Son in presence of the Father slays,
And at the Altar's base the slaughtered Father lays.
For this, benignant Mother! didst thou lead
My steps along a way from danger freed,
That I might see remorseless Men invade
The holiest places that these roofs o'ershade?
See Father, Consort, Son, all tinged and dyed
With mutual sprinklings, perish side by side?
Arms bring me, Friends! bring Arms! our last hour speaks,
It calls the Vanquished; cast me on the Greeks!
In rallying combat let us join; — not all,
This night, unsolaced by revenge shall fall!"
The sword resumes its place; the shield I bear;
And hurry now to reach the open air;
When on the ground before the threshold cast
Lo! where Creusa hath my feet embraced
And holding up Iülus, there cleaves fast!
" If thou, departing, be resolved to die,
Take us through all that in thy road may lie;
But if on Arms, already tried, attend
A single hope, then first this House defend;
On whose protection Sire and Son are thrown,
And I, the Wife that once was called thine own."
Such outcry filled the Mansion, when behold
A strange portent, and wonderous to be told!
All suddenly a luminous crest was seen;
Which, where the Boy Iülus hung between
The arms of each sad Parent, rose and shed,
Tapering aloft, a lustre from his head;
Along the hair the lambent flame proceeds
With harmless touch, and round his temples feeds.
In fear we haste, the burning tresses shake,
And from the fount the holy fire would slake;
But joyfully his hands Anchises raised,
His voice not silent as on Heaven he gazed:
" Almighty Jupiter! if prayers have power
To bend thee, look on us; I seek no more;
If aught our piety deserve, Oh deign
The hope this Omen proffers to sustain;
Nor, Father, let us ask a second Sign in vain!"
Thus spake the Sire, and scarcely ended, ere
A peal of sudden thunder, loud and clear,
Broke from the left; and shot through Heaven a Star
Trailing its torch, that sparkled from afar;
Above the roof the star, conspicuous sight,
Ran to be hid on Ida's sylvan height.
The long way marking with a train of light.
The furrowy track the distant sky illumes,
And far and wide are spread sulphureous fumes.
Uprisen from earth, my aged Sire implores
The Deities, the holy Star adores;
— " Now am I conquered — now is no delay;
Gods of my Country! where Ye lead the way
'Tis not in me to hesitate or swerve;
Preserve my House, Ye Powers, this Little One preserve!
Yours is this augury; and Troy hath still
Life in the signs that manifest your will!
I cannot choose but yield; and now, to Thee,
O Son, a firm Associate will I be!"
He spake; and nearer through the City came
Rolling more audibly, the sea of flame.
" Now give, dear Father, to this neck the freight
Of thy old age; — the burden will be light
For which my shoulders bend; henceforth one fate,
Evil or good shall we participate.
The Boy shall journey, tripping at my side;
Our steps, at distance marked, will be Creusa's guide.
My Household! heed these words: upon a Mound
(To those who quit the City obvious ground)
A Temple, once by Ceres honoured, shows
Its mouldering front; hard by a Cypress grows,
Through ages guarded with religious care;
Thither, by various roads, let all repair.
Thou, Father! take these relics; let thy hand
Bear the Penates of our native land;
I may not touch them, fresh from deeds of blood,
Till the stream cleanse me with its living flood."
Forthwith an ample vest my shoulders clad,
Above the vest a lion's skin was spread,
Next came the living Burden; fast in mine
His little hand Iülus doth entwine,
Following his Father with no equal pace;
Creusa treads behind; the darkest ways we trace.
And me, erewhile insensible to harms,
Whom adverse Greeks agglomerate in Arms
Moved not, now every breath of air alarms;
All sounds have power to trouble me with fear,
Anxious for whom I lead, and whom I bear.
Thus, till the Gates were nigh, my course I shaped,
And thought the hazards of the time escaped,
When through the gloom a noise of feet we hear,
Quick sounds that seemed to press upon the ear;
" Fly," cries my Father, looking forth, " Oh fly!
They come — I see their shields and dazzling panoply!"
Here, in my trepidation was I left,
Through some unfriendly Power, of mind bereft,
For, while I journeyed devious and forlorn,
From me, me wretched, was Creusa torn;
Whether stopped short by death, or from the road
She wandered, or sank down beneath a load
Of weariness, no vestiges made plain:
She vanished, ne'er to meet these eyes again.
Nor did I seek her lost, nor backward turn
My mind, until we reached the sacred bourne
Of ancient Ceres. All, even all, save One
Were in the spot assembled; She alone,
As if her melancholy fate disowned
Companion, Son, and Husband, nowhere could be found.
Who, man or God, from my reproach was free?
Had desolated Troy a heavier woe for me?
'Mid careful friends my Sire and Son I place,
With the Penates of our Phrygian race,
Deep in a winding vale; my footsteps then retrace;
Resolved the whole wide City to explore
And face the perils of the night once more.
So, with refulgent Arms begirt, I haste
Toward the dark gates through which my feet had passed,
Remeasure, where I may, the beaten ground,
And turn at every step a searching eye around.
Horror prevails on all sides, while with dread
The very silence is impregnated.
Fast to my Father's Mansion I repair,
If haply, haply, She had harboured there.
Seized by the Grecians was the whole Abode:
And now, voracious fire its mastery showed,
Rolled upward by the wind in flames that meet
High o'er the roof, — air rages with the heat;
Thence to the Towers I pass, where Priam held his Seat.
Already Phoenix and Ulysses kept,
As chosen Guards, the spoils of Ilium, heaped
In Juno's Temple, and the wealth that rose
Piled on the floors of vacant porticos,
Prey torn through fire from many a secret Hold,
Vests, tables of the Gods, and cups of massy gold.
And, in long order, round these treasures stand
Matrons, and Boys, and Youths, a trembling Band!
Nor did I spare with fearless voice to raise
Shouts in the gloom that filled the streets and ways,
And with reduplication sad and vain,
Creusa called, again and yet again.
While thus I prosecute an endless quest
A Shape was seen, unwelcome and unblest;
Creusa's Shade appeared before my eyes,
Her Image, but of more than mortal size;
Then I, as if the power of life had passed
Into my upright hair, stood speechless and aghast.
— She thus — to stop my troubles at their source:
" Dear Consort, why this fondly-desperate course?
Supernal Powers, not doubtfully, prepare
These issues; going hence thou wilt not bear
Creusa with thee; know that Fate denies
This fellowship, and this the Ruler of the skies.
Long wanderings will be thine, no home allowed;
Vast the extent of sea that must be ploughed
Ere, 'mid Hesperian fields where Tiber flows
With gentle current, thy tired keels repose.
Joy meets thee there, a Realm and royal Bride,
— For loved Creusa let thy tears be dried;
I go not where the Myrmidons abide.
No proud Dolopian Mansion shall I see
Nor shall a Grecian Dame be served by me,
Derived from Jove, and raised by thee so high,
Spouse to the Offspring of a Deity, —
Far otherwise; upon my native plains
Me the great Mother of the Gods detains.
Now, fare thee well! protect our Son, and prove
By tenderness for him, our common love."
This having said — my trouble to subdue,
Into thin air she silently withdrew;
Left me while tears were gushing from their springs,
And on my tongue a thousand hasty things;
Thrice with my arms I strove her neck to clasp,
Thrice had my hands succeeded in their grasp,
From which the Image slipped away, as light
As the swift winds, or sleep when taking flight.
Such was the close; and now the night thus spent,
Back to my Friends an eager course I bent,
And here a crowd with wonder I behold
Of new Associates, concourse manifold!
Matrons, and Men, and Youths that hither hied,
For exile gathering; and from every side
The wretched people thronged and multiplied;
Prepared with mind and means their flight to speed
Across the seas, where I might choose to lead.
Now on the ridge of Ida's summit grey
Rose Lucifer, prevenient to the day.
The Grecians held the Gates in close blockade,
Hope was there none of giving further aid;
I yielded, took my Father up once more,
And sought the Mountain, with the Freight I bore.
All breathed in silence, and intensely gazed,
When from the lofty couch his voice Aeneas raised,
And thus began: " The task which you impose
O Queen, revives unutterable woes;
How by the Grecians Troy was overturned,
And her power fell — to be for ever mourned;
Calamities which with a pitying heart
I saw, of which I formed no common part.
Oh! 'twas a miserable end! What One
Of all our Foes, Dolopian, Myrmidon,
Or Soldier bred in stern Ulysses' train
Such things could utter, and from tears refrain?
And hastens now from Heaven the dewy night,
And the declining stars to sleep invite.
But since such strong desire prevails to know
Our wretched fate, and Troy's last overthrow
I will attempt the theme though in my breast
Memory recoils and shudders at the test.
The Grecian Chiefs, exhausted of their strength
By war protracted to such irksome length,
And, from the siege repulsed, new schemes devise;
A wooden horse they build of mountain size.
Assisted by Minerva's art divine,
They frame the work, and sheathe its ribs with pine,
An offering to the Gods — that they may gain
Their home in safety; this they boldly feign,
And spread the Tale abroad; — meanwhile they hide
Selected Warriors in its gloomy side;
Throng the huge concave to its utmost den,
And fill that mighty Womb with armed Men.
In sight of Troy, an Island lies, by Fame
Amply distinguished, Tenedos its name;
Potent and rich while Priam's sway endured,
Now a bare hold for keels, unsafely moored.
Here did the Greeks, when for their native land
We thought them sailed, lurk on the desart strand.
From her long grief at once the Realm of Troy
Broke loose; — the gates are opened, and with joy
We seek the Dorian Camp, and wander o'er
The spots forsaken, the abandoned shore.
Here, the Dolopian ground its lines presents;
And here the dread Achilles pitched his tents;
There lay the Ships drawn up along the coast,
And here we oft encountered host with host.
Meanwhile, the rest an eye of wonder lift,
Unwedded Pallas! on the fatal Gift
To thee devoted. First, Thymoetes calls
For its free ingress through disparted walls
To lodge within the Citadel — thus He
Treacherous, or such the course of destiny.
Capys, with some of wiser mind, would sweep
The insidious Grecian offering to the Deep,
Or to the flames subject it; or advise
To perforate and search the cavities;
Into conflicting judgements break and split
The crowd, as random thoughts the fancy hit.
Down from the Citadel a numerous throng
Hastes with Laocoon; they sweep along,
And He, the foremost, crying from afar,
" What would ye? wretched Maniacs, as ye are!
Think ye the Foe departed? Or that e'er
A boon from Grecian hands can prove sincere?
Thus do ye read Ulysses? Foes unseen
Lurk in these chambers; or the huge Machine
Against the ramparts brought, by pouring down
Force from aloft, will seize upon the Town.
Let not a fair pretence your minds enthrall;
For me, I fear the Greeks and most of all
When they are offering gifts." With mighty force
This said, he hurled a spear against the Horse;
It smote the curved ribs, and quivering stood
While groans made answer through the hollow wood.
We too, upon this impulse, had not Fate
Been adverse, and our minds infatuate,
We too, had rushed the den to penetrate,
Streams of Argolic blood our swords had stained,
Troy, thou mightst yet have stood, and Priam's Towers remained.
But lo! an unknown Youth with hand to hand
Bound fast behind him, whom a boisterous Band
Of Dardan Swains with clamour hurrying
Force to the shore and place before the King.
Such his device when he those chains had sought
A voluntary captive, fixed in thought
Either the City to betray, or meet
Death, the sure penalty of foiled deceit.
The curious Trojans, pouring in, deride
And taunt the Prisoner, with an emulous pride.
Now see the cunning of the Greeks exprest
By guilt of One, true image of the rest!
For, while with helpless looks, from side to side
Anxiously cast, the Phrygian throng he eyed,
" Alas! what Land," he cries, " can now, what Sea,
Can offer refuge? what resource for me?
Who 'mid the Greeks no breathing-place can find,
And whom ye, Trojans, have to death consigned!"
Thus were we wrought upon; and now, with sense
Of pity touched, that checked all violence,
We cheered and urged him boldly to declare
His origin, what tidings he may bear,
And on what claims he ventures to confide;
Then, somewhat eased of fear, he thus replied:
" O King, a plain confession shall ensue
On these commands, in all things plain and true.
And first, the tongue that speaks shall not deny
My origin; a Greek by birth am I.
Fortune made Sinon wretched; — to do more,
And make him false, — that lies not in her power.
In converse, haply, ye have heard the name
Of Palamedes, and his glorious fame;
A Chief with treason falsely charged, and whom
The Achaians crushed by a nefarious doom,
And now lament when covered with the tomb.
His kinsman I; and hither by his side
Me my poor Father sent, when first these fields were tried.
While yet his voice the Grecian Chieftains swayed
And due respect was to his counsel paid,
Ere that high influence was with life cut short,
I did not walk ungraced by fair report.
Ulysses, envy rankling in his breast,
(And these are things which thousands can attest)
Thereafter turned his subtlety to give
That fatal injury, and he ceased to live.
I dragged my days in sorrow and in gloom,
And mourned my guiltless Friend, indignant at his doom;
This inwardly; and yet not always mute,
Rashly I vowed revenge — my sure pursuit,
If e'er the shores of Argos I again
Should see, victorious with my Countrymen.
Sharp hatred did these open threats excite;
Hence the first breathings of a deadly blight;
Hence, to appal me, accusations came,
Which still Ulysses was at work to frame;
Hence would he scatter daily 'mid the crowd
Loose hints, at will sustained or disavowed,
Beyond himself for instruments he looked,
And in this search of means no respite brooked
Till Calchas his accomplice — but the chain
Of foul devices why untwist in vain?
Why should I linger? if ye Trojans place
On the same level all of Argive race,
And 'tis enough to know that I am one,
Punish me; would Ulysses might look on!
And let the Atridae hear, rejoiced with what is done!"
This stirred us more, whose judgements were asleep
To all suspicion of a crime so deep
And craft so fine. Our questions we renewed;
And, trembling, thus the fiction he pursued.
" Oft did the Grecian Host the means prepare
To flee from Troy, tired with so long a war;
Would they had fled! but winds as often stopped
Their going, and the twisted sails were dropped;
And when this pine-ribbed Horse of monstrous size
Stood forth, a finished Work, before their eyes,
Then chiefly pealed the storm through blackened skies.
So that the Oracle its aid might lend
To quell our doubts, Eurypylus we send,
Who brought the answer of the voice divine
In these sad words given from the Delphic shrine.
— " Blood flowed, a Virgin perished to appease
The winds, when first for Troy ye passed the seas;
O Grecians! for return across the Flood,
Life must be paid, a sacrifice of blood. "
— With this response an universal dread
Among the shuddering multitude was spread;
All quaked to think at whom the Fates had aimed
This sentence, who the Victim Phoebus claimed.
Then doth the Ithacan with tumult loud
Bring forth the Prophet Calchas to the crowd;
Asks what the Gods would have; and some, meanwhile,
Discern what end the Mover of the guile
Is compassing; and do not hide from me
The crime which they in mute reserve foresee.
Ten days refused he still with guarded breath
To designate the Man, to fix the death;
The Ithacan still urgent for the deed;
At last the unwilling voice announced that I must bleed.
All gave assent, each happy to be cleared,
By one Man's fall, of what himself had feared.
Now came the accursed day; the salted cates
Are spread, — the Altar for the Victim waits;
The fillets bind my temples — I took flight
Bursting my chains, I own, and through the night
Lurked among oozy swamps, and there lay hid
Till winds might cease their voyage to forbid.
And now was I compelled at once to part
With all the dear old longings of the heart,
Never to see my Country, Children, Sire,
Whom they, perchance, will for this flight require
For this offence of mine of them will make
An expiation, punished for my sake.
But Thee, by all the Powers who hold their seat
In Heaven, and know the truth, do I entreat
O King! and by whate'er may yet remain
Among mankind of faith without a stain,
Have pity on my woes; commiserate
A mind that ne'er deserved this wretched fate."
His tears prevail, we spare the Suppliant's life
Pitying the man we spare, without a strife;
Even Priam's self, He first of all commands
To loose the fetters and unbind his hands,
Then adds these friendly words; — " Whoe'er thou be
Henceforth forget the Grecians, lost to thee;
We claim thee now, and let me truly hear
Who moved them first this monstrous Horse to rear?
And why? Was some religious vow the aim?
Or for what use in war the Engine might they frame?"
Straight were these artful words in answer given
While he upraised his hands, now free, to Heaven.
" Eternal Fires, on you I call; O Ye!
And your inviolable Deity!
Altars, and ruthless swords from which I fled!
Ye fillets, worn round my devoted head!
Be it no crime if Argive sanctions cease
To awe me, — none to hate the men of Greece!
The law of Country forfeiting its hold,
Mine be the voice their secrets to unfold!
And ye, O Trojans! keep the word ye gave;
Save me, if truth I speak, and Ilium save!
The Grecian Host on Pallas still relied;
Nor hope had they but what her aid supplied;
But all things drooped since that ill-omened time
In which Ulysses, Author of the crime,
Was leagued with impious Diomed, to seize
That Image pregnant with your destinies;
Tore the Palladium from the Holy Fane,
The Guards who watched the Citadel first slain.
And, fearing not the Goddess, touched the Bands
Wreathed round her virgin brow, with gory hands.
Hope ebbed, strength failed the Grecians since that day,
From them the Goddess turned her mind away.
This by no doubtful signs Tritonia showed,
The uplifted eyes with flames coruscant glowed,
Soon as they placed her Image in the Camp;
And trickled o'er its limbs a briny damp;
And from the ground, the Goddess (strange to hear!)
Leapt thrice, with buckler grasped, and quivering spear.
— Then Calchas bade to stretch the homeward sail,
And prophesied that Grecian Arms would fail,
Unless we for new omens should repair
To Argos, thither the Palladium bear;
And thence to Phrygian Shores recross the Sea,
Fraught with a more propitious Deity.
They went; but only to return in power
With favouring Gods, at some unlooked-for hour.
— So Calchas read those signs; the Horse was built
To soothe Minerva, and atone for guilt.
Compact in strength you see the Fabric rise,
A pile stupendous, towering to the skies!
This was ordained by Calchas, with intent
That the vast bulk its ingress might prevent,
And Ilium ne'er within her Walls enfold
Another Safeguard reverenced like the old.
For if, unawed by Pallas, ye should lift
A sacrilegious hand against the Gift,
The Phrygian Realm shall perish (May the Gods
Turn on himself the mischief he forebodes!)
But if your Town it enter — by your aid
Ascending — Asia, then, in arms arrayed
Shall storm the walls of Pelops, and a fate
As dire on our posterity await."
Even so the arts of perjured Sinon gained
Belief for this, and all that he had feigned;
Thus were they won by wiles, by tears compelled
Whom not Tydides, not Achilles quelled;
Who fronted ten years' war with safe disdain,
'Gainst whom a thousand Ships had tried their strength in vain.
To speed our fate, a thing did now appear
Yet more momentous, and of instant fear.
Laocoon, Priest by lot to Neptune, stood
Where to his hand a Bull poured forth its blood,
Before the Altar, in high offering slain; —
But lo! two Serpents, o'er the tranquil Main
Incumbent, roll from Tenedos, and seek
Our Coast together (shuddering do I speak);
Between the waves, their elevated breasts,
Upheaved in circling spires, and sanguine crests,
Tower o'er the flood; the parts that follow, sweep
In folds voluminous and vast, the Deep.
The agitated brine, with noisy roar
Attends their coming, till they touch the shore;
Sparkle their eyes suffused with blood, and quick
The tongues shot forth their hissing mouths to lick.
Dispersed with fear we fly; in close array
These move, and towards Laocoon point their way,
But first assault his Sons, their youthful prey.
— A several Snake in tortuous wreaths engrasps
Each slender frame; and fanging what it clasps
Feeds on the limbs; the Father rushes on,
Arms in his hand, for rescue; but anon
Himself they seize; and, coiling round his waist
Their scaly backs, they bind him, twice embraced
With monstrous spires, as with a double zone;
And, twice around his neck in tangles thrown,
High o'er the Father's head each Serpent lifts its own.
His priestly fillets then are sprinkled o'er
With sable venom and distained with gore;
And while his labouring hands the knots would rend
The cries he utters to the Heavens ascend;
Loud as a Bull — that, wounded by the axe
Shook off the uncertain steel, and from the altar breaks,
To fill with bellowing voice the depths of air!
— But toward the Temple slid the Hydra Pair,
Their work accomplished, and there lie concealed,
Couched at Minerva's feet, beneath her orbed Shield.
Nor was there One who trembled not with fear,
Or deemed the expiation too severe,
For him whose lance had pierced the votive Steed,
Which to the Temple they resolve to lead;
There to be lodged with pomp of service high
And supplication, such the general cry.
Shattering the Walls, a spacious breach we make,
We cleave the bulwarks — toil which all partake,
Some to the feet the rolling wheels apply,
Some round the lofty neck the cables tie;
The Engine, pregnant with our deadly foes,
Mounts to the breach; and ever, as it goes,
Boys, mixed with Maidens, chaunt a holy song
And press to touch the cords, a happy throng.
The Town it enters thus, and threatening moves along.
My Country, glorious Ilium! and ye Towers,
Loved habitation of celestial Powers!
Four times it halted 'mid the gates, — a din
Of armour four times warned us from within;
Yet towards the sacred Dome with reckless mind
We still press on, and in the place assigned
Lodge the portentous Gift, through frenzy blind.
Nor failed Cassandra now to scatter wide
Words that of instant ruin prophesied.
— But Phoebus willed that none should heed her voice,
And we, we miserable men, rejoice,
And hang our Temples round with festal boughs,
Upon that day, the last that Fate allows.
Meanwhile had Heaven revolved with rapid flight,
And fast from Ocean climbs the punctual Night,
With boundless shade involving earth and sky
And Myrmidonian frauds; — the Trojans lie
Scattered throughout the weary Town, and keep
Unbroken quiet in the embrace of sleep.
This was the time when, furnished and arrayed,
Nor wanting silent moonlight's friendly aid,
From Tenedos the Grecian Navy came,
Led by the royal Galley's signal flame,
And Sinon now, our hostile fates his guard,
By stealth the dungeon of the Greeks unbarred.
Straight, by a pendant rope adown the side
Of the steep Horse, the armed Warriors glide.
The Chiefs Thersander, Sthenelus are there,
With joy delivered to the open air;
Ulysses, Thoas, Achamas the cord
Lets down to earth and Helen's injured Lord,
— Pyrrhus, who from Pelides drew his birth,
And bold Machaon, first to issue forth,
Nor him forget whose skill had framed the Pile
Epeus, glorying in his prosperous wile.
They rush upon the City that lay still,
Buried in sleep and wine; the Warders kill;
And at the wide-spread Gates in triumph greet
Expectant Comrades crowding from the Fleet.
It was the earliest hour of slumbrous rest,
Gift of the Gods to Man with toil opprest,
When, present to my dream, did Hector rise
And stood before me with fast-streaming eyes;
Such as he was when horse had striven with horse,
Whirling along the plain his lifeless Corse,
The thongs that bound him to the Chariot thrust
Through his swoln feet, and black with gory dust, —
A spectacle how pitiably sad!
How changed from that returning Hector, clad
In glorious spoils, Achilles' own attire!
From Hector hurling shipward the red Phrygian fire!
— A squalid beard, hair clotted thick with gore,
And that same throng of patriot wounds he bore,
In front of Troy received; and now, methought,
That I myself was to a passion wrought
Of tears, which to my voice this greeting brought.
" O Light of Dardan Realms! most faithful Stay
To Trojan courage, why these lingerings of delay?
Where hast thou tarried, Hector? From what coast
Com'st thou, long wished-for? That so many lost
Thy kinsmen or thy friends, — such travail borne
By this afflicted City — we outworn
Behold thee. Why this undeserved disgrace?
Who thus defiled with wounds that honoured face?"
He naught to this — unwilling to detain
One, who had asked vain things, with answer vain;
But, groaning deep, " Flee, Goddess-born," he said,
" Snatch thyself from these flames around thee spread;
Our Enemy is master of the Walls;
Down from her elevation Ilium falls.
Enough for Priam; the long strife is o'er,
Nor doth our Country ask one effort more.
Could Pergamus have been defended — hence,
Even from this hand, had issued her defence;
Troy her Penates doth to thee commend,
Her sacred stores, — let these thy fates attend!
Sail under their protection for the Land
Where mighty Realms shall grow at thy command!"
— No more was uttered, but his hand he stretched,
And from the inmost Sanctuary fetched
The consecrated wreaths, the potency
Of Vesta, and the fires that may not die.
Meantime, wild tumult through the streets is poured,
And though apart, and 'mid thick trees embowered,
My Father's mansion stood, the loud alarms
Came pressing thither, and the clash of Arms.
Sleep fled; I climb the roof and where it rears
Its loftiest summit, stand with quickened ears.
So, when a fire by raging south winds borne
Lights on a billowy sea of ripened corn,
Or rapid torrent sweeps with mountain flood
The fields, the harvest prostrates, headlong bears the wood;
High on a rock, the unweeting Shepherd, bound,
In blank amazement, listens to the sound.
Then was apparent to whom faith was due,
And Grecian plots lie bare to open view.
Above the spacious palace where abode
Deiphobus, the flames in triumph rode;
Ucalegon burns next; through lurid air
Sigean Friths reflect a widening glare.
Clamour and clangour to the heavens arise,
The blast of trumpets mixed with vocal cries;
Arms do I snatch — weak reason scarcely knows
What aid they promise, but my spirit glows;
I burn to gather Friends, whose firm array
On to the Citadel shall force its way.
Precipitation works with desperate charms;
It seems a lovely thing to die in Arms.
Lo Pantheus! fugitive from Grecian spears,
Apollo's Priest; — his vanquished Gods he bears;
The other hand his little Grandson leads,
While from the Sovereign Fort, he toward my threshold speeds.
" Pantheus, what hope? Which Fortress shall we try?
Where plant resistance?" He in prompt reply
Said, deeply moved, — " 'Tis come — the final hour;
The inevitable close of Dardan power
Hath come: — we have been Trojans, Ilium was,
And the great name of Troy; now all things pass
To Argos; so wills angry Jupiter:
Within the burning Town the Grecians domineer.
Forth from its central stand the enormous Horse
Pours in continual stream an armed Force;
Sinon, insulting victor, aggravates
The flames; and thousands hurry through the Gates,
Thronged, as might seem, with press of all the Hosts
That e'er Mycenae sent to Phrygian Coasts.
Others with spears in serried files blockade
The passes; — hangs, with quivering point, the blade
Unsheathed for slaughter, — scarcely to the foes
A blind and baffled fight the Warders can oppose."
Urged by these words, and as the Gods inspire,
I rush into the battle and the fire,
Where sad Erinnys, where the shock of fight,
The roar, the tumult, and the groans invite;
Rypheus is with me, Epytus, the pride
Of battles, joins his aid, and to my side
Flock Dymas, Hypanis, the moon their guide;
With young Coroebus, who had lately sought
Our walls, by passion for Cassandra brought;
He led to Priam an auxiliar train,
His Son by wedlock, miserable Man
For whom a raving Spouse had prophesied in vain.
When these I saw collected, and intent
To face the strife with deeds of hardiment,
I thus began: " O Champions, vainly brave
If, like myself, to dare extremes ye crave,
You see our lost condition, — not a God,
Of all the Powers by whom this Empire stood,
But hath renounced his Altar — fled from his abode.
— Ye would uphold a City wrapped in fire;
Die rather; — let us rush, in battle to expire.
At least one safety shall the vanquished have
If they no safety seek but in the grave."
— Thus to their minds was fury added, — then,
Like wolves driven forth by hunger from the den,
To prowl amid blind vapours, whom the brood
Expect, their jaws all parched with thirst for blood,
Through flying darts, through pressure of the Foe,
To death, to not uncertain death, we go.
Right through the Town our midway course we bear,
Aided by hovering darkness, strengthened by despair.
Can words the havoc of that night express?
What power of tears may equal the distress?
An ancient City sinks to disappear;
She sinks who ruled for ages, — Far and near
The Unresisting through the streets, the abodes
Of Men and hallowed Temples of the Gods,
Are felled by massacre that takes no heed;
Nor are the Trojans only doomed to bleed;
The Vanquished sometimes to their hearts recall
Old virtues, and the conquering Argives fall.
Sorrow is everywhere and fiery skaith,
Fear, Anguish struggling to be rid of breath,
And Death still crowding on the shape of Death.
Androgeus, whom a numerous Force attends,
Was the first Greek we met; he rashly deems us Friends.
" What sloth," he cries, " retards you? Warriors haste!
Troy blazes, sacked by others, and laid waste;
And ye come lagging from your Ships the last!"
Thus he; and straight mistrusting our replies,
He felt himself begirt with enemies;
Voice failed — step faltered, at the dire mistake;
Like one who through a deeply tangled brake
Struggling, hath trod upon a lurking Snake,
And shrunk in terror from the unlooked-for Pest
Lifting his blue-swoln neck and wrathful crest.
Even so Androgeus, smit with sudden dread,
Recoils from what he saw, and would have fled,
Forward we rush, with arms the Troop surround,
The Men, surprised and ignorant of the ground,
Subdued by fear, become an easy prey;
So are we favoured in our first essay.
With exultation here Coroebus cries,
" Behold, O Friends, how bright our destinies!
Advance; — the road which they point out is plain;
Shields let us change, and bear the insignia of the Slain,
Grecians in semblance; wiles are lawful — who
To simple valour would restrict a foe?
Themselves shall give us Arms." When this was said
The Leader's helmet nods upon his head,
The emblazoned buckler on his arm is tied,
He fits an Argive falchion to his side.
The like doth Rypheus, Dymas, — all put on,
With eager haste, the spoils which they had won.
Then in the combat mingling, Heaven averse,
Amid the gloom a multitude we pierce,
And to the shades dismiss them. Others flee,
Appalled by this imagined treachery;
Some to the Ships — some to the Horse would hide.
Ah! what reap they but sorrow who confide
In aught to which the Gods their sanction have denied?
Behold Cassandra, Priam's royal Child,
By sacrilegious men, with hair all wild,
Dragged from Minerva's Temple! Toward the skies
The Virgin lifts in vain her glowing eyes,
Her eyes, she could no more, for Grecian bands
Had rudely manacled her tender hands.
The intolerable sight to madness stung
Coroebus; and his desperate self he flung
For speedy death the ruthless Foe among!
We follow, and with general shock assail
The hostile Throng: — here first our efforts fail:
While, from the summit of the lofty Fane
Darts, by the People flung, descend amain;
In miserable heaps their Friends are laid,
By show of Grecian Arms and Crests betrayed.
Wroth for the Virgin rescued, by defeat
Provoked, the Grecians from all quarters meet.
With Ajax combat there the Brother Kings;
And the Dolopian Squadron thither brings
Its utmost rage. Thus Winds break forth and fly
To conflict from all regions of the sky;
Notus and Zephyrus, while Eurus feeds
The strife, exulting in his orient steeds;
Woods roar, and foaming Nereus stirs the waves
Roused by his trident from their lowest caves.
They also whomsoe'er through shades of night
Our stratagem had driven to scattered flight
Now reappear — by them our Shields are known;
The simulating Javelins they disown,
And mark our utterance of discordant tone.
Numbers on numbers bear us down; and first
Coroebus falls; him Peneleus hath pierced
Before Minerva's Altar; next, in dust
Sinks Rhypeus, one above all Trojans just,
And righteous above all; but heavenly Powers
Ordain by lights that ill agree with ours.
Then Dymas, Hypanis are slain by Friends;
— Nor thee abundant piety defends,
O Pantheus! falling with the garland wound,
As fits Apollo's Priest, thy brows around.
Ashes of Ilium! and ye duteous fires,
Lit for my Friends upon their funeral pyres;
Amid your fall bear witness to my word!
I shunned no hazards of the Grecian sword,
No turns of war; with hand unsparing fought;
And earned, had Fate so willed, the death I sought.
Thence am I hurried by the rolling tide,
With Iphitus and Pelias at my side;
One bowed with years; and Pelias, from a wound
Given by Ulysses, halts along the ground.
New clamours rise; the Abode of Priam calls,
Besieged by thousands swarming round the walls;
Concourse how thick! as if, throughout the space
Of the whole City, war in other place
Were hushed — no death elsewhere. The Assailants wield
Above their heads shield, shell-wise locked in shield;
Climb step by step the ladders, near the side
Of the strong portal daringly applied;
The weaker hand its guardian shield presents;
The right is stretched to grasp the battlements.
The Dardans tug at roof and turrets high,
Rend fragments off, and with these weapons try
Life to preserve in such extremity,
Roll down the massy rafters decked with gold,
Magnific splendours raised by Kings of old;
Others with naked weapons stand prepared
In thick array, the doors below to guard.
A bolder hope inspirits me to lend
My utmost aid the Palace to defend,
And strengthen those afflicted. From behind,
A gateway opened, whence a passage blind
The various Mansions of the Palace joined.
— Unblest Andromache, while Priam reigned
Oft by this way the royal Palace gained,
A lonely Visitant; this way would tread
With young Astyanax, to his Grandsire led.
Entering the gate, I reached the roof, where stand
The Trojans, hurling darts with ineffectual hand.
A Tower there was; precipitous the site,
And the Pile rose to an unrivalled height;
Frequented Station, whence, in circuit wide
Troy might be seen, the Argive Fleet descried,
And all the Achaian Camp. This sovereign Tower
With irons grappling where the loftiest floor
Pressed with its beams the wall we shake, we rend,
And, in a mass of thundering ruin, send
To crush the Greeks beneath. But numbers press
To new assault with reckless eagerness:
Weapons and missiles from the ruins grow,
And what their hasty hands can seize they throw!
In front stands Pyrrhus, glorying in the might
Of his own weapons, while his armour bright
Casts from the portal gleams of brazen light,
So shines a Snake, when kindling, he hath crept
Forth from the winter bed in which he slept,
Swoln with a glut of poisonous herbs, — but now
Fresh from the shedding of his annual slough,
Glittering in youth, warm with instinctive fires,
He, with raised breast, involves his back in gyres,
Darts with his forked tongue, and toward the sun aspires.
Joined with redoubted Periphas, comes on
To storm the Palace fierce Automedon,
Who drove the Achillean Car; — the Bands
Of Scyros follow hurling fiery brands.
Pyrrhus himself hath seized an axe, would cleave
The ponderous doors, or from their hinges heave;
And now, reiterating stroke on stroke
Hath hewn, through plates of brass and solid oak,
A broad-mouthed entrance; — to their inmost seats
The long-drawn courts lie open; the retreats
Of Priam and ancestral Kings are bared
To instantaneous view; and Lo! the Guard
Stands at the threshold, for defence prepared.
But tumult spreads through all the space within;
The vaulted roofs repeat the mournful din
Of female Ululation, a strange vent
Of agony, that strikes the starry firmament!
The Matrons range with wildering step the floors;
Embrace, and print their kisses on, the doors.
Pyrrhus, with all his Father's might, dispels
Barriers and bolts, and living obstacles;
Force shapes her own clear way; — the doors are thrown
Off from their hinges; gates are battered down
By the onrushing Soldiery, who kill
Whom first they meet, and the broad area fill.
— Less irresistibly, o'er dams and mounds,
Burst by its rage, a foaming River bounds,
Herds sweeping with their stalls along the ravaged grounds.
Pyrrhus I saw with slaughter desperate;
The two Atridae near the Palace gate
Did I behold; and by these eyes were seen
The hundred Daughters with the Mother Queen,
And hoary-headed Priam, where he stood
Beside the Altar, staining with his blood
Fires which himself had hallowed. Hope had he
Erewhile, none equal hope, of large posterity.
There, fifty bridal chambers might be told —
Superb with trophies and barbaric gold,
All, in their pomp, lie level with the ground,
And where the fire is not, are Grecian Masters found.
Ask ye the fate of Priam? On that night
When captured Ilium blazed before his sight,
And the Foe, bursting through the Palace gate
Spread through the privacies of royal state,
In vain to tremulous shoulders he restored
Arms which had long forgot their ancient Lord,
And girt upon his side a useless sword;
Then, thus accoutred, forward did he hie,
As if to meet the Enemy and die.
— Amid the Courts, an Altar stood in view
Of the wide heavens, near which a long-lived Laurel grew
And, bending over this great Altar, made
For its Penates an embracing shade.
With all her Daughters, thronged like Doves that lie
Cowering, when storms have driven them from the sky,
Hecuba shelters in that sacred place
Where they the Statues of the Gods embrace.
But when she saw in youthful Arms arrayed
Priam himself; " What ominous thought," she said,
" Hangs, wretched Spouse, this weight on limbs decayed?
And wither wouldst thou hasten? If we were
More helpless still, this succour we might spare.
Not such Defenders doth the time demand;
Profitless here would be even Hector's hand.
Retire; this Altar can protect us all,
Or thou wilt not survive when we must fall."
This to herself: and toward the sacred spot
She drew the aged Man, to wait their common lot.
But see Polites, one of Priam's Sons,
Charged with the death which he in terror shuns!
The wounded Youth, escaped from Pyrrhus, flies
Through showers of darts, through press of enemies,
Where the long Porticos invite; the space
Of widely-vacant Courts his footsteps trace.
Him, Pyrrhus, following near and still more near,
Hath caught at with his hand, and presses with his spear;
But when at length this unremitting flight
Had brought him full before his Father's sight,
He fell — and scarcely prostrate on the ground,
Poured forth his life from many a streaming wound.
Here Priam, scorning death and self-regard,
His voice restrained not, nor his anger spared;
But " Shall the Gods," he cries, " if Gods there be
Who note such acts, and care for piety,
Requite this heinous crime with measure true,
Nor one reward withhold that is thy due;
Who thus a Father's presence hast defiled,
And forced upon his sight the murder of a Child!
Not thus Achilles' self, from whom a tongue
Versed in vainglorious falsehood boasts thee sprung,
Dealt with an enemy; my prayer he heard;
A Suppliant's rights in Priam he revered,
Gave Hector back to rest within the tomb,
And me remitted to my royal home."
This said, the aged Man a javelin cast;
With weak arm — faltering to the shield it past;
The tinkling shield the harmless point repelled,
Which, to the boss it hung from, barely held.
— Then Pyrrhus, " To my Sire, Pelides, bear
These feats of mine, ill relished as they are,
Tidings of which I make thee messenger!
To him a faithful history relate
Of Neoptolemus degenerate.
Now die!" So saying, towards the Altar, through
A stream of filial blood, the tottering Sire he drew;
His left hand locked within the tangled hair
Raised, with the right, a brandished sword in air,
Then to the hilt impelled it through his side;
Thus, 'mid a blazing City, Priam died.
Troy falling round him, thus he closed his fate,
Once proud Lord of many an Asian State!
Upon the shore lies stretched his mangled frame,
Head from the shoulders torn, a Body without name.
Then first it was, that Horror girt me round;
Chilled my frail heart, and all my senses bound;
The image of my Father crossed my mind;
Perchance in fate with slaughtered Priam joined;
Equal in age, thus may He breathe out life,
Creusa also, my deserted Wife!
The Child Iülus left without defence,
And the whole House laid bare to violence!
Backward I looked, and cast my eyes before;
My Friends had failed, and courage was no more;
All, wearied out, had followed desperate aims,
Self-dashed to earth, or stifled in the flames.
Thus was I left alone; such light my guide
As the conflagrant walls and roofs supplied;
When my far-wandering eyesight chanced to meet
Helen sequestered on a lonely seat
Amid the Porch of Vesta; She, through dread
Of Trojan vengeance amply merited,
Of Grecian punishment, and what the ire
Of a deserted Husband might require,
Thither had flown — there sate, the common bane
Of Troy and of her Country — to obtain
Protection from the Altar, or to try
What hope might spring from trembling secrecy.
Methought my falling Country cried aloud,
And the revenge it seemed to ask, I vowed;
" What! shall she visit Sparta once again?
In triumph enter with a loyal Train?
Consort, and Home, and Sires and Children view
By Trojan Females served, a Phrygian retinue?
For this was Priam slain? Troy burnt? The shore
Of Dardan Seas so often drenched in gore?
Not so; for though such victory can claim
In its own nature no reward of fame,
The punishment that ends the guilty days
Even of a Woman, shall find grateful praise;
My soul, at least, shall of her weight be eased,
The ashes of my Countrymen appeased."
Such words broke forth; and in my own despite
Onward I bore, when through the dreary night
Appeared my gracious Mother, vested in pure light;
Never till now before me did she shine
So much herself, so thoroughly divine;
Goddess revealed in all her beauty, love,
And majesty, as she is wont to move,
A Shape familiar to the Courts of Jove!
The hand she seized her touch sufficed to stay,
Then through her roseate mouth these words found easy way.
" O Son! what pain excites a wrath so blind?
Or could all thought of me desert thy mind?
Where now is left thy Parent worn with age?
Wilt thou not rather in that search engage?
Learn with thine eyes if yet Creusa live,
And if the Boy Ascanius still survive.
Them do the Greeks environ: — that they spare,
That swords so long abstain, and flames forbear,
Is through the intervention of my care.
Not Spartan Helen's beauty, so abhorred
By thee, not Paris, her upbraided Lord —
The hostile Gods have laid this grandeur low,
Troy from the Gods receives her overthrow.
Look! for the impediment of misty shade
With which thy mortal sight is overlaid
I will disperse; nor thou refuse to hear
Parental mandates, nor resist through fear!
There, where thou seest block rolling upon block,
Mass rent from mass, and dust condensed with smoke
In billowy intermixture, Neptune smites
The walls, with labouring Trident disunites
From their foundation — tearing up, as suits
His anger, Ilium from her deepest roots.
Fiercest of all, before the Scaean Gate,
Armed Juno stands, beckoning to animate
The Bands she summons from the Argive Fleet,
Tritonian Pallas holds her chosen seat
High on the Citadel, — look back! see there
Her Aegis beaming forth a stormy glare!
The very Father, Jove himself, supplies
Strength to the Greeks, sends heaven-born enemies
Against the Dardan Arms. My Son, take flight,
And close the struggle of this dismal night!
I will not quit thy steps whate'er betide,
But to thy Father's House will safely guide."
She ceased, and did in shades her presence hide.
Dire Faces still are seen and Deities
Adverse to Troy appear, her mighty Enemies.
Now was all Ilium, far as sight could trace,
Settling and sinking in the Fire's embrace,
Neptunian Troy subverted from her base.
Even so, a Mountain-Ash, long tried by shock
Of storms endured upon the native rock,
When He is doomed from rustic arms to feel
The rival blows of persevering steel,
Nods high with threatening forehead, till at length
Wounds unremitting have subdued his strength;
With groans the ancient Tree foretells his end;
He falls; and fragments of the mountain blend
With the precipitous ruin. — I descend
And, as the Godhead leads, 'twixt foe and fire
Advance: — the darts withdraw, the flames retire.
But when beneath her guidance I had come
Far as the Gates of the paternal Dome,
My Sire, whom first I sought and wished to bear
For safety to the Hills, disdains that care;
Nor will he now, since Troy hath fallen, consent
Life to prolong, or suffer banishment.
" Think Ye ," he says, " the current of whose blood
Is unimpaired, whose vigour unsubdued,
Think Ye of flight; — that I should live, the Gods
Wish not, or they had saved me these Abodes.
Not once, but twice, this City to survive,
What need against such destiny to strive?
While thus, even thus disposed the body lies,
Depart! pronounce my funeral obsequies!
Not long shall I have here to wait for death,
A pitying Foe will rid me of my breath,
Will seek my spoils; and should I lie forlorn
Of sepulture, the loss may well be borne.
Full long obnoxious to the Powers divine
Life lingers out these barren years of mine;
Even since the date when me the eternal Sire
Swept with the thunderbolt, and scathed with fire."
Thus he persists; — Creusa and her Son
Second the counter-prayer by me begun;
The total House with weeping deprecate
This weight of wilful impulse given to Fate;
He, all unmoved by pleadings and by tears,
Guards his resolve, and to the spot adheres.
Arms once again attract me, hurried on
In misery, and craving death alone.
" And hast thou hoped that I could move to find
A place of rest, thee, Father, left behind?
How could parental lips the guilty thought unbind?
If in so great a City Heaven ordain
Utter extinction; if thy soul retain
With stedfast longing that abrupt design
Which would to falling Troy add thee and thine;
That way to Death lies open; — soon will stand
Pyrrhus before thee with the reeking brand
That drank the blood of Priam; He whose hand
The Son in presence of the Father slays,
And at the Altar's base the slaughtered Father lays.
For this, benignant Mother! didst thou lead
My steps along a way from danger freed,
That I might see remorseless Men invade
The holiest places that these roofs o'ershade?
See Father, Consort, Son, all tinged and dyed
With mutual sprinklings, perish side by side?
Arms bring me, Friends! bring Arms! our last hour speaks,
It calls the Vanquished; cast me on the Greeks!
In rallying combat let us join; — not all,
This night, unsolaced by revenge shall fall!"
The sword resumes its place; the shield I bear;
And hurry now to reach the open air;
When on the ground before the threshold cast
Lo! where Creusa hath my feet embraced
And holding up Iülus, there cleaves fast!
" If thou, departing, be resolved to die,
Take us through all that in thy road may lie;
But if on Arms, already tried, attend
A single hope, then first this House defend;
On whose protection Sire and Son are thrown,
And I, the Wife that once was called thine own."
Such outcry filled the Mansion, when behold
A strange portent, and wonderous to be told!
All suddenly a luminous crest was seen;
Which, where the Boy Iülus hung between
The arms of each sad Parent, rose and shed,
Tapering aloft, a lustre from his head;
Along the hair the lambent flame proceeds
With harmless touch, and round his temples feeds.
In fear we haste, the burning tresses shake,
And from the fount the holy fire would slake;
But joyfully his hands Anchises raised,
His voice not silent as on Heaven he gazed:
" Almighty Jupiter! if prayers have power
To bend thee, look on us; I seek no more;
If aught our piety deserve, Oh deign
The hope this Omen proffers to sustain;
Nor, Father, let us ask a second Sign in vain!"
Thus spake the Sire, and scarcely ended, ere
A peal of sudden thunder, loud and clear,
Broke from the left; and shot through Heaven a Star
Trailing its torch, that sparkled from afar;
Above the roof the star, conspicuous sight,
Ran to be hid on Ida's sylvan height.
The long way marking with a train of light.
The furrowy track the distant sky illumes,
And far and wide are spread sulphureous fumes.
Uprisen from earth, my aged Sire implores
The Deities, the holy Star adores;
— " Now am I conquered — now is no delay;
Gods of my Country! where Ye lead the way
'Tis not in me to hesitate or swerve;
Preserve my House, Ye Powers, this Little One preserve!
Yours is this augury; and Troy hath still
Life in the signs that manifest your will!
I cannot choose but yield; and now, to Thee,
O Son, a firm Associate will I be!"
He spake; and nearer through the City came
Rolling more audibly, the sea of flame.
" Now give, dear Father, to this neck the freight
Of thy old age; — the burden will be light
For which my shoulders bend; henceforth one fate,
Evil or good shall we participate.
The Boy shall journey, tripping at my side;
Our steps, at distance marked, will be Creusa's guide.
My Household! heed these words: upon a Mound
(To those who quit the City obvious ground)
A Temple, once by Ceres honoured, shows
Its mouldering front; hard by a Cypress grows,
Through ages guarded with religious care;
Thither, by various roads, let all repair.
Thou, Father! take these relics; let thy hand
Bear the Penates of our native land;
I may not touch them, fresh from deeds of blood,
Till the stream cleanse me with its living flood."
Forthwith an ample vest my shoulders clad,
Above the vest a lion's skin was spread,
Next came the living Burden; fast in mine
His little hand Iülus doth entwine,
Following his Father with no equal pace;
Creusa treads behind; the darkest ways we trace.
And me, erewhile insensible to harms,
Whom adverse Greeks agglomerate in Arms
Moved not, now every breath of air alarms;
All sounds have power to trouble me with fear,
Anxious for whom I lead, and whom I bear.
Thus, till the Gates were nigh, my course I shaped,
And thought the hazards of the time escaped,
When through the gloom a noise of feet we hear,
Quick sounds that seemed to press upon the ear;
" Fly," cries my Father, looking forth, " Oh fly!
They come — I see their shields and dazzling panoply!"
Here, in my trepidation was I left,
Through some unfriendly Power, of mind bereft,
For, while I journeyed devious and forlorn,
From me, me wretched, was Creusa torn;
Whether stopped short by death, or from the road
She wandered, or sank down beneath a load
Of weariness, no vestiges made plain:
She vanished, ne'er to meet these eyes again.
Nor did I seek her lost, nor backward turn
My mind, until we reached the sacred bourne
Of ancient Ceres. All, even all, save One
Were in the spot assembled; She alone,
As if her melancholy fate disowned
Companion, Son, and Husband, nowhere could be found.
Who, man or God, from my reproach was free?
Had desolated Troy a heavier woe for me?
'Mid careful friends my Sire and Son I place,
With the Penates of our Phrygian race,
Deep in a winding vale; my footsteps then retrace;
Resolved the whole wide City to explore
And face the perils of the night once more.
So, with refulgent Arms begirt, I haste
Toward the dark gates through which my feet had passed,
Remeasure, where I may, the beaten ground,
And turn at every step a searching eye around.
Horror prevails on all sides, while with dread
The very silence is impregnated.
Fast to my Father's Mansion I repair,
If haply, haply, She had harboured there.
Seized by the Grecians was the whole Abode:
And now, voracious fire its mastery showed,
Rolled upward by the wind in flames that meet
High o'er the roof, — air rages with the heat;
Thence to the Towers I pass, where Priam held his Seat.
Already Phoenix and Ulysses kept,
As chosen Guards, the spoils of Ilium, heaped
In Juno's Temple, and the wealth that rose
Piled on the floors of vacant porticos,
Prey torn through fire from many a secret Hold,
Vests, tables of the Gods, and cups of massy gold.
And, in long order, round these treasures stand
Matrons, and Boys, and Youths, a trembling Band!
Nor did I spare with fearless voice to raise
Shouts in the gloom that filled the streets and ways,
And with reduplication sad and vain,
Creusa called, again and yet again.
While thus I prosecute an endless quest
A Shape was seen, unwelcome and unblest;
Creusa's Shade appeared before my eyes,
Her Image, but of more than mortal size;
Then I, as if the power of life had passed
Into my upright hair, stood speechless and aghast.
— She thus — to stop my troubles at their source:
" Dear Consort, why this fondly-desperate course?
Supernal Powers, not doubtfully, prepare
These issues; going hence thou wilt not bear
Creusa with thee; know that Fate denies
This fellowship, and this the Ruler of the skies.
Long wanderings will be thine, no home allowed;
Vast the extent of sea that must be ploughed
Ere, 'mid Hesperian fields where Tiber flows
With gentle current, thy tired keels repose.
Joy meets thee there, a Realm and royal Bride,
— For loved Creusa let thy tears be dried;
I go not where the Myrmidons abide.
No proud Dolopian Mansion shall I see
Nor shall a Grecian Dame be served by me,
Derived from Jove, and raised by thee so high,
Spouse to the Offspring of a Deity, —
Far otherwise; upon my native plains
Me the great Mother of the Gods detains.
Now, fare thee well! protect our Son, and prove
By tenderness for him, our common love."
This having said — my trouble to subdue,
Into thin air she silently withdrew;
Left me while tears were gushing from their springs,
And on my tongue a thousand hasty things;
Thrice with my arms I strove her neck to clasp,
Thrice had my hands succeeded in their grasp,
From which the Image slipped away, as light
As the swift winds, or sleep when taking flight.
Such was the close; and now the night thus spent,
Back to my Friends an eager course I bent,
And here a crowd with wonder I behold
Of new Associates, concourse manifold!
Matrons, and Men, and Youths that hither hied,
For exile gathering; and from every side
The wretched people thronged and multiplied;
Prepared with mind and means their flight to speed
Across the seas, where I might choose to lead.
Now on the ridge of Ida's summit grey
Rose Lucifer, prevenient to the day.
The Grecians held the Gates in close blockade,
Hope was there none of giving further aid;
I yielded, took my Father up once more,
And sought the Mountain, with the Freight I bore.
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