44

Troy now they reach'd, and touch'd those banks |
Where silver Simoïs and Scamander join. [divine
There Juno stopp'd, (and her fair steeds unloos'd)
Of air condens'd a vapour circumfus'd:
For these, impregnate with celestial dew
On Simoïs' brink ambrosial herbage grew.
Thence to relieve the fainting Argive throng,
Sinooth as the sailing doves, they glide along.
The best and bravest of the Grecian band
(A warlike circle) round Tydides stand:
Such was their look as lions bath'd in blood,
Or foaming boars, the terrour of the wood.
Heaven's empress mingles with the mortal crowd,
And shouts, in Stentor's sounding voice, aloud:
Stentor the strong, endued with brazen lungs,
Whose throat surpass'd the force of fifty tongues.
"Inglorious Argives! to your race a shame,
And only men in figure and in name!

Once from the walls your timorous foes engag'd,
While fierce in war divine Achilles rag'd;
Now issuing fearless they possess the plain,
Now win the shores, and scarce the seas remain."
Her speech new fury to their hearts convey'd ;
While near Tydides stood th' Athenian maid;
The king beside his panting steeds she found,
O'erspent with toil, reposing on the ground:
To cool his glowing wound he sat apart
(The wound inflicted by the Lycian dart);
Large drops of sweat from all his limbs descend;
Beneath his ponderous shield his sinews bend,
Whose ample belt, that o'er his shoulders lay,
He eas'd, and wash'd the clotted gore away.
The goddess leaning o'er the bending yoke,
Beside his coursers, thus her silence broke:
"Degenerate prince! and not of Tydeus' kind,
Whose little body lodg'd a mighty mind;
Foremost he press'd in glorious toils to share,
And scarce refrain'd when I forbade the war.
Alone, unguarded, once he dar'd to go
And feast, encircled by the Theban foe;
There brav'd, and vanquish'd, many a hardy knight;
Such nerves I gave him, and such force in fight.
Thou too no less hast been my constant care;
Thy hands I arm'd, and sent thee forth to war:
But thee or fear deters, or sloth detains ;
No drop of all thy father warms thy veins."

The chief thus answer'd mild: "Immortal maid!
I own thy presence, and confess thy aid. [plains,
Not fear, thou know'st, withholds me from the
Nor sloth hath seiz'd me, but thy word restrains:
From warring gods thou bad'st me turn my spear,
And Venus only found resistance here.
Hence, goddess! heedful of thy high commands,
Loth I gave way, and warn'd our Argive bands:
For Mars, the homicide, these eyes beheld,
With slaughter red, and raging round the field."
Then thus Minerva. "Brave Tydides, hear!
Not Mars himself, nor aught immortal, fear.
Full on the god impel thy foaming horse :
Pallas commands, and Pallas lends thee force.
Rash, furious, blind, from these to those he flies,
And every side of wavering combat tries; [made;
Large promise makes, and breaks the promise
Now gives the Grecians, now the Trojans aid."

She said, and to the steeds approaching near,
Drew from his seat the martial charioteer,
The vigorous power the trembling car ascends,
Fierce for revenge, and Diomed attends.
The groaning axle bent beneath the load;
So great a hero, and so great a God.

She snatch'd the reins, she lash'd with all her force;
And full on Mars impell'd the foaming horse:
But first, to hide her heavenly visage spread,
Black Orcus' helmet o'er her radiant head.

Just then gigantic Periphas lay slain,
The strongest warrior of th' Ætolian train;
The god, who slew him, leaves his prostrate prize
Stretch'd where he fell, and at Tydides flics.
Now, rushing fierce, in equal arms appear,
The daring Greek; the dreadful god of war!
Full at the chief, above his courser's head,
From Mars's arm th' enormous weapon fled :
Pallas oppos'd her hand, and caus'd to glance,
Far from the car, the strong immortal lance.
Then threw the force of Tydeus' warlike son;
The javelin hiss'd; the goddess urg'd it on:
Where the broad cincture girt his armour round,
It pierc'd the god: his groin receiv'd the wound.
From the rent skin the warrior tugs again
The smoaking steel. Mars bellows with the pain :
Loud as the roar encountering armies yield,
When shouting millions shake the thundering field.
Both armies start, and trembling gaze around;
And Earth and Heaven rebellow to the sound.
As vapours blown by Auster's sultry breath,
Pregnant with plagues, and shedding seeds of death,
Beneath the rage of burning Sirius rise,
Choke the parch'd Earth, and blacken all the skies;
In such a cloud the god from combat driven,
High o'er the dusty whirlwind scales the Heaven.
Wild with his pain, he sought the bright abodes,
There sullen sate beneath the sire of gods,
Show'd the celestial blood, and with a groan
Thus pour'd his plaints before th' immortal throne:
"Can Jove, supine, flagitious facts survey,
And brook the furies of this daring day?
For mortal men celestial powers engage,
And gods on gods exert eternal rage.
From thee, O father! all these ills we bear,
And thy fell daughter with the shield and spear:
Thou gav'st that fury to the realms of light,
Pernicious, wild, regardless of the right.
All Heaven beside reveres thy sovereign sway,
Thy voice we hear, and thy behests obey:
"Tis hers t' offend, and ev'n offending share
Thy breast, thy counsels thy distinguish'd care:
So boundless she, and thou so partial grown,
Well may we deem the wonderous birth thy own.
Now frantic Diomed, at her command,
Against th' immortals lifts his raging hand :
The heavenly Venus first his fury found,
Me next encountering, me he dar'd to wound;
Vanquish'd I filed: ev'n I the god of fight,
From mortal madness scarce was sav'd by flight.
Else had'st thou seen me sink on yonder plain,
Heap'd round, and heaving under loads of slain
Or, pierc'd with Grecian darts, for ages lie,
Condemn'd to pain, though fated not to die.

Him thus upbraiding, with a wrathful look
The lord of thunders view'd, and stern bespoke :
"To me, perfidious! this lamenting strain?
Of lawless force shall lawless Mars complain?
Of all the gods who tread the spangled skies,
Thou most unjust, most odious in our eyes!
Inhuman discord is thy dire delight,
The waste of slaughter, and the rage of fight.
No bound, no law, thy fiery temper quells,
And all thy mother in thy soul rebels.

In vain our threats, in vain our power we use
She gives th' example, and her son pursues.

Yet long th' inflicted pangs thou shalt not mourn,
Sprung since thou art from Jove, and heavenly born.
Else, sing'd with lightning hadst thou hence been
thrown,

Where chain'd on burning rocks the Titans groan."
Thus he who shakes Olympus with his nod;
Then gave to Pæon's care the bleeding god.
With gentle hand the balm he pour'd around,
And heal'd th' immortal flesh, and clos'd the wound.
As when the fig's press'd juice, infus'd in cream,
To curds coagulates the liquid stream,
Sudden the fluids fix, the parts combin'd;
Such, and so soon, the etherial texture join'd,
Cleans'd from the dust and gore, fair Hebè drest
His mighty limbs in an immortal vest.
Glorious he sate, in majesty restor'd,
Fast by the throne of Heaven's superior lord,
Juno and Pallas mount the blest abodes,
Their task perform'd, and mix among the gods.

THE ILIAD.

BOOK VI.

ARGUMENT.

THE EPISODES OF GLAUCUS AND DIOMED, AND OF
HECTOR AND ANDROMACHE.

THE gods having left the field, the Grecians pre-
vail. Helenus, the chief augur of Troy, com-
mands Hector to return to the city, in order to
appoint a solemn procession of the queen and
the Trojan matrons to the temple of Minerva,
to entreat her to remove Diomed from the fight.
The battle relaxing during the absence of Hec-
tor, Glaucus and Diomed have an interview be-
tween the two armies; where coming to the
knowledge of the friendship and hospitality past
between their ancestors, they make exchange
of their arms. Hector, having performed the
orders of Helenus, prevails upon Paris to re-
turn to the battle; and, taking a tender leave
of his wife Andromache, hastens again to the

field.

The scene is first in the field of battle, between the river Simoïs and Scamander, and then changes to Troy.

Now Heaven forsakes the fight: th' immortals
To human force and human skill, the field: [yield,
Dark showers of javelins fly from foes to foes;
Now here, now there, the tide of combat flows;
While Troy's fam'd streams', that bound the death-
On either side run purple to the main. [ful plain,
Great Ajax first to conquest led the way,
Broke the thick ranks, and turn'd the doubtful day.
The Thracian Acamas his falchion found,
And hew'd th' enormous giant to the ground;
His thundering arm a deadly stroke imprest
Where the black horse-hair nodded o'er his crest:

Scamander and Simoïs.

Fix'd in his front the brazen weapon lies,
And seals in endless shades his swimming eyes.
Next Teuthras' son distain'd the sands with blood,
Axylus, hospitable, rich and good:
In fair Arisbe's walls (his native place)
He held his seat: a friend to human race.
Fast by the road, his ever open door
Oblig'd the wealthy, and reliev'd the poor.
To stern Tydides now he falls a prey,
No friend to guard him in the dreadful day!
Breathless the good man fell, and by his side
His faithful servant, old Calesius, dy'd.

By great Euryalus was Dresus slain,
And next he laid Opheltius on the plain.
Two twins were near, bold, beautiful, and young,
From a fair Naiad and Bucolion sprung:
(Laomedon's white flocks Bucolion fed,
That monarch's first-born by a foreign bed;
In secret woods he won the Naiad's grace,
And two fair infants crown'd bis strong embrace.)
Here dead they lay in all their youthful charms;
The ruthless victor stripp'd their shining arms.
Astyalus by Polypoetes fell

Ulysses' spear Pydytes sent to Hell;
By Teucer's shaft brave Aretaön bled,
And Nestor's son laid stern Ablerus dead;
Great Agamemnon, leader of the brave,
The mortal wound of rich Elatus gave,
Who held in Pedasus his proud abode,

And till'd the banks where silver Satnio flow'd.
Melanthius by Eurypylus was slain;
And Phylacus from Leitus flies in vain.

Unblest Astrastus next at mercy lies
Beneath the Spartan spear, a living prize.
Scar'd with the din and tumult of the fight,
His headlong steeds, precipitate in flight,
Rush'd on a tamarisk's strong trunk, and broke
The shatter'd chariot from the crooked yoke;
Wide o'er the field, resistless as the wind,
For Troy they fly, and leave their lord behind.
Prone on his face he sinks beside the wheel :
Atrides o'er him shakes his vengeful steel;
The fallen chief in suppliant posture press'd
The victor's knees, and thus his prayer address'd:
"Oh, spare my youth! and for the life I owe
Large gifts of price my father shall bestow.
When fame shall tell, that, not in battle slain,
Thy hollow ships his captive son detain;
Rich heaps of brass shall in thy tent be told,
And steel well temper'd, and persuasive gold."

He said: compassion touch'd the hero's heart;
He stood, suspended, with the lifted dart;
As pity pleaded for his vanquish'd prize,
Stern Agamemnon swift to vengeance flics,
And furious thus: "Oh impotent of mind!
Shall these, shall these Atrides' mercy find?
And well her natives merit at thy hand!
Well hast thou known proud Troy's perfidious land,

Not one of all the race, nor sex, nor age,
Shall save a Trojan from our boundless rage:
Ilion shall perish whole, and bury all;
Her babes, her infants at the breast, shall fall.
To warn the nations, and to curb the great!"
A dreadful lesson of exampled fate,

The monarch spoke; the words with warmth ad-
To rigid justice steel'd his brother's breast. [drest,
Fierce from his knees the hapless chief he thrust;
The monarch's javelin stretch'd him in the dust,
Then pressing with his foot his panting heart,
Forth from the slain he tugg'd the reeking dart.

Old Nestor saw, and rous'd the warriors' rage!
"Thus, heroes! thus the vigorous combat wage!
No son of Mars descend, for servile gains,
To touch the booty, while a foe remains.
Behold yon glittering host, your future spoil!
First gain the conquest, then reward the toil."
And now had Greece eternal fame acquir'd,
And frighten'd Troy within her walls retir'd;
Had not sage Helenus her state redrest,
Taught by the gods that mov'd his sacred breast.
Where Hector stood, with great Æneas join'd,
The seer reveal'd the counsels of his mind:

[lay

"Ye generous chiefs! on whom th' immortals
The cares and glories of this doubtful day;
On whom your aids, your country's hopes depend;
Wise to consult, and active to defend !
Here, at our gates, your brave efforts unite,
Turn back the routed, and forbid the flight;
Ere yet their wives' soft arms the cowards gain,
The sport and insult of the hostile train.
When your commands have hearten'd every band,
Ourselves, here fix'd, will make the dangerous stand;
Prest as we are, and sore of former fight,

These straits demand our last remains of might.
Meanwhile, thou Hector to the town retire,
And teach our mother what the gods require:
Direct the queen to lead th' assembled train
Of Troy's chief matrons to Minerva's fane;
Unbar the sacred gates, and seek the power
With offer'd vows, in Ilion's topmost tower.
The largest mantle her rich wardrobes hold,
Most priz'd for art, and labour'd o'er with gold,
Before the goddess' honour'd knees be spread;
And twelve young heifers to her altar led:
If so the power, aton'd by fervent prayer,
Our wives, our infants, and our city spare,
And far avert Tydides' wasteful ire,
That mows whole troops, and makes all Troy retire.
Not thus Achilles taught our host to dread,
Sprung though he was from more than mortal bed;
Not thus resistless rul'd the stream of fight,
In rage unbounded, and unmatch'd in might."

Hector obedient heard; and with a bound,
Leap'd from his trembling chariot to the ground;
Through all his host, inspiring force, he flies,
And bids the thunder of the battle rise.
With rage recruited the bold Trojans glow,
And turn the tide of conflict on the foe:
Fierce in the front he shakes two dazzling spears:
All Greece recedes, and 'midst her triumphs fears;
Some god, they thought, who rul'd the fate of wars,
Shot down avenging, from the vault of stars.

Then thus, aloud: "Ye dauntless Dardans, hear!
And you whom distant nations send to war!
Be mindful of the strength your fathers bore;
Be still yourselves, and Hector asks no more.
One hour demands me in the Trojan wall,
To bid our altars flame, and victims fall:
Nor shall, I trust, the matrons' holy train
And reverend elders seek the gods in vain."

This said, with ample strides the hero past;
The shield's large orb behind his shoulder cast,
His neck o'ershading, to his ancle hung;
And as he march'd, the brazen buckler rung.
Now paus'd the battle (god-like Hector gone)
When daring Glaucus and great Tydeus' son
Between both armies met: the chiefs from far
Observ'd each other, and had mark'd for war.
Near as they drew, Tydides thus began:

"What art thou, boldest of the race of man?

Our eyes, till now, that aspect ne'er beheld,
Where fame is reap'd amid th' embattled field;
Yet far before the troops thou dar'st appear,
And meet a lance the fiercest heroes fear.
Unhappy they, and born of luckless sires,
Who tempt our fury when Minerva fires!
But if from Heaven, celestial, thou descend;
Know, with immortals we no more contend.
Not long Lycurgus view'd the golden light,
That daring man who mix'd with gods in fight.
Bacchus, and Bacchus' votaries, he drove,
With brandish'd steel, from Nyssa's sacred grove:
Their consecrated spears lay scatter'd round,
With curling vines and twisted ivy bound;
While Bacchus headlong sought the briny flood,
And Thetis' arm receiv'd the trembling god.
Nor fail'd the crime th' immortals' wrath to move,
(Th' immortals blest with endless ease above)
Depriv'd of sight by their avenging doom,
Cheerless he breath'd, and wander'd in the gloom:
Then sunk unpity'd to the dire abodes,
A wretch accurst, and hated by the gods!
I brave not Heaven: but if the fruits of Earth
Sustain thy life, and human be thy birth;
Bold as thou art, too prodigal of breath,
Approach, and enter the dark gates of Death."

"What, or from whence I am, or who my sire,"
(Reply'd the chief)" can Tydeus' son inquire?
Like leaves on trees the race of man is found,
Now green in youth, now withering on the ground;
Another race the following spring supplies;
They fall successive, and successive rise:
So generations in their course decay;

So flourish these, when those are past away.
But if thou still persist to search my birth,
Then hear a tale that fills the spacious Earth.

"A city stands on Argos' utmost bound,
(Argos the fair, for warlike steeds renown'd)
Eolian Sisyphus, with wisdom blest,
In ancient time the happy walls possest,
Then call'd Ephyre: Glaucus was his son;
Great Glaucus, father of Bellerophon,
Who o'er the sons of men in beauty shin'd,
Lov'd for that valour which preserves mankind.
Then mighty Prætus Argos' sceptres sway'd,
Whose hard command Bellerophon obey'd.
With direful jealousy the monarch rag'd,
And the brave prince in numerous toils engag'd.
For him Antæa burn'd with lawless flame,
And strove to tempt him from the paths of fame:
In vain she tempted the relentless youth,
Endued with wisdom, sacred fear, and truth.
Fir'd at his scorn the queen to Prætus fled,
And begg'd revenge for her insulted bed.
Incens'd he heard, resolving on his fate;
But hospitable laws restrain'd his hate:
To Lycia the devoted youth he sent,
With tablets seal'd, that told his dire intent.
Now, blest by every power who guards the good,
The chief arriv'd at Xanthus' silver flood:
There Lycia's monarch paid him honours due,
Nine days he feasted, and nine bulls he slew.
But when the tenth bright morning orient glow'd,
The faithful youth his monarch's mandate show'd:
The fatal tablets, till that instant seal'd,
The deathful secret to the king reveal'd:
First, dire Chimæra's conquest was enjoin'd,
A mingled monster, of no mortal kind;
Behind a dragon's fiery tail was spread;
A goat's rough body bore a lion's head;

Her pitchy nostrils flaky flames expire ;
Her gaping throat emits infernal fire.

"This pest he slaughter'd (for he read the skies,
And trusted Heaven's informing prodigies)
Then met in arms the Solymaan crew,
(Fiercest of men) and those the warrior slew,
Next the bold Amazon's whole force defy'd;
And conquer'd still, for Heaven was on his side.
"Nor ended here his toils: his Lycian foes,
At his return, a treacherous ambush rose,
With levell'd spears along the winding shore;
There fell they breathless, and return'd no more.
"At length the monarch with repentant grief
Confess'd the gods, and god-descended chief;
His daughter gave, the stranger to detain,
With half the honours of his ample reign:
The Lycians grant a chosen space ground,
With woods, with vineyards, and with harvests
crown'd,

There long the chief his happy lot possess'd,
With two brave sons and one fair daughter bless'd;
(Fair even in heavenly eyes; her fruitful love
Crown'd with Sarpedon's birth th' embrace of Jove)
But when at last, distracted in his mind,
Forsook by Heaven, forsaking human kind,
Wide o'er th' Aleian field he chose to stray,
A long, forlorn, uncomfortable way!

Woes heap'd on woes consum'd his wasted heart;
His beauteous daughter fell by Phoebe's dart;
His eldest-born by raging Mars was slain,
In combat on the Solymaan plain.
Hippolochus surviv'd; from him I came,
The honour'd author of my birth and name;
By his decree I sought the Trojan town,
By his instructions learn to win renown,
To stand the first in worth as in command,
To add new honours to my native land,
Before my eyes my mighty sires to place,
And emulate the glories of our race"

He spoke, and transport fill'd Tydides' heart;
In earth the generous warrior fix'd his dart,
Then friendly, thus, the Lycian prince addrest:
"Welcome, my brave hereditary guest!
Thus ever let us meet, with kind embrace,
Nor stain the sacred friendship of our race.
Know, chief, our grandsires have been guests of old;
Eneus the strong, Bellerophon the bold :
Our ancient seat his honour'd presence grac'd,
Where twenty days in genial rites he pass'd.
The parting heroes mutual presents left;
A golden goblet was thy grandsire's gift;
Eneus a belt of matchless work bestow'd,
That rich with Tyrian dye refulgent glow'd.
"This from his pledge I learn'd, which, safely
stor'd

Among my treasures, still adorns my board:
(For Tydeus left me young, when Thebe's wall
Beheld the sons of Greece untimely fall.)
Mindful of this, in friendship let us join;
If Heaven our steps to foreign lands incline,
My guest in Argos thou, and I in Lycia thine.
Enough of Trojans to this lance shall yield,
In the full harvest of yon ample field,
Enough of Greeks shall die thy spear with gore;
But thou and Diomed be foes no more.
Now change we arms, and prove to either host,
We guard the friendship of the line we boast.”
Thus having said, the gallant chiefs alight,
Their hands they join, their mutual faith they
plight;

Brave Glaucus then each narrow thought resign'd'
(Jove warm'd his bosom and enlarg'd his mind:)
For Diomed's brass arms, of mean device,
For which nine oxen paid, (a vulgar price)
He gave his own, of gold divinely wrought,
A hundred beeves the shining purchase bought.
Meantine the guardian of the Trojan state,
Great Hector, entered at the Scaan gate.
Beneath the beech-tree's consecrated shades,
The Trojan matrons and the Trojan maids
Around him flock'd, all press'd with pious care
For husbands, brothers, sons, engag'd in war.
He bids the train in long succession go,
And seek the gods t' avert th' impending woe.
And now to Priam's stately courts he came,
Rais'd on arch'd columns of stupendous frame;
O'er these a range of marble structure runs,
The rich pavilions of his fifty sons,

In fifty chambers lodg'd: and rooms of state
Oppos'd to those, where Priam's daughters sate :
Twelve domes for them and their lov'd spouses
Of equal beauty, and of polish'd stone. [shone,
Hither great Hector pass'd, nor pass'd unseen
Of royal Hecuba, his mother queen
(With her Laodicè, whose beauteous face
Surpass'd the nymphs of Troy's illustrious race):
Long in a strict embrace she held her son,
And press'd his hand, and tender thus begun :

"O Hector! say, what great occasion calls My son from fight, when Greece surrounds our walls?

Com'st thou to supplicate th' almighty power,
With lifted hands from Ilion's lofty tower?
Stay, till I bring the cup with Bacchus crown'd,
In Jove's high name, to sprinkle on the ground,
And pay due vows to all the gods around.
Then with a plenteous draught refresh thy soul,
And draw new spirits from the generous bowl;
Spent as thou art with long laborious fight,
The brave defender of thy country's right."

"Far hence be Bacchus' gifts," the chief rejoin'd:
"Inflaming wine, pernicious to mankind,
Unnerves the limbs, and dulls the noble mind.
Let chiefs abstain, and spare the sacred juice
To sprinkle to the gods, its better use.

"By me that holy office were profan'd;
Ill fits it me, with human gore distain'd,
To the pure skies these horrid hands to raise,
Or offer Heaven's great sire polluted praise.
You with your matrons, go! a spotless train,
And burn rich odours in Minerva's fane.
The largest mantle your full wardrobes hold,
Most priz'd for art, and labour'd o'er with gold,
Before the goddess' honour'd knees be spread,
And twelve young heifers to her altar led.
So may the power, aton'd by fervent prayer,
Our wives, our infants, and our city, spare,
And far avert Tydides' wasteful ire,

Who mows whole troops, and makes all Troy retire.
Be this, O mother! your religious care;

I go to rouse soft Paris to the war;

If yet, not lost to all the sense of shame,
The recreant warrior hear the voice of fame.
Oh would kind Earth the hateful wretch embrace,
That pest of Troy, that ruin of our race!
Deep to the dark abyss might he descend,
Troy yet should flourish, and my sorrows end."

This heard, she gave command; and summon'd

came

Each noble matron and illustrious dame.