Fat sheep and oxen from the town are led,
With generous wine, and all-sustaining bread.
Full hecatombs lay burning on the shore;
The winds to heaven the curling vapours bore.
Ungrateful offering to th' immortal powers!
Whose wrath hung heavy o'er the Trojan towers;
Nor Priam nor his sons obtain'd their grace;
Proud Troy they hated, and her guilty race.
The troops exulting sat in order round,
And beaming fires illumin'd all the ground.
As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night,

O'er heaven's clear azure spreads her sacred light,
When not a breath disturbs the deep serene,
And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene;
Around her throne the vivid planets roll,
And stars unnumber'd gild the glowing pole,
O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed,
And tip with silver every mountain's head;
Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise,
A flood of glory bursts from all the skies:
The conscious swains, rejoicing in the sight,
Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light.
many flames before proud Ilion blaze,

So

The long reflections of the distant fires

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And lighten glimmering Xanthus with their rays:

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Gleam on the walls, and tremble on the spires.

A thousand piles the dusky horrors gild,
And shoot a shady lustre o'er the field.
Full fifty guards each flaming pile attend,
Whose umber'd arms, by fits, thick flashes send.
Loud neigh the coursers o'er their heaps of corn,
And ardent warriors wait the rising morn.

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BOOK IX.

THE ARGUMENT.

THE EMBASSY TO ACHILLES.

Agamemnon, after the last day's defeat, proposes to the Greeks to quit the siege, and return to their country. Diomede opposes this, and Nestor seconds him, praising his wisdom and resolution. He orders the guard to be strengthened, and a council summoned to deliberate what measures

B. IX.]

ANXIETY OF AGAMEMNON.

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were to be followed in this emergency. Agamemnon pursues this advice, and Nestor farther prevails upon him to send ambassadors to Achilles, in order to move him to a reconciliation. Ulysses and Ajax are made choice of, who are accompanied by old Phoenix. They make, each of them, very moving and pressing speeches, but are rejected with roughness by Achilles, who notwithstanding retains Phoenix in his tent. The ambassadors return unsuccessfully to the camp, and the troops betake themselves to sleep.

This book, and the next following, take up the space of one night, which is the twenty-seventh from the beginning of the poem. The scene lies on the sea-shore, the station of the Grecian ships.

THUS joyful Troy maintain'd the watch of night;
While Fear, pale comrade of inglorious flight,
And heaven-bred horror, on the Grecian part,
Sat on each face, and sadden'd every heart.
As from its cloudy dungeon issuing forth,
A double tempest of the west and north
Swells o'er the sea, from Thracia's frozen shore,
Heaps waves on waves, and bids th' Egean roar;
This way and that the boiling deeps are toss'd;
Such various passions urged the troubled host.
Great Agamemnon griev'd above the rest;
Superior sorrows swell'd his royal breast;
Himself his orders to the heralds bears,
To bid to council all the Grecian peers,

But bid in whispers: these surround their chief,
In solemn sadness and majestic grief.
The king amidst the mournful circle rose;
Down his wan cheek a briny torrent flows:
So silent fountains, from a rock's tall head,
In sable streams soft-trickling waters shed.
With more than vulgar grief he stood oppress'd;

Words, mix'd with sighs, thus bursting from his breast:
Ye sons of Greece! partake your leader's care,
Fellows in arms, and princes of the war!
Of partial Jove too justly we complain,
And heavenly oracles believed in vain.
A safe return was promised to our toils,3

'With conquest honour'd, and enrich'd with spoils :
'Now shameful flight alone can save the host,
Our wealth, our people, and our glory, lost.

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1 Either that the enemy might not hear the summons, or lest his own people hearing it, and being already in a state of consternation, should be alarmed still more. Cowper. 2 See Book ii. ver. 139. 3 Agamemnon alludes to the extraordinary sign exhibited to them by Jupiter, while they sacrificed to him at Aulis, and which Calchas interpreted as a divine assurance of success in the tenth year. Cowper. See B. ii. ver. 394.

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So Jove decrees, almighty lord of all! 'Jove, at whose nod whole empires rise or fall, 'Who shakes the feeble props of human trust, And towers and armies humbles to the dust. 'Haste then, for ever quit these fatal fields,

Haste to the joys our native country yields;
"Spread all your canvas, all your oars employ,
Nor hope the fall of heaven-defended Troy."

He said; deep silence held the Grecian band;
Silent, unmov'd, in dire dismay they stand,
A pensive scene! till Tydeus' warlike son
Roll'd on the king his eyes, and thus begun :

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When kings advise us to renounce our fame, 'First let him speak, who first has suffer'd shame. "If I oppose thee, prince! thy wrath withhold; 'The laws of council bid my tongue be bold. Thou first, and thou alone, in fields of fight, Durst brand my courage, and defame my might; 'Nor from a friend th' unkind reproach appear'd, The Greeks stood witness, all our army heard.

The gods, O chief! from whom our honours spring, 'The gods have made thee but by halves a king:

They gave thee sceptres and a wide command,

They gave dominion o'er the seas and land; 'The noblest power that might the world control 'They gave thee not-a brave and virtuous soul.* 'Is this a general's voice, that would suggest 'Fears like his own in every Grecian breast? Confiding in our want of worth he stands, 'And if we fly, 'tis what our king commands. 'Go thou, inglorious! from th' embattled plain, Ships thou hast store, and nearest to the main; 'A nobler care the Grecians shall employ, To combat, conquer, and extirpate Troy. 'Here Greece shall stay; or, if all Greece retire Myself will stay, till Troy or I expire;

'Myself, and Sthenelus, will fight for fame;

God bade us fight, and 'twas with God we came.'

4 What can be the drift of Diomede, when he insults Agamemnon in his griefs and distresses? The truth is, this whole accusation of Diomede is only a feint to serve the designs of Agamemnon; for being desirous to persuade the Greeks against their departure, he effects that design by this counterfeited anger and licence of speech; and seeming to resent that Agamemnon should be capable of imagining that the army would return to Greece, he artfully makes use of these reproaches to cover his argument. Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Tech. sect. 8. Pope.

He ceas'd; the Greeks loud acclamations raise,
And voice to voice resounds Tydides' praise.
Wise Nestor then his reverend figure rear'd;
He spoke the host in still attention heard:

O truly great! in whom the gods have join'd 'Such strength of body with such force of mind; In conduct, as in courage, you excel,

'Still first to act what you advise so well.

Those wholesome counsels which thy wisdom moves,
Applauding Greece, with common voice, approves.

Kings thou canst blame; a bold, but prudent youth;
'And blame e'en kings with praise, because with truth.
'And yet those fears that since thy birth have run,
Would hardly style thee Nestor's youngest son.
'Then let me add what yet remains behind,
'A thought unfinish'd in that generous mind;
Age bids me speak; nor shall th' advice I bring
Distaste the people, or offend the king:
'Curs'd is the man, and void of law and right,
Unworthy property, unworthy light,

Unfit for public rule, or private care,

That wretch, that monster, that delights in war: "Whose lust is murder, and whose horrid joy

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To tear his country, and his kind destroy!

This night refresh and fortify thy train;

Between the trench and wall3 let guards remain : 'Be that the duty of the young and bold; 'But thou, O king, to council call the old: "Great is thy sway, and weighty are thy cares;

Thy high commands must spirit all our wars:

With Thracian wines recruit thy honour'd guests,

For happy counsels flow from sober feasts. Wise, weighty counsels aid a state distress'd 'And such a monarch as can choose the best. 'See! what a blaze from hostile tents aspires, 'How near our fleet approach the Trojan fires! 'Who can, unmov'd, behold the dreadful light? 6 What eye beholds them, and can close to-night? This dreadful interval determines all; To-morrow, Troy must flame, or Greece must fall.' Thus spoke the hoary sage: the rest obey ;

Swift through the gates the guards direct their

5 The space here mentioned between the trench and the wall, observes Pope, must be kept in mind through this and the following book, as frequent allusion is made to it.

His son was first to pass the lofty mound,
The generous Thrasymed, in arms renown'd:
Next him Ascalaphus, Iälmen, stood,
The double offspring of the warrior-god.
Deïpyrus, Aphareus, Merion join,
And Lycomed, of Creon's noble line.
Seven were the leaders of the nightly bands,
And each bold chief a hundred spears commands.
The fires they light, to short repasts they fall,
Some line the trench, aud others man the wall.
The king of men, on public counsels bent,
Conven'd the princes in his ample tent;

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Each seiz'd a portion of the kingly feast,

But stay'd his hand when thirst and hunger ceas'd.

Then Nestor spoke, for wisdom long approv'd,
And, slowly rising, thus the council mov'd:

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Monarch of nations! whose superior sway Assembled states and lords of earth obey, The laws and sceptres to thy hand are given, 'And millions own the care of thee and heaven. 'O king! the counsels of my age attend;

́ With thee my cares begin, with thee must end; Thee, prince! it fits alike to speak and hear,

Pronounce with judgment, with regard give ear,
To see no wholesome motion be withstood,

And ratify the best for public good.

Nor, though a meaner give advice, repine,
But follow it, and make the wisdom thine.

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Hear then a thought, not now conceiv'd in haste,
At once my present judgment, and my past :6
When from Pelides' tent you forc'd the maid,
I first oppos'd, and, faithful, durst dissuade;
'But, bold of soul, when headlong fury fir'd,

You wrong'd the man, by men and gods admir'd:

Now seek some means his fatal wrath to end,

With prayers to move him, or with gifts to bend.'

To whom the king: With justice hast thou shewn

'A prince's faults, and I with reason own.

That happy man whom Jove still honours most,

'Is more than armies, and himself a host.

Bless'd in his love, this wondrous hero stands ;7

'Heaven fights his war, and humbles all our bands.

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6 Nestor here means the advice he gave at the time of the quarrel in Book i. ver. 339. Pope. 7 It is remarkable, that Agamemnon here never uses the name of Achilles: though he is resolved to court his friendship, yet he cannot bear the mention of his name. EUSTATHIUS. Pope.