B. XVI.]

HECTOR REPULSED.

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The sword broke short; but his, Peneleus sped

Full on the juncture of the neck and head:

The head, divided by a stroke so just,

Hung by the skin; the body sunk to dust.

O'ertaken Acamas by Merion bleeds,

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Pierc'd through the shoulders as he mounts his steeds:

Back from the car he tumbles to the ground;

His swimming eyes eternal shades surround.

Next Erymas was doom'd his fate to feel: His open'd mouth receiv'd the Cretan steel; Beneath the brain the point a passage tore,

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Crash'd the thin bones, and ground the teeth in gore.

His mouth, his eyes, his nostrils, pour a flood;

He sobs his soul out in the gush of blood.

As when the flocks neglected by the swain
(Or kids, or lambs) lie scatter'd o'er the plain,
A troop of wolves th' unguarded charge survey,
And rend the trembling, unresisting prey :
Thus on the foe the Greeks impetuous came:
Troy fled, unmindful of her former fame.
But still at Hector godlike Ajax aim'd,
Still, pointed at his breast, his javelin flam'd:
The Trojan chief, experienc'd in the field,

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O'er his broad shoulders spread the massy shield,
Observ'd the storm of darts the Grecians pour,
And on his buckler caught the ringing shower.
He sees for Greece the scale of conquest rise,
Yet stops, and turns, and saves his lov'd allies.
As when the hand of Jove a tempest forms,
And rolls the clouds to blacken heaven with storms,
Dark o'er the fields th' ascending vapour flies,
And shades the sun, and blots the golden skies:
So from the ships, along the dusky plain,

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Dire Fright and Terror drove the Trojan train.

E'en Hector fled; through heaps of disarray
The fiery coursers forc'd their lord away:

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While far behind his Trojans fall confus'd,

Wedg'd in the trench, in one vast carnage bruis'd.
Chariots on chariots roll; the clashing spokes

Shock; while the maddening steeds break short their yokes. 445
In vain they labour up the steepy mound;

Their charioteers lie foaming on the ground.

Fierce on the rear, with shouts, Patroclus flies;
Tumultuous clamour fills the fields and skies;

Thick drifts of dust involve their rapid flight;

Clouds rise on clouds, and heaven is snatch'd from sight.

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Th' affrighted steeds, their dying lords cast down,
Scour o'er the fields, and stretch to reach the town.
Loud o'er the rout was heard the victor's cry,
Where the war bleeds, and where the thickest die;
Where horse, and arms, and chariots, lie o’erthrown,
And bleeding heroes under axles groan.

No stop, no check, the steeds of Peleus knew ;
From bank to bank th' immortal coursers flew,
High-bounding o'er the fosse : the whirling car
Smokes through the ranks, o'ertakes the flying war,
And thunders after Hector; Hector flies,
Patroclus shakes his lance; but fate denies.
Not with less noise, with less impetuous force,
The tide of Trojans urge their desperate course,
Than when in autumn Jove his fury pours,
And earth is laden with incessant showers;
(When guilty mortals break th' eternal laws,

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Or judges, bribed, betray the righteous cause ;)

From their deep beds he bids the rivers rise,

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And opens all the floodgates of the skies:

Th' impetuous torrents from their hills obey,

Whole fields are drown'd, and mountains swept away;

Loud roars the deluge till it meets the main;

And trembling man sees all his labours vain.

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And now the chief (the foremost troops repell'd)

Back to the ships his destin'd progress held,
Bore down half Troy in his resistless way,
And forc'd the routed ranks to stand the day."
Between the space where silver Simois flows,
Where lay the fleets, and where the rampires rose,
All grim with dust and blood, Patroclus stands,
And turns the slaughter on the conquering bands.
First Pronoüs died beneath his fiery dart,
Which pierc❜d below the shield his valiant heart.
Thestor was next; who saw the chief appear,
And fell the victim of his coward fear:

Shrunk up he sat, with wild and haggard eye,
Nor stood to combat, nor had force to fly :
Patroclus mark'd him as he shunn'd the war,
And with unmanly trembling shook the car,
And dropp'd the flowing reins. Him 'twixt the jaws
The javelin sticks, and from the chariot draws.

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7 This is not clear. The original signifies that Patroclus cut off a portion of the Trojans from the rest, and drove them back towards the Grecian vessels, instead of allowing them to shelter themselves in the town.

B. XVI.]

SARPEDON MEETS PATROCLUS.

297

As on a rock that overhangs the main,

An angler, studious of the line and cane,

495

Some mighty fish draws panting on the shore ;
Not with less ease the barbed javelin bore
The gaping dastard; as the spear was shook,
He fell, and life his heartless breast forsook.
Next on Eryalus he flies; a stone,
Large as a rock, was by his fury thrown:
Full on his crown the ponderous fragment flew,
And burst the helm, and cleft the head in two:
Prone to the ground the breathless warrior fell,
And death involv'd him with the shades of hell.
Then low in dust Epaltes, Echius, lie;
Ipheas, Evippus, Polymelus, die;

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Amphoterus and Erymas succeed;
And last Tlepolemus and Pyres bleed

Where'er he moves, the growing slaughters spread
In heaps on heaps; a monument of dead.

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·

When now Sarpedon his brave friends beheld Grovelling in dust, and gasping on the field, With this reproach his flying host he warms; 'Oh stain to honour! oh disgrace to arms! 'Forsake, inglorious, the contended plain;

This hand, unaided, shall the war sustain;
'The task be mine, this hero's strength to try,
'Who mows whole troops, and makes an army fly.'

He spake; and, speaking, leaps from off the car;
Patroclus lights, and sternly waits the war.
As when two vultures on the mountain's height
Stoop with resounding pinions to the fight;
They cuff, they tear, they raise a screaming cry;
The desert echoes, and the rocks reply:
The warriors thus, oppos'd in arms, engage
With equal clamours, and with equal rage.

Jove view'd the combat, whose event foreseen,
He thus bespoke his sister and his queen:

The hour draws on; the destinies ordain

My godlike son shall press the Phrygian plain : Already on the verge of death he stands, 'His life is ow'd to fierce Patroclus' hands. 'What passions in a parent's breast debate! Say, shall I snatch him from impending fate, And send him safe to Lycia, distant far 'From all the dangers and the toils of war? Or to his doom my bravest offspring yield, ( And fatten with celestial blood the field ?'

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,

Then thus the goddess with the radiant eyes:
'What words are these? O sovereign of the skies!
'Short is the date prescrib'd to mortal man;
Shall Jove, for one, extend the narrow span,
'Whose bounds were fix'd before his race began ?
'How many sons of gods, foredoom'd to death,
Before proud Ilion must resign their breath!
'Were thine exempt, debate would rise above,

And murmuring powers condemn their partial Jove.
Give the bold chief a glorious fate in fight;
'And when th' ascending soul has wing'd her flight,

Let Sleep and Death convey, by thy command,
The breathless body to his native land.

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His friends and people, to his future praise,

6

A marble tomb and pyramid shall raise,

And lasting honours to his ashes give;

555

His fame ('tis all the dead can have) shall live.'

She said; the cloud-compeller, overcome,

Assents to fate, and ratifies the doom.

Then, touch'd with grief, the weeping heavens distill'd

A shower of blood o'er all the fatal field;

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The god, his eyes averting from the plain,

Laments his son, predestin'd to be slain,

Far from the Lycian shores, his happy native reign.
Now met in arms, the combatants appear,
Each heav'd the shield, and pois'd the lifted spear;
From strong Patroclus' hand the javelin fled,
And pass'd the groin of valiant Thrasymed;
The nerves umbrac'd no more his bulk sustain ;
He falls, and falling bites the bloody plain.
Two sounding darts the Lycian leader threw ;
The first aloof with erring fury flew,

The next transpierc'd Achilles' mortal steed,

The generous Pedasus, of Theban breed,

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Fix'd in the shoulder-joint; he reel'd around,

Roll'd in the bloody dust, and paw'd the slippery ground. 575

His sudden fall th' entangled harness broke;
Each axle crackled, and the chariot shook :
When bold Automedon, to disengage

The starting coursers, and restrain their rage,
Divides the traces with his sword, and freed
Th' encumber'd chariot from the dying steed:
The rest move on, obedient to the rein;
The car rolls slowly o'er the dusty plain.

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The towering chiefs to fiercer fight advance, And first Sarpedon whirl'd his mighty lance,

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Which o'er the warrior's shoulder took its course,
And spent in empty air its dying force.
Not so Patroclus' never-erring dart;

Aim'd at his breast, it pierced the mortal part,
Where the strong fibres bind the solid heart.
Then, as the mountain oak, or poplar tall,
Or pine, (fit mast for some great admiral,)
Nods to the axe, till with a groaning sound
It sinks, and spreads its honours on the ground;
Thus fell the king; and, laid on earth supine,
Before his chariot stretch'd his form divine:
He grasp'd the dust distain'd with streaming gore,
And, pale in death, lay groaning on the shore.
So lies a bull beneath the lion's paws,

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While the grim savage grinds with foaming jaws

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The trembling limbs, and sucks the smoking blood;

Deep groans, and hollow roars, rebellow through the wood.

Then to the leader of the Lycian band

The dying chief address'd his last command:

'Glaucus, be bold; thy task be first to dare

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To lead my troops, to combat at their head,

Incite the living, and supply the dead.

'Tell them, I charged them with my latest breath

'Not unreveng'd to bear Sarpedon's death.

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'What grief, what shame, must Glaucus undergo,

That, taught by great examples, all may try

615

'Like thee to vanquish, or like me to die.'

He ceas'd; the fates suppress'd his labouring breath,

And his eyes darken'd with the shades of death.

Th' insulting victor with disdain bestrode

The prostrate prince, and on his bosom trod;

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Then drew the weapon from his panting heart,

The reeking fibres clinging to the dart;

From the wide wound gush'd out a stream of blood,

And the soul issued in the purple flood.

His flying steeds the Myrmidons detain,

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Unguided now, their mighty master slain.
All-impotent of aid, transfix'd with grief,
Unhappy Glaucus heard the dying chief.
His painful arm, yet useless with the smart
Inflicted late by Teucer's deadly dart,
Supported on his better hand he stay'd;
To Phoebus then ('twas all he could) he pray'd:

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