Book II

All lips were hushed, all eyes attentive fixed:
Then Sire Aeneas from his lofty couch
Addressed him thus to speak:

“Unutterable,
O queen, the grief thou bid’st me to revive.
How Troy’s magnificence and royal power,
Woe worth the day! the Danai overthrew;
Thrice piteous scenes which I myself beheld.
And was a mighty part of. Such a tale
Who or of Myrmidons or Dolopes
Or stern Ulysses’ soldiery could tell.
And hold from weeping? Now too dewy night
Adown the sky falls headlong, and the stars
Sinking invite to sleep. But if to learn
Our woes such longing take thee, and to hear
Brief-told Troy’s dying anguish, though my mind
At the remembrance shudders, from the grief
Recoils, I will attempt it.

“Broken in war
And baffled by the fates, the Danaan chiefs.
Now that so many grew the gliding years.
By Pallas’ aid, artificer divine,
Build up a horse of mountain bulk, the ribs
Of pine-planks interwoven, feigning it
A votive offering for their home-return;
So runs the rumour. Into its dark side
Picked warriors stealthily by lot they stow,
And fill the deep vaults of its mighty womb
With armed soldiery.

“There lies in sight
An isle, fame-bruited, Tenedos, full-fraught
Of power,” while yet stood Priam’s empire — now
Mere bay and roadstead, ill for keels to trust.
Hither they sail, and on the barren shore
Lie hid. We deem them far upon their way,
Bound for Mycenae with a favouring gale.
Thereat all Teucria shuffles off the load
Of her long mourning. Wide are flung the gates;
Whence issuing forth with rapture we behold
The Dorian camp, the haunts now tenantless,
The shore left void: here the Dolopian band,
Here fierce Achilles pitched; here lay the fleet;
Here were they wont to meet us, host to host.
Some gape at Maid Minerva’s doom-fraught gift.
And marvel at the monster-horse; and first
Thymoetes urged it within walls be haled.
And lodged in the fortress, or through treachery, or
That thither now the fates of Troy were set.
But Capys and the minds of saner bent
Bid either hurl it headlong in the sea —
This Danaan ambush, their suspicious gift,
Or fire it from beneath, or pierce and probe
The womb’s dark hollows. With fierce party-cries
This way and that the wavering crowd is torn.

“Then first of all Laocoon in hot haste
Comes rushing down the citadel’s steep height.
Thronged with a mighty crowd, and cries from far,
‘Alack! so mad, my masters! do ye think
The foe departed? deem ye any gift
Of Danaans can lack guile? have ye so learned
Ulysses? either in this timber caged
Achaeans lurk, or, ’tis an engine framed
Against the walls, to spy into our homes
And pounce upon the city from above,
Or else some trickery lurks therein; trust not
The horse, ye Trojans; whatsoe’er it be,
E’en gift in hand, I fear the Danai still.’
So saying, with main strength a huge spear he hurled
At the brute’s flank, and where the framework bulged
To belly: it stood there quivering; the womb shook;
The vaults rang hollow and gave forth a groan:
And had the powers above, had our own wit
Not turned awry, he had prevailed to sack
The Argives’ den; Troy still were standing; thou
Priam’s tall citadel unshaken still.

“Meanwhile a youth, his hands behind him bound.
See! Dardan hinds come haling to the king
Loud-clamouring, who, to shape it even so,
And let the Achaeans into Troy, had thrust
A stranger’s wilful presence on their path.
Dauntless of soul, and armed for this or that —
His wiles to ply, or fall on certain death.
Eager to see, Troy’s sons from every side
Rush round him like a torrent, each with each
Vying to mock their captive. Come now, hear
How Danaans can deceive, and learn from one
The villainy of all. For as he stood
Helpless, confused, a target for all eyes,
And gazed around upon the Phrygian ranks,
Alas! ‘he cried, ‘what land, what ocean now
Can harbour me? or what last hope have I —
The wretch, alike from Danaan earth debarred,
And for whose blood the Dardans howl no less,
To quit their hatred? ‘By that burst of grief
Changed was our humour, checked each rude assault;
We urge him speak, relate from whence he sprang.
His errand what, and why, a thrall, so bold.
Then, fear abandoned, thus at length he speaks:
All will I truly tell thee. King, quoth he,
Betide what may; my Argive birth I own;
This at the outset; nor, if Fortune shaped
Sinon for misery, shall her spite, beside,
Shape him to fraud and falsehood. It may be
Borne on men’s voices to thine ear hath sped
Some sound of Palamede from Belus sprung,
A name world-famous, whom by lies betrayed.
Guiltless, and on a villain’s charge, because
The war he gainsaid, the Pelasgian lords
Once did to death, now, lorn of light, deplore.
To him as comrade and near kinsman I
Was by a needy sire in earliest youth
Sent hither to the field. While yet enthroned
Scathless he stood, and at kings’ councils throve,
I in some sort held rank and honour too:
But when Ulysses’ treacherous spite, I speak
No secret, drave him from the realms of day,
Downcast and darkling my sad life dragged on.
With inward wrath for my friend’s guiltless fate.
Nor — madman — could I hold my peace, but vowed,
Should chance but offer, to my Argive home
If e’er returned in triumph, to wreak his fall.
And, thus outspoken, stirred the goads of hate.
Thence my first slip to ruin, Ulysses thence
Ceased not to scare me with new charges, thence
To sow dark rumours in the common ear,
And hunt for armed accomplices. Indeed
No rest he took till, Calchas at his side —
But why the unwelcome record do I thus
Vainly unroll? or why the tale prolong?
If all the Achaeans in one class ye file,
And hearing that suffices, take, ’tis time,
Your vengeance; this the Ithacan would wish,
And this the Atreidae grudge no gold to buy.’
“Then truly burn we to search out and learn
The why and wherefore, strangers as we were
To guilt so monstrous and Pelasgian guile.
He, quaking, with false heart his speech renews:

“’ Oft were the Danai fain to take their flight,
Leave Troy behind, and quit the weary war;
And would they had done so! the rough sea as oft
Opposed its stormy barrier, and the south
Scared them from going. Chiefly when yon horse,
Of maple-beams compacted, stood erect,
With bellowing storm-clouds the whole welkin rang.
Doubtful, we send Eurypylus to ask
The oracle of Phoebus: from the shrine
This dolorous word he brings. “It was with blood
Of a slain virgin ye appeased the winds,
When, Danai, first ye made for Ilium’s shore:
With blood no less must your return be sought,
And expiation of an Argive’s life.”

“’ When to the people’s ears this utterance came,
Numbed were all hearts, and through their inmost bones
Ran a chill shudder — who was he by fate
Predestined thus? Apollo’s victim who?
Then he of Ithaca with blusterings loud
Drags forth into their midst Calchas the seer;
Hotly demands, what is this will of heaven.
Nor lacked there who e’en then foretold to me
The schemer’s cruel outrage, or who saw
The end, yet spake not. Twice five days the seer
In silence hides him, vows no word of his
Shall denounce any, or to death consign.
Scarce driven at length by the Ithacan’s loud cries.
To crown their compact, he breaks forth in speech,
And dooms me to the altar. All approved,
And turned what each was fearing for himself
To one poor soul’s destruction. Now drew near
The unutterable day; for me were now
The altar-rites preparing, the salt cakes
And brow-encircling fillets. I confess
I plucked me from perdition, brake my bonds,
In miry pool all night sedge-sheltered lay.
Till they should sail, if haply sailed they had.
Nor longer my old country may I hope
Or children sweet, or longed-for sire to see,
Of whom far likelier they for my default
Will claim the forfeit, with their death, poor souls!
Atone my trespass. But I thee implore
By the high Gods, and powers that know the truth.
By what remains to mortals anywhere
Of faith untarnished, pity woes like mine,
Pity a soul with unjust burdens bowed.’
“Life to his tears we grant and pity too:
Priam’s own voice first bids the man be loosed
From grip of gyve and fetter, and thus speaks
With kindly word: ‘Whoe’er thou art, henceforth.
As for the Greeks, forget them and forego:
Ours shalt thou be, and to my questioning
Unfold true answers: this huge monster-horse
Why built they? by whom fathered? to what end?
A sacred symbol? or some tool of war? ‘
He had said: the other, well equipped with guile
And craft Pelasgian, to the stars upturned
His hands now fetterless: ‘You, quenchless fires.
And your inviolable majesty
I call,’ quoth he, ‘to witness, and you too,
Altars and heinous swords which I escaped.
And garlands of the gods, my victim-gear;
Lawful it is for me to break my vows
Of fealty to the Greeks, lawful to hate
The men themselves, and all things air abroad
That they hide in the closet, nor am I
Holden by any of my country’s laws:
Only do thou stand by thy plighted word,
Troy, and, safeguarded, guard thy promise safe.
If truth I tell, if richly thee repay.

“‘All hope and courage for the war’s emprise
On Pallas’ help the Danaans ever stayed:
But from what time, with Tydeus’ impious son
Ulysses, crime-contriver, dared to rend
Doom-fraught Palladium from its hallowed shrine.
And slew the watchmen of her castled height.
And snatched the sacred image, and feared not
With hands blood-reeking to contaminate
Her godhead’s maiden fillets, from henceforth
The Danaans’ hope at ebb slid ever back.
Crushed was their strength, the goddess’ heart estranged.
Nor doubtful the dread signs Tritonia gave;
Scarce was her semblance lodged within the camp.
When from the upturned eyes shot quivering flames,
A salt sweat coursed along the limbs, and thrice —
Wondrous to tell — of her own self she sprang
From earth shield-laden, and with spear that shook.
Calchas at once with prophet-voice bids brave
Ocean in flight, for that no Argive arms
Could uptear Pergamus, except they seek
At Argos for new omens, and bring back
That will of heaven, which erst they bare away
O’er ocean with them in their curved keels.
And now that homeward-wafted they have sought
Mycenae, ’tis to get them arms, and gods
For their way-fellows, and, the sea recrossed,
They will be here unlooked for. In such wise
Doth Calchas sort the omens. Warned by him ‘
They reared this image in Palladium’s place,
For outraged godhead, their dark crime to quit.
But to this monstrous height of woven planks
Calchas bade lift it and upbuild to heaven,
Lest through your gates it be received, or drawn
Within the ramparts, and so shield your folk
Beneath their ancient worship. For if hand
Of yours had wronged Minerva’s offering,
Mighty destruction then — which augury
May heaven first turn upon himself! — would fall
On Priam’s empire and the Phrygians; but
If by your hands your city it should scale,
Asia herself should in a mighty war
Assail the walls of Pelops, and such doom
Remain in store for our posterity.’
“By such decoys of Sinon’s art forsworn
The tale gat credence, and by craft were caught
And forced tears, whom neither Tydeus’ son.
No, nor Achilles of Larissa, nor
Ten years had conquered, nor a thousand keels.

“A mightier portent and more fearful far,
Poor souls! here bursts upon them, and confounds
Their blinded senses. For Laocoon,
The priest of Neptune, as by lot assigned.
Was sacrificing at the wonted shrine
A mighty bull, when, lo! from Tenedos,
Over the tranquil ocean serpents twain —
I shudder to recount it — with huge coils
Cumbering the deep, ply shoreward side by side;
Reared on the surge their breasts and blood-red manes
O’ertop the billows; the remaining bulk
Skims ocean aft in labyrinthine folds:
Hark! how the brine seethes audibly! and now.
Their glowing eyes with blood suffused and fire.
The shore-fields they were gaining, and their chaps
Hissed, as with flickering tongues they licked them; we
Pale at the sight fly scattered; they with line
Unwavering at Laocoon aim, and first
His two sons’ slender bodies either snake
Embraces and enfolds, and gnawing feeds
Upon the hapless limbs; then him they seize
Up-hurrying armed to aid them, and bind fast
With mighty spires, and now — their scaly length
Twice wreathed about his waist, twice round his neck —
With heads o’ertop him and high-towering throats.
He, while to rend their knots, he strives amain,
His fillets with black venom drenched and gore,
Uplifts to heaven heart-piercing shrieks; as when
’Scaped from the altar, bellows a maimed bull,
That from his neck shakes off the erring axe.
But to the temple’s height that dragon-pair
Gliding escape, and seek the citadel
Of fell Tritonia, to find covert close
Under the goddess’ feet and orbed shield.
Then through the trembling hearts of all there crept
Strange fear; and ‘rightly hath Laocoon
Paid for his crime,’ they cry, ‘with point of spear
Wounding the hallowed wood, what time he hurled
His guilty lance against the flank.’ Then all
Shout that the image to her shrine be drawn.
And supplication to the goddess made.
We cleave the city-walls, the ramparts ope;
All gird them to the task, beneath the hoofs
Set wheels a-gliding, and around the neck
Stretch hempen hawsers; with war-laden womb
The doom-fraught engine scales the wall: around
Boys and unwedded girls sing litanies,
And joy to touch the cable with their hands.
And so it enters, and glides threateningly
Into the city’s midst. Land of my birth!
O Ilium, home of gods, and, famed in war,
Ye Dardan battlements! four times it stopped
At the gate’s very threshold, and four times
From out its entrails came a clash of arms.
But frenzy-blinded we press heedless on,
And in our hallowed citadel uprear
The luckless prodigy. Then, even then,
Cassandra for the coming doom unlocks
Those lips ne’er trusted by the sons of Troy —
So heaven decreed it: we, that day our last.
Fond wretches! range the city, and festoon
With gala-boughs the temples of the gods.

“Meanwhile the face of heaven is turned, and night
Comes up from Ocean, in its mighty shade
Both earth and sky, and Myrmidonian wiles
Enveloping: stretched silent on the walls
The Teucrians lay; sleep held their weary limbs.
E’en now the Argive host from Tenedos
With vessels in array was wending on,
Through the kind stillness of the silent moon
Seeking the well-known shore, when sudden lo!
The royal galley reared her signal-fires.
And, shielded by the gods’ unequal doom,
Sinon by stealth lets loose the pinewood bolts,
And womb-imprisoned Danai. Them the horse
Restores, thrown open, to the light of day,
And from the hollow frame with joy they leap —
Thessander, Sthenelus, those lords of war.
And dread Ulysses, by the lowered rope
Down-gliding; Acamas, and Thoas, and
Son’s son of Peleus Neoptolemus,
And first Machaon, Menelaus too,
Ay, and Epeus, framer of the fraud.
These storm the town, buried in sleep and wine;
The guards are slain; through the wide portals all
Let in their friends, and join the federate band.

“It was the time when the first slumber falls
On suffering mortals, by the high God’s gift
Then sweetliest stealing o’er them: lo! in sleep
Hector before mine eyes, all woe-begone,
Did seem to stand, and shower down floods of tears;
Torn by the dragging chariot, as of old,
And black with blood-stained dust, and his swol’n feet
Pierced with the thong. Ah! what a sight he was!
How all unlike that Hector, who returns
Clad in Achilles’ arms, the spoils of war,
Or fresh from hurling on the Danaan decks
The fires of Phrygia! now with draggled beard,
And hair blood-clotted, wearing all those wounds
So thickly dealt him round his native walls!
Weeping myself, I first, methought, addressed
The hero, and drew forth these sorrowing words:
Light of the Dardan land, O staunchest hope
Of Teucria’s sons, say why this long delay?
Or from what borders. Hector, art thou come,
Much looked for? is it thus that wearied out
With all the myriad slaughters of thy friends,
City and townsmen’s ever-changing woes,
Our eyes behold thee? What unseemly cause
Hath marred thy cloudless features? or what mean
These wounds I gaze on? ‘Not a word spake he.
Nor recked mine idle questioning, but groan
On laboured groan from out his bosom’s depth
Upheaving, ‘Ah! fly, goddess-born,’ he said,
And snatch thee from the flames: the foemen hath
Our walls, and Troy from her proud summit sinks.
Enough to king and country hath been given:
If any hand could Pergamus have saved,
Then mine had saved it: Troy commits to thee
Her worship and her household gods; these take
As comrades of thy destinies; for these
Seek out a mighty city thou at length
Shalt rear thee, having roamed wide ocean o’er.’
Such words he spake, and in his hands bare forth
The sacred fillets from the inmost shrine,
And Vesta’s might, and her undying fire.

“Meantime the walls grow one confused scene
Of widespread anguish; and, though far withdrawn
My sire Anchises’ palace amid trees
Lay sheltered, ever louder and more loud
Surges the din, swells out the alarm of war.
I start from sleep, to the high roof-top mount,
And stand, all ear, to hearken: as when fire
Falls on the corn beneath the furious south.
Or ravening torrent from a mountain-flood
Lays low the fields, lays low the laughing crops.
The oxen’s labour, and drags forests down
Headlong, the hind from some tall craggy peak
Mute with amaze stands listening to the roar.
Then is the bare truth self-attested, then
The Danaan wiles unmask them; see e’en now
The house of Deiphobus a vast ruin yawns
O’ertopped by Vulcan! see his neighbour too
Ucalegon in flames! Sigeum’s gulf
Reflects the blaze afar. Up goes to heaven
Shouting of men, and clarion’s bray; distraught
I seize mine arms, though arms lack argument;
But my heart burns to mass a warrior-band,
And with my comrades hasten to the hold:
Frenzy and anger urge my headlong will.
And death methinks how comely, sword in hand.

“But Pantheus, from the Achaean darts escaped,
Pantheus, the son of Othrys, see! and priest
Of Phoebus on the height, in his own hand
The sacred emblems of the vanquished gods,
And dragging his young grandchild after him.
Nigh at wits’ end comes hurrying to my door.
Pantheus, how stands the fortune of the day?
What point of vantage seize me? ‘Scarce had I
Uttered the words when, groaning, he replies:
The latest day, the inevitable hour,
Has dawned on Dardan land; we, Trojans once,
And Ilium, and the Teucrians’ giant fame
Have been, and are not; Jove’s remorseless will
From us to Argos hath borne all away;
Our town’s a-flame; the Danaans lord it there.
Towering amidst the city-walls erect
The horse rains armed warriors! far and near
Sinon with victor-insolence spreads wide
The conflagration. Through the folding gates
Some enter, myriads countless as e’er came
From great Mycenae; some, to bar our path,
With weapons have beset the narrow ways,
A wall of steel-blade edges flashing bare.
For death-blow dight: scarce seek the foremost guards
To hold the gates against them, or maintain
The blindfold conflict.’ At such words as these
From Othrys’ son, and at the doom of heaven,
I rush into the midst of fire and fray.
Where the grim Fury, where the battle-din
Me summons, and the shouts uptossed to heaven.
Then, lo! by moonlight borne across my path,
Rhipeus, and Epytus, right brave in arms,
And Hypanis and Dymas join with me,
And gather to my side, and Mygdon’s child,
The youth Coroebus. In those days it chanced
He, with mad passion for Cassandra fired,
Had come to Troy, and as a son was now
To Priam and the Phrygians lending aid,
Unhappy, not to heed the warning voice
Of his heaven-frenzied bride. Whom when I saw
The latest day, the inevitable hour.
Close-banded and with stomach for the fray
I thus the more exhort them: ‘Warrior-hearts,
Dauntless in vain, if your desire be set
On following one who dares the bitter end;
Our fortune’s plight how desperate, ye may see:
Gone are the gods, from shrine and altar fled.
Ay, one and all, by whom this empire stood:
The town ye seek to succour is in flames;
Die we, and plunge into the battle’s midst;
One safety hath defeat — to hope for none ‘
Thus were the warriors’ souls to frenzy wrought.
Then like to ravening wolves in a black mist.
Whose belly-rage unbridled drives them forth
To grope for prey — their cubs left lone the while
With droughty jaws await them — on we press
Through darts, through foes, to no uncertain doom,
Thridding the city’s midst: night’s ebon wings
Float round us with their overarching shade.
Who could unfold the havoc of that night,
Tell o’er the slain, or match our teen with tears?
Stoops to her fall our ancient city, she
The empress of the ages. Through her streets
And homes, and hallowed thresholds of the gods,
Heap upon heap the dead lie strewn and stark;
Nor Teucrians only pay the bloody debt;
Sometimes, though vanquished, to their heart returns
Valour, and down the conquering Danai go.
Look where you will, heart-rending agony
And panic reign, and many a shape of death.

“First to confront us, with a mighty band
Of Danai backed, behold Androgeos,
Who, all unconscious, taking foes for friends.
Thus as a comrade hails us: ‘Haste, my men!
What laggard sloth retards you? others, see!
Amid her flames are plundering Pergamus,
While ye from your tall ships are newly come.’
He said, and, greeted with no sure reply,
Felt in a moment fallen amid foes.
Staggered, both foot and voice he backward drew.
As one, who, struggling with rough briars, hath trod
At unawares a serpent underfoot.
Starts back in sudden terror, as it rears
Its wrath on high, and puffs a purple throat,
Not otherwise, confounded at the sight,
Androgeos was retreating. On we rush,
With serried arms enclose them, and on ground
They knew not, and with terror ta’en aback.
Slay them on every side. So fortune’s breath
Fans our first effort. Here Coroebus cries,
Waxed jubilant with courage and success:
Where fortune at the outset, comrades mine.
With such clear signs of friendship points the path.
Be ours to follow: change we shields and don
The Danaan emblems. Craft or prowess, which.
Who cares to ask in dealing with a foe?
Themselves shall furnish us with arms.’ So saying.
The plumed helmet of Androgeos
He next puts on, with buckler blazoned fair.
And girds an Argive sword upon his thigh.
The like does Rhipeus, ay and Dymas too.
And all our youth exulting; every man
Arms him from out the recent spoil; then on
We press, commingling with the Danaan ranks.
Led by no gods of ours, and hand to hand
Through the blind night wage many a battle-bout
Send many Danaans to the shades below.
This way and that they fly, some to the ships,
And seek at headlong speed the trusty shore;
Some clambering up the monster-horse again.
Vile dastards, hide them in the well-known womb.
Ah! not for men to trust, if gods be loth!
See where, with locks that stream upon the wind,
Maiden Cassandra, Priam’s daughter, comes
Haled from the temple and Minerva’s shrine;
Vainly to heaven her burning eyes she casts —
Eyes, for her tender hands are locked in chains.
This sight Coroebus brooked not; mad with rage
He hurled him on their very midst, to die.
We following all in close array rush on.
Here first from the high temple’s top o’erwhelmed
With friendly darts, most piteous slaughter falls
Upon us, through the aspect of our arms,
And lying semblance of our Grecian crests.
Then too the Danai, with a groan of wrath
For the maid’s rescue, mustering from all sides,
Fall on — impetuous Ajax, and the twin
Atridae, and all the host of Dolopes;
E’en as at times, when a tornado bursts,
Winds meet in shock of battle. West, and South,
And East exulting in his orient steeds;
The forest creaks, and Nereus, all a-foam,
Storms with his trident, from its lowest depth
Upchurning all the ocean. Such beside
As through the darkness in the gloom of night
We routed by our stratagem, and chased
The city’s length, appear, and first are they
Our shields and lying weapons to discern.
And mark the incongruous accent of our tongues.
Straightway we are outnumbered and o’erwhelmed;
And first Coroebus at the altar-steps
Slain of the warrior-goddess, by thy hand,
Peneleos, bites the dust: falls Rhipeus too.
Of all the Teucrians foremost without peer
For justice and fast-cleaving to the right:
The gods ruled otherwise; next, pierced by friends.
Both Hypanis and Dymas are laid low;
Nor all thy goodness, Pantheus, no, nor did
Apollo’s fillet shield thee in thy fall.
Ashes of Ilium, and ye funeral-fires
Of my lost friends, witness, when ye went down,
I shunned no Danaan missiles, and no chance
Of blow for blow, that, had fate willed my fall.
This arm had earned it. Sundered from the rest
With me are Iphitus and Pelias,
Iphitus age-encumbered, Pelias
Sore-wounded by Ulysses. Straight we hie
Toward Priam’s palace, by the shouting led.
But here a giant conflict we behold.
As warring else were nowhere, none beside
Dying the city through; so stubborn raged
The war-god, while the Danai roofward rush.
And the shield-tortoise driven besets the door.
Close cleave their ladders to the walls, and nigh
The very entrance up the rungs they press.
With left hands shielded intercept the darts.
And with the right clutch fast the battlements.
Meanwhile the Dardans see! upwrench amain
Turret and roofing-tile; with these for darts.
Seeing the end, in death’s extremity,
They stand on their defence; some topple down
August ancestral splendours — gilded beams;
Others with drawn blades block the doors below.
And guard them densely massed; fresh heart, I take
To aid the palace, ease with help our men.
Add vigour to the vanquished.

“There was set
An entrance by a hidden door that led
From hall to hall of Priam, posternwise
Left rearward of the palace, by the which
While yet the empire stood, Andromache,
Poor heart! would ofttimes unattended seek
Her royal kinsfolk, to his grandsire’s knee,
Dragging her little son Astyanax.
Mounting, I gain the summit of the pile,
From whence the wretched Teucrians hurled amain
Their ineffectual darts. A turret stands
On the sheer edge, with its high pinnacle
Reared to the stars, whence Troy would oft be viewed,
The Danaan ships too, and the Achaean camp:
This, armed with tools, assail we round about.
Where the high floor-joists lend a tottering hold.
And from its deep bed wrench, and hurl it: lo!
Suddenly with a crash down, down it goes.
Trailing wild havoc on the Danaan ranks:
But up come others, and meanwhile the storm
Of stones and motley missiles knows no stay.
Hard on the threshold, by the very door,
Pyrrhus exults, flashing in armed sheen:
As when a serpent fed on poisonous weeds,
By winter-frosts kept swollen underground,
Fresh from the shedding of his slough, with youth
New-burnished, rolls his slippery length to light.
And, sunward towering with uplifted breast,
Flickers the three-forked lightning of his tongue.
With him huge Periphas, and Automedon,
Achilles’ charioteer, who bare his arms,
And all the flower of Scyros, storm the walls.
And at the roof fling fire. In front of all,
Gripping a two-edged axe, himself is there.
Bursting the tough doors through, and from their hinge
The brass-bound valves divorcing: see! e’en now
He has hewn a beam out, scooped the stubborn oak,
And made a monstrous and wide-yawning breach.
The inner palace and far-lengthening halls
Ope and lie bare, the secret sanctuary
Of Priam and the kings of long ago;
And standing on the threshold’s edge they see
Arm’d warriors.

“But confusion reigns within,
Wild shrieks and piteous uproar; far-withdrawn
The hollow chambers, hark! with women’s plaints
Are wailing: the cry strikes the golden stars.
Then through the wide halls trembling matrons stray,
And, fondly clinging, clasp the doors and kiss.
On presses Pyrrhus with his father’s might;
Nor barriers, no, nor guards his onset brook;
With quick blows of the battering-ram the door
Totters, the valves fall forward from the hinge:
Force cleaves a way: the Danaans flooding in
Burst them a passage, cut the foremost down.
And fill the wide space with their soldiery.
Not all so madly doth a foaming flood
Burst through the barrier of opposing banks
With conquering swirl, then, raging on an heap,
O’erride the country, and through all the plain
Sweep byre and herd before it. I myself
Saw mad with slaughter Neoptolemus,
And both the Atreidae on the threshold; ay.
And Hecuba I saw, with her sons’ brides
A hundred, and, along the altar stretched,
Priam, polluting with his own heart’s blood
The fires himself had consecrated. All
Those fifty bridal chambers, the rich hope
Of children’s children, portals proudly dight
With trophies and barbaric gold, lie low;
And still the Danai swarm where fails the fire.

“Of Priam’s fate too haply thou wouldst hear.
Soon as he saw the city stormed and fallen.
His palace doors wrenched open, and the foe
Amid his inmost chambers, the old man
About his shoulders, palsied now with age,
Binds, unavailing, long-forgotten arms.
Then girds him with his helpless sword, and, where
The foe throngs thickest, turns his steps to die.
Midmost the palace, under heaven’s bare vault,
Stood a huge altar, and a bay-tree near,
Of immemorial age, drooped over it,
Embracing in its shade the household gods.
Here round the unavailing altar-stone.
Like doves swept headlong by a murky storm,
Hecuba and her daughters huddling cowered,
Clasping the sacred images. But when
Priam she saw in arms of youth arrayed,
Ah! my unhappy lord, what thought so dire
Pricked thee to don this battle-gear? ‘she cried,
And whither bound so hotly? Not for such
Succour or such defenders craves the time,
No, not were my own Hector now at hand.
Enough, withdraw thee hither: all shall be
Saved by this altar, or thou slain with us.’
So spake she, and drew towards her, and set down
Her aged lord upon the hallowed seat.

“But lo! from Pyrrhus’ slaughtering sword escaped,
Polites, one of Priam’s sons, through darts.
Through foemen, the long corridors adown
Comes flying, and traverses the empty court.
Wounded. Him Pyrrhus with pursuing stroke
Plies hotly, and all but within his grasp
Holds even now, and pricks him with his spear:
Bursting at length upon his parents’ view,
Before their very eyes prostrate he fell,
And poured his life out in a rush of blood.
Then Priam, though fast within the net of death.
Brake all restraint, nor voice, nor passion spared.
For crime so shameless may the gods,’ he cries,
If justice be in heaven such deeds to mark,
Pay thee due thanks, fair meed requite thee, who
Hast forced mine own son’s murder on my sight,
And with his death profaned a father’s eyes:
But he — thou liest to call thyself his son —
Achilles, erst with Priam, though a foe.
Dealt otherwise; with kindling shame he owned
A suppliant’s rights and honour, rendered up
The bloodless corse of Hector for the tomb.
And sent me to my realm again.’ So saying.
The old man heaved a weak and woundless spear,
Which, straightway by the clanging brass repelled,
From the shield’s outer boss-rim harmless hung.
Therefore,’ said Pyrrhus, ‘shalt thou bear the news.
And to my sire the son of Peleus go:
Look that thou tell him of my sorry deeds.
And how degenerate Neoptolemus;
Now die.’ So speaking, to the altar’s self
He haled him trembling, slipping in a pool
Of his son’s blood, and, wreathing in the hair
His left hand, with the right flashed out his sword,
And plunged it in his body to the hilt.
Such was the goal of Priam’s destinies;
Such end befel him, with his eyes to see
Troy burnt, and Pergamus to ruin fallen,
Erewhile o’er many nations, many lands.
The haughty lord of Asia. There he lies
A vast trunk stretched along the sand, a head
Shorn from the shoulders, and a nameless corse.

“Then first fell horror closed me round; I stood
Amazed: uprose the form of my loved sire,
As I beheld the king, in age his peer.
Cruelly wounded, gasping out his life.
Rose to my mind Creusa too, left lone.
And my house plundered, and the plight of young
Iulus. I look back to scan what force
Is yet around me: one and all worn out
Have vanished from my side, cast them to earth
Headlong, or, fainting, dropped into the flames.

“Now was I left alone, when I discern
Clinging to Vesta’s shrine, and silently
Lurking within her solitary cell,
The daughter of Tyndareos: the fierce glare
Of conflagration lends me light to stray.
And cast my eyes o’er all things, far and near.
She, with a dread foreboding in her heart
Of Teucrian hate for Pergamus o’erthrown,
And Danaan retribution, and the wrath
Of her forsaken lord — she, common fiend
Of Troy and her own country, hidden close.
Couched by the altar from the scorn of men.
At once my soul caught fire, and rising wrath
Prompts to avenge my country, and exact
The wage of wickedness. Shall she forsooth
Live to see Sparta, and her native town
Mycenae? in the triumph she has won
Walk as a queen, and with her eyes behold
Husband and home, her parents and her sons.
Thronged round with Ilian women, and a train
Of Phrygian bondsmen.’ What! with Priam slain,
Troy burnt to ashes, and the Dardan shore
Bedewed so often with the sweat of blood!
Not so: albeit no memorable name
By woman’s death be won, nor triumph yield
Such victory, yet to have wiped out a pest,
Wreaked worthy punishment shall be my praise,
My joy to surfeit in avenging fire,
And to have slaked the ashes of my friends.
Such words outflinging, and by rage of heart
Transported, sudden to my sight is borne.
Never till now so dazzling to behold,
And in pure radiance beaming through the night,
My gentle mother — goddess undisguised —
Such and so stately as her form appears
To sons of heaven: she held me by the hand,
And thus, moreover, spake with rosy lips.
Son, what fierce anguish in thy bosom stirs
Ungovernable wrath? why ragest thou?
Thy care for me fled whither? Wilt thou not
See first where thou hast left thine age-worn sire
Anchises, whether still survive thy wife
Creusa, and Ascanius thy child?
Whom all ere this, encompassed every side
By prowling Greeks, did not my care prevent,
Or flames had snatched, or foeman’s sword devoured.
Think not it is the hated face of her.
The Spartan daughter of Tyndareos,
No, nor much blamed Paris, but the gods,
The gods, whose unrelenting hate o’erturns
This empire, and Troy’s loftiness brings low.
Look — for the cloud which, o’er thy vision drawn,
Dulls mortal sight, and spreads a misty murk,
I will snatch from thee utterly; but thou
Fear not thy mother’s bidding, nor refuse
Her bests to hearken — here where thou but seest
Huge shattered fragments and stone rent from stone.
And dust and smoke blent in one surging sea,
Neptune with his vast trident shakes the walls.
And heaves the deep foundations, from her bed
O’ertoppling all the city. Juno here
Storms at the entrance of the Scaean gate.
Implacable, and raging, sword on thigh,
Summons her armed confederates from the ships.
Now backward glance, and on the embattled height
Already see Tritonian Pallas throned,
Flashing with storm-cloud and with Gorgon fell.
The Sire himself each Danaan heart imbues
With courage and victorious might; himself
Against our Dardan power stirs up the gods.
Son, snatch at flight, and let thine efforts end:
Nowhere will I forsake thee till set safe
Upon thy father’s threshold.’ She had said,
And vanished in thick shadows of the night.
Dread forms appear, and mighty potentates
Of heaven, at feud with Troy.

“Ah! then mine eyes
Beheld all Ilium settling into flame,
Troy, Neptune’s city, from her base o’erthrown;
As some hoar ash-tree on the mountain-tops,
Which eager husbandmen in haste to fell
Hack at with steel and showering axe-strokes, it
Threatens and ever threatens, and nods on
With quaking foliage, rocking crest, until.
Little by little, ’neath the wounds o’erpowered.
One dying groan it utters, and falls stretched
Along the hillside, a root-severed wreck.
I get me down, and with the god to guide
Through fire and foes win unimpeded way;
Weapons give place to me, and flames retire.

“So when at last my father’s door was gained,
And the old home, my sire, whom first I seek —
My first thought now to bear him to the hills —
Refuses to live on, Troy laid in dust,
Or stoop to exile. ‘Ye, whose blood,’ he cried,
Hath yet youth’s freshness, and whose strength stands whole
In native vigour, do ye speed your flight;
Me had the high gods destined to survive,
They would have spared my home. Enough and more
That I have seen one downfall, and outlived
The capture of our city: here e’en here
Lay out my body, and bid farewell, and go.
This hand shall find out death; the foe will take
Pity on me, and hunger for my spoil.
Light is the loss of burial. Long ago
Hateful to heaven and useless, I drag on
My lingering days, e’er since the sire of gods
And king of men breathed on me with the blast
Of his wing’d bolt, and touched me with his fire.’
“So spake he, and stood firm, persisting; we,
My wife Creusa, and Ascanius,
And the whole house, beseech him, bathed in tears.
Not to whelm all in his own ruin, nor add
Weight to the push of doom: he spurns our prayer.
Stands rooted to his purpose and the spot.
Once more I turn to arms, and long for death
To end my misery; for what counsel now.
What fortune was vouchsafed me? ‘Didst thou think
That I could leave thee, sire, and go my way?
Fell word so monstrous from a father’s lips?
If it be writ in heaven that naught remain
Of all this city, and thy fixed purpose hold.
So fain to heap upon Troy’s funeral-pyre
Thyself and thine, death opes thee wide the door;
And, fresh from bathing in the blood of Priam,
Soon Pyrrhus will be here, who butchers son
In face of sire, and sire at altar-side.
For this then, gentle mother, did thy hand
Pluck me from sword and flame, that I might see
The foe upon my hearth-stone, see my sire,
Ascanius and Creusa at his side,
Slaughtered and weltering in each other’s blood?
Arms, arms, my men! their last reveille calls
The vanquished. To the Danai give me back:
Let me revisit and renew the fight:
Ne’er shall we all die unavenged to-day.’
“Therewith once more I gird my sword on, brace
And fit my left arm to the shield, and forth
Was hurrying from the house, when lo! my wife
Clasping my feet upon the threshold clung,
Stretched forth the young Iulus to his sire.
If bound for death, speed us with thee through all;
But if past effort teach thee still to place
Some hope in arms, then first defend our home.
Bethink thee to whose hand thou leavest us.
Thy sire, and young Iulus, and myself.
Once called thy wife.’ So loudly pleading she
Filled all the house with moans, when lo! there falls
A sudden portent marvellous to tell!
For, as betwixt their gaze and their embrace
His sorrowing parents hold him, on the crown
See! of lulus’ head a tongue of fire
Light-hovering shone, and, harmless to the touch
Licked his soft locks, and round his temples fed.
We in a flutter of alarm shake out
The blazing hair, and with spring water strive
To quench the sacred flame; but joyfully
My sire Anchises with a starward gaze
Lifted his voice and upturned hands to heaven.
Almighty Jupiter, if any prayer
Can bend thee, look upon us; only this;
And, if our goodness earn it. Sire, henceforth
Grant us thine aid, and ratify this sign.’
Scarce had the old man spoken, when there pealed
A sudden crash of thunder on the left;
And, gliding through the darkness from on high,
Shot with a torch-like trail of rushing light
A star; we mark it o’er the roof-top glide,
A fiery path displaying, and at length
Bury its brightness beneath Ida’s wood:
Then lo! a long-drawn furrow-line of light!
And o’er the region hangs a sulphurous smoke.
Conquered at last my sire uplifts his head,
Invokes the gods, adores the sacred star.
Up, up! no tarriance more! I follow, and where
Ye lead, am with you. Gods, that guard our land,
Preserve my house, preserve my grandchild: yours
This omen, in your holy keeping Troy.
Son, I submit, content with thee to go.’
“He said; and through the streets more loudly now
Is heard the fire, and nearer roll the tides
Of conflagration. ‘Come then, father mine,
Mount thee upon my neck; these shoulders, see!
Shall bear thee up, nor feel that task a toil.
Come what come may, one peril both shall share,
Or one deliverance. Hand in hand with me
Let walk the child, Iulus, and my wife
Follow our footsteps from afar. And ye.
Servants, be mindful; heed what I shall say.
Quitting the city to a mound ye come
And ancient fane of Ceres in the waste:
Hard by, an aged cypress, by our sires
With holy awe regarded years on years.
To this one goal by divers tracks we’ll wend.
Father, do thou the sacred emblems take.
Our country’s household gods, within thy hand:
Fresh from the slaughter of so fierce a strife.
For me ’twere sin to touch them, till I wash
Me clean in running water.’ So I spake
And, over my broad shoulders and bowed neck
Donning for robe a tawny lion’s hide.
Stoop to the burden; twines his hand in mine
The child Iulus, with unequal steps
Following his sire: my wife comes on behind.
Forth fare we through the shady ways, and me
Whom erst no showering missiles could make blench,
Nor banded Greeks in hostile ranks arrayed,
Now every breeze affrights and every sound
Startles, so tremulous am I, at once
Fearful for my companion and my load.

“And now, nearing the gates, the journey’s length
Methought I had o’erpast, when suddenly
A sound of hurrying footsteps to mine ear
Seemed borne, and, peering through the dark, my sire
Exclaims; ‘They are upon us; fly, son fly!
I see their glowing shields and glittering arms.’
Then, in the scare, some Power that loved me not
Snatched my bewildered sense. For as I thrid
Untrodden paths, the wonted track forego,
Alas! my wife Creusa, now by fate
Torn from me, to my sorrow, either stopped.
Or missed her way, or weary sat her down —
I know not — to our eyes restored no more.
Nor did I once look back to learn my loss,
Nor turn my thoughts upon her, till we reached
The mound of ancient Ceres, and her shrine.
Then, then, of all our gathered forces, she
Alone was wanting to the way-fellows.
Slipped from the sight of husband and of son.
Whom in my frenzy did I not upbraid
Of men and gods? Or what more cruel hap
Saw in the falling city? Ascanius,
My sire Anchises, and Troy’s household gods
I give into my comrades’ care, and lodge
Safe in the winding vale, then seek once more
The city, and gird me in my glittering arms,
Steadfast to re-encounter every risk,
All Troy retraverse, and expose my life
Anew to every peril. I repair
First to the walls, and that dark portal, whence
My feet had issued, trace and follow back
Each step in the dark, and scan with searching eye.
The horror round, the very silence too
Scares me; then home I turn, if haply — ah!
If thither haply she had bent her steps.
The Danai had rushed in, filled all the house.
Speeds the devouring fire before the wind,
Rolled to the roof-top; now the flames outsoar it;
The billowy heat goes raging up to heaven.
Thence I pass onward, and cast eyes again
On Priam’s palace and the citadel.
E’en now within the empty corridors
Of Juno’s sanctuary, as chosen guards,
Phoenix and dread Ulysses watch the spoil.
Hereinto gathered from her burning shrines,
Troy’s plundered treasure — tables of the gods.
Cups all of gold, and captive raiment, lie
Massed in a heap. About it in long line
Stand boys and trembling matrons. Nay, I dared
Even to launch my shouts into the dark.
Making the streets re-echo, as I called
Creusa ‘and ‘Creusa,’ cry on cry.
With mournful iteration, but in vain.
Searching the city thus from house to house.
And raving without end, the hapless shade
And spectre of Creusa’s self appeared
Before me, statelier than the form I knew.
I stood aghast; my hair rose, and the voice
Stuck in my throat. Then thus, methought, she spake.
And with such words allayed my trouble: ‘Why
To frantic sorrow give such wanton way,
O my sweet lord? Without the nod of Heaven
These things befall not; at thy side to bear
Creusa hence — nor fate decrees, nor he
The lord of high Olympus suffers it.
Lo! exile long awaits thee, and to cleave
A vast expanse of ocean: then shalt thou
Arrive Hesperia, where with gentle march,
Through their rich fields the Lydian Tiber flows.
High fortune here, a throne, a royal bride.
The Fates assign thee. Banish now thy tears
For loved Creusa: I shall never look
Upon the proud homes of the Myrmidons
Or Dolopes, ne’er go to be the slave
Of Grecian dames, a Dardan woman I,
Wed to the son of Venus the divine.
But me the mighty mother of the gods
Holds on this shore. And now adieu! Guard well
The love we cherished for thy child and mine.’
So saying, she left me weeping, yearning sore
To speak, and vanished into empty air.
Thrice, as she stood, my arms I would have flung
About her neck, and thrice my baffled hands
Closed upon nothing, and a form that fled,
Like to light breezes, one with winged sleep.
So passed the night, and so at length I turn
Back to my friends, and here with wonder find
New comrades, a vast concourse, matrons, men.
An army massed for exile — piteous throng! —
From all sides gathered, armed in heart and gear,
Where’er I list to lead them over sea.
And now o’er Ida’s topmost ridge the star
Of dawn was rising, bringing back the day:
The Danaans had beset and held the gates,
Nor hope of help was offered: I gave o’er.
Took up my sire and for the mountains made.”