Книга - The Iliad

The Iliad
Homer Homer


HarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics.‘Clanless, lawless, homeless is he who is in love with civil war, that brutal ferocious thing.’The epic poem The Iliad begins nine years after the beginning of the Trojan War and describes the great warrior Achilles and the battles and events that take place as he quarrels with the King Agamemnon. Attributed to Homer, The Iliad, along with The Odyssey, is still revered today as the oldest and finest example of Western Literature.












THE ILIAD

Homer










CONTENTS


Cover (#ua440d3eb-63f7-54d3-b5e7-08b185d224e6)

Title Page (#u5c19661a-32ec-57f2-bcb0-b410e1a5384a)

Introduction (#ulink_423de4ed-f57c-5c1e-ab4f-fb02c19afa81)

Pope’s Preface to The Iliad of Homer (#ulink_8338c765-02e5-5c31-9d3f-b347639ddfe2)

Book I (#ulink_138d85e5-44c0-5c60-a201-5acdeca70935)

Book II (#ulink_7dc8f397-4579-55cb-b847-fd43190e8c2f)

Book III (#ulink_d5dea87e-f7d6-5128-916f-626fd3fe84df)

Book IV (#ulink_7bca0e16-f31e-5df1-abe4-02d798b99ff0)

Book V (#litres_trial_promo)

Book VI (#litres_trial_promo)

Book VII (#litres_trial_promo)

Book VIII (#litres_trial_promo)

Book IX (#litres_trial_promo)

Book X (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XI (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XII (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XIII (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XIV (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XV (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XVI (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XVII (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XVIII (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XIX (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XX (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XXI (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XXII (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XXIII (#litres_trial_promo)

Book XXIV (#litres_trial_promo)

Concluding Note (#litres_trial_promo)

Classic Literature: Words and Phrases Adapted from the Collins English Dictionary (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)

History of Collins (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)




INTRODUCTION (#ulink_03e61427-c99f-5569-bbc9-ce751fe2a389)


Scepticism is as much the result of knowledge, as knowledge is of scepticism. To be content with what we at present know, is, for the most part, to shut our ears against conviction; since, from the very gradual character of our education, we must continually forget, and emancipate ourselves from, knowledge previously acquired; we must set aside old notions and embrace fresh ones; and, as we learn, we must be daily unlearning something which it has cost us no small labour and anxiety to acquire.

And this difficulty attaches itself more closely to an age in which progress has gained a strong ascendency over prejudice, and in which persons and things are, day by day, finding their real level, in lieu of their conventional value. The same principles which have swept away traditional abuses, and which are making rapid havoc among the revenues of sinecurists, and stripping the thin, tawdry veil from attractive superstitions, are working as actively in literature as in society. The credulity of one writer, or the partiality of another, finds as powerful a touchstone and as wholesome a chastisement in the healthy scepticism of a temperate class of antagonists, as the dreams of conservatism, or the impostures of pluralist sinecures in the Church. History and tradition, whether of ancient or comparatively recent times, are subjected to very different handling from that which the indulgence or credulity of former ages could allow. Mere statements are jealously watched, and the motives of the writer form as important an ingredient in the analysis of his history, as the facts he records. Probability is a powerful and troublesome test; and it is by this troublesome standard that a large portion of historical evidence is sifted. Consistency is no less pertinacious and exacting in its demands. In brief, to write a history, we must know more than mere facts. Human nature, viewed under an induction of extended experience, is the best help to the criticism of human history. Historical characters can only be estimated by the standard which human experience, whether actual or traditionary, has furnished. To form correct views of individuals we must regard them as forming parts of a great whole—we must measure them by their relation to the mass of beings by whom they are surrounded, and, in contemplating the incidents in their lives or condition which tradition has handed down to us, we must rather consider the general bearing of the whole narrative, than the respective probability of its details.

It is unfortunate for us, that, of some of the greatest men, we know least, and talk most. Homer, Socrates, and Shakespere have, perhaps, contributed more to the intellectual enlightenment of mankind than any other three writers who could be named, and yet the history of all three has given rise to a boundless ocean of discussion, which has left us little save the option of choosing which theory or theories we will follow. The personality of Shakespere is, perhaps, the only thing in which critics will allow us to believe without controversy; but upon everything else, even down to the authorship of plays, there is more or less of doubt and uncertainty. Of Socrates we know as little as the contradictions of Plato and Xenophon will allow us to know. He was one of the dramatis personae in two dramas as unlike in principles as in style. He appears as the enunciator of opinions as different in their tone as those of the writers who have handed them down. When we have read Plato or Xenophon, we think we know something of Socrates; when we have fairly read and examined both, we feel convinced that we are something worse than ignorant.

It has been an easy, and a popular expedient, of late years, to deny the personal or real existence of men and things whose life and condition were too much for our belief. This system—which has often comforted the religious sceptic, and substituted the consolations of Strauss for those of the New Testament—has been of incalculable value to the historical theorists of the last and present centuries. To question the existence of Alexander the Great, would be a more excusable act, than to believe in that of Romulus. To deny a fact related in Herodotus, because it is inconsistent with a theory developed from an Assyrian inscription which no two scholars read in the same way, is more pardonable, than to believe in the good-natured old king whom the elegant pen of Florian has idealized—Numa Pompilius.

Scepticism has attained its culminating point with respect to Homer, and the state of our Homeric knowledge may be described as a free permission to believe any theory, provided we throw overboard all written tradition, concerning the author or authors of the Iliad and Odyssey. What few authorities exist on the subject, are summarily dismissed, although the arguments appear to run in a circle. “This cannot be true, because it is not true; and, that is not true, because it cannot be true.” Such seems to be the style, in which testimony upon testimony, statement upon statement, is consigned to denial and oblivion.

It is, however, unfortunate that the professed biographies of Homer are partly forgeries, partly freaks of ingenuity and imagination, in which truth is the requisite most wanting. Before taking a brief review of the Homeric theory in its present conditions, some notice must be taken of the treatise on the Life of Homer which has been attributed to Herodotus.

According to this document, the city of Cumae in Æolia, was, at an early period, the seat of frequent immigrations from various parts of Greece. Among the immigrants was Menapolus, the son of Ithagenes. Although poor, he married, and the result of the union was a girl named Critheis. The girl was left an orphan at an early age, under the guardianship of Cleanax, of Argos. It is to the indiscretion of this maiden that we “are indebted for so much happiness.” Homer was the first fruit of her juvenile frailty, and received the name of Melesigenes, from having been born near the river Meles, in Boeotia, whither Critheis had been transported in order to save her reputation.

“At this time,” continues our narrative, “there lived at Smyrna a man named Phemius, a teacher of literature and music, who, not being married, engaged Critheis to manage his household, and spin the flax he received as the price of his scholastic labours. So satisfactory was her performance of this task, and so modest her conduct, that he made proposals of marriage, declaring himself, as a further inducement, willing to adopt her son, who, he asserted, would become a clever man, if he were carefully brought up.”

They were married; careful cultivation ripened the talents which nature had bestowed, and Melesigenes soon surpassed his schoolfellows in every attainment, and, when older, rivalled his preceptor in wisdom. Phemius died, leaving him sole heir to his property, and his mother soon followed. Melesigenes carried on his adopted father’s school with great success, exciting the admiration not only of the inhabitants of Smyrna, but also of the strangers whom the trade carried on there, especially in the exportation of corn, attracted to that city. Among these visitors, one Mentes, from Leucadia, the modern Santa Maura, who evinced a knowledge and intelligence rarely found in those times, persuaded Melesigenes to close his school, and accompany him on his travels. He promised not only to pay his expenses, but to furnish him with a further stipend, urging, that, “While he was yet young, it was fitting that he should see with his own eyes the countries and cities which might hereafter be the subjects of his discourses.” Melesigenes consented, and set out with his patron, “examining all the curiosities of the countries they visited, and informing himself of everything by interrogating those whom he met.” We may also suppose, that he wrote memoirs of all that he deemed worthy of preservation. Having set sail from Tyrrhenia and Iberia, they reached Ithaca. Here Melesigenes, who had already suffered in his eyes, became much worse, and Mentes, who was about to leave for Leucadia, left him to the medical superintendence of a friend of his, named Mentor, the son of Alcinor. Under his hospitable and intelligent host, Melesigenes rapidly became acquainted with the legends respecting Ulysses, which afterwards formed the subject of the Odyssey. The inhabitants of Ithaca assert, that it was here that Melesigenes became blind, but the Colophomans make their city the seat of that misfortune. He then returned to Smyrna, where he applied himself to the study of poetry.

But poverty soon drove him to Cumae. Having passed over the Hermaean plain, he arrived at Neon Teichos, the New Wall, a colony of Cumae. Here his misfortunes and poetical talent gained him the friendship of one Tychias, an armourer. “And up to my time,” continued the author, “the inhabitants showed the place where he used to sit when giving a recitation of his verses, and they greatly honoured the spot. Here also a poplar grew, which they said had sprung up ever since Melesigenes arrived”.

But poverty still drove him on, and he went by way of Larissa, as being the most convenient road. Here, the Cumans say, he composed an epitaph on Gordius, king of Phrygia, which has however, and with greater probability, been attributed to Cleobulus of Lindus.

Arrived at Cumae, he frequented the converzationes of the old men, and delighted all by the charms of his poetry. Encouraged by this favourable reception, he declared that, if they would allow him a public maintenance, he would render their city most gloriously renowned. They avowed their willingness to support him in the measure he proposed, and procured him an audience in the council. Having made the speech, with the purport of which our author has forgotten to acquaint us, he retired, and left them to debate respecting the answer to be given to his proposal.

The greater part of the assembly seemed favourable to the poet’s demand, but one man observed that “if they were to feed Homers, they would be encumbered with a multitude of useless people.” “From this circumstance,” says the writer, “Melesigenes acquired the name of Homer, for the Cumans call blind men Homers.” With a love of economy, which shows how similar the world has always been in its treatment of literary men, the pension was denied, and the poet vented his disappointment in a wish that Cumoea might never produce a poet capable of giving it renown and glory.

At Phocoea, Homer was destined to experience another literary distress. One Thestorides, who aimed at the reputation of poetical genius, kept Homer in his own house, and allowed him a pittance, on condition of the verses of the poet passing in his name. Having collected sufficient poetry to be profitable, Thestorides, like some would-be-literary publishers, neglected the man whose brains he had sucked, and left him. At his departure, Homer is said to have observed: “O Thestorides, of the many things hidden from the knowledge of man, nothing is more unintelligible than the human heart.”

Homer continued his career of difficulty and distress, until some Chian merchants, struck by the similarity of the verses they heard him recite, acquainted him with the fact that Thestorides was pursuing a profitable livelihood by the recital of the very same poems. This at once determined him to set out for Chios. No vessel happened then to be setting sail thither, but he found one ready to Start for Erythrae, a town of Ionia, which faces that island, and he prevailed upon the seamen to allow him to accompany them. Having embarked, he invoked a favourable wind, and prayed that he might be able to expose the imposture of Thestorides, who, by his breach of hospitality, had drawn down the wrath of Jove the Hospitable.

At Erythrae, Homer fortunately met with a person who had known him in Phocoea, by whose assistance he at length, after some difficulty, reached the little hamlet of Pithys. Here he met with an adventure, which we will continue in the words of our author. “Having set out from Pithys, Homer went on, attracted by the cries of some goats that were pasturing. The dogs barked on his approach, and he cried out. Glaucus (for that was the name of the goat-herd) heard his voice, ran up quickly, called off his dogs, and drove them away from Homer. For or some time he stood wondering how a blind man should have reached such a place alone, and what could be his design in coming. He then went up to him, and inquired who he was, and how he had come to desolate places and untrodden spots, and of what he stood in need. Homer, by recounting to him the whole history of his misfortunes, moved him with compassion; and he took him, and led him to his cot, and having lit a fire, bade him sup.

“The dogs, instead of eating, kept barking at the stranger, according to their usual habit. Whereupon Homer addressed Glaucus thus: O Glaucus, my friend, prythee attend to my behest. First give the dogs their supper at the doors of the hut: for so it is better, since, whilst they watch, nor thief nor wild beast will approach the fold.

Glaucus was pleased with the advice, and marvelled at its author. Having finished supper, they banqueted afresh on conversation, Homer narrating his wanderings, and telling of the cities he had visited.

At length they retired to rest; but on the following morning, Glaucus resolved to go to his master, and acquaint him with his meeting with Homer. Having left the goats in charge of a fellow-servant, he left Homer at home, promising to return quickly. Having arrived at Bolissus, a place near the farm, and finding his mate, he told him the whole story respecting Homer and his journey. He paid little attention to what he said, and blamed Glaucus for his stupidity in taking in and feeding maimed and enfeebled persons. However, he bade him bring the stranger to him.

Glaucus told Homer what had taken place, and bade him follow him, assuring him that good fortune would be the result. Conversation soon showed that the stranger was a man of much cleverness and general knowledge, and the Chian persuaded him to remain, and to undertake the charge of his children.

Besides the satisfaction of driving the impostor Thestorides from the island, Homer enjoyed considerable success as a teacher. In the town of Chios he established a school where he taught the precepts of poetry. “To this day,” says Chandler, “the most curious remain is that which has been named, without reason, the School of Homer. It is on the coast, at some distance from the city, northward, and appears to have been an open temple of Cybele, formed on the top of a rock. The shape is oval, and in the centre is the image of the goddess, the head and an arm wanting. She is represented, as usual, sitting. The chair has a lion carved on each side, and on the back. The area is bounded by a low rim, or seat, and about five yards over. The whole is hewn out of the mountain, is rude, indistinct, and probably of the most remote antiquity.”

So successful was this school, that Homer realised a considerable fortune. He married, and had two daughters, one of whom died single, the other married a Chian.

The following passage betrays the same tendency to connect the personages of the poems with the history of the poet, which has already been mentioned:—

“In his poetical compositions Homer displays great gratitude towards Mentor of Ithaca, in the Odyssey, whose name he has inserted in his poem as the companion of Ulysses, in return for the care taken of him when afflicted with blindness. He also testifies his gratitude to Phemius, who had given him both sustenance and instruction.”

His celebrity continued to increase, and many persons advised him to visit Greece, whither his reputation had now extended. Having, it is said, made some additions to his poems calculated to please the vanity of the Athenians, of whose city he had hitherto made no mention, he sent out for Samos. Here being recognized by a Samian, who had met with him in Chios, he was handsomely received, and invited to join in celebrating the Apaturian festival. He recited some verses, which gave great satisfaction, and by singing the Eiresione at the New Moon festivals, he earned a subsistence, visiting the houses of the rich, with whose children he was very popular.

In the spring he sailed for Athens, and arrived at the island of Ios, now Ino, where he fell extremely ill, and died. It is said that his death arose from vexation, at not having been able to unravel an enigma proposed by some fishermen’s children.

Such is, in brief, the substance of the earliest life of Homer we possess, and so broad are the evidences of its historical worthlessness, that it is scarcely necessary to point them out in detail. Let us now consider some of the opinions to which a persevering, patient, and learned—but by no means consistent—series of investigations has led. In doing so, I profess to bring forward statements, not to vouch for their reasonableness or probability.

“Homer appeared. The history of this poet and his works is lost in doubtful obscurity, as is the history of many of the first minds who have done honour to humanity, because they rose amidst darkness. The majestic stream of his song, blessing and fertilizing, flows like the Nile, through many lands and nations; and, like the sources of the Nile, its fountains will ever remain concealed.”

Such are the words in which one of the most judicious German critics has eloquently described the uncertainty in which the whole of the Homeric question is involved. With no less truth and feeling he proceeds:—

“It seems here of chief importance to expect no more than the nature of things makes possible. If the period of tradition in history is the region of twilight, we should not expect in it perfect light. The creations of genius always seem like miracles, because they are, for the most part, created far out of the reach of observation. If we were in possession of all the historical testimonies, we never could wholly explain the origin of the Iliad and the Odyssey; for their origin, in all essential points, must have remained the secret of the poet.”

From this criticism, which shows as much insight into the depths of human nature as into the minute wire-drawings of scholastic investigation, let us pass on to the main question at issue. Was Homer an individual? Or were the Iliad and Odyssey the result of an ingenious arrangement of fragments by earlier poets?

Well has Landor remarked: “Some tell us there were twenty Homers; some deny that there was ever one. It were idle and foolish to shake the contents of a vase, in order to let them settle at last. We are perpetually labouring to destroy our delights, our composure, our devotion to superior power. Of all the animals on earth we least know what is good for us. My opinion is, that what is best for us is our admiration of good. No man living venerates Homer more than I do.”

But, greatly as we admire the generous enthusiasm which rests contented with the poetry on which its best impulses had been nurtured and fostered, without seeking to destroy the vividness of first impressions by minute analysis—our editorial office compels us to give some attention to the doubts and difficulties with which the Homeric question is beset, and to entreat our reader, for a brief period, to prefer his judgment to his imagination, and to condescend to dry details.

Before, however, entering into particulars respecting the question of this unity of the Homeric poems, (at least of the Iliad,) I must express my sympathy with the sentiments expressed in the following remarks:—

“We cannot but think the universal admiration of its unity by the better, the poetic age of Greece, almost conclusive testimony to its original composition. It was not till the age of the grammarians that its primitive integrity was called in question; nor is it injustice to assert, that the minute and analytical spirit of a grammarian is not the best qualification for the profound feeling, the comprehensive conception of an harmonious whole. The most exquisite anatomist may be no judge of the symmetry of the human frame: and we would take the opinion of Chantrey or Westmacott on the proportions and general beauty of a form, rather than that of Mr. Brodie or Sir Astley Cooper.

“There is some truth, though some malicious exaggeration, in the lines of Pope.—



“‘The critic eye—that microscope of wit

Sees hairs and pores, examines bit by bit,

How parts relate to parts, or they to whole

The body’s harmony, the beaming soul,

Are things which Kuster, Burmann, Wasse, shall see,

When man’s whole frame is obvious to a flea.’”



Long was the time which elapsed before any one dreamt of questioning the unity of the authorship of the Homeric poems. The grave and cautious Thucydides quoted without hesitation the Hymn to Apollo, the authenticity of which has been already disclaimed by modern critics. Longinus, in an oft quoted passage, merely expressed an opinion touching the comparative inferiority of the Odyssey to the Iliad, and, among a mass of ancient authors, whose very names it would be tedious to detail, no suspicion of the personal non-existence of Homer ever arose. So far, the voice of antiquity seems to be in favour of our early ideas on the subject; let us now see what are the discoveries to which more modern investigations lay claim.

At the end of the seventeenth century, doubts had begun to awaken on the subject, and we find Bentley remarking that “Homer wrote a sequel of songs and rhapsodies, to be sung by himself, for small comings and good cheer, at festivals and other days of merriment. These loose songs were not collected together, in the form of an epic poem, till about Peisistratus’ time, about five hundred years after.”

Two French writers—Hedelin and Perrault—avowed a similar scepticism on the subject; but it is in the “Scienza Nuova” of Battista Vico, that we first meet with the germ of the theory, subsequently defended by Wolf with so much learning and acuteness. Indeed, it is with the Wolfian theory that we have chiefly to deal, and with the following bold hypothesis, which we will detail in the words of Grote—

“Half a century ago, the acute and valuable Prolegomena of F. A. Wolf, turning to account the Venetian Scholia, which had then been recently published, first opened philosophical discussion as to the history of the Homeric text. A considerable part of that dissertation (though by no means the whole) is employed in vindicating the position, previously announced by Bentley, amongst others, that the separate constituent portions of the Iliad and Odyssey had not been cemented together into any compact body and unchangeable order, until the days of Peisistratus, in the sixth century before Christ. As a step towards that conclusion, Wolf maintained that no written copies of either poem could be shown to have existed during the earlier times, to which their composition is referred; and that without writing, neither the perfect symmetry of so complicated a work could have been originally conceived by any poet, nor, if realized by him, transmitted with assurance to posterity. The absence of easy and convenient writing, such as must be indispensably supposed for long manuscripts, among the early Greeks, was thus one of the points in Wolf’s case against the primitive integrity of the Iliad and Odyssey. By Nitzsch, and other leading opponents of Wolf, the connection of the one with the other seems to have been accepted as he originally put it; and it has been considered incumbent on those who defended the ancient aggregate character of the Iliad and Odyssey, to maintain that they were written poems from the beginning.

“To me it appears, that the architectonic functions ascribed by Wolf to Peisistratus and his associates, in reference to the Homeric poems, are nowise admissible. But much would undoubtedly be gained towards that view of the question, if it could be shown, that, in order to controvert it, we were driven to the necessity of admitting long written poems, in the ninth century before the Christian aera. Few things, in my opinion, can be more improbable; and Mr. Payne Knight, opposed as he is to the Wolfian hypothesis, admits this no less than Wolf himself. The traces of writing in Greece, even in the seventh century before the Christian aera, are exceedingly trifling. We have no remaining inscription earlier than the fortieth Olympiad, and the early inscriptions are rude and unskilfully executed; nor can we even assure ourselves whether Archilochus, Simonides of Amorgus, Kallinus, Tyrtaeus, Xanthus, and the other early elegiac and lyric poets, committed their compositions to writing, or at what time the practice of doing so became familiar. The first positive ground which authorizes us to presume the existence of a manuscript of Homer, is in the famous ordinance of Solon, with regard to the rhapsodies at the Panathenaea: but for what length of time previously manuscripts had existed, we are unable to say.

“Those who maintain the Homeric poems to have been written from the beginning, rest their case, not upon positive proofs, nor yet upon the existing habits of society with regard to poetry—for they admit generally that the Iliad and Odyssey were not read, but recited and heard,—but upon the supposed necessity that there must have been manuscripts to ensure the preservation of the poems—the unassisted memory of reciters being neither sufficient nor trustworthy. But here we only escape a smaller difficulty by running into a greater; for the existence of trained bards, gifted with extraordinary memory, is far less astonishing than that of long manuscripts, in an age essentially non-reading and non-writing, and when even suitable instruments and materials for the process are not obvious. Moreover, there is a strong positive reason for believing that the bard was under no necessity of refreshing his memory by consulting a manuscript; for if such had been the fact, blindness would have been a disqualification for the profession, which we know that it was not, as well from the example of Demodokus, in the Odyssey, as from that of the blind bard of Chios, in the Hymn to the Delian Apollo, whom Thucydides, as well as the general tenor of Grecian legend, identifies with Homer himself. The author of that hymn, be he who he may, could never have described a blind man as attaining the utmost perfection in his art, if he had been conscious that the memory of the bard was only maintained by constant reference to the manuscript in his chest.”

The loss of the digamma, that crux of critics, that quicksand upon which even the acumen of Bentley was shipwrecked, seems to prove beyond a doubt, that the pronunciation of the Greek language had undergone a considerable change. Now it is certainly difficult to suppose that the Homeric poems could have suffered by this change, had written copies been preserved. If Chaucer’s poetry, for instance, had not been written, it could only have come down to us in a softened form, more like the effeminate version of Dryden, than the rough, quaint, noble original.

“At what period,” continues Grote, “these poems, or indeed any other Greek poems, first began to be written, must be matter of conjecture, though there is ground for assurance that it was before the time of Solon. If, in the absence of evidence, we may venture upon naming any more determinate period, the question a once suggests itself, What were the purposes which, in that state of society, a manuscript at its first commencement must have been intended to answer? For whom was a written Iliad necessary? Not for the rhapsodes; for with them it was not only planted in the memory, but also interwoven with the feelings, and conceived in conjunction with all those flexions and intonations of voice, pauses, and other oral artifices which were required for emphatic delivery, and which the naked manuscript could never reproduce. Not for the general public—they were accustomed to receive it with its rhapsodic delivery, and with its accompaniments of a solemn and crowded festival. The only persons for whom the written Iliad would be suitable would be a select few; studious and curious men; a class of readers capable of analyzing the complicated emotions which they had experienced as hearers in the crowd, and who would, on perusing the written words, realize in their imaginations a sensible portion of the impression communicated by the reciter. Incredible as the statement may seem in an age like the present, there is in all early societies, and there was in early Greece, a time when no such reading class existed. If we could discover at what time such a class first began to be formed, we should be able to make a guess at the time when the old epic poems were first committed to writing. Now the period which may with the greatest probability be fixed upon as having first witnessed the formation even of the narrowest reading class in Greece, is the middle of the seventh century before the Christian aera (B.C. 660 to B.C. 630), the age of Terpander, Kallinus, Archilochus, Simonides of Amorgus, &c. I ground this supposition on the change then operated in the character and tendencies of Grecian poetry and music—the elegiac and the iambic measures having been introduced as rivals to the primitive hexameter, and poetical compositions having been transferred from the epical past to the affairs of present and real life. Such a change was important at a time when poetry was the only known mode of publication (to use a modern phrase not altogether suitable, yet the nearest approaching to the sense). It argued a new way of looking at the old epical treasures of the people as well as a thirst for new poetical effect; and the men who stood forward in it, may well be considered as desirous to study, and competent to criticize, from their own individual point of view, the written words of the Homeric rhapsodies, just as we are told that Kallinus both noticed and eulogized the Thebais as the production of Homer. There seems, therefore, ground for conjecturing that (for the use of this newly-formed and important, but very narrow class), manuscripts of the Homeric poems and other old epics,—the Thebais and the Cypria, as well as the Iliad and the Odyssey,—began to be compiled towards the middle of the seventh century (B.C. 1); and the opening of Egypt to Grecian commerce, which took place about the same period, would furnish increased facilities for obtaining the requisite papyrus to write upon. A reading class, when once formed, would doubtless slowly increase, and the number of manuscripts along with it; so that before the time of Solon, fifty years afterwards, both readers and manuscripts, though still comparatively few, might have attained a certain recognized authority, and formed a tribunal of reference against the carelessness of individual rhapsodes.”

But even Peisistratus has not been suffered to remain in possession of the credit, and we cannot help feeling the force of the following observations—



“There are several incidental circumstances which, in our opinion, throw some suspicion over the whole history of the Peisistratid compilation, at least over the theory, that the Iliad was cast into its present stately and harmonious form by the directions of the Athenian ruler. If the great poets, who flourished at the bright period of Grecian song, of which, alas! we have inherited little more than the fame, and the faint echo, if Stesichorus, Anacreon, and Simonides were employed in the noble task of compiling the Iliad and Odyssey, so much must have been done to arrange, to connect, to harmonize, that it is almost incredible, that stronger marks of Athenian manufacture should not remain. Whatever occasional anomalies may be detected, anomalies which no doubt arise out of our own ignorance of the language of the Homeric age, however the irregular use of the digamma may have perplexed our Bentleys, to whom the name of Helen is said to have caused as much disquiet and distress as the fair one herself among the heroes of her age, however Mr. Knight may have failed in reducing the Homeric language to its primitive form; however, finally, the Attic dialect may not have assumed all its more marked and distinguishing characteristics—still it is difficult to suppose that the language, particularly in the joinings and transitions, and connecting parts, should not more clearly betray the incongruity between the more ancient and modern forms of expression. It is not quite in character with such a period to imitate an antique style, in order to piece out an imperfect poem in the character of the original, as Sir Walter Scott has done in his continuation of Sir Tristram.

“If, however, not even such faint and indistinct traces of Athenian compilation are discoverable in the language of the poems, the total absence of Athenian national feeling is perhaps no less worthy of observation. In later, and it may fairly be suspected in earlier times, the Athenians were more than ordinarily jealous of the fame of their ancestors. But, amid all the traditions of the glories of early Greece embodied in the Iliad, the Athenians play a most subordinate and insignificant part. Even the few passages which relate to their ancestors, Mr. Knight suspects to be interpolations. It is possible, indeed, that in its leading outline, the Iliad may be true to historic fact, that in the great maritime expedition of western Greece against the rival and half-kindred empire of the Laomedontiadae, the chieftain of Thessaly, from his valour and the number of his forces, may have been the most important ally of the Peloponnesian sovereign; the preeminent value of the ancient poetry on the Trojan war may thus have forced the national feeling of the Athenians to yield to their taste. The songs which spoke of their own great ancestor were, no doubt, of far inferior sublimity and popularity, or, at first sight, a Theseid would have been much more likely to have emanated from an Athenian synod of compilers of ancient song, than an Achilleid or an Olysseid. Could France have given birth to a Tasso, Tancred would have been the hero of the Jerusalem. If, however, the Homeric ballads, as they are sometimes called, which related the wrath of Achilles, with all its direful consequences, were so far superior to the rest of the poetic cycle, as to admit no rivalry,—it is still surprising, that throughout the whole poem the callida junctura should never betray the workmanship of an Athenian hand, and that the national spirit of a race, who have at a later period not inaptly been compared to our self admiring neighbours, the French, should submit with lofty self denial to the almost total exclusion of their own ancestors—or, at least, to the questionable dignity of only having produced a leader tolerably skilled in the military tactics of his age.”



To return to the Wolfian theory. While it is to be confessed, that Wolf’s objections to the primitive integrity of the Iliad and Odyssey have never been wholly got over, we cannot help discovering that they have failed to enlighten us as to any substantial point, and that the difficulties with which the whole subject is beset, are rather augmented than otherwise, if we admit his hypothesis. Nor is Lachmann’s modification of his theory any better. He divides the first twenty-two books of the Iliad into sixteen different songs, and treats as ridiculous the belief that their amalgamation into one regular poem belongs to a period earlier than the age of Peisistratus. This, as Grote observes, “explains the gaps and contradictions in the narrative, but it explains nothing else.” Moreover, we find no contradictions warranting this belief, and the so-called sixteen poets concur in getting rid of the following leading men in the first battle after the secession of Achilles: Elphenor, chief of the Euboeans; Tlepolemus, of the Rhodians; Pandarus, of the Lycians; Odius, of the Halizonians; Pirous and Acamas, of the Thracians. None of these heroes again make their appearance, and we can but agree with Colonel Mure, that “it seems strange that any number of independent poets should have so harmoniously dispensed with the services of all six in the sequel.” The discrepancy, by which Pylaemenes, who is represented as dead in the fifth book, weeps at his son’s funeral in the thirteenth, can only be regarded as the result of an interpolation.

Grote, although not very distinct in stating his own opinions on the subject, has done much to clearly show the incongruity of the Wolfian theory, and of Lachmann’s modifications with the character of Peisistratus. But he has also shown, and we think with equal success, that the two questions relative to the primitive unity of these poems, or, supposing that impossible, the unison of these parts by Peisistratus, and not before his time, are essentially distinct. In short, “a man may believe the Iliad to have been put together out of pre-existing songs, without recognising the age of Peisistratus as the period of its first compilation.” The friends or literary employes of Peisistratus must have found an Iliad that was already ancient, and the silence of the Alexandrine critics respecting the Peisistratic “recension”, goes far to prove, that, among the numerous manuscripts they examined, this was either wanting, or thought unworthy of attention.

“Moreover,” he continues, “the whole tenor of the poems themselves confirms what is here remarked. There is nothing, either in the Iliad or Odyssey, which savours of modernism, applying that term to the age of Peisistratus—nothing which brings to our view the alterations brought about by two centuries, in the Greek language, the coined money, the habits of writing and reading, the despotisms and republican governments, the close military array, the improved construction of ships, the Amphiktyonic convocations, the mutual frequentation of religious festivals, the Oriental and Egyptian veins of religion, &c., familiar to the latter epoch. These alterations Onomakritus, and the other literary friends of Peisistratus, could hardly have failed to notice, even without design, had they then, for the first time, undertaken the task of piecing together many self existent epics into one large aggregate. Everything in the two great Homeric poems, both in substance and in language, belongs to an age two or three centuries earlier than Peisistratus. Indeed, even the interpolations (or those passages which, on the best grounds, are pronounced to be such) betray no trace of the sixth century before Christ, and may well have been heard by Archilochus and Kallinus—in some cases even by Arktinus and Hesiod—as genuine Homeric matter. As far as the evidences on the case, as well internal as external, enable us to judge, we seem warranted in believing that the Iliad and Odyssey were recited substantially as they now stand (always allowing for paitial divergences of text and interpolations) in 776 B.C., our first trustworthy mark of Grecian time; and this ancient date, let it be added, as it is the best-authenticated fact, so it is also the most important attribute of the Homeric poems, considered in reference to Grecian history; for they thus afford us an insight into the anti-historical character of the Greeks, enabling us to trace the subsequent forward march of the nation, and to seize instructive contrasts between their former and their later condition.”

On the whole, I am inclined to believe, that the labours of Peisistratus were wholly of an editorial character, although, I must confess, that I can lay down nothing respecting the extent of his labours. At the same time, so far from believing that the composition or primary arrangement of these poems, in their present form, was the work of Peisistratus, I am rather persuaded that the fine taste and elegant mind of that Athenian would lead him to preserve an ancient and traditional order of the poems, rather than to patch and re-construct them according to a fanciful hypothesis. I will not repeat the many discussions respecting whether the poems were written or not, or whether the art of writing was known in the time of their reputed author. Suffice it to say, that the more we read, the less satisfied we are upon either subject.

I cannot, however, help thinking, that the story which attributes the preservation of these poems to Lycurgus, is little else than a version of the same story as that of Peisistratus, while its historical probability must be measured by that of many others relating to the Spartan Confucius.

I will conclude this sketch of the Homeric theories, with an attempt, made by an ingenious friend, to unite them into something like consistency. It is as follows:—



“No doubt the common soldiers of that age had, like the common sailors of some fifty years ago, some one qualified to ‘discourse in excellent music’ among them. Many of these, like those of the negroes in the United States, were extemporaneous, and allusive to events passing around them. But what was passing around them? The grand events of a spirit-stirring war; occurrences likely to impress themselves, as the mystical legends of former times had done, upon their memory; besides which, a retentive memory was deemed a virtue of the first water, and was cultivated accordingly in those ancient times. Ballads at first, and down to the beginning of the war with Troy, were merely recitations, with an intonation. Then followed a species of recitative, probably with an intoned burden. Tune next followed, as it aided the memory considerably.

“It was at this period, about four hundred years after the war, that a poet flourished of the name of Melesigenes, or Moeonides, but most probably the former. He saw that these ballads might be made of great utility to his purpose of writing a poem on the social position of Hellas, and, as a collection, he published these lays, connecting them by a tale of his own. This poem now exists, under the title of the ‘Odyssea.’ The author, however, did not affix his own name to the poem, which, in fact, was, great part of it, remodelled from the archaic dialect of Crete, in which tongue the ballads were found by him. He therefore called it the poem of Homeros, or the Collector; but this is rather a proof of his modesty and talent, than of his mere drudging arrangement of other people’s ideas; for, as Grote has finely observed, arguing for the unity of authorship, ‘a great poet might have re-cast pre-existing separate songs into one comprehensive whole; but no mere arrangers or compilers would be competent to do so.’

“While employed on the wild legend of Odysseus, he met with a ballad, recording the quarrel of Achilles and Agamemnon. His noble mind seized the hint that there presented itself, and the Achilleis grew under his hand. Unity of design, however, caused him to publish the poem under the same pseudonyme as his former work: and the disjointed lays of the ancient bards were joined together, like those relating to the Cid, into a chronicle history, named the Iliad. Melesigenes knew that the poem was destined to be a lasting one, and so it has proved; but, first, the poems were destined to undergo many vicissitudes and corruptions, by the people who took to singing them in the streets, assemblies, and agoras. However, Solon first, and then Peisistratus, and afterwards Aristoteles and others, revised the poems, and restored the works of Melesigenes Homeros to their original integrity in a great measure.”



Having thus given some general notion of the strange theories which have developed themselves respecting this most interesting subject, I must still express my conviction as to the unity of the authorship of the Homeric poems. To deny that many corruptions and interpolations disfigure them, and that the intrusive hand of the poetasters may here and there have inflicted a wound more serious than the negligence of the copyist, would be an absurd and captious assumption, but it is to a higher criticism that we must appeal, if we would either understand or enjoy these poems. In maintaining the authenticity and personality of their one author, be he Homer or Melesigenes, quocunque nomine vocari eum jus fasque sit, I feel conscious that, while the whole weight of historical evidence is against the hypothesis which would assign these great works to a plurality of authors, the most powerful internal evidence, and that which springs from the deepest and most immediate impulse of the soul, also speaks eloquently to the contrary.

The minutiae of verbal criticism I am far from seeking to despise. Indeed, considering the character of some of my own books, such an attempt would be gross inconsistency. But, while I appreciate its importance in a philological view, I am inclined to set little store on its aesthetic value, especially in poetry. Three parts of the emendations made upon poets are mere alterations, some of which, had they been suggested to the author by his Maecenas or Africanus, he would probably have adopted. Moreover, those who are most exact in laying down rules of verbal criticism and interpretation, are often least competent to carry out their own precepts. Grammarians are not poets by profession, but may be so per accidens. I do not at this moment remember two emendations on Homer, calculated to substantially improve the poetry of a passage, although a mass of remarks, from Herodotus down to Loewe, have given us the history of a thousand minute points, without which our Greek knowledge would be gloomy and jejune.

But it is not on words only that grammarians, mere grammarians, will exercise their elaborate and often tiresome ingenuity. Binding down an heroic or dramatic poet to the block upon which they have previously dissected his words and sentences, they proceed to use the axe and the pruning knife by wholesale, and inconsistent in everything but their wish to make out a case of unlawful affiliation, they cut out book after book, passage after passage, till the author is reduced to a collection of fragments, or till those, who fancied they possessed the works of some great man, find that they have been put off with a vile counterfeit got up at second hand. If we compare the theories of Knight, Wolf, Lachmann, and others, we shall feel better satisfied of the utter uncertainty of criticism than of the apocryphal position of Homer. One rejects what another considers the turning-point of his theory. One cuts a supposed knot by expunging what another would explain by omitting something else.

Nor is this morbid species of sagacity by any means to be looked upon as a literary novelty. Justus Lipsius, a scholar of no ordinary skill, seems to revel in the imaginary discovery, that the tragedies attributed to Seneca are by four different authors. Now, I will venture to assert, that these tragedies are so uniform, not only in their borrowed phraseology—a phraseology with which writers like Boethius and Saxo Grammaticus were more charmed than ourselves—in their freedom from real poetry, and last, but not least, in an ultra-refined and consistent abandonment of good taste, that few writers of the present day would question the capabilities of the same gentleman, be he Seneca or not, to produce not only these, but a great many more equally bad. With equal sagacity, Father Hardouin astonished the world with the startling announcement that the Æneid of Virgil, and the satires of Horace, were literary deceptions. Now, without wishing to say one word of disrespect against the industry and learning—nay, the refined acuteness—which scholars, like Wolf, have bestowed upon this subject, I must express my fears, that many of our modern Homeric theories will become matter for the surprise and entertainment, rather than the instruction, of posterity. Nor can I help thinking, that the literary history of more recent times will account for many points of difficulty in the transmission of the Iliad and Odyssey to a period so remote from that of their first creation.

I have already expressed my belief that the labours of Peisistratus were of a purely editorial character; and there seems no more reason why corrupt and imperfect editions of Homer may not have been abroad in his day, than that the poems of Valerius Flaccus and Tibullus should have given so much trouble to Poggio, Scaliger, and others. But, after all, the main fault in all the Homeric theories is, that they demand too great a sacrifice of those feelings to which poetry most powerfully appeals, and which are its most fitting judges. The ingenuity which has sought to rob us of the name and existence of Homer, does too much violence to that inward emotion, which makes our whole soul yearn with love and admiration for the blind bard of Chios. To believe the author of the Iliad a mere compiler, is to degrade the powers of human invention; to elevate analytical judgment at the expense of the most ennobling impulses of the soul; and to forget the ocean in the contemplation of a polypus. There is a catholicity, so to speak, in the very name of Homer. Our faith in the author of the Iliad may be a mistaken one, but as yet nobody has taught us a better.

While, however, I look upon the belief in Homer as one that has nature herself for its mainspring; while I can join with old Ennius in believing in Homer as the ghost, who, like some patron saint, hovers round the bed of the poet, and even bestows rare gifts from that wealth of imagination which a host of imitators could not exhaust,—still I am far from wishing to deny that the author of these great poems found a rich fund of tradition, a well-stocked mythical storehouse from whence he might derive both subject and embellishment. But it is one thing to use existing romances in the embellishment of a poem, another to patch up the poem itself from such materials. What consistency of style and execution can be hoped for from such an attempt? or, rather, what bad taste and tedium will not be the infallible result?

A blending of popular legends, and a free use of the songs of other bards, are features perfectly consistent with poetical originality. In fact, the most original writer is still drawing upon outward impressions—nay, even his own thoughts are a kind of secondary agents which support and feed the impulses of imagination. But unless there be some grand pervading principle—some invisible, yet most distinctly stamped archetypus of the great whole, a poem like the Iliad can never come to the birth. Traditions the most picturesque, episodes the most pathetic, local associations teeming with the thoughts of gods and great men, may crowd in one mighty vision, or reveal themselves in more substantial forms to the mind of the poet; but, except the power to create a grand whole, to which these shall be but as details and embellishments, be present, we shall have nought but a scrap-book, a parterre filled with flowers and weeds strangling each other in their wild redundancy: we shall have a cento of rags and tatters, which will require little acuteness to detect.

Sensible as I am of the difficulty of disproving a negative, and aware as I must be of the weighty grounds there are for opposing my belief, it still seems to me that the Homeric question is one that is reserved for a higher criticism than it has often obtained. We are not by nature intended to know all things; still less, to compass the powers by which the greatest blessings of life have been placed at our disposal. Were faith no virtue, then we might indeed wonder why God willed our ignorance on any matter. But we are too well taught the contrary lesson; and it seems as though our faith should be especially tried touching the men and the events which have wrought most influence upon the condition of humanity. And there is a kind of sacredness attached to the memory of the great and the good, which seems to bid us repulse the scepticism which would allegorize their existence into a pleasing apologue, and measure the giants of intellect by an homeopathic dynameter.

Long and habitual reading of Homer appears to familiarize our thoughts even to his incongruities; or rather, if we read in a right spirit and with a heartfelt appreciation, we are too much dazzled, too deeply wrapped in admiration of the whole, to dwell upon the minute spots which mere analysis can discover. In reading an heroic poem we must transform ourselves into heroes of the time being, we in imagination must fight over the same battles, woo the same loves, burn with the same sense of injury, as an Achilles or a Hector. And if we can but attain this degree of enthusiasm (and less enthusiasm will scarcely suffice for the reading of Homer), we shall feel that the poems of Homer are not only the work of one writer, but of the greatest writer that ever touched the hearts of men by the power of song.

And it was this supposed unity of authorship which gave these poems their powerful influence over the minds of the men of old. Heeren, who is evidently little disposed in favour of modern theories, finely observes:—



“It was Homer who formed the character of the Greek nation. No poet has ever, as a poet, exercised a similar influence over his countrymen. Prophets, lawgivers, and sages have formed the character of other nations; it was reserved to a poet to form that of the Greeks. This is a feature in their character which was not wholly erased even in the period of their degeneracy. When lawgivers and sages appeared in Greece, the work of the poet had already been accomplished; and they paid homage to his superior genius. He held up before his nation the mirror, in which they were to behold the world of gods and heroes no less than of feeble mortals, and to behold them reflected with purity and truth. His poems are founded on the first feeling of human nature; on the love of children, wife, and country; on that passion which outweighs all others, the love of glory. His songs were poured forth from a breast which sympathized with all the feelings of man; and therefore they enter, and will continue to enter, every breast which cherishes the same sympathies. If it is granted to his immortal spirit, from another heaven than any of which he dreamed on earth, to look down on his race, to see the nations from the fields of Asia to the forests of Hercynia, performing pilgrimages to the fountain which his magic wand caused to flow; if it is permitted to him to view the vast assemblage of grand, of elevated, of glorious productions, which had been called into being by means of his songs; wherever his immortal spirit may reside, this alone would suffice to complete his happiness.”



Can we contemplate that ancient monument, on which the “Apotheosis of Homer” is depictured, and not feel how much of pleasing association, how much that appeals most forcibly and most distinctly to our minds, is lost by the admittance of any theory but our old tradition? The more we read, and the more we think—think as becomes the readers of Homer,—the more rooted becomes the conviction that the Father of Poetry gave us this rich inheritance, whole and entire. Whatever were the means of its preservation, let us rather be thankful for the treasury of taste and eloquence thus laid open to our use, than seek to make it a mere centre around which to drive a series of theories, whose wildness is only equalled by their inconsistency with each other.

As the hymns, and some other poems usually ascribed to Homer, are not included in Pope’s translation, I will content myself with a brief account of the Battle of the Frogs and Mice, from the pen of a writer who has done it full justice:—



“This poem,” says Coleridge, “is a short mock-heroic of ancient date. The text varies in different editions, and is obviously disturbed and corrupt to a great degree; it is commonly said to have been a juvenile essay of Homer’s genius; others have attributed it to the same Pigrees, mentioned above, and whose reputation for humour seems to have invited the appropriation of any piece of ancient wit, the author of which was uncertain; so little did the Greeks, before the age of the Ptolemies, know or care about that department of criticism employed in determining the genuineness of ancient writings. As to this little poem being a youthful prolusion of Homer, it seems sufficient to say that from the beginning to the end it is a plain and palpable parody, not only of the general spirit, but of the numerous passages of the Iliad itself; and even, if no such intention to parody were discernible in it, the objection would still remain, that to suppose a work of mere burlesque to be the primary effort of poetry in a simple age, seems to reverse that order in the development of national taste, which the history of every other people in Europe, and of many in Asia, has almost ascertained to be a law of the human mind; it is in a state of society much more refined and permanent than that described in the Iliad, that any popularity would attend such a ridicule of war and the gods as is contained in this poem; and the fact of there having existed three other poems of the same kind attributed, for aught we can see, with as much reason to Homer, is a strong inducement to believe that none of them were of the Homeric age. Knight infers from the usage of the word deltos, “writing tablet,” instead of diphthera, “skin,” which, according to Herod. 5, 58, was the material employed by the Asiatic Greeks for that purpose, that this poem was another offspring of Attic ingenuity; and generally that the familiar mention of the cock (v. 191) is a strong argument against so ancient a date for its composition.”



Having thus given a brief account of the poems comprised in Pope’s design, I will now proceed to make a few remarks on his translation, and on my own purpose in the present edition.

Pope was not a Grecian. His whole education had been irregular, and his earliest acquaintance with the poet was through the version of Ogilby. It is not too much to say that his whole work bears the impress of a disposition to be satisfied with the general sense, rather than to dive deeply into the minute and delicate features of language. Hence his whole work is to be looked upon rather as an elegant paraphrase than a translation. There are, to be sure, certain conventional anecdotes, which prove that Pope consulted various friends, whose classical attainments were sounder than his own, during the undertaking; but it is probable that these examinations were the result rather of the contradictory versions already existing, than of a desire to make a perfect transcript of the original. And in those days, what is called literal translation was less cultivated than at present. If something like the general sense could be decorated with the easy gracefulness of a practised poet; if the charms of metrical cadence and a pleasing fluency could be made consistent with a fair interpretation of the poet’s meaning, his words were less jealously sought for, and those who could read so good a poem as Pope’s Iliad had fair reason to be satisfied.

It would be absurd, therefore, to test Pope’s translation by our own advancing knowledge of the original text. We must be content to look at it as a most delightful work in itself,—a work which is as much a part of English literature as Homer himself is of Greek. We must not be torn from our kindly associations with the old Iliad, that once was our most cherished companion, or our most looked-for prize, merely because Buttmann, Loewe, and Liddell have made us so much more accurate as to amphikupellon being an adjective, and not a substantive. Far be it from us to defend the faults of Pope, especially when we think of Chapman’s fine, bold, rough old English;—far be it from, us to hold up his translation as what a translation of Homer might be. But we can still dismiss Pope’s Iliad to the hands of our readers, with the consciousness that they must have read a very great number of books before they have read its fellow.

As to the Notes accompanying the present volume, they are drawn up without pretension, and mainly with the view of helping the general reader. Having some little time since translated all the works of Homer for another publisher, I might have brought a large amount of accumulated matter, sometimes of a critical character, to bear upon the text. But Pope’s version was no field for such a display; and my purpose was to touch briefly on antiquarian or mythological allusions, to notice occasionally some departures from the original, and to give a few parallel passages from our English Homer, Milton. In the latter task I cannot pretend to novelty, but I trust that my other annotations, while utterly disclaiming high scholastic views, will be found to convey as much as is wanted; at least, as far as the necessary limits of these volumes could be expected to admit. To write a commentary on Homer is not my present aim; but if I have made Pope’s translation a little more entertaining and instructive to a mass of miscellaneous readers, I shall consider my wishes satisfactorily accomplished.

THEODORE ALOIS BUCKLEY.



Christ Church.




POPE’S PREFACE TO THE ILIAD OF HOMER (#ulink_e81f698f-8a8b-5206-a2b2-7c623c125558)


Homer is universally allowed to have had the greatest invention of any writer whatever. The praise of judgment Virgil has justly contested with him, and others may have their pretensions as to particular excellences; but his invention remains yet unrivalled. Nor is it a wonder if he has ever been acknowledged the greatest of poets, who most excelled in that which is the very foundation of poetry. It is the invention that, in different degrees, distinguishes all great geniuses: the utmost stretch of human study, learning, and industry, which masters everything besides, can never attain to this. It furnishes art with all her materials, and without it judgment itself can at best but “steal wisely”: for art is only like a prudent steward that lives on managing the riches of nature. Whatever praises may be given to works of judgment, there is not even a single beauty in them to which the invention must not contribute: as in the most regular gardens, art can only reduce beauties of nature to more regularity, and such a figure, which the common eye may better take in, and is, therefore, more entertained with. And, perhaps, the reason why common critics are inclined to prefer a judicious and methodical genius to a great and fruitful one, is, because they find it easier for themselves to pursue their observations through a uniform and bounded walk of art, than to comprehend the vast and various extent of nature.

Our author’s work is a wild paradise, where, if we cannot see all the beauties so distinctly as in an ordered garden, it is only because the number of them is infinitely greater. It is like a copious nursery, which contains the seeds and first productions of every kind, out of which those who followed him have but selected some particular plants, each according to his fancy, to cultivate and beautify. If some things are too luxuriant it is owing to the richness of the soil; and if others are not arrived to perfection or maturity, it is only because they are overrun and oppressed by those of a stronger nature.

It is to the strength of this amazing invention we are to attribute that unequalled fire and rapture which is so forcible in Homer, that no man of a true poetical spirit is master of himself while he reads him. What he writes is of the most animated nature imaginable; every thing moves, every thing lives, and is put in action. If a council be called, or a battle fought, you are not coldly informed of what was said or done as from a third person; the reader is hurried out of himself by the force of the poet’s imagination, and turns in one place to a hearer, in another to a spectator. The course of his verses resembles that of the army he describes,

Hoid’ ar’ isan hosei te puri chthon pasa nemoito.

“They pour along like a fire that sweeps the whole earth before it.” It is, however, remarkable, that his fancy, which is everywhere vigorous, is not discovered immediately at the beginning of his poem in its fullest splendour: it grows in the progress both upon himself and others, and becomes on fire, like a chariot-wheel, by its own rapidity. Exact disposition, just thought, correct elocution, polished numbers, may have been found in a thousand; but this poetic fire, this “vivida vis animi,” in a very few. Even in works where all those are imperfect or neglected, this can overpower criticism, and make us admire even while we disapprove. Nay, where this appears, though attended with absurdities, it brightens all the rubbish about it, till we see nothing but its own splendour. This fire is discerned in Virgil, but discerned as through a glass, reflected from Homer, more shining than fierce, but everywhere equal and constant: in Lucan and Statius it bursts out in sudden, short, and interrupted flashes: In Milton it glows like a furnace kept up to an uncommon ardour by the force of art: in Shakspeare it strikes before we are aware, like an accidental fire from heaven: but in Homer, and in him only, it burns everywhere clearly and everywhere irresistibly.

I shall here endeavour to show how this vast invention exerts itself in a manner superior to that of any poet through all the main constituent parts of his work: as it is the great and peculiar characteristic which distinguishes him from all other authors.

This strong and ruling faculty was like a powerful star, which, in the violence of its course, drew all things within its vortex. It seemed not enough to have taken in the whole circle of arts, and the whole compass of nature, to supply his maxims and reflections; all the inward passions and affections of mankind, to furnish his characters: and all the outward forms and images of things for his descriptions: but wanting yet an ampler sphere to expatiate in, he opened a new and boundless walk for his imagination, and created a world for himself in the invention of fable. That which Aristotle calls “the soul of poetry”, was first breathed into it by Homer, I shall begin with considering him in his part, as it is naturally the first; and I speak of it both as it means the design of a poem, and as it is taken for fiction.

Fable may be divided into the probable, the allegorical, and the marvellous. The probable fable is the recital of such actions as, though they did not happen, yet might, in the common course of nature; or of such as, though they did, became fables by the additional episodes and manner of telling them. Of this sort is the main story of an epic poem, “The return of Ulysses, the settlement of the Trojans in Italy”, or the like. That of the Iliad is the “anger of Achilles”, the most short and single subject that ever was chosen by any poet. Yet this he has supplied with a vaster variety of incidents and events, and crowded with a greater number of councils, speeches, battles, and episodes of all kinds, than are to be found even in those poems whose schemes are of the utmost latitude and irregularity. The action is hurried on with the most vehement spirit, and its whole duration employs not so much as fifty days. Virgil, for want of so warm a genius, aided himself by taking in a more extensive subject, as well as a greater length of time, and contracting the design of both Homer’s poems into one, which is yet but a fourth part as large as his. The other epic poets have used the same practice, but generally carried it so far as to superinduce a multiplicity of fables, destroy the unity of action, and lose their readers in an unreasonable length of time. Nor is it only in the main design that they have been unable to add to his invention, but they have followed him in every episode and part of story. If he has given a regular catalogue of an army, they all draw up their forces in the same order. If he has funeral games for Patroclus, Virgil has the same for Anchises, and Statius (rather than omit them) destroys the unity of his actions for those of Archemorus. If Ulysses visit the shades, the Æneas of Virgil and Scipio of Silius are sent after him. If he be detained from his return by the allurements of Calypso, so is Æneas by Dido, and Rinaldo by Armida. If Achilles be absent from the army on the score of a quarrel through half the poem, Rinaldo must absent himself just as long on the like account. If he gives his hero a suit of celestial armour, Virgil and Tasso make the same present to theirs. Virgil has not only observed this close imitation of Homer, but, where he had not led the way, supplied the want from other Greek authors. Thus the story of Sinon, and the taking of Troy, was copied (says Macrobius) almost word for word from Pisander, as the loves of Dido and Æneas are taken from those of Medea and Jason in Apollonius, and several others in the same manner.

To proceed to the allegorical fable—If we reflect upon those innumerable knowledges, those secrets of nature and physical philosophy which Homer is generally supposed to have wrapped up in his allegories, what a new and ample scene of wonder may this consideration afford us! How fertile will that imagination appear, which as able to clothe all the properties of elements, the qualifications of the mind, the virtues and vices, in forms and persons, and to introduce them into actions agreeable to the nature of the things they shadowed! This is a field in which no succeeding poets could dispute with Homer, and whatever commendations have been allowed them on this head, are by no means for their invention in having enlarged his circle, but for their judgment in having contracted it. For when the mode of learning changed in the following ages, and science was delivered in a plainer manner, it then became as reasonable in the more modern poets to lay it aside, as it was in Homer to make use of it. And perhaps it was no unhappy circumstance for Virgil, that there was not in his time that demand upon him of so great an invention as might be capable of furnishing all those allegorical parts of a poem.

The marvellous fable includes whatever is supernatural, and especially the machines of the gods. If Homer was not the first who introduced the deities (as Herodotus imagines) into the religion of Greece, he seems the first who brought them into a system of machinery for poetry, and such a one as makes its greatest importance and dignity: for we find those authors who have been offended at the literal notion of the gods, constantly laying their accusation against Homer as the chief support of it. But whatever cause there might be to blame his machines in a philosophical or religious view, they are so perfect in the poetic, that mankind have been ever since contented to follow them: none have been able to enlarge the sphere of poetry beyond the limits he has set: every attempt of this nature has proved unsuccessful; and after all the various changes of times and religions, his gods continue to this day the gods of poetry.

We come now to the characters of his persons; and here we shall find no author has ever drawn so many, with so visible and surprising a variety, or given us such lively and affecting impressions of them. Every one has something so singularly his own, that no painter could have distinguished them more by their features, than the poet has by their manners. Nothing can be more exact than the distinctions he has observed in the different degrees of virtues and vices. The single quality of courage is wonderfully diversified in the several characters of the Iliad. That of Achilles is furious and intractable; that of Diomede forward, yet listening to advice, and subject to command; that of Ajax is heavy and self-confiding; of Hector, active and vigilant: the courage of Agamemnon is inspirited by love of empire and ambition; that of Menelaus mixed with softness and tenderness for his people: we find in Idomeneus a plain direct soldier; in Sarpedon a gallant and generous one. Nor is this judicious and astonishing diversity to be found only in the principal quality which constitutes the main of each character, but even in the under parts of it, to which he takes care to give a tincture of that principal one. For example: the main characters of Ulysses and Nestor consist in wisdom; and they are distinct in this, that the wisdom of one is artificial and various, of the other natural, open, and regular. But they have, besides, characters of courage; and this quality also takes a different turn in each from the difference of his prudence; for one in the war depends still upon caution, the other upon experience. It would be endless to produce instances of these kinds. The characters of Virgil are far from striking us in this open manner; they lie, in a great degree, hidden and undistinguished; and, where they are marked most evidently affect us not in proportion to those of Homer. His characters of valour are much alike; even that of Turnus seems no way peculiar, but, as it is, in a superior degree; and we see nothing that differences the courage of Mnestheus from that of Sergestus, Cloanthus, or the rest. In like manner it may be remarked of Statius’s heroes, that an air of impetuosity runs through them all; the same horrid and savage courage appears in his Capaneus, Tydeus, Hippomedon, &c. They have a parity of character, which makes them seem brothers of one family. I believe when the reader is led into this tract of reflection, if he will pursue it through the epic and tragic writers, he will be convinced how infinitely superior, in this point, the invention of Homer was to that of all others.

The speeches are to be considered as they flow from the characters; being perfect or defective as they agree or disagree with the manners, of those who utter them. As there is more variety of characters in the Iliad, so there is of speeches, than in any other poem. “Everything in it has manner” (as Aristotle expresses it), that is, everything is acted or spoken. It is hardly credible, in a work of such length, how small a number of lines are employed in narration. In Virgil the dramatic part is less in proportion to the narrative, and the speeches often consist of general reflections or thoughts, which might be equally just in any person’s mouth upon the same occasion. As many of his persons have no apparent characters, so many of his speeches escape being applied and judged by the rule of propriety. We oftener think of the author himself when we read Virgil, than when we are engaged in Homer, all which are the effects of a colder invention, that interests us less in the action described. Homer makes us hearers, and Virgil leaves us readers.

If, in the next place, we take a view of the sentiments, the same presiding faculty is eminent in the sublimity and spirit of his thoughts. Longinus has given his opinion, that it was in this part Homer principally excelled. What were alone sufficient to prove the grandeur and excellence of his sentiments in general, is, that they have so remarkable a parity with those of the Scripture. Duport, in his Gnomologia Homerica, has collected innumerable instances of this sort. And it is with justice an excellent modern writer allows, that if Virgil has not so many thoughts that are low and vulgar, he has not so many that are sublime and noble; and that the Roman author seldom rises into very astonishing sentiments where he is not fired by the Iliad.

If we observe his descriptions, images, and similes, we shall find the invention still predominant. To what else can we ascribe that vast comprehension of images of every sort, where we see each circumstance of art, and individual of nature, summoned together by the extent and fecundity of his imagination to which all things, in their various views presented themselves in an instant, and had their impressions taken off to perfection at a heat? Nay, he not only gives us the full prospects of things, but several unexpected peculiarities and side views, unobserved by any painter but Homer. Nothing is so surprising as the descriptions of his battles, which take up no less than half the Iliad, and are supplied with so vast a variety of incidents, that no one bears a likeness to another; such different kinds of deaths, that no two heroes are wounded in the same manner, and such a profusion of noble ideas, that every battle rises above the last in greatness, horror, and confusion. It is certain there is not near that number of images and descriptions in any epic poet, though every one has assisted himself with a great quantity out of him; and it is evident of Virgil especially, that he has scarce any comparisons which are not drawn from his master.

If we descend from hence to the expression, we see the bright imagination of Homer shining out in the most enlivened forms of it. We acknowledge him the father of poetical diction; the first who taught that “language of the gods” to men. His expression is like the colouring of some great masters, which discovers itself to be laid on boldly, and executed with rapidity. It is, indeed, the strongest and most glowing imaginable, and touched with the greatest spirit. Aristotle had reason to say, he was the only poet who had found out “living words”; there are in him more daring figures and metaphors than in any good author whatever. An arrow is “impatient” to be on the wing, a weapon “thirsts” to drink the blood of an enemy, and the like, yet his expression is never too big for the sense, but justly great in proportion to it. It is the sentiment that swells and fills out the diction, which rises with it, and forms itself about it, for in the same degree that a thought is warmer, an expression will be brighter, as that is more strong, this will become more perspicuous; like glass in the furnace, which grows to a greater magnitude, and refines to a greater clearness, only as the breath within is more powerful, and the heat more intense.

To throw his language more out of prose, Homer seems to have affected the compound epithets. This was a sort of composition peculiarly proper to poetry, not only as it heightened the diction, but as it assisted and filled the numbers with greater sound and pomp, and likewise conduced in some measure to thicken the images. On this last consideration I cannot but attribute these also to the fruitfulness of his invention, since (as he has managed them) they are a sort of supernumerary pictures of the persons or things to which they were joined. We see the motion of Hector’s plumes in the epithet Korythaiolos, the landscape of Mount Neritus in that of Einosiphyllos, and so of others, which particular images could not have been insisted upon so long as to express them in a description (though but of a single line) without diverting the reader too much from the principal action or figure. As a metaphor is a short simile, one of these epithets is a short description.

Lastly, if we consider his versification, we shall be sensible what a share of praise is due to his invention in that also. He was not satisfied with his language as he found it settled in any one part of Greece, but searched through its different dialects with this particular view, to beautify and perfect his numbers he considered these as they had a greater mixture of vowels or consonants, and accordingly employed them as the verse required either a greater smoothness or strength. What he most affected was the Ionic, which has a peculiar sweetness, from its never using contractions, and from its custom of resolving the diphthongs into two syllables, so as to make the words open themselves with a more spreading and sonorous fluency. With this he mingled the Attic contractions, the broader Doric, and the feebler Æolic, which often rejects its aspirate, or takes off its accent, and completed this variety by altering some letters with the licence of poetry. Thus his measures, instead of being fetters to his sense, were always in readiness to run along with the warmth of his rapture, and even to give a further representation of his notions, in the correspondence of their sounds to what they signified. Out of all these he has derived that harmony which makes us confess he had not only the richest head, but the finest ear in the world. This is so great a truth, that whoever will but consult the tune of his verses, even without understanding them (with the same sort of diligence as we daily see practised in the case of Italian operas), will find more sweetness, variety, and majesty of sound, than in any other language of poetry. The beauty of his numbers is allowed by the critics to be copied but faintly by Virgil himself, though they are so just as to ascribe it to the nature of the Latin tongue: indeed the Greek has some advantages both from the natural sound of its words, and the turn and cadence of its verse, which agree with the genius of no other language. Virgil was very sensible of this, and used the utmost diligence in working up a more intractable language to whatsoever graces it was capable of, and, in particular, never failed to bring the sound of his line to a beautiful agreement with its sense. If the Grecian poet has not been so frequently celebrated on this account as the Roman, the only reason is, that fewer critics have understood one language than the other. Dionysius of Halicarnassus has pointed out many of our author’s beauties in this kind, in his treatise of the Composition of Words. It suffices at present to observe of his numbers, that they flow with so much ease, as to make one imagine Homer had no other care than to transcribe as fast as the Muses dictated, and, at the same time, with so much force and inspiriting vigour, that they awaken and raise us like the sound of a trumpet. They roll along as a plentiful river, always in motion, and always full; while we are borne away by a tide of verse, the most rapid, and yet the most smooth imaginable.

Thus on whatever side we contemplate Homer, what principally strikes us is his invention. It is that which forms the character of each part of his work; and accordingly we find it to have made his fable more extensive and copious than any other, his manners more lively and strongly marked, his speeches more affecting and transported, his sentiments more warm and sublime, his images and descriptions more full and animated, his expression more raised and daring, and his numbers more rapid and various. I hope, in what has been said of Virgil, with regard to any of these heads, I have no way derogated from his character. Nothing is more absurd or endless, than the common method of comparing eminent writers by an opposition of particular passages in them, and forming a judgment from thence of their merit upon the whole. We ought to have a certain knowledge of the principal character and distinguishing excellence of each: it is in that we are to consider him, and in proportion to his degree in that we are to admire him. No author or man ever excelled all the world in more than one faculty; and as Homer has done this in invention, Virgil has in judgment. Not that we are to think that Homer wanted judgment, because Virgil had it in a more eminent degree; or that Virgil wanted invention, because Homer possessed a larger share of it; each of these great authors had more of both than perhaps any man besides, and are only said to have less in comparison with one another. Homer was the greater genius, Virgil the better artist. In one we most admire the man, in the other the work. Homer hurries and transports us with a commanding impetuosity; Virgil leads us with an attractive majesty; Homer scatters with a generous profusion; Virgil bestows with a careful magnificence; Homer, like the Nile, pours out his riches with a boundless overflow; Virgil, like a river in its banks, with a gentle and constant stream. When we behold their battles, methinks the two poets resemble the heroes they celebrate. Homer, boundless and resistless as Achilles, bears all before him, and shines more and more as the tumult increases; Virgil, calmly daring, like Æneas, appears undisturbed in the midst of the action; disposes all about him, and conquers with tranquillity. And when we look upon their machines, Homer seems like his own Jupiter in his terrors, shaking Olympus, scattering the lightnings, and firing the heavens: Virgil, like the same power in his benevolence, counselling with the gods, laying plans for empires, and regularly ordering his whole creation.

But after all, it is with great parts, as with great virtues, they naturally border on some imperfection; and it is often hard to distinguish exactly where the virtue ends, or the fault begins. As prudence may sometimes sink to suspicion, so may a great judgment decline to coldness; and as magnanimity may run up to profusion or extravagance, so may a great invention to redundancy or wildness. If we look upon Homer in this view, we shall perceive the chief objections against him to proceed from so noble a cause as the excess of this faculty.

Among these we may reckon some of his marvellous fictions, upon which so much criticism has been spent, as surpassing all the bounds of probability. Perhaps it may be with great and superior souls, as with gigantic bodies, which, exerting themselves with unusual strength, exceed what is commonly thought the due proportion of parts, to become miracles in the whole; and, like the old heroes of that make, commit something near extravagance, amidst a series of glorious and inimitable performances. Thus Homer has his “speaking horses”; and Virgil his “myrtles distilling blood”; where the latter has not so much as contrived the easy intervention of a deity to save the probability.

It is owing to the same vast invention, that his similes have been thought too exuberant and full of circumstances. The force of this faculty is seen in nothing more, than in its inability to confine itself to that single circumstance upon which the comparison is grounded: it runs out into embellishments of additional images, which, however, are so managed as not to overpower the main one. His similes are like pictures, where the principal figure has not only its proportion given agreeable to the original, but is also set off with occasional ornaments and prospects. The same will account for his manner of heaping a number of comparisons together in one breath, when his fancy suggested to him at once so many various and correspondent images. The reader will easily extend this observation to more objections of the same kind.

If there are others which seem rather to charge him with a defect or narrowness of genius, than an excess of it, those seeming defects will be found upon examination to proceed wholly from the nature of the times he lived in. Such are his grosser representations of the gods; and the vicious and imperfect manners of his heroes; but I must here speak a word of the latter, as it is a point generally carried into extremes, both by the censurers and defenders of Homer. It must be a strange partiality to antiquity, to think with Madame Dacier, “that those times and manners are so much the more excellent, as they are more contrary to ours.” Who can be so prejudiced in their favour as to magnify the felicity of those ages, when a spirit of revenge and cruelty, joined with the practice of rapine and robbery, reigned through the world: when no mercy was shown but for the sake of lucre; when the greatest princes were put to the sword, and their wives and daughters made slaves and concubines? On the other side, I would not be so delicate as those modern critics, who are shocked at the servile offices and mean employments in which we sometimes see the heroes of Homer engaged. There is a pleasure in taking a view of that simplicity, in opposition to the luxury of succeeding ages: in beholding monarchs without their guards; princes tending their flocks, and princesses drawing water from the springs. When we read Homer, we ought to reflect that we are reading the most ancient author in the heathen world; and those who consider him in this light, will double their pleasure in the perusal of him. Let them think they are growing acquainted with nations and people that are now no more; that they are stepping almost three thousand years back into the remotest antiquity, and entertaining themselves with a clear and surprising vision of things nowhere else to be found, the only true mirror of that ancient world. By this means alone their greatest obstacles will vanish; and what usually creates their dislike, will become a satisfaction.

This consideration may further serve to answer for the constant use of the same epithets to his gods and heroes; such as the “far-darting Phoebus,” the “blue-eyed Pallas,” the “swift-footed Achilles,” &c., which some have censured as impertinent, and tediously repeated. Those of the gods depended upon the powers and offices then believed to belong to them; and had contracted a weight and veneration from the rites and solemn devotions in which they were used: they were a sort of attributes with which it was a matter of religion to salute them on all occasions, and which it was an irreverence to omit. As for the epithets of great men, Mons. Boileau is of opinion, that they were in the nature of surnames, and repeated as such; for the Greeks having no names derived from their fathers, were obliged to add some other distinction of each person; either naming his parents expressly, or his place of birth, profession, or the like: as Alexander the son of Philip, Herodotus of Halicarnassus, Diogenes the Cynic, &c. Homer, therefore, complying with the custom of his country, used such distinctive additions as better agreed with poetry. And, indeed, we have something parallel to these in modern times, such as the names of Harold Harefoot, Edmund Ironside, Edward Longshanks, Edward the Black Prince, &c. If yet this be thought to account better for the propriety than for the repetition, I shall add a further conjecture. Hesiod, dividing the world into its different ages, has placed a fourth age, between the brazen and the iron one, of “heroes distinct from other men; a divine race who fought at Thebes and Troy, are called demi-gods, and live by the care of Jupiter in the islands of the blessed.” Now among the divine honours which were paid them, they might have this also in common with the gods, not to be mentioned without the solemnity of an epithet, and such as might be acceptable to them by celebrating their families, actions or qualities.

What other cavils have been raised against Homer, are such as hardly deserve a reply, but will yet be taken notice of as they occur in the course of the work. Many have been occasioned by an injudicious endeavour to exalt Virgil; which is much the same, as if one should think to raise the superstructure by undermining the foundation: one would imagine, by the whole course of their parallels, that these critics never so much as heard of Homer’s having written first; a consideration which whoever compares these two poets ought to have always in his eye. Some accuse him for the same things which they overlook or praise in the other; as when they prefer the fable and moral of the Æneis to those of the Iliad, for the same reasons which might set the Odyssey above the Æneis; as that the hero is a wiser man, and the action of the one more beneficial to his country than that of the other; or else they blame him for not doing what he never designed; as because Achilles is not as good and perfect a prince as Æneas, when the very moral of his poem required a contrary character: it is thus that Rapin judges in his comparison of Homer and Virgil. Others select those particular passages of Homer which are not so laboured as some that Virgil drew out of them: this is the whole management of Scaliger in his Poetics. Others quarrel with what they take for low and mean expressions, sometimes through a false delicacy and refinement, oftener from an ignorance of the graces of the original, and then triumph in the awkwardness of their own translations: this is the conduct of Perrault in his Parallels. Lastly, there are others, who, pretending to a fairer proceeding, distinguish between the personal merit of Homer, and that of his work; but when they come to assign the causes of the great reputation of the Iliad, they found it upon the ignorance of his times, and the prejudice of those that followed: and in pursuance of this principle, they make those accidents (such as the contention of the cities, &c.) to be the causes of his fame, which were in reality the consequences of his merit. The same might as well be said of Virgil, or any great author whose general character will infallibly raise many casual additions to their reputation. This is the method of Mons. de la Mott; who yet confesses upon the whole that in whatever age Homer had lived, he must have been the greatest poet of his nation, and that he may be said in his sense to be the master even of those who surpassed him.

In all these objections we see nothing that contradicts his title to the honour of the chief invention: and as long as this (which is indeed the characteristic of poetry itself) remains unequalled by his followers, he still continues superior to them. A cooler judgment may commit fewer faults, and be more approved in the eyes of one sort of critics: but that warmth of fancy will carry the loudest and most universal applauses which holds the heart of a reader under the strongest enchantment. Homer not only appears the inventor of poetry, but excels all the inventors of other arts, in this, that he has swallowed up the honour of those who succeeded him. What he has done admitted no increase, it only left room for contraction or regulation. He showed all the stretch of fancy at once; and if he has failed in some of his flights, it was but because he attempted everything. A work of this kind seems like a mighty tree, which rises from the most vigorous seed, is improved with industry, flourishes, and produces the finest fruit: nature and art conspire to raise it; pleasure and profit join to make it valuable: and they who find the justest faults, have only said that a few branches which run luxuriant through a richness of nature, might be lopped into form to give it a more regular appearance.

Having now spoken of the beauties and defects of the original, it remains to treat of the translation, with the same view to the chief characteristic. As far as that is seen in the main parts of the poem, such as the fable, manners, and sentiments, no translator can prejudice it but by wilful omissions or contractions. As it also breaks out in every particular image, description, and simile, whoever lessens or too much softens those, takes off from this chief character. It is the first grand duty of an interpreter to give his author entire and unmaimed; and for the rest, the diction and versification only are his proper province, since these must be his own, but the others he is to take as he finds them.

It should then be considered what methods may afford some equivalent in our language for the graces of these in the Greek. It is certain no literal translation can be just to an excellent original in a superior language: but it is a great mistake to imagine (as many have done) that a rash paraphrase can make amends for this general defect; which is no less in danger to lose the spirit of an ancient, by deviating into the modern manners of expression. If there be sometimes a darkness, there is often a light in antiquity, which nothing better preserves than a version almost literal. I know no liberties one ought to take, but those which are necessary to transfusing the spirit of the original, and supporting the poetical style of the translation: and I will venture to say, there have not been more men misled in former times by a servile, dull adherence to the letter, than have been deluded in ours by a chimerical, insolent hope of raising and improving their author. It is not to be doubted, that the fire of the poem is what a translator should principally regard, as it is most likely to expire in his managing: however, it is his safest way to be content with preserving this to his utmost in the whole, without endeavouring to be more than he finds his author is, in any particular place. It is a great secret in writing, to know when to be plain, and when poetical and figurative; and it is what Homer will teach us, if we will but follow modestly in his footsteps. Where his diction is bold and lofty, let us raise ours as high as we can; but where his is plain and humble, we ought not to be deterred from imitating him by the fear of incurring the censure of a mere English critic. Nothing that belongs to Homer seems to have been more commonly mistaken than the just pitch of his style: some of his translators having swelled into fustian in a proud confidence of the sublime; others sunk into flatness, in a cold and timorous notion of simplicity. Methinks I see these different followers of Homer, some sweating and straining after him by violent leaps and bounds (the certain signs of false mettle), others slowly and servilely creeping in his train, while the poet himself is all the time proceeding with an unaffected and equal majesty before them. However, of the two extremes one could sooner pardon frenzy than frigidity; no author is to be envied for such commendations, as he may gain by that character of style, which his friends must agree together to call simplicity, and the rest of the world will call dullness. There is a graceful and dignified simplicity, as well as a bold and sordid one; which differ as much from each other as the air of a plain man from that of a sloven: it is one thing to be tricked up, and another not to be dressed at all. Simplicity is the mean between ostentation and rusticity.

This pure and noble simplicity is nowhere in such perfection as in the Scripture and our author. One may affirm, with all respect to the inspired writings, that the Divine Spirit made use of no other words but what were intelligible and common to men at that time, and in that part of the world; and, as Homer is the author nearest to those, his style must of course bear a greater resemblance to the sacred books than that of any other writer. This consideration (together with what has been observed of the parity of some of his thoughts) may, methinks, induce a translator, on the one hand, to give in to several of those general phrases and manners of expression, which have attained a veneration even in our language from being used in the Old Testament; as, on the other, to avoid those which have been appropriated to the Divinity, and in a manner consigned to mystery and religion.

For a further preservation of this air of simplicity, a particular care should be taken to express with all plainness those moral sentences and proverbial speeches which are so numerous in this poet. They have something venerable, and as I may say, oracular, in that unadorned gravity and shortness with which they are delivered: a grace which would be utterly lost by endeavouring to give them what we call a more ingenious (that is, a more modern) turn in the paraphrase.

Perhaps the mixture of some Graecisms and old words after the manner of Milton, if done without too much affectation, might not have an ill effect in a version of this particular work, which most of any other seems to require a venerable, antique cast. But certainly the use of modern terms of war and government, such as “platoon, campaign, junto,” or the like, (into which some of his translators have fallen) cannot be allowable; those only excepted without which it is impossible to treat the subjects in any living language.

There are two peculiarities in Homer’s diction, which are a sort of marks or moles by which every common eye distinguishes him at first sight; those who are not his greatest admirers look upon them as defects, and those who are, seemed pleased with them as beauties. I speak of his compound epithets, and of his repetitions. Many of the former cannot be done literally into English without destroying the purity of our language. I believe such should be retained as slide easily of themselves into an English compound, without violence to the ear or to the received rules of composition, as well as those which have received a sanction from the authority of our best poets, and are become familiar through their use of them; such as “the cloud-compelling Jove,” &c. As for the rest, whenever any can be as fully and significantly expressed in a single word as in a compounded one, the course to be taken is obvious.

Some that cannot be so turned, as to preserve their full image by one or two words, may have justice done them by circumlocution; as the epithet einosiphyllos to a mountain, would appear little or ridiculous translated literally “leaf-shaking,” but affords a majestic idea in the periphrasis: “the lofty mountain shakes his waving woods.” Others that admit of different significations, may receive an advantage from a judicious variation, according to the occasions on which they are introduced. For example, the epithet of Apollo, hekaebolos or “far-shooting,” is capable of two explications; one literal, in respect of the darts and bow, the ensigns of that god; the other allegorical, with regard to the rays of the sun; therefore, in such places where Apollo is represented as a god in person, I would use the former interpretation; and where the effects of the sun are described, I would make choice of the latter. Upon the whole, it will be necessary to avoid that perpetual repetition of the same epithets which we find in Homer, and which, though it might be accommodated (as has been already shown) to the ear of those times, is by no means so to ours: but one may wait for opportunities of placing them, where they derive an additional beauty from the occasions on which they are employed; and in doing this properly, a translator may at once show his fancy and his judgment.

As for Homer’s repetitions, we may divide them into three sorts: of whole narrations and speeches, of single sentences, and of one verse or hemistitch. I hope it is not impossible to have such a regard to these, as neither to lose so known a mark of the author on the one hand, nor to offend the reader too much on the other. The repetition is not ungraceful in those speeches, where the dignity of the speaker renders it a sort of insolence to alter his words; as in the messages from gods to men, or from higher powers to inferiors in concerns of state, or where the ceremonial of religion seems to require it, in the solemn forms of prayers, oaths, or the like. In other cases, I believe the best rule is, to be guided by the nearness, or distance, at which the repetitions are placed in the original: when they follow too close, one may vary the expression; but it is a question, whether a professed translator be authorized to omit any: if they be tedious, the author is to answer for it.

It only remains to speak of the versification. Homer (as has been said) is perpetually applying the sound to the sense, and varying it on every new subject. This is indeed one of the most exquisite beauties of poetry, and attainable by very few: I only know of Homer eminent for it in the Greek, and Virgil in the Latin. I am sensible it is what may sometimes happen by chance, when a writer is warm, and fully possessed of his image: however, it may reasonably be believed they designed this, in whose verse it so manifestly appears in a superior degree to all others. Few readers have the ear to be judges of it: but those who have, will see I have endeavoured at this beauty.

Upon the whole, I must confess myself utterly incapable of doing justice to Homer. I attempt him in no other hope but that which one may entertain without much vanity, of giving a more tolerable copy of him than any entire translation in verse has yet done. We have only those of Chapman, Hobbes, and Ogilby. Chapman has taken the advantage of an immeasurable length of verse, notwithstanding which, there is scarce any paraphrase more loose and rambling than his. He has frequent interpolations of four or six lines; and I remember one in the thirteenth book of the Odyssey, ver. 312, where he has spun twenty verses out of two. He is often mistaken in so bold a manner, that one might think he deviated on purpose, if he did not in other places of his notes insist so much upon verbal trifles. He appears to have had a strong affectation of extracting new meanings out of his author; insomuch as to promise, in his rhyming preface, a poem of the mysteries he had revealed in Homer; and perhaps he endeavoured to strain the obvious sense to this end. His expression is involved in fustian; a fault for which he was remarkable in his original writings, as in the tragedy of Bussy d’Amboise, &c. In a word, the nature of the man may account for his whole performance; for he appears, from his preface and remarks, to have been of an arrogant turn, and an enthusiast in poetry. His own boast, of having finished half the Iliad in less than fifteen weeks, shows with what negligence his version was performed. But that which is to be allowed him, and which very much contributed to cover his defects, is a daring fiery spirit that animates his translation, which is something like what one might imagine Homer himself would have writ before he arrived at years of discretion.

Hobbes has given us a correct explanation of the sense in general; but for particulars and circumstances he continually lops them, and often omits the most beautiful. As for its being esteemed a close translation, I doubt not many have been led into that error by the shortness of it, which proceeds not from his following the original line by line, but from the contractions above mentioned. He sometimes omits whole similes and sentences; and is now and then guilty of mistakes, into which no writer of his learning could have fallen, but through carelessness. His poetry, as well as Ogilby’s, is too mean for criticism.

It is a great loss to the poetical world that Mr. Dryden did not live to translate the Iliad. He has left us only the first book, and a small part of the sixth; in which if he has in some places not truly interpreted the sense, or preserved the antiquities, it ought to be excused on account of the haste he was obliged to write in. He seems to have had too much regard to Chapman, whose words he sometimes copies, and has unhappily followed him in passages where he wanders from the original. However, had he translated the whole work, I would no more have attempted Homer after him than Virgil: his version of whom (notwithstanding some human errors) is the most noble and spirited translation I know in any language. But the fate of great geniuses is like that of great ministers: though they are confessedly the first in the commonwealth of letters, they must be envied and calumniated only for being at the head of it.

That which, in my opinion, ought to be the endeavour of any one who translates Homer, is above all things to keep alive that spirit and fire which makes his chief character: in particular places, where the sense can bear any doubt, to follow the strongest and most poetical, as most agreeing with that character; to copy him in all the variations of his style, and the different modulations of his numbers; to preserve, in the more active or descriptive parts, a warmth and elevation; in the more sedate or narrative, a plainness and solemnity; in the speeches, a fulness and perspicuity; in the sentences, a shortness and gravity; not to neglect even the little figures and turns on the words, nor sometimes the very cast of the periods; neither to omit nor confound any rites or customs of antiquity: perhaps too he ought to include the whole in a shorter compass than has hitherto been done by any translator who has tolerably preserved either the sense or poetry. What I would further recommend to him is, to study his author rather from his own text, than from any commentaries, how learned soever, or whatever figure they may make in the estimation of the world; to consider him attentively in comparison with Virgil above all the ancients, and with Milton above all the moderns. Next these, the Archbishop of Cambray’s Telemachus may give him the truest idea of the spirit and turn of our author; and Bossu’s admirable Treatise of the Epic Poem the justest notion of his design and conduct. But after all, with whatever judgment and study a man may proceed, or with whatever happiness he may perform such a work, he must hope to please but a few; those only who have at once a taste of poetry, and competent learning. For to satisfy such a want either, is not in the nature of this undertaking; since a mere modern wit can like nothing that is not modern, and a pedant nothing that is not Greek.

What I have done is submitted to the public; from whose opinions I am prepared to learn; though I fear no judges so little as our best poets, who are most sensible of the weight of this task. As for the worst, whatever they shall please to say, they may give me some concern as they are unhappy men, but none as they are malignant writers. I was guided in this translation by judgments very different from theirs, and by persons for whom they can have no kindness, if an old observation be true, that the strongest antipathy in the world is that of fools to men of wit. Mr. Addison was the first whose advice determined me to undertake this task; who was pleased to write to me upon that occasion in such terms as I cannot repeat without vanity. I was obliged to Sir Richard Steele for a very early recommendation of my undertaking to the public. Dr. Swift promoted my interest with that warmth with which he always serves his friend. The humanity and frankness of Sir Samuel Garth are what I never knew wanting on any occasion. I must also acknowledge, with infinite pleasure, the many friendly offices, as well as sincere criticisms, of Mr. Congreve, who had led me the way in translating some parts of Homer. I must add the names of Mr. Rowe, and Dr. Parnell, though I shall take a further opportunity of doing justice to the last, whose good nature (to give it a great panegyric), is no less extensive than his learning. The favour of these gentlemen is not entirely undeserved by one who bears them so true an affection. But what can I say of the honour so many of the great have done me; while the first names of the age appear as my subscribers, and the most distinguished patrons and ornaments of learning as my chief encouragers? Among these it is a particular pleasure to me to find, that my highest obligations are to such who have done most honour to the name of poet: that his grace the Duke of Buckingham was not displeased I should undertake the author to whom he has given (in his excellent Essay), so complete a praise:



“Read Homer once, and you can read no more;

For all books else appear so mean, so poor,

Verse will seem prose: but still persist to read,

And Homer will be all the books you need.”



That the Earl of Halifax was one of the first to favour me; of whom it is hard to say whether the advancement of the polite arts is more owing to his generosity or his example: that such a genius as my Lord Bolingbroke, not more distinguished in the great scenes of business, than in all the useful and entertaining parts of learning, has not refused to be the critic of these sheets, and the patron of their writer: and that the noble author of the tragedy of “Heroic Love” has continued his partiality to me, from my writing pastorals to my attempting the Iliad. I cannot deny myself the pride of confessing, that I have had the advantage not only of their advice for the conduct in general, but their correction of several particulars of this translation.

I could say a great deal of the pleasure of being distinguished by the Earl of Carnarvon; but it is almost absurd to particularize any one generous action in a person whose whole life is a continued series of them. Mr. Stanhope, the present secretary of state, will pardon my desire of having it known that he was pleased to promote this affair. The particular zeal of Mr. Harcourt (the son of the late Lord Chancellor) gave me a proof how much I am honoured in a share of his friendship. I must attribute to the same motive that of several others of my friends: to whom all acknowledgments are rendered unnecessary by the privileges of a familiar correspondence; and I am satisfied I can no way better oblige men of their turn than by my silence.

In short, I have found more patrons than ever Homer wanted. He would have thought himself happy to have met the same favour at Athens that has been shown me by its learned rival, the University of Oxford. And I can hardly envy him those pompous honours he received after death, when I reflect on the enjoyment of so many agreeable obligations, and easy friendships, which make the satisfaction of life. This distinction is the more to be acknowledged, as it is shown to one whose pen has never gratified the prejudices of particular parties, or the vanities of particular men. Whatever the success may prove, I shall never repent of an undertaking in which I have experienced the candour and friendship of so many persons of merit; and in which I hope to pass some of those years of youth that are generally lost in a circle of follies, after a manner neither wholly unuseful to others, nor disagreeable to myself.




BOOK I (#ulink_8d0a8128-033c-5613-9f6b-bf8162963541)


Argument

The Contention of Achilles and

Agamemnon

In the war of Troy, the Greeks having sacked some of the neighbouring towns, and taken from thence two beautiful captives, Chryseis and Briseis, allotted the first to Agamemnon, and the last to Achilles. Chryses, the father of Chryseis, and priest of Apollo, comes to the Grecian camp to ransom her; with which the action of the poem opens, in the tenth year of the siege. The priest being refused, and insolently dismissed by Agamemnon, entreats for vengeance from his god; who inflicts a pestilence on the Greeks. Achilles calls a council, and encourages Chalcas to declare the cause of it; who attributes it to the refusal of Chryseis. The king, being obliged to send back his captive, enters into a furious contest with Achilles, which Nestor pacifies; however, as he had the absolute command of the army, he seizes on Briseis in revenge. Achilles in discontent withdraws himself and his forces from the rest of the Greeks; and complaining to Thetis, she supplicates Jupiter to render them sensible of the wrong done to her son, by giving victory to the Trojans. Jupiter, granting her suit, incenses Juno: between whom the debate runs high, till they are reconciled by the address of Vulcan.

The time of two-and-twenty days is taken up in this book: nine during the plague, one in the council and quarrel of the princes, and twelve for Jupiter’s stay with the Æthiopians, at whose return Thetis prefers her petition. The scene lies in the Grecian camp, then changes to Chrysa, and lastly to Olympus.

Achilles’ wrath, to Greece the direful spring

Of woes unnumber’d, heavenly goddess, sing!

That wrath which hurl’d to Pluto’s gloomy reign

The souls of mighty chiefs untimely slain;

Whose limbs unburied on the naked shore,

Devouring dogs and hungry vultures tore.

Since great Achilles and Atrides strove,

Such was the sovereign doom, and such the will of Jove!

Declare, O Muse! in what ill-fated hour

Sprung the fierce strife, from what offended power

Latona’s son a dire contagion spread,

And heap’d the camp with mountains of the dead;

The king of men his reverent priest defied,

And for the king’s offence the people died.

For Chryses sought with costly gifts to gain

His captive daughter from the victor’s chain.

Suppliant the venerable father stands;

Apollo’s awful ensigns grace his hands

By these he begs; and lowly bending down,

Extends the sceptre and the laurel crown

He sued to all, but chief implored for grace

The brother-kings, of Atreus’ royal race

“Ye kings and warriors! may your vows be crown’d,

And Troy’s proud walls lie level with the ground.

May Jove restore you when your toils are o’er

Safe to the pleasures of your native shore.

But, oh! relieve a wretched parent’s pain,

And give Chryseis to these arms again;

If mercy fail, yet let my presents move,

And dread avenging Phoebus, son of Jove.”

The Greeks in shouts their joint assent declare,

The priest to reverence, and release the fair.

Not so Atrides; he, with kingly pride,

Repulsed the sacred sire, and thus replied:

“Hence on thy life, and fly these hostile plains,

Nor ask, presumptuous, what the king detains

Hence, with thy laurel crown, and golden rod,

Nor trust too far those ensigns of thy god.

Mine is thy daughter, priest, and shall remain;

And prayers, and tears, and bribes, shall plead in vain;

Till time shall rifle every youthful grace,

And age dismiss her from my cold embrace,

In daily labours of the loom employ’d,

Or doom’d to deck the bed she once enjoy’d

Hence then; to Argos shall the maid retire,

Far from her native soil and weeping sire.”

The trembling priest along the shore return’d,

And in the anguish of a father mourn’d.

Disconsolate, not daring to complain,

Silent he wander’d by the sounding main;

Till, safe at distance, to his god he prays,

The god who darts around the world his rays.

“O Smintheus! sprung from fair Latona’s line,

Thou guardian power of Cilla the divine,

Thou source of light! whom Tenedos adores,

And whose bright presence gilds thy Chrysa’s shores.

If e’er with wreaths I hung thy sacred fane,

Or fed the flames with fat of oxen slain;

God of the silver bow! thy shafts employ,

Avenge thy servant, and the Greeks destroy.”

Thus Chryses pray’d.—the favouring power attends,

And from Olympus’ lofty tops descends.

Bent was his bow, the Grecian hearts to wound;

Fierce as he moved, his silver shafts resound.

Breathing revenge, a sudden night he spread,

And gloomy darkness roll’d about his head.

The fleet in view, he twang’d his deadly bow,

And hissing fly the feather’d fates below.

On mules and dogs the infection first began;

And last, the vengeful arrows fix’d in man.

For nine long nights, through all the dusky air,

The pyres, thick-flaming, shot a dismal glare.

But ere the tenth revolving day was run,

Inspired by Juno, Thetis’ godlike son

Convened to council all the Grecian train;

For much the goddess mourn’d her heroes slain.

The assembly seated, rising o’er the rest,

Achilles thus the king of men address’d:

“Why leave we not the fatal Trojan shore,

And measure back the seas we cross’d before?

The plague destroying whom the sword would spare,

’Tis time to save the few remains of war.

But let some prophet, or some sacred sage,

Explore the cause of great Apollo’s rage;

Or learn the wasteful vengeance to remove

By mystic dreams, for dreams descend from Jove.

If broken vows this heavy curse have laid,

Let altars smoke, and hecatombs be paid.

So Heaven, atoned, shall dying Greece restore,

And Phoebus dart his burning shafts no more.”

He said, and sat: when Chalcas thus replied;

Chalcas the wise, the Grecian priest and guide,

That sacred seer, whose comprehensive view,

The past, the present, and the future knew:

Uprising slow, the venerable sage

Thus spoke the prudence and the fears of age:

“Beloved of Jove, Achilles! would’st thou know

Why angry Phoebus bends his fatal bow?

First give thy faith, and plight a prince’s word

Of sure protection, by thy power and sword:

For I must speak what wisdom would conceal,

And truths, invidious to the great, reveal,

Bold is the task, when subjects, grown too wise,

Instruct a monarch where his error lies;

For though we deem the short-lived fury past,

’Tis sure the mighty will revenge at last.”

To whom Pelides:—“From thy inmost soul

Speak what thou know’st, and speak without control.

E’en by that god I swear who rules the day,

To whom thy hands the vows of Greece convey.

And whose bless’d oracles thy lips declare;

Long as Achilles breathes this vital air,

No daring Greek, of all the numerous band,

Against his priest shall lift an impious hand;

Not e’en the chief by whom our hosts are led,

The king of kings, shall touch that sacred head.”

Encouraged thus, the blameless man replies:

“Nor vows unpaid, nor slighted sacrifice,

But he, our chief, provoked the raging pest,

Apollo’s vengeance for his injured priest.

Nor will the god’s awaken’d fury cease,

But plagues shall spread, and funeral fires increase,

Till the great king, without a ransom paid,

To her own Chrysa send the black-eyed maid.

Perhaps, with added sacrifice and prayer,

The priest may pardon, and the god may spare.”

The prophet spoke: when with a gloomy frown

The monarch started from his shining throne;

Black choler fill’d his breast that boil’d with ire,

And from his eye-balls flash’d the living fire:

“Augur accursed! denouncing mischief still,

Prophet of plagues, for ever boding ill!

Still must that tongue some wounding message bring,

And still thy priestly pride provoke thy king?

For this are Phoebus’ oracles explored,

To teach the Greeks to murmur at their lord?

For this with falsehood is my honour stain’d,

Is heaven offended, and a priest profaned;

Because my prize, my beauteous maid, I hold,

And heavenly charms prefer to proffer’d gold?

A maid, unmatch’d in manners as in face,

Skill’d in each art, and crown’d with every grace;

Not half so dear were Clytaemnestra’s charms,

When first her blooming beauties bless’d my arms.

Yet, if the gods demand her, let her sail;

Our cares are only for the public weal:

Let me be deem’d the hateful cause of all,

And suffer, rather than my people fall.

The prize, the beauteous prize, I will resign,

So dearly valued, and so justly mine.

But since for common good I yield the fair,

My private loss let grateful Greece repair;

Nor unrewarded let your prince complain,

That he alone has fought and bled in vain.”

“Insatiate king (Achilles thus replies),

Fond of the power, but fonder of the prize!

Would’st thou the Greeks their lawful prey should yield,

The due reward of many a well-fought field?

The spoils of cities razed and warriors slain,

We share with justice, as with toil we gain;

But to resume whate’er thy avarice craves

(That trick of tyrants) may be borne by slaves.

Yet if our chief for plunder only fight,

The spoils of Ilion shall thy loss requite,

Whene’er, by Jove’s decree, our conquering powers

Shall humble to the dust her lofty towers.”

Then thus the king: “Shall I my prize resign

With tame content, and thou possess’d of thine?

Great as thou art, and like a god in fight,

Think not to rob me of a soldier’s right.

At thy demand shall I restore the maid?

First let the just equivalent be paid;

Such as a king might ask; and let it be

A treasure worthy her, and worthy me.

Or grant me this, or with a monarch’s claim

This hand shall seize some other captive dame.

The mighty Ajax shall his prize resign;

Ulysses’ spoils, or even thy own, be mine.

The man who suffers, loudly may complain;

And rage he may, but he shall rage in vain.

But this when time requires.—It now remains

We launch a bark to plough the watery plains,

And waft the sacrifice to Chrysa’s shores,

With chosen pilots, and with labouring oars.

Soon shall the fair the sable ship ascend,

And some deputed prince the charge attend:

This Creta’s king, or Ajax shall fulfil,

Or wise Ulysses see perform’d our will;

Or, if our royal pleasure shall ordain,

Achilles’ self conduct her o’er the main;

Let fierce Achilles, dreadful in his rage,

The god propitiate, and the pest assuage.”

At this, Pelides, frowning stern, replied:

“O tyrant, arm’d with insolence and pride!

Inglorious slave to interest, ever join’d

With fraud, unworthy of a royal mind!

What generous Greek, obedient to thy word,

Shall form an ambush, or shall lift the sword?

What cause have I to war at thy decree?

The distant Trojans never injured me;

To Phthia’s realms no hostile troops they led:

Safe in her vales my warlike coursers fed;

Far hence removed, the hoarse-resounding main,

And walls of rocks, secure my native reign,

Whose fruitful soil luxuriant harvests grace,

Rich in her fruits, and in her martial race.

Hither we sail’d, a voluntary throng,

To avenge a private, not a public wrong:

What else to Troy the assembled nations draws,

But thine, ungrateful, and thy brother’s cause?

Is this the pay our blood and toils deserve;

Disgraced and injured by the man we serve?

And darest thou threat to snatch my prize away,

Due to the deeds of many a dreadful day?

A prize as small, O tyrant! match’d with thine,

As thy own actions if compared to mine.

Thine in each conquest is the wealthy prey,

Though mine the sweat and danger of the day.

Some trivial present to my ships I bear:

Or barren praises pay the wounds of war.

But know, proud monarch, I’m thy slave no more;

My fleet shall waft me to Thessalia’s shore:

Left by Achilles on the Trojan plain,

What spoils, what conquests, shall Atrides gain?”

To this the king: “Fly, mighty warrior! fly;

Thy aid we need not, and thy threats defy.

There want not chiefs in such a cause to fight,

And Jove himself shall guard a monarch’s right.

Of all the kings (the god’s distinguish’d care)

To power superior none such hatred bear:

Strife and debate thy restless soul employ,

And wars and horrors are thy savage joy,

If thou hast strength, ’twas Heaven that strength bestow’d;

For know, vain man! thy valour is from God.

Haste, launch thy vessels, fly with speed away;

Rule thy own realms with arbitrary sway;

I heed thee not, but prize at equal rate

Thy short-lived friendship, and thy groundless hate.

Go, threat thy earth-born Myrmidons:—but here

’Tis mine to threaten, prince, and thine to fear.

Know, if the god the beauteous dame demand,

My bark shall waft her to her native land;

But then prepare, imperious prince! prepare,

Fierce as thou art, to yield thy captive fair:

Even in thy tent I’ll seize the blooming prize,

Thy loved Briseis with the radiant eyes.

Hence shalt thou prove my might, and curse the hour

Thou stood’st a rival of imperial power;

And hence, to all our hosts it shall be known,

That kings are subject to the gods alone.”

Achilles heard, with grief and rage oppress’d,

His heart swell’d high, and labour’d in his breast;

Distracting thoughts by turns his bosom ruled;

Now fired by wrath, and now by reason cool’d:

That prompts his hand to draw the deadly sword,

Force through the Greeks, and pierce their haughty lord;

This whispers soft his vengeance to control,

And calm the rising tempest of his soul.

Just as in anguish of suspense he stay’d,

While half unsheathed appear’d the glittering blade,

Minerva swift descended from above,

Sent by the sister and the wife of Jove

(For both the princes claim’d her equal care);

Behind she stood, and by the golden hair

Achilles seized; to him alone confess’d;

A sable cloud conceal’d her from the rest.

He sees, and sudden to the goddess cries,

Known by the flames that sparkle from her eyes:

“Descends Minerva, in her guardian care,

A heavenly witness of the wrongs I bear

From Atreus’ son?—Then let those eyes that view

The daring crime, behold the vengeance too.”

“Forbear (the progeny of Jove replies)

To calm thy fury I forsake the skies:

Let great Achilles, to the gods resign’d,

To reason yield the empire o’er his mind.

By awful Juno this command is given;

The king and you are both the care of heaven.

The force of keen reproaches let him feel;

But sheathe, obedient, thy revenging steel.

For I pronounce (and trust a heavenly power)

Thy injured honour has its fated hour,

When the proud monarch shall thy arms implores

And bribe thy friendship with a boundless store.

Then let revenge no longer bear the sway;

Command thy passions, and the gods obey.”

To her Pelides:—“With regardful ear,

’Tis just, O goddess! I thy dictates hear.

Hard as it is, my vengeance I suppress:

Those who revere the gods the gods will bless.”

He said, observant of the blue-eyed maid;

Then in the sheath return’d the shining blade.

The goddess swift to high Olympus flies,

And joins the sacred senate of the skies.

Nor yet the rage his boiling breast forsook,

Which thus redoubling on Atrides broke:

“O monster! mix’d of insolence and fear,

Thou dog in forehead, but in heart a deer!

When wert thou known in ambush’d fights to dare,

Or nobly face the horrid front of war?

’Tis ours, the chance of fighting fields to try;

Thine to look on, and bid the valiant die:

So much ’tis safer through the camp to go,

And rob a subject, than despoil a foe.

Scourge of thy people, violent and base!

Sent in Jove’s anger on a slavish race;

Who, lost to sense of generous freedom past,

Are tamed to wrongs;—or this had been thy last.

Now by this sacred sceptre hear me swear,

Which never more shall leaves or blossoms bear,

Which sever’d from the trunk (as I from thee)

On the bare mountains left its parent tree;

This sceptre, form’d by temper’d steel to prove

An ensign of the delegates of Jove,

From whom the power of laws and justice springs

(Tremendous oath! inviolate to kings);

By this I swear:—when bleeding Greece again

Shall call Achilles, she shall call in vain.

When, flush’d with slaughter, Hector comes to spread

The purpled shore with mountains of the dead,

Then shall thou mourn the affront thy madness gave,

Forced to deplore when impotent to save:

Then rage in bitterness of soul to know

This act has made the bravest Greek thy foe.”

He spoke; and furious hurl’d against the ground

His sceptre starr’d with golden studs around:

Then sternly silent sat. With like disdain

The raging king return’d his frowns again.

To calm their passion with the words of age,

Slow from his seat arose the Pylian sage,

Experienced Nestor, in persuasion skill’d;

Words, sweet as honey, from his lips distill’d:

Two generations now had pass’d away,

Wise by his rules, and happy by his sway;

Two ages o’er his native realm he reign’d,

And now the example of the third remain’d.

All view’d with awe the venerable man;

Who thus with mild benevolence began:—

“What shame, what woe is this to Greece! what joy

To Troy’s proud monarch, and the friends of Troy!

That adverse gods commit to stern debate

The best, the bravest, of the Grecian state.

Young as ye are, this youthful heat restrain,

Nor think your Nestor’s years and wisdom vain.

A godlike race of heroes once I knew,

Such as no more these aged eyes shall view!

Lives there a chief to match Pirithous’ fame,

Dryas the bold, or Ceneus’ deathless name;

Theseus, endued with more than mortal might,

Or Polyphemus, like the gods in fight?

With these of old, to toils of battle bred,

In early youth my hardy days I led;

Fired with the thirst which virtuous envy breeds,

And smit with love of honourable deeds,

Strongest of men, they pierced the mountain boar,

Ranged the wild deserts red with monsters’ gore,

And from their hills the shaggy Centaurs tore:

Yet these with soft persuasive arts I sway’d;

When Nestor spoke, they listen’d and obey’d.

If in my youth, even these esteem’d me wise;

Do you, young warriors, hear my age advise.

Atrides, seize not on the beauteous slave;

That prize the Greeks by common suffrage gave:

Nor thou, Achilles, treat our prince with pride;

Let kings be just, and sovereign power preside.

Thee, the first honours of the war adorn,

Like gods in strength, and of a goddess born;

Him, awful majesty exalts above

The powers of earth, and sceptred sons of Jove.

Let both unite with well-consenting mind,

So shall authority with strength be join’d.

Leave me, O king! to calm Achilles’ rage;

Rule thou thyself, as more advanced in age.

Forbid it, gods! Achilles should be lost,

The pride of Greece, and bulwark of our host.”

This said, he ceased. The king of men replies:

“Thy years are awful, and thy words are wise.

But that imperious, that unconquer’d soul,

No laws can limit, no respect control.

Before his pride must his superiors fall;

His word the law, and he the lord of all?

Him must our hosts, our chiefs, ourself obey?

What king can bear a rival in his sway?

Grant that the gods his matchless force have given;

Has foul reproach a privilege from heaven?”

Here on the monarch’s speech Achilles broke,

And furious, thus, and interrupting spoke:

“Tyrant, I well deserved thy galling chain,

To live thy slave, and still to serve in vain,

Should I submit to each unjust decree:—

Command thy vassals, but command not me.

Seize on Briseis, whom the Grecians doom’d

My prize of war, yet tamely see resumed;

And seize secure; no more Achilles draws

His conquering sword in any woman’s cause.

The gods command me to forgive the past:

But let this first invasion be the last:

For know, thy blood, when next thou darest invade,

Shall stream in vengeance on my reeking blade.”

At this they ceased: the stern debate expired:

The chiefs in sullen majesty retired.

Achilles with Patroclus took his way

Where near his tents his hollow vessels lay.

Meantime Atrides launch’d with numerous oars

A well-rigg’d ship for Chrysa’s sacred shores:

High on the deck was fair Chryseis placed,

And sage Ulysses with the conduct graced:

Safe in her sides the hecatomb they stow’d,

Then swiftly sailing, cut the liquid road.

The host to expiate next the king prepares,

With pure lustrations, and with solemn prayers.

Wash’d by the briny wave, the pious train

Are cleansed; and cast the ablutions in the main.

Along the shore whole hecatombs were laid,

And bulls and goats to Phoebus’ altars paid;

The sable fumes in curling spires arise,

And waft their grateful odours to the skies.

The army thus in sacred rites engaged,

Atrides still with deep resentment raged.

To wait his will two sacred heralds stood,

Talthybius and Eurybates the good.

“Haste to the fierce Achilles’ tent (he cries),

Thence bear Briseis as our royal prize:

Submit he must; or if they will not part,

Ourself in arms shall tear her from his heart.”

The unwilling heralds act their lord’s commands;

Pensive they walk along the barren sands:

Arrived, the hero in his tent they find,

With gloomy aspect on his arm reclined.

At awful distance long they silent stand,

Loth to advance, and speak their hard command;

Decent confusion! This the godlike man

Perceived, and thus with accent mild began:

“With leave and honour enter our abodes,

Ye sacred ministers of men and gods!

I know your message; by constraint you came;

Not you, but your imperious lord I blame.

Patroclus, haste, the fair Briseis bring;

Conduct my captive to the haughty king.

But witness, heralds, and proclaim my vow,

Witness to gods above, and men below!

But first, and loudest, to your prince declare

(That lawless tyrant whose commands you bear),

Unmoved as death Achilles shall remain,

Though prostrate Greece shall bleed at every vein:

The raging chief in frantic passion lost,

Blind to himself, and useless to his host,

Unskill’d to judge the future by the past,

In blood and slaughter shall repent at last.”

Patroclus now the unwilling beauty brought;

She, in soft sorrows, and in pensive thought,

Pass’d silent, as the heralds held her hand,

And of look’d back, slow-moving o’er the strand.

Not so his loss the fierce Achilles bore;

But sad, retiring to the sounding shore,

O’er the wild margin of the deep he hung,

That kindred deep from whence his mother sprung:

There bathed in tears of anger and disdain,

Thus loud lamented to the stormy main:

“O parent goddess! since in early bloom

Thy son must fall, by too severe a doom;

Sure to so short a race of glory born,

Great Jove in justice should this span adorn:

Honour and fame at least the thunderer owed;

And ill he pays the promise of a god,

If yon proud monarch thus thy son defies,

Obscures my glories, and resumes my prize.”

Far from the deep recesses of the main,

Where aged Ocean holds his watery reign,

The goddess-mother heard. The waves divide;

And like a mist she rose above the tide;

Beheld him mourning on the naked shores,

And thus the sorrows of his soul explores.

“Why grieves my son? Thy anguish let me share;

Reveal the cause, and trust a parent’s care.”

He deeply sighing said: “To tell my woe

Is but to mention what too well you know.

From Thebe, sacred to Apollo’s name

(Aetion’s realm), our conquering army came,

With treasure loaded and triumphant spoils,

Whose just division crown’d the soldier’s toils;

But bright Chryseis, heavenly prize! was led,

By vote selected, to the general’s bed.

The priest of Phoebus sought by gifts to gain

His beauteous daughter from the victor’s chain;

The fleet he reach’d, and, lowly bending down,

Held forth the sceptre and the laurel crown,

Intreating all; but chief implored for grace

The brother-kings of Atreus’ royal race:

The generous Greeks their joint consent declare,

The priest to reverence, and release the fair;

Not so Atrides: he, with wonted pride,

The sire insulted, and his gifts denied:

The insulted sire (his god’s peculiar care)

To Phoebus pray’d, and Phoebus heard the prayer:

A dreadful plague ensues: the avenging darts

Incessant fly, and pierce the Grecian hearts.

A prophet then, inspired by heaven, arose,

And points the crime, and thence derives the woes:

Myself the first the assembled chiefs incline

To avert the vengeance of the power divine;

Then rising in his wrath, the monarch storm’d;

Incensed he threaten’d, and his threats perform’d:

The fair Chryseis to her sire was sent,

With offer’d gifts to make the god relent;

But now he seized Briseis’ heavenly charms,

And of my valour’s prize defrauds my arms,

Defrauds the votes of all the Grecian train;

And service, faith, and justice, plead in vain.

But, goddess! thou thy suppliant son attend.

To high Olympus’ shining court ascend,

Urge all the ties to former service owed,

And sue for vengeance to the thundering god.

Oft hast thou triumph’d in the glorious boast,

That thou stood’st forth of all the ethereal host,

When bold rebellion shook the realms above,

The undaunted guard of cloud-compelling Jove:

When the bright partner of his awful reign,

The warlike maid, and monarch of the main,

The traitor-gods, by mad ambition driven,

Durst threat with chains the omnipotence of Heaven.

Then, call’d by thee, the monster Titan came

(Whom gods Briareus, men Ægeon name),

Through wondering skies enormous stalk’d along;

Not he that shakes the solid earth so strong:

With giant-pride at Jove’s high throne he stands,

And brandish’d round him all his hundred hands:

The affrighted gods confess’d their awful lord,

They dropp’d the fetters, trembled, and adored.

This, goddess, this to his remembrance call,

Embrace his knees, at his tribunal fall;

Conjure him far to drive the Grecian train,

To hurl them headlong to their fleet and main,

To heap the shores with copious death, and bring

The Greeks to know the curse of such a king.

Let Agamemnon lift his haughty head

O’er all his wide dominion of the dead,

And mourn in blood that e’er he durst disgrace

The boldest warrior of the Grecian race.”

“Unhappy son! (fair Thetis thus replies,

While tears celestial trickle from her eyes)

Why have I borne thee with a mother’s throes,

To Fates averse, and nursed for future woes?

So short a space the light of heaven to view!

So short a space! and fill’d with sorrow too!

O might a parent’s careful wish prevail,

Far, far from Ilion should thy vessels sail,

And thou, from camps remote, the danger shun

Which now, alas! too nearly threats my son.

Yet (what I can) to move thy suit I’ll go

To great Olympus crown’d with fleecy snow.

Meantime, secure within thy ships, from far

Behold the field, not mingle in the war.

The sire of gods and all the ethereal train,

On the warm limits of the farthest main,

Now mix with mortals, nor disdain to grace

The feasts of Æthiopia’s blameless race,

Twelve days the powers indulge the genial rite,

Returning with the twelfth revolving light.

Then will I mount the brazen dome, and move

The high tribunal of immortal Jove.”

The goddess spoke: the rolling waves unclose;

Then down the steep she plunged from whence she rose,

And left him sorrowing on the lonely coast,

In wild resentment for the fair he lost.

In Chrysa’s port now sage Ulysses rode;

Beneath the deck the destined victims stow’d:

The sails they furl’d, they lash the mast aside,

And dropp’d their anchors, and the pinnace tied.

Next on the shore their hecatomb they land;

Chryseis last descending on the strand.

Her, thus returning from the furrow’d main,

Ulysses led to Phoebus’ sacred fane;

Where at his solemn altar, as the maid

He gave to Chryses, thus the hero said:

“Hail, reverend priest! to Phoebus’ awful dome

A suppliant I from great Atrides come:

Unransom’d, here receive the spotless fair;

Accept the hecatomb the Greeks prepare;

And may thy god who scatters darts around,

Atoned by sacrifice, desist to wound.”

At this, the sire embraced the maid again,

So sadly lost, so lately sought in vain.

Then near the altar of the darting king,

Disposed in rank their hecatomb they bring;

With water purify their hands, and take

The sacred offering of the salted cake;

While thus with arms devoutly raised in air,

And solemn voice, the priest directs his prayer:

“God of the silver bow, thy ear incline,

Whose power incircles Cilla the divine;

Whose sacred eye thy Tenedos surveys,

And gilds fair Chrysa with distinguish’d rays!

If, fired to vengeance at thy priest’s request,

Thy direful darts inflict the raging pest:

Once more attend! avert the wasteful woe,

And smile propitious, and unbend thy bow.”

So Chryses pray’d. Apollo heard his prayer:

And now the Greeks their hecatomb prepare;

Between their horns the salted barley threw,

And, with their heads to heaven, the victims slew:

The limbs they sever from the inclosing hide;

The thighs, selected to the gods, divide:

On these, in double cauls involved with art,

The choicest morsels lay from every part.

The priest himself before his altar stands,

And burns the offering with his holy hands.

Pours the black wine, and sees the flames aspire;

The youth with instruments surround the fire:

The thighs thus sacrificed, and entrails dress’d,

The assistants part, transfix, and roast the rest:

Then spread the tables, the repast prepare;

Each takes his seat, and each receives his share.

When now the rage of hunger was repress’d,

With pure libations they conclude the feast;

The youths with wine the copious goblets crown’d,

And, pleased, dispense the flowing bowls around;

With hymns divine the joyous banquet ends,

The paeans lengthen’d till the sun descends:

The Greeks, restored, the grateful notes prolong;

Apollo listens, and approves the song.

’Twas night; the chiefs beside their vessel lie,

Till rosy morn had purpled o’er the sky:

Then launch, and hoist the mast: indulgent gales,

Supplied by Phoebus, fill the swelling sails;

The milk-white canvas bellying as they blow,

The parted ocean foams and roars below:

Above the bounding billows swift they flew,

Till now the Grecian camp appear’d in view.

Far on the beach they haul their bark to land,

(The crooked keel divides the yellow sand,)

Then part, where stretch’d along the winding bay,

The ships and tents in mingled prospect lay.

But raging still, amidst his navy sat

The stern Achilles, stedfast in his hate;

Nor mix’d in combat, nor in council join’d;

But wasting cares lay heavy on his mind:

In his black thoughts revenge and slaughter roll,

And scenes of blood rise dreadful in his soul.

Twelve days were past, and now the dawning light

The gods had summon’d to the Olympian height:

Jove, first ascending from the watery bowers,

Leads the long order of ethereal powers.

When, like the morning-mist in early day,

Rose from the flood the daughter of the sea:

And to the seats divine her flight address’d.

There, far apart, and high above the rest,

The thunderer sat; where old Olympus shrouds

His hundred heads in heaven, and props the clouds.

Suppliant the goddess stood: one hand she placed

Beneath his beard, and one his knees embraced.

“If e’er, O father of the gods! (she said)

My words could please thee, or my actions aid,

Some marks of honour on my son bestow,

And pay in glory what in life you owe.

Fame is at least by heavenly promise due

To life so short, and now dishonour’d too.

Avenge this wrong, O ever just and wise!

Let Greece be humbled, and the Trojans rise;

Till the proud king and all the Achaian race

Shall heap with honours him they now disgrace.”

Thus Thetis spoke; but Jove in silence held

The sacred counsels of his breast conceal’d.

Not so repulsed, the goddess closer press’d,

Still grasp’d his knees, and urged the dear request.

“O sire of gods and men! thy suppliant hear;

Refuse, or grant; for what has Jove to fear?

Or oh! declare, of all the powers above,

Is wretched Thetis least the care of Jove?”

She said; and, sighing, thus the god replies,

Who rolls the thunder o’er the vaulted skies:

“What hast thou ask’d? ah, why should Jove engage

In foreign contests and domestic rage,

The gods’ complaints, and Juno’s fierce alarms,

While I, too partial, aid the Trojan arms?

Go, lest the haughty partner of my sway

With jealous eyes thy close access survey;

But part in peace, secure thy prayer is sped:

Witness the sacred honours of our head,

The nod that ratifies the will divine,

The faithful, fix’d, irrevocable sign;

This seals thy suit, and this fulfils thy vows—”

He spoke, and awful bends his sable brows,

Shakes his ambrosial curls, and gives the nod,

The stamp of fate and sanction of the god:

High heaven with trembling the dread signal took,

And all Olympus to the centre shook.

Swift to the seas profound the goddess flies,

Jove to his starry mansions in the skies.

The shining synod of the immortals wait

The coming god, and from their thrones of state

Arising silent, wrapp’d in holy fear,

Before the majesty of heaven appear.

Trembling they stand, while Jove assumes the throne,

All, but the god’s imperious queen alone:

Late had she view’d the silver-footed dame,

And all her passions kindled into flame.

“Say, artful manager of heaven (she cries),

Who now partakes the secrets of the skies?

Thy Juno knows not the decrees of fate,

In vain the partner of imperial state.

What favourite goddess then those cares divides,

Which Jove in prudence from his consort hides?”

To this the thunderer: “Seek not thou to find

The sacred counsels of almighty mind:

Involved in darkness likes the great decree,

Nor can the depths of fate be pierced by thee.

What fits thy knowledge, thou the first shalt know;

The first of gods above, and men below;

But thou, nor they, shall search the thoughts that roll

Deep in the close recesses of my soul.”

Full on the sire the goddess of the skies

Roll’d the large orbs of her majestic eyes,

And thus return’d:—“Austere Saturnius, say,

From whence this wrath, or who controls thy sway?

Thy boundless will, for me, remains in force,

And all thy counsels take the destined course.

But ’tis for Greece I fear: for late was seen,

In close consult, the silver-footed queen.

Jove to his Thetis nothing could deny,

Nor was the signal vain that shook the sky.

What fatal favour has the goddess won,

To grace her fierce, inexorable son?

Perhaps in Grecian blood to drench the plain,

And glut his vengeance with my people slain.”

Then thus the god: “O restless fate of pride,

That strives to learn what heaven resolves to hide;

Vain is the search, presumptuous and abhorr’d,

Anxious to thee, and odious to thy lord.

Let this suffice: the immutable decree

No force can shake: what is, that ought to be.

Goddess, submit; nor dare our will withstand,

But dread the power of this avenging hand:

The united strength of all the gods above

In vain resists the omnipotence of Jove.”

The thunderer spoke, nor durst the queen reply;

A reverent horror silenced all the sky.

The feast disturb’d, with sorrow Vulcan saw

His mother menaced, and the gods in awe;

Peace at his heart, and pleasure his design,

Thus interposed the architect divine:

“The wretched quarrels of the mortal state

Are far unworthy, gods! of your debate:

Let men their days in senseless strife employ,

We, in eternal peace and constant joy.

Thou, goddess-mother, with our sire comply,

Nor break the sacred union of the sky:

Lest, roused to rage, he shake the bless’d abodes,

Launch the red lightning, and dethrone the gods.

If you submit, the thunderer stands appeased;

The gracious power is willing to be pleased.”

Thus Vulcan spoke: and rising with a bound,

The double bowl with sparkling nectar crown’d,

Which held to Juno in a cheerful way,

“Goddess (he cried), be patient and obey.

Dear as you are, if Jove his arm extend,

I can but grieve, unable to defend

What god so daring in your aid to move,

Or lift his hand against the force of Jove?

Once in your cause I felt his matchless might,

Hurl’d headlong down from the ethereal height;

Toss’d all the day in rapid circles round,

Nor till the sun descended touch’d the ground.

Breathless I fell, in giddy motion lost;

The Sinthians raised me on the Lemnian coast;

He said, and to her hands the goblet heaved,

Which, with a smile, the white-arm’d queen received

Then, to the rest he fill’d; and in his turn,

Each to his lips applied the nectar’d urn,

Vulcan with awkward grace his office plies,

And unextinguish’d laughter shakes the skies.

Thus the blest gods the genial day prolong,

In feasts ambrosial, and celestial song.

Apollo tuned the lyre; the Muses round

With voice alternate aid the silver sound.

Meantime the radiant sun to mortal sight

Descending swift, roll’d down the rapid light:

Then to their starry domes the gods depart,

The shining monuments of Vulcan’s art:

Jove on his couch reclined his awful head,

And Juno slumber’d on the golden bed.




BOOK II (#ulink_e87c3f24-80b3-5ac5-9294-080822f42a38)


Argument

The Trial of the Army, and Catalogue

of the Forces

Jupiter, in pursuance of the request of Thetis, sends a deceitful vision to Agamemnon, persuading him to lead the army to battle, in order to make the Greeks sensible of their want of Achilles. The general, who is deluded with the hopes of taking Troy without his assistance, but fears the army was discouraged by his absence, and the late plague, as well as by the length of time, contrives to make trial of their disposition by a stratagem. He first communicates his design to the princes in council, that he would propose a return to the soldiers, and that they should put a stop to them if the proposal was embraced. Then he assembles the whole host, and upon moving for a return to Greece, they unanimously agree to it, and run to prepare the ships. They are detained by the management of Ulysses, who chastises the insolence of Thersites. The assembly is recalled, several speeches made on the occasion, and at length the advice of Nestor followed, which was to make a general muster of the troops, and to divide them into their several nations, before they proceeded to battle. This gives occasion to the poet to enumerate all the forces of the Greeks and Trojans, and in a large catalogue.

The time employed in this book consists not entirely of one day. The scene lies in the Grecian camp, and upon the sea-shore; towards the end it removes to Troy.

Now pleasing sleep had seal’d each mortal eye,

Stretch’d in the tents the Grecian leaders lie:

The immortals slumber’d on their thrones above;

All, but the ever-wakeful eyes of Jove.

To honour Thetis’ son he bends his care,

And plunge the Greeks in all the woes of war:

Then bids an empty phantom rise to sight,

And thus commands the vision of the night.

“Fly hence, deluding Dream! and light as air,

To Agamemnon’s ample tent repair.

Bid him in arms draw forth the embattled train,

Lead all his Grecians to the dusty plain.

Declare, e’en now ’tis given him to destroy

The lofty towers of wide-extended Troy.

For now no more the gods with fate contend,

At Juno’s suit the heavenly factions end.

Destruction hangs o’er yon devoted wall,

And nodding Ilion waits the impending fall.”

Swift as the word the vain illusion fled,

Descends, and hovers o’er Atrides’ head;

Clothed in the figure of the Pylian sage,

Renown’d for wisdom, and revered for age:

Around his temples spreads his golden wing,

And thus the flattering dream deceives the king.

“Canst thou, with all a monarch’s cares oppress’d,

O Atreus’ son! canst thou indulge the rest?

Ill fits a chief who mighty nations guides,

Directs in council, and in war presides,

To whom its safety a whole people owes,

To waste long nights in indolent repose.

Monarch, awake! ’tis Jove’s command I bear;

Thou, and thy glory, claim his heavenly care.

In just array draw forth the embattled train,

Lead all thy Grecians to the dusty plain;

E’en now, O king! ’tis given thee to destroy

The lofty towers of wide-extended Troy.

For now no more the gods with fate contend,

At Juno’s suit the heavenly factions end.

Destruction hangs o’er yon devoted wall,

And nodding Ilion waits the impending fall.

Awake, but waking this advice approve,

And trust the vision that descends from Jove.”

The phantom said; then vanish’d from his sight,

Resolves to air, and mixes with the night.

A thousand schemes the monarch’s mind employ;

Elate in thought he sacks untaken Troy:

Vain as he was, and to the future blind,

Nor saw what Jove and secret fate design’d,

What mighty toils to either host remain,

What scenes of grief, and numbers of the slain!

Eager he rises, and in fancy hears

The voice celestial murmuring in his ears.

First on his limbs a slender vest he drew,

Around him next the regal mantle threw,

The embroider’d sandals on his feet were tied;

The starry falchion glitter’d at his side;

And last, his arm the massy sceptre loads,

Unstain’d, immortal, and the gift of gods.

Now rosy Morn ascends the court of Jove,

Lifts up her light, and opens day above.

The king despatch’d his heralds with commands

To range the camp and summon all the bands:

The gathering hosts the monarch’s word obey;

While to the fleet Atrides bends his way.

In his black ship the Pylian prince he found;

There calls a senate of the peers around:

The assembly placed, the king of men express’d

The counsels labouring in his artful breast.

“Friends and confederates! with attentive ear

Receive my words, and credit what you hear.

Late as I slumber’d in the shades of night,

A dream divine appear’d before my sight;

Whose visionary form like Nestor came,

The same in habit, and in mien the same.

The heavenly phantom hover’d o’er my head,

‘And, dost thou sleep, O Atreus’ son? (he said)

Ill fits a chief who mighty nations guides,

Directs in council, and in war presides;

To whom its safety a whole people owes,

To waste long nights in indolent repose.

Monarch, awake! ’tis Jove’s command I bear,

Thou and thy glory claim his heavenly care.

In just array draw forth the embattled train,

And lead the Grecians to the dusty plain;

E’en now, O king! ’tis given thee to destroy

The lofty towers of wide-extended Troy.

For now no more the gods with fate contend,

At Juno’s suit the heavenly factions end.

Destruction hangs o’er yon devoted wall,

And nodding Ilion waits the impending fall.

This hear observant, and the gods obey!’

The vision spoke, and pass’d in air away.

Now, valiant chiefs! since heaven itself alarms,

Unite, and rouse the sons of Greece to arms.

But first, with caution, try what yet they dare,

Worn with nine years of unsuccessful war.

To move the troops to measure back the main,

Be mine; and yours the province to detain.”

He spoke, and sat: when Nestor, rising said,

(Nestor, whom Pylos’ sandy realms obey’d,)

“Princes of Greece, your faithful ears incline,

Nor doubt the vision of the powers divine;

Sent by great Jove to him who rules the host,

Forbid it, heaven! this warning should be lost!

Then let us haste, obey the god’s alarms,

And join to rouse the sons of Greece to arms.”

Thus spoke the sage: the kings without delay

Dissolve the council, and their chief obey:

The sceptred rulers lead; the following host,

Pour’d forth by thousands, darkens all the coast.

As from some rocky cleft the shepherd sees

Clustering in heaps on heaps the driving bees,

Rolling and blackening, swarms succeeding swarms,

With deeper murmurs and more hoarse alarms;

Dusky they spread, a close embodied crowd,

And o’er the vale descends the living cloud.

So, from the tents and ships, a lengthen’d train

Spreads all the beach, and wide o’ershades the plain:

Along the region runs a deafening sound;

Beneath their footsteps groans the trembling ground.

Fame flies before the messenger of Jove,

And shining soars, and claps her wings above.

Nine sacred heralds now, proclaiming loud

The monarch’s will, suspend the listening crowd.

Soon as the throngs in order ranged appear,

And fainter murmurs died upon the ear,

The king of kings his awful figure raised:

High in his hand the golden sceptre blazed;

The golden sceptre, of celestial flame,

By Vulcan form’d, from Jove to Hermes came.

To Pelops he the immortal gift resign’d;

The immortal gift great Pelops left behind,

In Atreus’ hand, which not with Atreus ends,

To rich Thyestes next the prize descends;

And now the mark of Agamemnon’s reign,

Subjects all Argos, and controls the main.

On this bright sceptre now the king reclined,

And artful thus pronounced the speech design’d:

“Ye sons of Mars, partake your leader’s care,

Heroes of Greece, and brothers of the war!

Of partial Jove with justice I complain,

And heavenly oracles believed in vain

A safe return was promised to our toils,

Renown’d, triumphant, and enrich’d with spoils.

Now shameful flight alone can save the host,

Our blood, our treasure, and our glory lost.

So Jove decrees, resistless lord of all!

At whose command whole empires rise or fall:

He shakes the feeble props of human trust,

And towns and armies humbles to the dust

What shame to Greece a fruitful war to wage,

Oh, lasting shame in every future age!

Once great in arms, the common scorn we grow,

Repulsed and baffled by a feeble foe.

So small their number, that if wars were ceased,

And Greece triumphant held a general feast,

All rank’d by tens, whole decades when they dine

Must want a Trojan slave to pour the wine.

But other forces have our hopes o’erthrown,

And Troy prevails by armies not her own.

Now nine long years of mighty Jove are run,

Since first the labours of this war begun:

Our cordage torn, decay’d our vessels lie,

And scarce insure the wretched power to fly.

Haste, then, for ever leave the Trojan wall!

Our weeping wives, our tender children call:

Love, duty, safety, summon us away,

’Tis nature’s voice, and nature we obey,

Our shatter’d barks may yet transport us o’er,

Safe and inglorious, to our native shore.

Fly, Grecians, fly, your sails and oars employ,

And dream no more of heaven-defended Troy.”

His deep design unknown, the hosts approve

Atrides’ speech. The mighty numbers move.

So roll the billows to the Icarian shore,

From east and south when winds begin to roar,

Burst their dark mansions in the clouds, and sweep

The whitening surface of the ruffled deep.

And as on corn when western gusts descend,

Before the blast the lofty harvests bend:

Thus o’er the field the moving host appears,

With nodding plumes and groves of waving spears.

The gathering murmur spreads, their trampling feet

Beat the loose sands, and thicken to the fleet;

With long-resounding cries they urge the train

To fit the ships, and launch into the main.

They toil, they sweat, thick clouds of dust arise,

The doubling clamours echo to the skies.

E’en then the Greeks had left the hostile plain,

And fate decreed the fall of Troy in vain;

But Jove’s imperial queen their flight survey’d,

And sighing thus bespoke the blue-eyed maid:

“Shall then the Grecians fly! O dire disgrace!

And leave unpunish’d this perfidious race?

Shall Troy, shall Priam, and the adulterous spouse,

In peace enjoy the fruits of broken vows?

And bravest chiefs, in Helen’s quarrel slain,

Lie unrevenged on yon detested plain?

No: let my Greeks, unmoved by vain alarms,

Once more refulgent shine in brazen arms.

Haste, goddess, haste! the flying host detain,

Nor let one sail be hoisted on the main.”

Pallas obeys, and from Olympus’ height

Swift to the ships precipitates her flight.

Ulysses, first in public cares, she found,

For prudent counsel like the gods renown’d:

Oppress’d with generous grief the hero stood,

Nor drew his sable vessels to the flood.

“And is it thus, divine Laertes’ son,

Thus fly the Greeks (the martial maid begun),

Thus to their country bear their own disgrace,

And fame eternal leave to Priam’s race?

Shall beauteous Helen still remain unfreed,

Still unrevenged, a thousand heroes bleed!

Haste, generous Ithacus! prevent the shame,

Recall your armies, and your chiefs reclaim.

Your own resistless eloquence employ,

And to the immortals trust the fall of Troy.”

The voice divine confess’d the warlike maid,

Ulysses heard, nor uninspired obey’d:

Then meeting first Atrides, from his hand

Received the imperial sceptre of command.

Thus graced, attention and respect to gain,

He runs, he flies through all the Grecian train;

Each prince of name, or chief in arms approved,

He fired with praise, or with persuasion moved.

“Warriors like you, with strength and wisdom bless’d,

By brave examples should confirm the rest.

The monarch’s will not yet reveal’d appears;

He tries our courage, but resents our fears.

The unwary Greeks his fury may provoke;

Not thus the king in secret council spoke.

Jove loves our chief, from Jove his honour springs,

Beware! for dreadful is the wrath of kings.”

But if a clamorous vile plebeian rose,

Him with reproof he check’d or tamed with blows.

“Be still, thou slave, and to thy betters yield;

Unknown alike in council and in field!

Ye gods, what dastards would our host command!

Swept to the war, the lumber of a land.

Be silent, wretch, and think not here allow’d

That worst of tyrants, an usurping crowd.

To one sole monarch Jove commits the sway;

His are the laws, and him let all obey.”

With words like these the troops Ulysses ruled,

The loudest silenced, and the fiercest cool’d.

Back to the assembly roll the thronging train,

Desert the ships, and pour upon the plain.

Murmuring they move, as when old ocean roars,

And heaves huge surges to the trembling shores;

The groaning banks are burst with bellowing sound,

The rocks remurmur and the deeps rebound.

At length the tumult sinks, the noises cease,

And a still silence lulls the camp to peace.

Thersites only clamour’d in the throng,

Loquacious, loud, and turbulent of tongue:

Awed by no shame, by no respect controll’d,

In scandal busy, in reproaches bold:

With witty malice studious to defame,

Scorn all his joy, and laughter all his aim:—

But chief he gloried with licentious style

To lash the great, and monarchs to revile.

His figure such as might his soul proclaim;

One eye was blinking, and one leg was lame:

His mountain shoulders half his breast o’erspread,

Thin hairs bestrew’d his long misshapen head.

Spleen to mankind his envious heart possess’d,

And much he hated all, but most the best:

Ulysses or Achilles still his theme;

But royal scandal his delight supreme,

Long had he lived the scorn of every Greek,

Vex’d when he spoke, yet still they heard him speak.

Sharp was his voice; which in the shrillest tone,

Thus with injurious taunts attack’d the throne.

“Amidst the glories of so bright a reign,

What moves the great Atrides to complain?

’Tis thine whate’er the warrior’s breast inflames,

The golden spoil, and thine the lovely dames.

With all the wealth our wars and blood bestow,

Thy tents are crowded and thy chests o’erflow.

Thus at full ease in heaps of riches roll’d,

What grieves the monarch? Is it thirst of gold?

Say, shall we march with our unconquer’d powers

(The Greeks and I) to Ilion’s hostile towers,

And bring the race of royal bastards here,

For Troy to ransom at a price too dear?

But safer plunder thy own host supplies;

Say, wouldst thou seize some valiant leader’s prize?

Or, if thy heart to generous love be led,

Some captive fair, to bless thy kingly bed?

Whate’er our master craves submit we must,

Plagued with his pride, or punish’d for his lust.

Oh women of Achaia; men no more!

Hence let us fly, and let him waste his store

In loves and pleasures on the Phrygian shore.

We may be wanted on some busy day,

When Hector comes: so great Achilles may:

From him he forced the prize we jointly gave,

From him, the fierce, the fearless, and the brave:

And durst he, as he ought, resent that wrong,

This mighty tyrant were no tyrant long.”

Fierce from his seat at this Ulysses springs,

In generous vengeance of the king of kings.

With indignation sparkling in his eyes,

He views the wretch, and sternly thus replies:

“Peace, factious monster, born to vex the state,

With wrangling talents form’d for foul debate:

Curb that impetuous tongue, nor rashly vain,

And singly mad, asperse the sovereign reign.

Have we not known thee, slave! of all our host,

The man who acts the least, upbraids the most?

Think not the Greeks to shameful flight to bring,

Nor let those lips profane the name of king.

For our return we trust the heavenly powers;

Be that their care; to fight like men be ours.

But grant the host with wealth the general load,

Except detraction, what hast thou bestow’d?

Suppose some hero should his spoils resign,

Art thou that hero, could those spoils be thine?

Gods! let me perish on this hateful shore,

And let these eyes behold my son no more;

If, on thy next offence, this hand forbear

To strip those arms thou ill deserv’st to wear,

Expel the council where our princes meet,

And send thee scourged and howling through the fleet.”

He said, and cowering as the dastard bends,

The weighty sceptre on his bank descends.

On the round bunch the bloody tumours rise:

The tears spring starting from his haggard eyes;

Trembling he sat, and shrunk in abject fears,

From his vile visage wiped the scalding tears;

While to his neighbour each express’d his thought:

“Ye gods! what wonders has Ulysses wrought!

What fruits his conduct and his courage yield!

Great in the council, glorious in the field.

Generous he rises in the crown’s defence,

To curb the factious tongue of insolence,

Such just examples on offenders shown,

Sedition silence, and assert the throne.”

’Twas thus the general voice the hero praised,

Who, rising, high the imperial sceptre raised:

The blue-eyed Pallas, his celestial friend,

(In form a herald,) bade the crowds attend.

The expecting crowds in still attention hung,

To hear the wisdom of his heavenly tongue.

Then deeply thoughtful, pausing ere he spoke,

His silence thus the prudent hero broke:

“Unhappy monarch! whom the Grecian race

With shame deserting, heap with vile disgrace.

Not such at Argos was their generous vow:

Once all their voice, but ah! forgotten now:

Ne’er to return, was then the common cry,

Till Troy’s proud structures should in ashes lie.

Behold them weeping for their native shore;

What could their wives or helpless children more?

What heart but melts to leave the tender train,

And, one short month, endure the wintry main?

Few leagues removed, we wish our peaceful seat,

When the ship tosses, and the tempests beat:

Then well may this long stay provoke their tears,

The tedious length of nine revolving years.

Not for their grief the Grecian host I blame;

But vanquish’d! baffled! oh, eternal shame!

Expect the time to Troy’s destruction given.

And try the faith of Chalcas and of heaven.

What pass’d at Aulis, Greece can witness bear,

And all who live to breathe this Phrygian air.

Beside a fountain’s sacred brink we raised

Our verdant altars, and the victims blazed:

’Twas where the plane-tree spread its shades around,

The altars heaved; and from the crumbling ground

A mighty dragon shot, of dire portent;

From Jove himself the dreadful sign was sent.

Straight to the tree his sanguine spires he roll’d,

And curl’d around in many a winding fold;

The topmost branch a mother-bird possess’d;

Eight callow infants fill’d the mossy nest;

Herself the ninth; the serpent, as he hung,

Stretch’d his black jaws and crush’d the crying young;

While hovering near, with miserable moan,

The drooping mother wail’d her children gone.

The mother last, as round the nest she flew,

Seized by the beating wing, the monster slew;

Nor long survived: to marble turn’d, he stands

A lasting prodigy on Aulis’ sands.

Such was the will of Jove; and hence we dare

Trust in his omen, and support the war.

For while around we gazed with wondering eyes,

And trembling sought the powers with sacrifice,

Full of his god, the reverend Chalcas cried,

‘Ye Grecian warriors! lay your fears aside.

This wondrous signal Jove himself displays,

Of long, long labours, but eternal praise.

As many birds as by the snake were slain,

So many years the toils of Greece remain;

But wait the tenth, for Ilion’s fall decreed:’

Thus spoke the prophet, thus the Fates succeed.

Obey, ye Grecians! with submission wait,

Nor let your flight avert the Trojan fate.”

He said: the shores with loud applauses sound,

The hollow ships each deafening shout rebound.

Then Nestor thus—“These vain debates forbear,

Ye talk like children, not like heroes dare.

Where now are all your high resolves at last?

Your leagues concluded, your engagements past?

Vow’d with libations and with victims then,

Now vanish’d like their smoke: the faith of men!

While useless words consume the unactive hours,

No wonder Troy so long resists our powers.

Rise, great Atrides! and with courage sway;

We march to war, if thou direct the way.

But leave the few that dare resist thy laws,

The mean deserters of the Grecian cause,

To grudge the conquests mighty Jove prepares,

And view with envy our successful wars.

On that great day, when first the martial train,

Big with the fate of Ilion, plough’d the main,

Jove, on the right, a prosperous signal sent,

And thunder rolling shook the firmament.

Encouraged hence, maintain the glorious strife,

Till every soldier grasp a Phrygian wife,

Till Helen’s woes at full revenged appear,

And Troy’s proud matrons render tear for tear.

Before that day, if any Greek invite

His country’s troops to base, inglorious flight,

Stand forth that Greek! and hoist his sail to fly,

And die the dastard first, who dreads to die.

But now, O monarch! all thy chiefs advise:

Nor what they offer, thou thyself despise.

Among those counsels, let not mine be vain;

In tribes and nations to divide thy train:

His separate troops let every leader call,

Each strengthen each, and all encourage all.

What chief, or soldier, of the numerous band,

Or bravely fights, or ill obeys command,

When thus distinct they war, shall soon be known

And what the cause of Ilion not o’erthrown;

If fate resists, or if our arms are slow,

If gods above prevent, or men below.”

To him the king: “How much thy years excel

In arts of counsel, and in speaking well!

O would the gods, in love to Greece, decree

But ten such sages as they grant in thee;

Such wisdom soon should Priam’s force destroy,

And soon should fall the haughty towers of Troy!

But Jove forbids, who plunges those he hates

In fierce contention and in vain debates:

Now great Achilles from our aid withdraws,

By me provoked; a captive maid the cause:

If e’er as friends we join, the Trojan wall

Must shake, and heavy will the vengeance fall!

But now, ye warriors, take a short repast;

And, well refresh’d, to bloody conflict haste.

His sharpen’d spear let every Grecian wield,

And every Grecian fix his brazen shield,

Let all excite the fiery steeds of war,

And all for combat fit the rattling car.

This day, this dreadful day, let each contend;

No rest, no respite, till the shades descend;

Till darkness, or till death, shall cover all:

Let the war bleed, and let the mighty fall;

Till bathed in sweat be every manly breast,

With the huge shield each brawny arm depress’d,

Each aching nerve refuse the lance to throw,

And each spent courser at the chariot blow.

Who dares, inglorious, in his ships to stay,

Who dares to tremble on this signal day;

That wretch, too mean to fall by martial power,

The birds shall mangle, and the dogs devour.”

The monarch spoke; and straight a murmur rose,

Loud as the surges when the tempest blows,

That dash’d on broken rocks tumultuous roar,

And foam and thunder on the stony shore.

Straight to the tents the troops dispersing bend,

The fires are kindled, and the smokes ascend;

With hasty feasts they sacrifice, and pray,

To avert the dangers of the doubtful day.

A steer of five years’ age, large limb’d, and fed,

To Jove’s high altars Agamemnon led:

There bade the noblest of the Grecian peers;

And Nestor first, as most advanced in years.

Next came Idomeneus,

and Tydeus’ son,

Ajax the less, and Ajax Telamon;

Then wise Ulysses in his rank was placed;

And Menelaus came, unbid, the last.

The chiefs surround the destined beast, and take

The sacred offering of the salted cake:

When thus the king prefers his solemn prayer;

“O thou! whose thunder rends the clouded air,

Who in the heaven of heavens hast fixed thy throne,

Supreme of gods! unbounded, and alone!

Hear! and before the burning sun descends,

Before the night her gloomy veil extends,

Low in the dust be laid yon hostile spires,

Be Priam’s palace sunk in Grecian fires.

In Hector’s breast be plunged this shining sword,

And slaughter’d heroes groan around their lord!”

Thus prayed the chief: his unavailing prayer

Great Jove refused, and toss’d in empty air:

The God averse, while yet the fumes arose,

Prepared new toils, and doubled woes on woes.

Their prayers perform’d the chiefs the rite pursue,

The barley sprinkled, and the victim slew.

The limbs they sever from the inclosing hide,

The thighs, selected to the gods, divide.

On these, in double cauls involved with art,

The choicest morsels lie from every part,

From the cleft wood the crackling flames aspire

While the fat victims feed the sacred fire.

The thighs thus sacrificed, and entrails dress’d

The assistants part, transfix, and roast the rest;

Then spread the tables, the repast prepare,

Each takes his seat, and each receives his share.

Soon as the rage of hunger was suppress’d,

The generous Nestor thus the prince address’d.

“Now bid thy heralds sound the loud alarms,

And call the squadrons sheathed in brazen arms;

Now seize the occasion, now the troops survey,

And lead to war when heaven directs the way.”

He said; the monarch issued his commands;

Straight the loud heralds call the gathering bands

The chiefs inclose their king; the hosts divide,

In tribes and nations rank’d on either side.

High in the midst the blue-eyed virgin flies;

From rank to rank she darts her ardent eyes;

The dreadful aegis, Jove’s immortal shield,

Blazed on her arm, and lighten’d all the field:

Round the vast orb a hundred serpents roll’d,

Form’d the bright fringe, and seem’d to burn in gold,

With this each Grecian’s manly breast she warms,

Swells their bold hearts, and strings their nervous arms,

No more they sigh, inglorious, to return,

But breathe revenge, and for the combat burn.

As on some mountain, through the lofty grove,

The crackling flames ascend, and blaze above;

The fires expanding, as the winds arise,

Shoot their long beams, and kindle half the skies:

So from the polish’d arms, and brazen shields,

A gleamy splendour flash’d along the fields.

Not less their number than the embodied cranes,

Or milk-white swans in Asius’ watery plains.

That, o’er the windings of Cayster’s springs,

Stretch their long necks, and clap their rustling wings,

Now tower aloft, and course in airy rounds,

Now light with noise; with noise the field resounds.

Thus numerous and confused, extending wide,

The legions crowd Scamander’s flowery side;

With rushing troops the plains are cover’d o’er,

And thundering footsteps shake the sounding shore.

Along the river’s level meads they stand,

Thick as in spring the flowers adorn the land,

Or leaves the trees; or thick as insects play,

The wandering nation of a summer’s day:

That, drawn by milky steams, at evening hours,

In gather’d swarms surround the rural bowers;

From pail to pail with busy murmur run

The gilded legions, glittering in the sun.

So throng’d, so close, the Grecian squadrons stood

In radiant arms, and thirst for Trojan blood.

Each leader now his scatter’d force conjoins

In close array, and forms the deepening lines.

Not with more ease the skilful shepherd-swain

Collects his flocks from thousands on the plain.

The king of kings, majestically tall,

Towers o’er his armies, and outshines them all;

Like some proud bull, that round the pastures leads

His subject herds, the monarch of the meads,

Great as the gods, the exalted chief was seen,

His strength like Neptune, and like Mars his mien;

Jove o’er his eyes celestial glories spread,

And dawning conquest played around his head.

Say, virgins, seated round the throne divine,

All-knowing goddesses! immortal nine!

Since earth’s wide regions, heaven’s unmeasur’d height,

And hell’s abyss, hide nothing from your sight,

(We, wretched mortals! lost in doubts below,

But guess by rumour, and but boast we know,)

O say what heroes, fired by thirst of fame,

Or urged by wrongs, to Troy’s destruction came.

To count them all, demands a thousand tongues,

A throat of brass, and adamantine lungs.

Daughters of Jove, assist! inspired by you

The mighty labour dauntless I pursue;

What crowded armies, from what climes they bring,

Their names, their numbers, and their chiefs I sing.

THE CATALOGUE OF THE SHIPS.

The hardy warriors whom Boeotia bred,

Penelius, Leitus, Prothoenor, led:

With these Arcesilaus and Clonius stand,

Equal in arms, and equal in command.

These head the troops that rocky Aulis yields,

And Eteon’s hills, and Hyrie’s watery fields,

And Schoenos, Scholos, Graea near the main,

And Mycalessia’s ample piny plain;

Those who in Peteon or Ilesion dwell,

Or Harma where Apollo’s prophet fell;

Heleon and Hyle, which the springs o’erflow;

And Medeon lofty, and Ocalea low;

Or in the meads of Haliartus stray,

Or Thespia sacred to the god of day:

Onchestus, Neptune’s celebrated groves;

Copae, and Thisbe, famed for silver doves;

For flocks Erythrae, Glissa for the vine;

Platea green, and Nysa the divine;

And they whom Thebe’s well-built walls inclose,

Where Myde, Eutresis, Corone, rose;

And Arne rich, with purple harvests crown’d;

And Anthedon, Boeotia’s utmost bound.

Full fifty ships they send, and each conveys

Twice sixty warriors through the foaming seas.

To these succeed Aspledon’s martial train,

Who plough the spacious Orchomenian plain.

Two valiant brothers rule the undaunted throng,

Ialmen and Ascalaphus the strong:

Sons of Astyoche, the heavenly fair,

Whose virgin charms subdued the god of war:

(In Actor’s court as she retired to rest,

The strength of Mars the blushing maid compress’d)

Their troops in thirty sable vessels sweep,

With equal oars, the hoarse-resounding deep.

The Phocians next in forty barks repair;

Epistrophus and Schedius head the war:

From those rich regions where Cephisus leads

His silver current through the flowery meads;

From Panopea, Chrysa the divine,

Where Anemoria’s stately turrets shine,

Where Pytho, Daulis, Cyparissus stood,

And fair Lilaea views the rising flood.

These, ranged in order on the floating tide,

Close, on the left, the bold Boeotians’ side.

Fierce Ajax led the Locrian squadrons on,

Ajax the less, Oileus’ valiant son;

Skill’d to direct the flying dart aright;

Swift in pursuit, and active in the fight.

Him, as their chief, the chosen troops attend,

Which Bessa, Thronus, and rich Cynos send;

Opus, Calliarus, and Scarphe’s bands;

And those who dwell where pleasing Augia stands,

And where Boagrius floats the lowly lands,

Or in fair Tarphe’s sylvan seats reside:

In forty vessels cut the yielding tide.

Euboea next her martial sons prepares,

And sends the brave Abantes to the wars:

Breathing revenge, in arms they take their way

From Chalcis’ walls, and strong Eretria;

The Isteian fields for generous vines renown’d,

The fair Caristos, and the Styrian ground;

Where Dios from her towers o’erlooks the plain,

And high Cerinthus views the neighbouring main.

Down their broad shoulders falls a length of hair;

Their hands dismiss not the long lance in air;

But with protended spears in fighting fields

Pierce the tough corslets and the brazen shields.

Twice twenty ships transport the warlike bands,

Which bold Elphenor, fierce in arms, commands.

Full fifty more from Athens stem the main,

Led by Menestheus through the liquid plain.

(Athens the fair, where great Erectheus sway’d,

That owed his nurture to the blue-eyed maid,

But from the teeming furrow took his birth,

The mighty offspring of the foodful earth.

Him Pallas placed amidst her wealthy fane,

Adored with sacrifice and oxen slain;

Where, as the years revolve, her altars blaze,

And all the tribes resound the goddess’ praise.)

No chief like thee, Menestheus! Greece could yield,

To marshal armies in the dusty field,

The extended wings of battle to display,

Or close the embodied host in firm array.

Nestor alone, improved by length of days,

For martial conduct bore an equal praise.

With these appear the Salaminian bands,

Whom the gigantic Telamon commands;

In twelve black ships to Troy they steer their course,

And with the great Athenians join their force.

Next move to war the generous Argive train,

From high Troezene, and Maseta’s plain,

And fair Ægina circled by the main:

Whom strong Tyrinthe’s lofty walls surround,

And Epidaure with viny harvests crown’d:

And where fair Asinen and Hermoin show

Their cliffs above, and ample bay below.

These by the brave Euryalus were led,

Great Sthenelus, and greater Diomed;

But chief Tydides bore the sovereign sway:

In fourscore barks they plough the watery way.

The proud Mycene arms her martial powers,

Cleone, Corinth, with imperial towers,

Fair Araethyrea, Ornia’s fruitful plain,

And Ægion, and Adrastus’ ancient reign;

And those who dwell along the sandy shore,

And where Pellene yields her fleecy store,

Where Helice and Hyperesia lie,

And Gonoessa’s spires salute the sky.

Great Agamemnon rules the numerous band,

A hundred vessels in long order stand,

And crowded nations wait his dread command.

High on the deck the king of men appears,

And his refulgent arms in triumph wears;

Proud of his host, unrivall’d in his reign,

In silent pomp he moves along the main.

His brother follows, and to vengeance warms

The hardy Spartans, exercised in arms:

Phares and Brysia’s valiant troops, and those

Whom Lacedaemon’s lofty hills inclose;

Or Messe’s towers for silver doves renown’d,

Amyclae, Laas, Augia’s happy ground,

And those whom OEtylos’ low walls contain,

And Helos, on the margin of the main:

These, o’er the bending ocean, Helen’s cause,

In sixty ships with Menelaus draws:

Eager and loud from man to man he flies,

Revenge and fury flaming in his eyes;

While vainly fond, in fancy oft he hears

The fair one’s grief, and sees her falling tears.

In ninety sail, from Pylos’ sandy coast,

Nestor the sage conducts his chosen host:

From Amphigenia’s ever-fruitful land,

Where Æpy high, and little Pteleon stand;

Where beauteous Arene her structures shows,

And Thryon’s walls Alpheus’ streams inclose:

And Dorion, famed for Thamyris’ disgrace,

Superior once of all the tuneful race,

Till, vain of mortals’ empty praise, he strove

To match the seed of cloud-compelling Jove!

Too daring bard! whose unsuccessful pride

The immortal Muses in their art defied.

The avenging Muses of the light of day

Deprived his eyes, and snatch’d his voice away;

No more his heavenly voice was heard to sing,

His hand no more awaked the silver string.

Where under high Cyllene, crown’d with wood,

The shaded tomb of old Æpytus stood;

From Ripe, Stratie, Tegea’s bordering towns,

The Phenean fields, and Orchomenian downs,

Where the fat herds in plenteous pasture rove;

And Stymphelus with her surrounding grove;

Parrhasia, on her snowy cliffs reclined,

And high Enispe shook by wintry wind,

And fair Mantinea’s ever-pleasing site;

In sixty sail the Arcadian bands unite.

Bold Agapenor, glorious at their head,

(Ancaeus’ son) the mighty squadron led.

Their ships, supplied by Agamemnon’s care,

Through roaring seas the wondering warriors bear;

The first to battle on the appointed plain,

But new to all the dangers of the main.

Those, where fair Elis and Buprasium join;

Whom Hyrmin, here, and Myrsinus confine,

And bounded there, where o’er the valleys rose

The Olenian rock; and where Alisium flows;

Beneath four chiefs (a numerous army) came:

The strength and glory of the Epean name.

In separate squadrons these their train divide,

Each leads ten vessels through the yielding tide.

One was Amphimachus, and Thalpius one;

(Eurytus’ this, and that Teatus’ son;)

Diores sprung from Amarynceus’ line;

And great Polyxenus, of force divine.

But those who view fair Elis o’er the seas

From the blest islands of the Echinades,

In forty vessels under Meges move,

Begot by Phyleus, the beloved of Jove:

To strong Dulichium from his sire he fled,

And thence to Troy his hardy warriors led.

Ulysses follow’d through the watery road,

A chief, in wisdom equal to a god.

With those whom Cephalenia’s line inclosed,

Or till their fields along the coast opposed;

Or where fair Ithaca o’erlooks the floods,

Where high Neritos shakes his waving woods,

Where Ægilipa’s rugged sides are seen,

Crocylia rocky, and Zacynthus green.

These in twelve galleys with vermilion prores,

Beneath his conduct sought the Phrygian shores.

Thoas came next, Andraemon’s valiant son,

From Pleuron’s walls, and chalky Calydon,

And rough Pylene, and the Olenian steep,

And Chalcis, beaten by the rolling deep.

He led the warriors from the Ætolian shore,

For now the sons of OEneus were no more!

The glories of the mighty race were fled!

OEneus himself, and Meleager dead!

To Thoas’ care now trust the martial train,

His forty vessels follow through the main.

Next, eighty barks the Cretan king commands,

Of Gnossus, Lyctus, and Gortyna’s bands;

And those who dwell where Rhytion’s domes arise,

Or white Lycastus glitters to the skies,

Or where by Phaestus silver Jardan runs;

Crete’s hundred cities pour forth all her sons.

These march’d, Idomeneus, beneath thy care,

And Merion, dreadful as the god of war.

Tlepolemus, the sun of Hercules,

Led nine swift vessels through the foamy seas,

From Rhodes, with everlasting sunshine bright,

Jalyssus, Lindus, and Camirus white.

His captive mother fierce Alcides bore

From Ephyr’s walls and Selle’s winding shore,

Where mighty towns in ruins spread the plain,

And saw their blooming warriors early slain.

The hero, when to manly years he grew,

Alcides’ uncle, old Licymnius, slew;

For this, constrain’d to quit his native place,

And shun the vengeance of the Herculean race,

A fleet he built, and with a numerous train

Of willing exiles wander’d o’er the main;

Where, many seas and many sufferings past,

On happy Rhodes the chief arrived at last:

There in three tribes divides his native band,

And rules them peaceful in a foreign land;

Increased and prosper’d in their new abodes

By mighty Jove, the sire of men and gods;

With joy they saw the growing empire rise,

And showers of wealth descending from the skies.

Three ships with Nireus sought the Trojan shore,

Nireus, whom Aglae to Charopus bore,

Nireus, in faultless shape and blooming grace,

The loveliest youth of all the Grecian race;

Pelides only match’d his early charms;

But few his troops, and small his strength in arms.

Next thirty galleys cleave the liquid plain,

Of those Calydnae’s sea-girt isles contain;

With them the youth of Nisyrus repair,

Casus the strong, and Crapathus the fair;

Cos, where Eurypylus possess’d the sway,

Till great Alcides made the realms obey:

These Antiphus and bold Phidippus bring,

Sprung from the god by Thessalus the king.

Now, Muse, recount Pelasgic Argos’ powers,

From Alos, Alope, and Trechin’s towers:

From Phthia’s spacious vales; and Hella, bless’d

With female beauty far beyond the rest.

Full fifty ships beneath Achilles’ care,

The Achaians, Myrmidons, Hellenians bear;

Thessalians all, though various in their name;

The same their nation, and their chief the same.

But now inglorious, stretch’d along the shore,

They hear the brazen voice of war no more;

No more the foe they face in dire array:

Close in his fleet the angry leader lay;

Since fair Briseis from his arms was torn,

The noblest spoil from sack’d Lyrnessus borne,

Then, when the chief the Theban walls o’erthrew,

And the bold sons of great Evenus slew.

There mourn’d Achilles, plunged in depth of care,

But soon to rise in slaughter, blood, and war.

To these the youth of Phylace succeed,

Itona, famous for her fleecy breed,

And grassy Pteleon deck’d with cheerful greens,

The bowers of Ceres, and the sylvan scenes.

Sweet Pyrrhasus, with blooming flowerets crown’d,

And Antron’s watery dens, and cavern’d ground.

These own’d, as chief, Protesilas the brave,

Who now lay silent in the gloomy grave:

The first who boldly touch’d the Trojan shore,

And dyed a Phrygian lance with Grecian gore;

There lies, far distant from his native plain;

Unfinish’d his proud palaces remain,

And his sad consort beats her breast in vain.

His troops in forty ships Podarces led,

Iphiclus’ son, and brother to the dead;

Nor he unworthy to command the host;

Yet still they mourn’d their ancient leader lost.

The men who Glaphyra’s fair soil partake,

Where hills incircle Boebe’s lowly lake,

Where Phaere hears the neighbouring waters fall,

Or proud Iolcus lifts her airy wall,

In ten black ships embark’d for Ilion’s shore,

With bold Eumelus, whom Alceste bore:

All Pelias’ race Alceste far outshined,

The grace and glory of the beauteous kind,

The troops Methone or Thaumacia yields,

Olizon’s rocks, or Meliboea’s fields,

With Philoctetes sail’d whose matchless art

From the tough bow directs the feather’d dart.

Seven were his ships; each vessel fifty row,

Skill’d in his science of the dart and bow.

But he lay raging on the Lemnian ground,

A poisonous hydra gave the burning wound;

There groan’d the chief in agonizing pain,

Whom Greece at length shall wish, nor wish in vain.

His forces Medon led from Lemnos’ shore,

Oileus’ son, whom beauteous Rhena bore.

The Œchalian race, in those high towers contain’d

Where once Eurytus in proud triumph reign’d,

Or where her humbler turrets Tricca rears,

Or where Ithome, rough with rocks, appears,

In thirty sail the sparkling waves divide,

Which Podalirius and Machaon guide.

To these his skill their parent-god imparts,

Divine professors of the healing arts.

The bold Ormenian and Asterian bands

In forty barks Eurypylus commands.

Where Titan hides his hoary head in snow,

And where Hyperia’s silver fountains flow.

Thy troops, Argissa, Polypoetes leads,

And Eleon, shelter’d by Olympus’ shades,

Gyrtone’s warriors; and where Orthe lies,

And Oloosson’s chalky cliffs arise.

Sprung from Pirithous of immortal race,

The fruit of fair Hippodame’s embrace,

(That day, when hurl’d from Pelion’s cloudy head,

To distant dens the shaggy Centaurs fled)

With Polypoetes join’d in equal sway

Leonteus leads, and forty ships obey.

In twenty sail the bold Perrhaebians came

From Cyphus, Guneus was their leader’s name.

With these the Enians join’d, and those who freeze

Where cold Dodona lifts her holy trees;

Or where the pleasing Titaresius glides,

And into Peneus rolls his easy tides;

Yet o’er the silvery surface pure they flow,

The sacred stream unmix’d with streams below,

Sacred and awful! from the dark abodes

Styx pours them forth, the dreadful oath of gods!

Last, under Prothous the Magnesians stood,

(Prothous the swift, of old Tenthredon’s blood;)

Who dwell where Pelion, crown’d with piny boughs,

Obscures the glade, and nods his shaggy brows;

Or where through flowery Tempe Peneus stray’d:

(The region stretch’d beneath his mighty shade:)

In forty sable barks they stemm’d the main;

Such were the chiefs, and such the Grecian train.

Say next, O Muse! of all Achaia breeds,

Who bravest fought, or rein’d the noblest steeds?

Eumelus’ mares were foremost in the chase,

As eagles fleet, and of Pheretian race;

Bred where Pieria’s fruitful fountains flow,

And train’d by him who bears the silver bow.

Fierce in the fight their nostrils breathed a flame,

Their height, their colour, and their age the same;

O’er fields of death they whirl the rapid car,

And break the ranks, and thunder through the war.

Ajax in arms the first renown acquired,

While stern Achilles in his wrath retired:

(His was the strength that mortal might exceeds,

And his the unrivall’d race of heavenly steeds:)

But Thetis’ son now shines in arms no more;

His troops, neglected on the sandy shore.

In empty air their sportive javelins throw,

Or whirl the disk, or bend an idle bow:

Unstain’d with blood his cover’d chariots stand;

The immortal coursers graze along the strand;

But the brave chiefs the inglorious life deplored,

And, wandering o’er the camp, required their lord.

Now, like a deluge, covering all around,

The shining armies sweep along the ground;

Swift as a flood of fire, when storms arise,

Floats the wild field, and blazes to the skies.

Earth groan’d beneath them; as when angry Jove

Hurls down the forky lightning from above,

On Arime when he the thunder throws,

And fires Typhoeus with redoubled blows,

Where Typhon, press’d beneath the burning load,

Still feels the fury of the avenging god.

But various Iris, Jove’s commands to bear,

Speeds on the wings of winds through liquid air;

In Priam’s porch the Trojan chiefs she found,

The old consulting, and the youths around.

Polites’ shape, the monarch’s son, she chose,

Who from Æsetes’ tomb observed the foes,

High on the mound; from whence in prospect lay

The fields, the tents, the navy, and the bay.

In this dissembled form, she hastes to bring

The unwelcome message to the Phrygian king.

“Cease to consult, the time for action calls;

War, horrid war, approaches to your walls!

Assembled armies oft have I beheld;

But ne’er till now such numbers charged a field:

Thick as autumnal leaves or driving sand,

The moving squadrons blacken all the strand.

Thou, godlike Hector! all thy force employ,

Assemble all the united bands of Troy;

In just array let every leader call

The foreign troops: this day demands them all!”

The voice divine the mighty chief alarms;

The council breaks, the warriors rush to arms.

The gates unfolding pour forth all their train,

Nations on nations fill the dusky plain,

Men, steeds, and chariots, shake the trembling ground:

The tumult thickens, and the skies resound.

Amidst the plain, in sight of Ilion, stands

A rising mount, the work of human hands;

(This for Myrinne’s tomb the immortals know,

Though call’d Bateia in the world below;)

Beneath their chiefs in martial order here,

The auxiliar troops and Trojan hosts appear.

The godlike Hector, high above the rest,

Shakes his huge spear, and nods his plumy crest:

In throngs around his native bands repair,

And groves of lances glitter in the air.

Divine Æneas brings the Dardan race,

Anchises’ son, by Venus’ stolen embrace,

Born in the shades of Ida’s secret grove;

(A mortal mixing with the queen of love;)

Archilochus and Acamas divide

The warrior’s toils, and combat by his side.

Who fair Zeleia’s wealthy valleys till,

Fast by the foot of Ida’s sacred hill,

Or drink, Æsepus, of thy sable flood,

Were led by Pandarus, of royal blood;

To whom his art Apollo deign’d to show,

Graced with the presents of his shafts and bow.

From rich Apaesus and Adrestia’s towers,

High Teree’s summits, and Pityea’s bowers;

From these the congregated troops obey

Young Amphius and Adrastus’ equal sway;

Old Merops’ sons; whom, skill’d in fates to come,

The sire forewarn’d, and prophesied their doom:

Fate urged them on! the sire forewarn’d in vain,

They rush’d to war, and perish’d on the plain.

From Practius’ stream, Percote’s pasture lands,

And Sestos and Abydos’ neighbouring strands,

From great Arisba’s walls and Selle’s coast,

Asius Hyrtacides conducts his host:

High on his car he shakes the flowing reins,

His fiery coursers thunder o’er the plains.

The fierce Pelasgi next, in war renown’d,

March from Larissa’s ever-fertile ground:

In equal arms their brother leaders shine,

Hippothous bold, and Pyleus the divine.

Next Acamas and Pyrous lead their hosts,

In dread array, from Thracia’s wintry coasts;

Round the bleak realms where Hellespontus roars,

And Boreas beats the hoarse-resounding shores.

With great Euphemus the Ciconians move,

Sprung from Troezenian Ceus, loved by Jove.

Pyraechmes the Paeonian troops attend,

Skill’d in the fight their crooked bows to bend;

From Axius’ ample bed he leads them on,

Axius, that laves the distant Amydon,

Axius, that swells with all his neighbouring rills,

And wide around the floating region fills.

The Paphlagonians Pylaemenes rules,

Where rich Henetia breeds her savage mules,

Where Erythinus’ rising cliffs are seen,

Thy groves of box, Cytorus! ever green,

And where Ægialus and Cromna lie,

And lofty Sesamus invades the sky,

And where Parthenius, roll’d through banks of flowers,

Reflects her bordering palaces and bowers.

Here march’d in arms the Halizonian band,

Whom Odius and Epistrophus command,

From those far regions where the sun refines

The ripening silver in Alybean mines.

There mighty Chromis led the Mysian train,

And augur Ennomus, inspired in vain;

For stern Achilles lopp’d his sacred head,

Roll’d down Scamander with the vulgar dead.

Phorcys and brave Ascanius here unite

The Ascanian Phrygians, eager for the fight.

Of those who round Maeonia’s realms reside,

Or whom the vales in shades of Tmolus hide,

Mestles and Antiphus the charge partake,

Born on the banks of Gyges’ silent lake.

There, from the fields where wild Maeander flows,

High Mycale, and Latmos’ shady brows,

And proud Miletus, came the Carian throngs,

With mingled clamours and with barbarous tongues.

Amphimachus and Naustes guide the train,

Naustes the bold, Amphimachus the vain,

Who, trick’d with gold, and glittering on his car,

Rode like a woman to the field of war.

Fool that he was! by fierce Achilles slain,

The river swept him to the briny main:

There whelm’d with waves the gaudy warrior lies

The valiant victor seized the golden prize.

The forces last in fair array succeed,

Which blameless Glaucus and Sarpedon lead

The warlike bands that distant Lycia yields,

Where gulfy Xanthus foams along the fields.




BOOK III (#ulink_1d09a68c-b8b8-5c69-8487-870f6a8cfe85)


Argument

The Duel of Menelaus and Paris

The armies being ready to engage, a single combat is agreed upon between Menelaus and Paris (by the intervention of Hector) for the determination of the war. Iris is sent to call Helen to behold the fight. She leads her to the walls of Troy, where Priam sat with his counsellers observing the Grecian leaders on the plain below, to whom Helen gives an account of the chief of them. The kings on either part take the solemn oath for the conditions of the combat. The duel ensues; wherein Paris being overcome, he is snatched away in a cloud by Venus, and transported to his apartment. She then calls Helen from the walls, and brings the lovers together. Agamemnon, on the part of the Grecians, demands the restoration of Helen, and the performance of the articles.

The three-and-twentieth day still continues throughout this book. The scene is sometimes in the fields before Troy, and sometimes in Troy itself.

Thus by their leaders’ care each martial band

Moves into ranks, and stretches o’er the land.

With shouts the Trojans, rushing from afar,

Proclaim their motions, and provoke the war

So when inclement winters vex the plain

With piercing frosts, or thick-descending rain,

To warmer seas the cranes embodied fly,

With noise, and order, through the midway sky;

To pigmy nations wounds and death they bring,

And all the war descends upon the wing,

But silent, breathing rage, resolved and skill’d

By mutual aids to fix a doubtful field,

Swift march the Greeks: the rapid dust around

Darkening arises from the labour’d ground.

Thus from his flaggy wings when Notus sheds

A night of vapours round the mountain heads,

Swift-gliding mists the dusky fields invade,

To thieves more grateful than the midnight shade;

While scarce the swains their feeding flocks survey,

Lost and confused amidst the thicken’d day:

So wrapp’d in gathering dust, the Grecian train,

A moving cloud, swept on, and hid the plain.

Now front to front the hostile armies stand,

Eager of fight, and only wait command;

When, to the van, before the sons of fame

Whom Troy sent forth, the beauteous Paris came:

In form a god! the panther’s speckled hide

Flow’d o’er his armour with an easy pride:

His bended bow across his shoulders flung,

His sword beside him negligently hung;

Two pointed spears he shook with gallant grace,

And dared the bravest of the Grecian race.

As thus, with glorious air and proud disdain,

He boldly stalk’d, the foremost on the plain,

Him Menelaus, loved of Mars, espies,

With heart elated, and with joyful eyes:

So joys a lion, if the branching deer,

Or mountain goat, his bulky prize, appear;

Eager he seizes and devours the slain,

Press’d by bold youths and baying dogs in vain.

Thus fond of vengeance, with a furious bound,

In clanging arms he leaps upon the ground

From his high chariot: him, approaching near,

The beauteous champion views with marks of fear,

Smit with a conscious sense, retires behind,

And shuns the fate he well deserved to find.

As when some shepherd, from the rustling trees

Shot forth to view, a scaly serpent sees,

Trembling and pale, he starts with wild affright

And all confused precipitates his flight:

So from the king the shining warrior flies,

And plunged amid the thickest Trojans lies.

As godlike Hector sees the prince retreat,

He thus upbraids him with a generous heat:

“Unhappy Paris! but to women brave!

So fairly form’d, and only to deceive!

Oh, hadst thou died when first thou saw’st the light,

Or died at least before thy nuptial rite!

A better fate than vainly thus to boast,

And fly, the scandal of thy Trojan host.

Gods! how the scornful Greeks exult to see

Their fears of danger undeceived in thee!

Thy figure promised with a martial air,

But ill thy soul supplies a form so fair.

In former days, in all thy gallant pride,

When thy tall ships triumphant stemm’d the tide,

When Greece beheld thy painted canvas flow,

And crowds stood wondering at the passing show,

Say, was it thus, with such a baffled mien,

You met the approaches of the Spartan queen,

Thus from her realm convey’d the beauteous prize,

And both her warlike lords outshined in Helen’s eyes?

This deed, thy foes’ delight, thy own disgrace,

Thy father’s grief, and ruin of thy race;

This deed recalls thee to the proffer’d fight;

Or hast thou injured whom thou dar’st not right?

Soon to thy cost the field would make thee know

Thou keep’st the consort of a braver foe.

Thy graceful form instilling soft desire,

Thy curling tresses, and thy silver lyre,

Beauty and youth; in vain to these you trust,

When youth and beauty shall be laid in dust:

Troy yet may wake, and one avenging blow

Crush the dire author of his country’s woe.”

His silence here, with blushes, Paris breaks:

“’Tis just, my brother, what your anger speaks:

But who like thee can boast a soul sedate,

So firmly proof to all the shocks of fate?

Thy force, like steel, a temper’d hardness shows,

Still edged to wound, and still untired with blows,

Like steel, uplifted by some strenuous swain,

With falling woods to strew the wasted plain.

Thy gifts I praise; nor thou despise the charms

With which a lover golden Venus arms;

Soft moving speech, and pleasing outward show,

No wish can gain them, but the gods bestow.

Yet, would’st thou have the proffer’d combat stand,

The Greeks and Trojans seat on either hand;

Then let a midway space our hosts divide,

And, on that stage of war, the cause be tried:

By Paris there the Spartan king be fought,

For beauteous Helen and the wealth she brought;

And who his rival can in arms subdue,

His be the fair, and his the treasure too.

Thus with a lasting league your toils may cease,

And Troy possess her fertile fields in peace;

Thus may the Greeks review their native shore,

Much famed for generous steeds, for beauty more.”

He said. The challenge Hector heard with joy,

Then with his spear restrain’d the youth of Troy,

Held by the midst, athwart; and near the foe

Advanced with steps majestically slow:

While round his dauntless head the Grecians pour

Their stones and arrows in a mingled shower.

Then thus the monarch, great Atrides, cried:

“Forbear, ye warriors! lay the darts aside:

A parley Hector asks, a message bears;

We know him by the various plume he wears.”

Awed by his high command the Greeks attend,

The tumult silence, and the fight suspend.

While from the centre Hector rolls his eyes

On either host, and thus to both applies:

“Hear, all ye Trojan, all ye Grecian bands,

What Paris, author of the war, demands.

Your shining swords within the sheath restrain,

And pitch your lances in the yielding plain.

Here in the midst, in either army’s sight,

He dares the Spartan king to single fight;

And wills that Helen and the ravish’d spoil,

That caused the contest, shall reward the toil.

Let these the brave triumphant victor grace,

And different nations part in leagues of peace.”

He spoke: in still suspense on either side

Each army stood: the Spartan chief replied:

“Me too, ye warriors, hear, whose fatal right

A world engages in the toils of fight.

To me the labour of the field resign;

Me Paris injured; all the war be mine.

Fall he that must, beneath his rival’s arms;

And live the rest, secure of future harms.

Two lambs, devoted by your country’s rite,

To earth a sable, to the sun a white,

Prepare, ye Trojans! while a third we bring

Select to Jove, the inviolable king.

Let reverend Priam in the truce engage,

And add the sanction of considerate age;

His sons are faithless, headlong in debate,

And youth itself an empty wavering state;

Cool age advances, venerably wise,

Turns on all hands its deep-discerning eyes;

Sees what befell, and what may yet befall,

Concludes from both, and best provides for all.

The nations hear with rising hopes possess’d,

And peaceful prospects dawn in every breast.

Within the lines they drew their steeds around,

And from their chariots issued on the ground;

Next, all unbuckling the rich mail they wore,

Laid their bright arms along the sable shore.

On either side the meeting hosts are seen

With lances fix’d, and close the space between.

Two heralds now, despatch’d to Troy, invite

The Phrygian monarch to the peaceful rite.

Talthybius hastens to the fleet, to bring

The lamb for Jove, the inviolable king.

Meantime to beauteous Helen, from the skies

The various goddess of the rainbow flies:

(Like fair Laodice in form and face,

The loveliest nymph of Priam’s royal race:)

Her in the palace, at her loom she found;

The golden web her own sad story crown’d,

The Trojan wars she weaved (herself the prize)

And the dire triumphs of her fatal eyes.

To whom the goddess of the painted bow:

“Approach, and view the wondrous scene below!

Each hardy Greek, and valiant Trojan knight,

So dreadful late, and furious for the fight,

Now rest their spears, or lean upon their shields;

Ceased is the war, and silent all the fields.

Paris alone and Sparta’s king advance,

In single fight to toss the beamy lance;

Each met in arms, the fate of combat tries,

Thy love the motive, and thy charms the prize.”

This said, the many-coloured maid inspires

Her husband’s love, and wakes her former fires;

Her country, parents, all that once were dear,

Rush to her thought, and force a tender tear,

O’er her fair face a snowy veil she threw,

And, softly sighing, from the loom withdrew.

Her handmaids, Clymene and Æthra, wait

Her silent footsteps to the Scaean gate.

There sat the seniors of the Trojan race:

(Old Priam’s chiefs, and most in Priam’s grace,)

The king the first; Thymoetes at his side;

Lampus and Clytius, long in council tried;

Panthus, and Hicetaon, once the strong;

And next, the wisest of the reverend throng,

Antenor grave, and sage Ucalegon,

Lean’d on the walls and bask’d before the sun:

Chiefs, who no more in bloody fights engage,

But wise through time, and narrative with age,

In summer days, like grasshoppers rejoice,

A bloodless race, that send a feeble voice.

These, when the Spartan queen approach’d the tower,

In secret own’d resistless beauty’s power:

They cried, “No wonder such celestial charms

For nine long years have set the world in arms;

What winning graces! what majestic mien!

She moves a goddess, and she looks a queen!

Yet hence, O Heaven, convey that fatal face,

And from destruction save the Trojan race.”

The good old Priam welcomed her, and cried,

“Approach, my child, and grace thy father’s side.

See on the plain thy Grecian spouse appears,

The friends and kindred of thy former years.

No crime of thine our present sufferings draws,

Not thou, but Heaven’s disposing will, the cause

The gods these armies and this force employ,

The hostile gods conspire the fate of Troy.

But lift thy eyes, and say, what Greek is he

(Far as from hence these aged orbs can see)

Around whose brow such martial graces shine,

So tall, so awful, and almost divine!

Though some of larger stature tread the green,

None match his grandeur and exalted mien:

He seems a monarch, and his country’s pride.”

Thus ceased the king, and thus the fair replied:

“Before thy presence, father, I appear,

With conscious shame and reverential fear.

Ah! had I died, ere to these walk I fled,

False to my country, and my nuptial bed;

My brothers, friends, and daughter left behind,

False to them all, to Paris only kind!

For this I mourn, till grief or dire disease

Shall waste the form whose fault it was to please!

The king of kings, Atrides, you survey,

Great in the war, and great in arts of sway:

My brother once, before my days of shame!

And oh! that still he bore a brother’s name!”

With wonder Priam view’d the godlike man,

Extoll’d the happy prince, and thus began:

“O bless’d Atrides! born to prosperous fate,

Successful monarch of a mighty state!

How vast thy empire! Of your matchless train

What numbers lost, what numbers yet remain!

In Phrygia once were gallant armies known,

In ancient time, when Otreus fill’d the throne,

When godlike Mygdon led their troops of horse,

And I, to join them, raised the Trojan force:

Against the manlike Amazons we stood,

And Sangar’s stream ran purple with their blood.

But far inferior those, in martial grace,

And strength of numbers, to this Grecian race.”

This said, once more he view’d the warrior train;

“What’s he, whose arms lie scatter’d on the plain?

Broad is his breast, his shoulders larger spread,

Though great Atrides overtops his head.

Nor yet appear his care and conduct small;

From rank to rank he moves, and orders all.

The stately ram thus measures o’er the ground,

And, master of the flock, surveys them round.”

Then Helen thus: “Whom your discerning eyes

Have singled out, is Ithacus the wise;

A barren island boasts his glorious birth;

His fame for wisdom fills the spacious earth.”

Antenor took the word, and thus began:

“Myself, O king! have seen that wondrous man

When, trusting Jove and hospitable laws,

To Troy he came, to plead the Grecian cause;

(Great Menelaus urged the same request;)

My house was honour’d with each royal guest:

I knew their persons, and admired their parts,

Both brave in arms, and both approved in arts.

Erect, the Spartan most engaged our view;

Ulysses seated, greater reverence drew.

When Atreus’ son harangued the listening train,

Just was his sense, and his expression plain,

His words succinct, yet full, without a fault;

He spoke no more than just the thing he ought.

But when Ulysses rose, in thought profound,

His modest eyes he fix’d upon the ground;

As one unskill’d or dumb, he seem’d to stand,

Nor raised his head, nor stretch’d his sceptred hand;

But, when he speaks, what elocution flows!

Soft as the fleeces of descending snows,

The copious accents fall, with easy art;

Melting they fall, and sink into the heart!

Wondering we hear, and fix’d in deep surprise,

Our ears refute the censure of our eyes.”

The king then ask’d (as yet the camp he view’d)

“What chief is that, with giant strength endued,

Whose brawny shoulders, and whose swelling chest,

And lofty stature, far exceed the rest?”

“Ajax the great, (the beauteous queen replied,)

Himself a host: the Grecian strength and pride.

See! bold Idomeneus superior towers

Amid yon circle of his Cretan powers,

Great as a god! I saw him once before,

With Menelaus on the Spartan shore.

The rest I know, and could in order name;

All valiant chiefs, and men of mighty fame.

Yet two are wanting of the numerous train,

Whom long my eyes have sought, but sought in vain:

Castor and Pollux, first in martial force,

One bold on foot, and one renown’d for horse.

My brothers these; the same our native shore,

One house contain’d us, as one mother bore.

Perhaps the chiefs, from warlike toils at ease,

For distant Troy refused to sail the seas;

Perhaps their swords some nobler quarrel draws,

Ashamed to combat in their sister’s cause.”

So spoke the fair, nor knew her brothers’ doom;

Wrapt in the cold embraces of the tomb;

Adorn’d with honours in their native shore,

Silent they slept, and heard of wars no more.

Meantime the heralds, through the crowded town.

Bring the rich wine and destined victims down.

Idaeus’ arms the golden goblets press’d,

Who thus the venerable king address’d:

“Arise, O father of the Trojan state!

The nations call, thy joyful people wait

To seal the truce, and end the dire debate.

Paris, thy son, and Sparta’s king advance,

In measured lists to toss the weighty lance;

And who his rival shall in arms subdue,

His be the dame, and his the treasure too.

Thus with a lasting league our toils may cease,

And Troy possess her fertile fields in peace:

So shall the Greeks review their native shore,

Much famed for generous steeds, for beauty more.”

With grief he heard, and bade the chiefs prepare

To join his milk-white coursers to the car;

He mounts the seat, Antenor at his side;

The gentle steeds through Scaea’s gates they guide:

Next from the car descending on the plain,

Amid the Grecian host and Trojan train,

Slow they proceed: the sage Ulysses then

Arose, and with him rose the king of men.

On either side a sacred herald stands,

The wine they mix, and on each monarch’s hands

Pour the full urn; then draws the Grecian lord

His cutlass sheathed beside his ponderous sword;

From the sign’d victims crops the curling hair;

The heralds part it, and the princes share;

Then loudly thus before the attentive bands

He calls the gods, and spreads his lifted hands:

“O first and greatest power! whom all obey,

Who high on Ida’s holy mountain sway,

Eternal Jove! and you bright orb that roll

From east to west, and view from pole to pole!

Thou mother Earth! and all ye living floods!

Infernal furies, and Tartarean gods,

Who rule the dead, and horrid woes prepare

For perjured kings, and all who falsely swear!

Hear, and be witness. If, by Paris slain,

Great Menelaus press the fatal plain;

The dame and treasures let the Trojan keep,

And Greece returning plough the watery deep.

If by my brother’s lance the Trojan bleed,

Be his the wealth and beauteous dame decreed:

The appointed fine let Ilion justly pay,

And every age record the signal day.

This if the Phrygians shall refuse to yield,

Arms must revenge, and Mars decide the field.”

With that the chief the tender victims slew,

And in the dust their bleeding bodies threw;

The vital spirit issued at the wound,

And left the members quivering on the ground.

From the same urn they drink the mingled wine,

And add libations to the powers divine.

While thus their prayers united mount the sky,

“Hear, mighty Jove! and hear, ye gods on high!

And may their blood, who first the league confound,

Shed like this wine, disdain the thirsty ground;

May all their consorts serve promiscuous lust,

And all their lust be scatter’d as the dust!”

Thus either host their imprecations join’d,

Which Jove refused, and mingled with the wind.

The rites now finish’d, reverend Priam rose,

And thus express’d a heart o’ercharged with woes:

“Ye Greeks and Trojans, let the chiefs engage,

But spare the weakness of my feeble age:

In yonder walls that object let me shun,

Nor view the danger of so dear a son.

Whose arms shall conquer and what prince shall fall,

Heaven only knows; for heaven disposes all.”

This said, the hoary king no longer stay’d,

But on his car the slaughter’d victims laid:

Then seized the reins his gentle steeds to guide,

And drove to Troy, Antenor at his side.

Bold Hector and Ulysses now dispose

The lists of combat, and the ground inclose:

Next to decide, by sacred lots prepare,

Who first shall launch his pointed spear in air.

The people pray with elevated hands,

And words like these are heard through all the bands:

“Immortal Jove, high Heaven’s superior lord,

On lofty Ida’s holy mount adored!

Whoe’er involved us in this dire debate,

O give that author of the war to fate

And shades eternal! let division cease,

And joyful nations join in leagues of peace.”

With eyes averted Hector hastes to turn

The lots of fight and shakes the brazen urn.

Then, Paris, thine leap’d forth; by fatal chance

Ordain’d the first to whirl the weighty lance.

Both armies sat the combat to survey.

Beside each chief his azure armour lay,

And round the lists the generous coursers neigh.

The beauteous warrior now arrays for fight,

In gilded arms magnificently bright:

The purple cuishes clasp his thighs around,

With flowers adorn’d, with silver buckles bound:

Lycaon’s corslet his fair body dress’d,

Braced in and fitted to his softer breast;

A radiant baldric, o’er his shoulder tied,

Sustain’d the sword that glitter’d at his side:

His youthful face a polish’d helm o’erspread;

The waving horse-hair nodded on his head:

His figured shield, a shining orb, he takes,

And in his hand a pointed javelin shakes.

With equal speed and fired by equal charms,

The Spartan hero sheathes his limbs in arms.

Now round the lists the admiring armies stand,

With javelins fix’d, the Greek and Trojan band.

Amidst the dreadful vale, the chiefs advance,

All pale with rage, and shake the threatening lance.

The Trojan first his shining javelin threw;

Full on Atrides’ ringing shield it flew,

Nor pierced the brazen orb, but with a bound

Leap’d from the buckler, blunted, on the ground.

Atrides then his massy lance prepares,

In act to throw, but first prefers his prayers:

“Give me, great Jove! to punish lawless lust,

And lay the Trojan gasping in the dust:

Destroy the aggressor, aid my righteous cause,

Avenge the breach of hospitable laws!

Let this example future times reclaim,

And guard from wrong fair friendship’s holy name.”

Be said, and poised in air the javelin sent,

Through Paris’ shield the forceful weapon went,

His corslet pierces, and his garment rends,

And glancing downward, near his flank descends.

The wary Trojan, bending from the blow,

Eludes the death, and disappoints his foe:

But fierce Atrides waved his sword, and strook

Full on his casque: the crested helmet shook;

The brittle steel, unfaithful to his hand,

Broke short: the fragments glitter’d on the sand.

The raging warrior to the spacious skies

Raised his upbraiding voice and angry eyes:

“Then is it vain in Jove himself to trust?

And is it thus the gods assist the just?

When crimes provoke us, Heaven success denies;

The dart falls harmless, and the falchion flies.”

Furious he said, and towards the Grecian crew

(Seized by the crest) the unhappy warrior drew;

Struggling he followed, while the embroider’d thong

That tied his helmet, dragg’d the chief along.

Then had his ruin crown’d Atrides’ joy,

But Venus trembled for the prince of Troy:

Unseen she came, and burst the golden band;

And left an empty helmet in his hand.

The casque, enraged, amidst the Greeks he threw;

The Greeks with smiles the polish’d trophy view.

Then, as once more he lifts the deadly dart,

In thirst of vengeance, at his rival’s heart;

The queen of love her favour’d champion shrouds

(For gods can all things) in a veil of clouds.

Raised from the field the panting youth she led,

And gently laid him on the bridal bed,

With pleasing sweets his fainting sense renews,

And all the dome perfumes with heavenly dews.

Meantime the brightest of the female kind,

The matchless Helen, o’er the walls reclined;

To her, beset with Trojan beauties, came,

In borrow’d form, the laughter-loving dame.

(She seem’d an ancient maid, well-skill’d to cull

The snowy fleece, and wind the twisted wool.)

The goddess softly shook her silken vest,

That shed perfumes, and whispering thus address’d:

“Haste, happy nymph! for thee thy Paris calls,

Safe from the fight, in yonder lofty walls,

Fair as a god; with odours round him spread,

He lies, and waits thee on the well-known bed;

Not like a warrior parted from the foe,

But some gay dancer in the public show.”

She spoke, and Helen’s secret soul was moved;

She scorn’d the champion, but the man she loved.

Fair Venus’ neck, her eyes that sparkled fire,

And breast, reveal’d the queen of soft desire.

Struck with her presence, straight the lively red

Forsook her cheek; and trembling, thus she said:

“Then is it still thy pleasure to deceive?

And woman’s frailty always to believe!

Say, to new nations must I cross the main,

Or carry wars to some soft Asian plain?

For whom must Helen break her second vow?

What other Paris is thy darling now?

Left to Atrides, (victor in the strife,)

An odious conquest and a captive wife,

Hence let me sail; and if thy Paris bear

My absence ill, let Venus ease his care.

A handmaid goddess at his side to wait,

Renounce the glories of thy heavenly state,

Be fix’d for ever to the Trojan shore,

His spouse, or slave; and mount the skies no more.

For me, to lawless love no longer led,

I scorn the coward, and detest his bed;

Else should I merit everlasting shame,

And keen reproach, from every Phrygian dame:

Ill suits it now the joys of love to know,

Too deep my anguish, and too wild my woe.”

Then thus incensed, the Paphian queen replies:

“Obey the power from whom thy glories rise:

Should Venus leave thee, every charm must fly,

Fade from thy cheek, and languish in thy eye.

Cease to provoke me, lest I make thee more

The world’s aversion, than their love before;

Now the bright prize for which mankind engage,

Than, the sad victim, of the public rage.”

At this, the fairest of her sex obey’d,

And veil’d her blushes in a silken shade;

Unseen, and silent, from the train she moves,

Led by the goddess of the Smiles and Loves.

Arrived, and enter’d at the palace gate,

The maids officious round their mistress wait;

Then, all dispersing, various tasks attend;

The queen and goddess to the prince ascend.

Full in her Paris’ sight, the queen of love

Had placed the beauteous progeny of Jove;

Where, as he view’d her charms, she turn’d away

Her glowing eyes, and thus began to say:

“Is this the chief, who, lost to sense of shame,

Late fled the field, and yet survives his fame?

O hadst thou died beneath the righteous sword

Of that brave man whom once I call’d my lord!

The boaster Paris oft desired the day

With Sparta’s king to meet in single fray:

Go now, once more thy rival’s rage excite,

Provoke Atrides, and renew the fight:

Yet Helen bids thee stay, lest thou unskill’d

Shouldst fall an easy conquest on the field.”

The prince replies: “Ah cease, divinely fair,

Nor add reproaches to the wounds I bear;

This day the foe prevail’d by Pallas’ power:

We yet may vanquish in a happier hour:

There want not gods to favour us above;

But let the business of our life be love:

These softer moments let delights employ,

And kind embraces snatch the hasty joy.

Not thus I loved thee, when from Sparta’s shore

My forced, my willing heavenly prize I bore,

When first entranced in Cranae’s isle I lay,

Mix’d with thy soul, and all dissolved away!”

Thus having spoke, the enamour’d Phrygian boy

Rush’d to the bed, impatient for the joy.

Him Helen follow’d slow with bashful charms,

And clasp’d the blooming hero in her arms.

While these to love’s delicious rapture yield,

The stern Atrides rages round the field:

So some fell lion whom the woods obey,

Roars through the desert, and demands his prey.

Paris he seeks, impatient to destroy,

But seeks in vain along the troops of Troy;

Even those had yielded to a foe so brave

The recreant warrior, hateful as the grave.

Then speaking thus, the king of kings arose,

“Ye Trojans, Dardans, all our generous foes!

Hear and attest! from Heaven with conquest crown’d,

Our brother’s arms the just success have found:

Be therefore now the Spartan wealth restor’d,

Let Argive Helen own her lawful lord;

The appointed fine let Ilion justly pay,

And age to age record this signal day.”

He ceased; his army’s loud applauses rise,

And the long shout runs echoing through the skies.




BOOK IV (#ulink_4abd248b-b318-505d-89d8-ddb25356a4cb)


Argument

The Breach of The Truce,

and The First Battle

The gods deliberate in council concerning the Trojan war: they agree upon the continuation of it, and Jupiter sends down Minerva to break the truce. She persuades Pandarus to aim an arrow at Menelaus, who is wounded, but cured by Machaon. In the meantime some of the Trojan troops attack the Greeks. Agamemnon is distinguished in all the parts of a good general; he reviews the troops, and exhorts the leaders, some by praises and others by reproof. Nestor is particularly celebrated for his military discipline. The battle joins, and great numbers are slain on both sides.

The same day continues through this as through the last book (as it does also through the two following, and almost to the end of the seventh book). The scene is wholly in the field before Troy.

And now Olympus’ shining gates unfold;

The gods, with Jove, assume their thrones of gold:

Immortal Hebe, fresh with bloom divine,

The golden goblet crowns with purple wine:

While the full bowls flow round, the powers employ

Their careful eyes on long-contended Troy.

When Jove, disposed to tempt Saturnia’s spleen,

Thus waked the fury of his partial queen,

“Two powers divine the son of Atreus aid,

Imperial Juno, and the martial maid;

But high in heaven they sit, and gaze from far,

The tame spectators of his deeds of war.

Not thus fair Venus helps her favour’d knight,

The queen of pleasures shares the toils of fight,

Each danger wards, and constant in her care,

Saves in the moment of the last despair.

Her act has rescued Paris’ forfeit life,

Though great Atrides gain’d the glorious strife.

Then say, ye powers! what signal issue waits

To crown this deed, and finish all the fates!

Shall Heaven by peace the bleeding kingdoms spare,

Or rouse the furies, and awake the war?

Yet, would the gods for human good provide,

Atrides soon might gain his beauteous bride,

Still Priam’s walls in peaceful honours grow,

And through his gates the crowding nations flow.”

Thus while he spoke, the queen of heaven, enraged,

And queen of war, in close consult engaged:

Apart they sit, their deep designs employ,

And meditate the future woes of Troy.

Though secret anger swell’d Minerva’s breast,

The prudent goddess yet her wrath suppress’d;

But Juno, impotent of passion, broke

Her sullen silence, and with fury spoke:

“Shall then, O tyrant of the ethereal reign!

My schemes, my labours, and my hopes be vain?

Have I, for this, shook Ilion with alarms,

Assembled nations, set two worlds in arms?

To spread the war, I flew from shore to shore;

The immortal coursers scarce the labour bore.

At length ripe vengeance o’er their heads impends,

But Jove himself the faithless race defends.

Loth as thou art to punish lawless lust,

Not all the gods are partial and unjust.”

The sire whose thunder shakes the cloudy skies,

Sighs from his inmost soul, and thus replies:

“Oh lasting rancour! oh insatiate hate

To Phrygia’s monarch, and the Phrygian state!

What high offence has fired the wife of Jove?

Can wretched mortals harm the powers above,

That Troy, and Troy’s whole race thou wouldst confound,

And yon fair structures level with the ground!

Haste, leave the skies, fulfil thy stern desire,

Burst all her gates, and wrap her walls in fire!

Let Priam bleed! if yet you thirst for more,

Bleed all his sons, and Ilion float with gore:

To boundless vengeance the wide realm be given,

Till vast destruction glut the queen of heaven!

So let it be, and Jove his peace enjoy,

When heaven no longer hears the name of Troy.

But should this arm prepare to wreak our hate

On thy loved realms, whose guilt demands their fate;

Presume not thou the lifted bolt to stay,

Remember Troy, and give the vengeance way.

For know, of all the numerous towns that rise

Beneath the rolling sun and starry skies,

Which gods have raised, or earth-born men enjoy,

None stands so dear to Jove as sacred Troy.

No mortals merit more distinguish’d grace

Than godlike Priam, or than Priam’s race.

Still to our name their hecatombs expire,

And altars blaze with unextinguish’d fire.”

At this the goddess rolled her radiant eyes,

Then on the Thunderer fix’d them, and replies:

“Three towns are Juno’s on the Grecian plains,

More dear than all the extended earth contains,

Mycenae, Argos, and the Spartan wall;

These thou mayst raze, nor I forbid their fall:

’Tis not in me the vengeance to remove;

The crime’s sufficient that they share my love.

Of power superior why should I complain?

Resent I may, but must resent in vain.

Yet some distinction Juno might require,

Sprung with thyself from one celestial sire,

A goddess born, to share the realms above,

And styled the consort of the thundering Jove;

Nor thou a wife and sister’s right deny;

Let both consent, and both by terms comply;

So shall the gods our joint decrees obey,

And heaven shall act as we direct the way.

See ready Pallas waits thy high commands

To raise in arms the Greek and Phrygian bands;

Their sudden friendship by her arts may cease,

And the proud Trojans first infringe the peace.”

The sire of men and monarch of the sky

The advice approved, and bade Minerva fly,

Dissolve the league, and all her arts employ

To make the breach the faithless act of Troy.

Fired with the charge, she headlong urged her flight,

And shot like lightning from Olympus’ height.

As the red comet, from Saturnius sent

To fright the nations with a dire portent,

(A fatal sign to armies on the plain,

Or trembling sailors on the wintry main,)

With sweeping glories glides along in air,

And shakes the sparkles from its blazing hair:

Between both armies thus, in open sight

Shot the bright goddess in a trail of light,

With eyes erect the gazing hosts admire

The power descending, and the heavens on fire!

“The gods (they cried), the gods this signal sent,

And fate now labours with some vast event:

Jove seals the league, or bloodier scenes prepares;

Jove, the great arbiter of peace and wars.”

They said, while Pallas through the Trojan throng,

(In shape a mortal,) pass’d disguised along.

Like bold Laodocus, her course she bent,

Who from Antenor traced his high descent.

Amidst the ranks Lycaon’s son she found,

The warlike Pandarus, for strength renown’d;

Whose squadrons, led from black Æsepus’ flood,

With flaming shields in martial circle stood.

To him the goddess: “Phrygian! canst thou hear

A well-timed counsel with a willing ear?

What praise were thine, couldst thou direct thy dart,

Amidst his triumph, to the Spartan’s heart?

What gifts from Troy, from Paris wouldst thou gain,

Thy country’s foe, the Grecian glory slain?

Then seize the occasion, dare the mighty deed,

Aim at his breast, and may that aim succeed!

But first, to speed the shaft, address thy vow

To Lycian Phoebus with the silver bow,

And swear the firstlings of thy flock to pay,

On Zelia’s altars, to the god of day.”

He heard, and madly at the motion pleased,

His polish’d bow with hasty rashness seized.

’Twas form’d of horn, and smooth’d with artful toil:

A mountain goat resign’d the shining spoil.

Who pierced long since beneath his arrows bled;

The stately quarry on the cliffs lay dead,

And sixteen palms his brow’s large honours spread:

The workmen join’d, and shaped the bended horns,

And beaten gold each taper point adorns.

This, by the Greeks unseen, the warrior bends,

Screen’d by the shields of his surrounding friends:

There meditates the mark; and couching low,

Fits the sharp arrow to the well-strung bow.

One from a hundred feather’d deaths he chose,

Fated to wound, and cause of future woes;

Then offers vows with hecatombs to crown

Apollo’s altars in his native town.

Now with full force the yielding horn he bends,

Drawn to an arch, and joins the doubling ends;

Close to his breast he strains the nerve below,

Till the barb’d points approach the circling bow;

The impatient weapon whizzes on the wing;

Sounds the tough horn, and twangs the quivering string.

But thee, Atrides! in that dangerous hour

The gods forget not, nor thy guardian power,

Pallas assists, and (weakened in its force)

Diverts the weapon from its destined course:

So from her babe, when slumber seals his eye,

The watchful mother wafts the envenom’d fly.

Just where his belt with golden buckles join’d,

Where linen folds the double corslet lined,

She turn’d the shaft, which, hissing from above,

Pass’d the broad belt, and through the corslet drove;

The folds it pierced, the plaited linen tore,

And razed the skin, and drew the purple gore.

As when some stately trappings are decreed

To grace a monarch on his bounding steed,

A nymph in Caria or Maeonia bred,

Stains the pure ivory with a lively red;

With equal lustre various colours vie,

The shining whiteness, and the Tyrian dye:

So great Atrides! show’d thy sacred blood,

As down thy snowy thigh distill’d the streaming flood.

With horror seized, the king of men descried

The shaft infix’d, and saw the gushing tide:

Nor less the Spartan fear’d, before he found

The shining barb appear above the wound,

Then, with a sigh, that heaved his manly breast,

The royal brother thus his grief express’d,

And grasp’d his hand; while all the Greeks around

With answering sighs return’d the plaintive sound.

“Oh, dear as life! did I for this agree

The solemn truce, a fatal truce to thee!

Wert thou exposed to all the hostile train,

To fight for Greece, and conquer, to be slain!

The race of Trojans in thy ruin join,

And faith is scorn’d by all the perjured line.

Not thus our vows, confirm’d with wine and gore,

Those hands we plighted, and those oaths we swore,

Shall all be vain: when Heaven’s revenge is slow,

Jove but prepares to strike the fiercer blow.

The day shall come, that great avenging day,

When Troy’s proud glories in the dust shall lay,

When Priam’s powers and Priam’s self shall fall,

And one prodigious ruin swallow all.

I see the god, already, from the pole

Bare his red arm, and bid the thunder roll;

I see the Eternal all his fury shed,

And shake his aegis o’er their guilty head.

Such mighty woes on perjured princes wait;

But thou, alas! deserv’st a happier fate.

Still must I mourn the period of thy days,

And only mourn, without my share of praise?

Deprived of thee, the heartless Greeks no more

Shall dream of conquests on the hostile shore;

Troy seized of Helen, and our glory lost,

Thy bones shall moulder on a foreign coast;

While some proud Trojan thus insulting cries,

(And spurns the dust where Menelaus lies,)

‘Such are the trophies Greece from Ilion brings,

And such the conquest of her king of kings!

Lo his proud vessels scatter’d o’er the main,

And unrevenged, his mighty brother slain.’

Oh! ere that dire disgrace shall blast my fame,

O’erwhelm me, earth! and hide a monarch’s shame.”

He said: a leader’s and a brother’s fears

Possess his soul, which thus the Spartan cheers:

“Let not thy words the warmth of Greece abate;

The feeble dart is guiltless of my fate:

Stiff with the rich embroider’d work around,

My varied belt repell’d the flying wound.”

To whom the king: “My brother and my friend,

Thus, always thus, may Heaven thy life defend!

Now seek some skilful hand, whose powerful art

May stanch the effusion, and extract the dart.

Herald, be swift, and bid Machaon bring

His speedy succour to the Spartan king;

Pierced with a winged shaft (the deed of Troy),

The Grecian’s sorrow, and the Dardan’s joy.”

With hasty zeal the swift Talthybius flies;

Through the thick files he darts his searching eyes,

And finds Machaon, where sublime he stands

In arms incircled with his native bands.

Then thus: “Machaon, to the king repair,

His wounded brother claims thy timely care;

Pierced by some Lycian or Dardanian bow,

A grief to us, a triumph to the foe.”

The heavy tidings grieved the godlike man

Swift to his succour through the ranks he ran.

The dauntless king yet standing firm he found,

And all the chiefs in deep concern around.

Where to the steely point the reed was join’d,

The shaft he drew, but left the head behind.

Straight the broad belt with gay embroidery graced,

He loosed; the corslet from his breast unbraced;

Then suck’d the blood, and sovereign balm infused,

Which Chiron gave, and Æsculapius used.

While round the prince the Greeks employ their care,

The Trojans rush tumultuous to the war;

Once more they glitter in refulgent arms,

Once more the fields are fill’d with dire alarms.

Nor had you seen the king of men appear

Confused, unactive, or surprised with fear;

But fond of glory, with severe delight,

His beating bosom claim’d the rising fight.

No longer with his warlike steeds he stay’d,

Or press’d the car with polish’d brass inlaid

But left Eurymedon the reins to guide;

The fiery coursers snorted at his side.

On foot through all the martial ranks he moves

And these encourages, and those reproves.

“Brave men!” he cries, (to such who boldly dare

Urge their swift steeds to face the coming war),

“Your ancient valour on the foes approve;

Jove is with Greece, and let us trust in Jove.

’Tis not for us, but guilty Troy, to dread,

Whose crimes sit heavy on her perjured head;

Her sons and matrons Greece shall lead in chains,

And her dead warriors strew the mournful plains.”

Thus with new ardour he the brave inspires;

Or thus the fearful with reproaches fires:

“Shame to your country, scandal of your kind;

Born to the fate ye well deserve to find!

Why stand ye gazing round the dreadful plain,

Prepared for flight, but doom’d to fly in vain?

Confused and panting thus, the hunted deer

Falls as he flies, a victim to his fear.

Still must ye wait the foes, and still retire,

Till yon tall vessels blaze with Trojan fire?

Or trust ye, Jove a valiant foe shall chase,

To save a trembling, heartless, dastard race?”

This said, he stalk’d with ample strides along,

To Crete’s brave monarch and his martial throng;

High at their head he saw the chief appear,

And bold Meriones excite the rear.

At this the king his generous joy express’d,

And clasp’d the warrior to his armed breast.

“Divine Idomeneus! what thanks we owe

To worth like thine! what praise shall we bestow?

To thee the foremost honours are decreed,

First in the fight and every graceful deed.

For this, in banquets, when the generous bowls

Restore our blood, and raise the warriors’ souls,

Though all the rest with stated rules we bound,

Unmix’d, unmeasured, are thy goblets crown’d.

Be still thyself, in arms a mighty name;

Maintain thy honours, and enlarge thy fame.”

To whom the Cretan thus his speech address’d:

“Secure of me, O king! exhort the rest.

Fix’d to thy side, in every toil I share,

Thy firm associate in the day of war.

But let the signal be this moment given;

To mix in fight is all I ask of Heaven.

The field shall prove how perjuries succeed,

And chains or death avenge the impious deed.”

Charm’d with this heat, the king his course pursues,

And next the troops of either Ajax views:

In one firm orb the bands were ranged around,

A cloud of heroes blacken’d all the ground.

Thus from the lofty promontory’s brow

A swain surveys the gathering storm below;

Slow from the main the heavy vapours rise,

Spread in dim streams, and sail along the skies,

Till black as night the swelling tempest shows,

The cloud condensing as the west-wind blows:

He dreads the impending storm, and drives his flock

To the close covert of an arching rock.

Such, and so thick, the embattled squadrons stood,

With spears erect, a moving iron wood:

A shady light was shot from glimmering shields,

And their brown arms obscured the dusky fields.

“O heroes! worthy such a dauntless train,

Whose godlike virtue we but urge in vain,

(Exclaim’d the king), who raise your eager bands

With great examples, more than loud commands.

Ah! would the gods but breathe in all the rest

Such souls as burn in your exalted breast,

Soon should our arms with just success be crown’d,

And Troy’s proud walls lie smoking on the ground.”

Then to the next the general bends his course;

(His heart exults, and glories in his force);

There reverend Nestor ranks his Pylian bands,

And with inspiring eloquence commands;

With strictest order sets his train in arms,

The chiefs advises, and the soldiers warms.

Alastor, Chromius, Haemon, round him wait,

Bias the good, and Pelagon the great.

The horse and chariots to the front assign’d,

The foot (the strength of war) he ranged behind;

The middle space suspected troops supply,

Inclosed by both, nor left the power to fly;

He gives command to “curb the fiery steed,

Nor cause confusion, nor the ranks exceed:

Before the rest let none too rashly ride;

No strength nor skill, but just in time, be tried:

The charge once made, no warrior turn the rein,

But fight, or fall; a firm embodied train.

He whom the fortune of the field shall cast

From forth his chariot, mount the next in haste;

Nor seek unpractised to direct the car,

Content with javelins to provoke the war.

Our great forefathers held this prudent course,

Thus ruled their ardour, thus preserved their force;

By laws like these immortal conquests made,

And earth’s proud tyrants low in ashes laid.”

So spoke the master of the martial art,

And touch’d with transport great Atrides’ heart.

“Oh! hadst thou strength to match thy brave desires,

And nerves to second what thy soul inspires!

But wasting years, that wither human race,

Exhaust thy spirits, and thy arms unbrace.

What once thou wert, oh ever mightst thou be!

And age the lot of any chief but thee.”

Thus to the experienced prince Atrides cried;

He shook his hoary locks, and thus replied:

“Well might I wish, could mortal wish renew

That strength which once in boiling youth I knew;

Such as I was, when Ereuthalion, slain

Beneath this arm, fell prostrate on the plain.

But heaven its gifts not all at once bestows,

These years with wisdom crowns, with action those:

The field of combat fits the young and bold,

The solemn council best becomes the old:

To you the glorious conflict I resign,

Let sage advice, the palm of age, be mine.”

He said. With joy the monarch march’d before,

And found Menestheus on the dusty shore,

With whom the firm Athenian phalanx stands;

And next Ulysses, with his subject bands.

Remote their forces lay, nor knew so far

The peace infringed, nor heard the sounds of war;

The tumult late begun, they stood intent

To watch the motion, dubious of the event.

The king, who saw their squadrons yet unmoved,

With hasty ardour thus the chiefs reproved:

“Can Peleus’ son forget a warrior’s part.

And fears Ulysses, skill’d in every art?

Why stand you distant, and the rest expect

To mix in combat which yourselves neglect?

From you ’twas hoped among the first to dare

The shock of armies, and commence the war;

For this your names are call’d before the rest,

To share the pleasures of the genial feast:

And can you, chiefs! without a blush survey

Whole troops before you labouring in the fray?

Say, is it thus those honours you requite?

The first in banquets, but the last in fight.”

Ulysses heard: the hero’s warmth o’erspread

His cheek with blushes: and severe, he said:

“Take back the unjust reproach! Behold we stand

Sheathed in bright arms, and but expect command.

If glorious deeds afford thy soul delight,

Behold me plunging in the thickest fight.

Then give thy warrior-chief a warrior’s due,

Who dares to act whate’er thou dar’st to view.”

Struck with his generous wrath, the king replies:

“O great in action, and in council wise!

With ours, thy care and ardour are the same,

Nor need I to commend, nor aught to blame.

Sage as thou art, and learn’d in human kind,

Forgive the transport of a martial mind.

Haste to the fight, secure of just amends;

The gods that make, shall keep the worthy, friends.”

He said, and pass’d where great Tydides lay,

His steeds and chariots wedged in firm array;

(The warlike Sthenelus attends his side;)

To whom with stern reproach the monarch cried:

“O son of Tydeus! (he, whose strength could tame

The bounding steed, in arms a mighty name)

Canst thou, remote, the mingling hosts descry,

With hands unactive, and a careless eye?

Not thus thy sire the fierce encounter fear’d;

Still first in front the matchless prince appear’d:

What glorious toils, what wonders they recite,

Who view’d him labouring through the ranks of fight?

I saw him once, when gathering martial powers,

A peaceful guest, he sought Mycenae’s towers;

Armies he ask’d, and armies had been given,

Not we denied, but Jove forbade from heaven;

While dreadful comets glaring from afar,

Forewarn’d the horrors of the Theban war.

Next, sent by Greece from where Asopus flows,

A fearless envoy, he approach’d the foes;

Thebes’ hostile walls unguarded and alone,

Dauntless he enters, and demands the throne.

The tyrant feasting with his chiefs he found,

And dared to combat all those chiefs around:

Dared, and subdued before their haughty lord;

For Pallas strung his arm and edged his sword.

Stung with the shame, within the winding way,

To bar his passage fifty warriors lay;

Two heroes led the secret squadron on,

Mason the fierce, and hardy Lycophon;

Those fifty slaughter’d in the gloomy vale.

He spared but one to bear the dreadful tale,

Such Tydeus was, and such his martial fire;

Gods! how the son degenerates from the sire!”

No words the godlike Diomed return’d,

But heard respectful, and in secret burn’d:

Not so fierce Capaneus’ undaunted son;

Stern as his sire, the boaster thus begun:

“What needs, O monarch! this invidious praise,

Ourselves to lessen, while our sire you raise?

Dare to be just, Atrides! and confess

Our value equal, though our fury less.

With fewer troops we storm’d the Theban wall,

And happier saw the sevenfold city fall,

In impious acts the guilty father died;

The sons subdued, for Heaven was on their side.

Far more than heirs of all our parents’ fame,

Our glories darken their diminish’d name.”

To him Tydides thus: “My friend, forbear;

Suppress thy passion, and the king revere:

His high concern may well excuse this rage,

Whose cause we follow, and whose war we wage:

His the first praise, were Ilion’s towers o’erthrown,

And, if we fail, the chief disgrace his own.

Let him the Greeks to hardy toils excite,

’Tis ours to labour in the glorious fight.”

He spoke, and ardent, on the trembling ground





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