Inhuman deed! that swells the guilty score
Of Ægypt's monsters, well increas'd before.
Not Theffaly, not Juba's favage train,
Pharnaces' impious troops, not cruel Spain,
Nor Pontus, nor the Syrtes' barbarous land,
Dar'd an attempt like this voluptuous band.
Th' attack is form'd, the palace closely pent;
Huge javelins to the shaken walls are fent,
A ftorm of flying fpears; yet from below
No battering rams refiftless drive the blow,
No engine 's brought, no fires; the giddy croud
'In parties roam, and with brute clamours loud,
In feveral bands their wasted strength divide,
And here and there to force an entrance try'd; 635
In vain, for Fortune fights on Cæfar's fide.
Then, where the palace 'midst surrounding waves Projects luxuriant, and their fury braves, The fhips too their united force apply, And swiftly hurl the naval war on high.
Yet, prefent every where with fword or fire,
Cæfar th' approaches guards, and makes the foes re
To all by turns he brings fuccefsful aids,
Inverts the war, and, though befieg'd, invades.
Fireballs, and torches dreft with unctuous spoil
Of tar combuftible, and frying oil,
Kindled he launch'd against the fleet; nor flow
The catching flames inveft the fmouldering tow.
The pitchy planks their crackling prey become;
The painted fterns, and rowers feats confume.
There, hulks half-burnt sink in the main; and her
Arms on the waves and drowning men appear.
Nor thus fuffic'd, the flames from thence aspire, And seize the buildings with contagious fire.
wift o'er the roofs by winds increas'd, they fly; 655 So fhooting meteors blaze along the sky,
And lead their wandering courfe with sudden glare,
By fulphurous atoms fed in fields of thinneft air.
Affrighted crouds the growing ruin view;
To fave the city from the fiege they flew,
When Cæfar, wont the lucky hour to chufe
Of fudden chance in war, and wifely use,
Lost not in flɔthful reft the favouring night,
But shipp'd his men, and fudden took his flight.
Pharos he feiz'd, an island heretofore,'
When prophet Proteus Ægypt's fceptre bore,
Now by a chain of moles contiguous to the shore.
Here Cæfar's arms a double use obtain ;
from the ftraiten'd foe he bars the main, While to his friends th' important harbour lies 670 A fafe retreat, and open to supplies.
Nor longer now the doom fufpended stands,
Which Justice on Pothinus' guilt demands.
Yet not as guilt, unmatch'd like his, requires,
Not by the shameful cross, or torturing fires, 675
Ner torn by ravenous beasts, the howling wretch
The fword dishonour'd did his head divide,
And by a fate like Rome's best fon he dy’d.
Arlinge now, by well-concerted fnares
'Scap'd from the palace, to the foe repairs;
The trufty Ganymede assists her flight.
Then o'er the camp the claim'd a fovereign's right;
Her brother abfent, fhe affumes the fword,
And frees the tyrant from his houshold lord;
By her juft hand Achillas meets his fate,
Rebel accurs'd! in blood and mischief great!
Another victim, Pompey, to thy shade;
But think not yet the full atonement made,
Though Ægypt's king, though all the royal line
Should fall, thy murmuring ghoft would still repine;
Still unreveng'd thy murder would remain,
Till Cæfar's purple life the fenate's fwords fhall ftain.
Nor does the fwelling tempest yet subside.
The chief remov'd that did its fury guide,
To the fame charge bold Ganymede succeeds,
Profperous awhile in many hardy deeds.
So long th' event of war in balance lay,
So great the dangers of that doubtful day,
That Cæfar from that day alone might claim
Immortal wreaths, and all the warrior's fame.
Now while to quit the ftraiten'd mole he strovė,
And to the vacant fhips the fight remove,
War's utmoft terrors prefs on every fide;
Before the strand befieging navies ride';
Behind, the troops advance. No way is seen
Tefcape, or fcarce a glorious death to win.
No room with flaughter'd foes to ftrew the plain,
And bravely fall, amidst a pile of flain.
A captive to the place he now appears,
Doubtful if death fhould move his hope, or fears. 710
In this diftrefs a fudden thought infpir'd
His hardy breast, by great examples fir'd;
Bold Scæva's action he to mind recalls,
And glory won near fam'd Dyrrachium's walls;
Where, whilft his men a doubtful fight maintain, 715
And Pompey ftrove the batter'd works to gain,
Amidst a field of foes, that hemm'd him round,
Alone the brave Centurion kept his ground.
Here the original poem breaks off abruptly, having been left unfinished by the author.
|