Upon his entering, hides to form a couch; And there Patroclus laid him down and cut The rankling arrow from his thigh, and shed Warm water on the wound to cleanse away
The purple blood, and last applied a root the smart,
Of bitter flavor to assuage
Bruising it first within his palms: the pangs
Ceased; the wound dried; the blood no longer flowed.
HUS in the camp Menatius' valiant son
Tended Eurypylus, and dressed his wounds;
While yet in mingled throngs the warriors fought,— Trojans and Greeks. Nor longer was the trench A barrier for the Greeks, nor the broad wall Which they had built above it to defend Their fleet; for all around it they had drawn The trench, yet not with chosen hecatombs Paid to the gods, that so it might protect The galleys and the heaps of spoil they held. Without the favor of the gods it rose, And therefore was not long to stand entire. As long as Hector lived, and Peleus' son
Was angered, and King Priam's city yet
Was not o'erthrown, so long the massive wall
Built by the Greeks stood firm. But when at length
The bravest of the Trojans had been slain,
And many of the Greeks were dead,—though still
Others survived,—and when in the tenth year The city of Priam fell, and in their ships
The Greeks went back to their beloved land,
Then did Apollo and the god of sea
Consult together to destroy the wall
By turning on it the resistless might
Of rivers, all that from the Idæan heights Flow to the ocean,-Rhesus, Granicus, Heptaporus, Caresus, Rhodius,
Æsepus, and Scamander's hallowed stream, And Simoïs, in whose bed lay many shields And helms and bodies of slain demigods. Phœbus Apollo turned the mouths of these All toward one spot; nine days against the wall He bade their currents rush, while Jupiter Poured constant rain, that floods might overwhelm The rampart; and the god who shakes the earth, Wielding his trident, led the rivers on.
He flung among the billows the huge beams
And stones which, with hard toil, the Greeks had laid
For the foundations. Thus he levelled all
Beside the hurrying Hellespont, destroyed
The bulwarks utterly, and overspread
The long broad shore with sand; and then he brought
Again the rivers to the ancient beds In which their gently flowing waters ran. This yet was to be done in time to come By Neptune and Apollo. Meanwhile raged Battle and tumult round that strong-built wall. The towers in, all their timbers rang with blows; And, driven as by the scourge of Jove, the Greeks, Hemmed closely in beside their roomy ships, Trembled at Hector, the great scatterer
Of squadrons, fighting, as he did before,
With all a whirlwind's might. As when a boar Or lion mid the hounds and huntsmen stands, Fearfully strong, and fierce of eye, and they In square array assault him, and their hands Fling many a javelin;—yet his noble heart Fears not, nor does he fly, although at last His courage cause his death; and oft he turns, And tries their ranks; and where he makes a rush The ranks give way; -so Hector moved and turned Among the crowd, and bade his followers cross The trench. The swift-paced horses ventured not The leap, but stood upon the edge and neighed Aloud, for the wide space affrighted them; And hard it was to spring across, or pass
From side to side, for on each side the brink
Was steep, and bristled with sharp stakes, close set And strong, which there the warrior sons of Greece
Had planted, a defence against the foe.
No steed that whirled the rapid car along
Could enter, but the soldiery on foot
Eagerly sought to pass, and in these words
Polydamas to daring Hector spake:
"Hector, and ye who lead the troops of Troy And our auxiliars! rashly do we seek
To urge our rapid steeds across the trench
So hard to pass, beset with pointed stakes,
And the Greek wall so near. The troops of horse Cannot descend nor combat there: the space Is narrow: they would all be slain. If Jove, The Thunderer of the skies, design to crush The Greeks and succor Troy, I should rejoice Were the design at once fulfilled, and all The sons of Greece ingloriously cut off,
Far from their Argos. But if they should turn Upon us, and repulse us from their fleet, And we become entangled in the trench, I deem no messenger would e'er go back
To Troy from fighting with the rallied Greeks.
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