Trojan

“ All this from Jove’s afflictive hand we bear, Who, far from Argos, wills our ruin here. Past are the days when happier Greece was blest, And all his favour, all his aid confess’d; Now heaven averse, our hands from battle ties, And lifts the Trojan glory to the skies. Cease we at length to waste our blood in vain, And launch what ships lie nearest to the main; Leave these at anchor, till the coming night: Then, if impetuous Troy forbear the fight, Bring all to sea, and hoist each sail for flight. Better from evils, well foreseen, to run, Than perish in the danger we may shun. ”

“ And now she leads the Trojan chief along
The lofty walls, amidst the busy throng;
Displays her Tyrian wealth, and rising town,
Which love, without his labor, makes his own.
This pomp she shows, to tempt her wand'ring guest;
Her falt'ring tongue forbids to speak the rest.
When day declines, and feasts renew the night,
Still on his face she feeds her famish'd sight;
She longs again to hear the prince relate
His own adventures and the Trojan fate. ”

“ A Grecian’s life hath sunk; for every scruple
Of her contaminated carrion weight
A Trojan hath been slain. Since she could speak,
She hath not given so many good words breath
As for her Greeks and Trojans suff’red death.
PARIS.
Fair Diomed, you do as chapmen do,
Dispraise the thing that you desire to buy;
But we in silence hold this virtue well,
We’ll not commend what we intend to sell.
Here lies our way.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE II. Troy. The court of Pandarus’ house. Enter Troilus and Cressida.
TROILUS.
Dear, trouble not yourself; the morn is cold. ”

“ And Ilian tow'rs and Priam's empire stood.
Meantime, with shouts, the Trojan shepherds bring
A captive Greek, in bands, before the king;
Taken to take; who made himself their prey,
T' impose on their belief, and Troy betray;
Fix'd on his aim, and obstinately bent
To die undaunted, or to circumvent.
About the captive, tides of Trojans flow;
All press to see, and some insult the foe.
Now hear how well the Greeks their wiles disguis'd;
Behold a nation in a man compris'd. ”

“ Then graceful as he stood, in act to throw The lifted javelin, thus bespoke the foe:
“How proud Achilles glories in his fame! And hopes this day to sink the Trojan name Beneath her ruins! Know, that hope is vain; A thousand woes, a thousand toils remain. Parents and children our just arms employ, And strong and many are the sons of Troy. Great as thou art, even thou may’st stain with gore These Phrygian fields, and press a foreign shore.” ”

“ 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. ”

“ But when the sun the height of heaven ascends, The sire of gods his golden scales suspends, [192] With equal hand: in these explored the fate Of Greece and Troy, and poised the mighty weight: Press’d with its load, the Grecian balance lies Low sunk on earth, the Trojan strikes the skies. Then Jove from Ida’s top his horrors spreads; The clouds burst dreadful o’er the Grecian heads; Thick lightnings flash; the muttering thunder rolls; Their strength he withers, and unmans their souls. Before his wrath the trembling hosts retire; The gods in terrors, and the skies on fire. ”

“ It is the heroic story of the last night of Troy, and the subsequent wanderings of a band of Trojans under Æneas, prince of Troy; their long, vain search for their fate-promised land; their shipwreck upon the shores of Africa; their sojourn in Carthage and the love tragedy of Dido and Æneas; their memorial games in Sicily; Æneas' visit to the underworld, and the struggle of the Trojan exiles against native princes for a foothold in their destined Italy—all a story of heroes and heroic deeds, sketched on broad lines and with a free hand, but worked out with exquisite grace and beauty of detail. ”

“ In Troy deserted, as abhorred at home!"
⁠So spoke the fair, with sorrow-streaming eye:
Distressful beauty melts each stander-by;
On all around the infectious sorrow grows;
But Priam checked the torrent as it rose:
"Perform, ye Trojans, what the rites require,
And fell the forests for a funeral pyre!
Twelve days nor foes nor secret ambush dread;
Achilles grants these honours to the dead."
⁠He spoke; and at his word the Trojan train
Their mules and oxen harness to the wain,
Pour through the gates, and, felled from Ida's crown,
Roll back the gathered forests to the town. ”

“ Then the Greeks set sail for their own country which they had not seen for so many years, and they took the beautiful Helen with them, awakened at last from the spell which Venus had cast upon her, and sorrowing for all the suffering she had caused.
But the glory of the old Trojan days was gone forever. Men search to-day the ruins of ancient Troy that lie hidden like bright jewels in the depths of the ancient mountains. There is little left but the memory of the apple of Discord that caused the destruction of the city and the heroes and the citadel of Troy's old power. ”

“ With Troy; and Priam's more unhappy spouse,
To crown her losses, loses human shape;
With new-heard barkings shaking foreign climes.
Where the long Hellespont's contracted bounds
Are seen, Troy blaz'd: nor yet the fires were quench'd.
The scanty drops of blood Jove's altar soak'd,
Which flow'd from aged Priam. By her locks
Dragg'd on, Apollo's priestess vainly stretch'd
To lofty heaven her arms. The victor Greeks
Tear off the Trojan mothers as they clasp
Their country's imag'd gods; and as they cling
To flaming temples—an invidious prey. ”

“ Then each Trojan looked round to see by what way he could escape, and when men do that in battle they soon run by the way they have chosen. Patroclus rushed to the ship of Protesilaus, and slew the leader of the Trojans there, and drove them out, and quenched the fire; while they of Troy drew back from the ships, and Aias and the other unwounded Greek princes leaped among them, smiting with sword and spear. ”

“ Thro' ambient seas and thro' devouring sands,
Our exil'd crew has sought th' Ausonian ground;
And now, at length, the flying coast is found.
Thus far the fate of Troy, from place to place,
With fury has pursued her wand'ring race.
Here cease, ye pow'rs, and let your vengeance end:
Troy is no more, and can no more offend.
And thou, O sacred maid, inspir'd to see
Th' event of things in dark futurity;
Give me what Heav'n has promis'd to my fate,
To conquer and command the Latian state;
To fix my wand'ring gods, and find a place
For the long exiles of the Trojan race. ”

“ Meantime the Trojan cuts his wat'ry way,
Fix'd on his voyage, thro' the curling sea;
Then, casting back his eyes, with dire amaze,
Sees on the Punic shore the mounting blaze.
The cause unknown; yet his presaging mind
The fate of Dido from the fire divin'd;
He knew the stormy souls of womankind,
What secret springs their eager passions move,
How capable of death for injur'd love. ”

“ That knows not Troy's unhappy lot?
See Priam! aye, praise waits on worth
E'en in this corner of the earth;
E'en here the tear of pity springs,
And hearts are touched by human things.
Dismiss your fear: we sure may claim
To find some safety in our fame.'
He said; and feeds his hungry heart
With shapes of unsubstantial art,
In fond remembrance groaning deep,
While briny floods his visage steep.
There spreads and broadens on his sight
The portraiture of Greece in flight,
Pressed by the Trojan youth; while here
Troy flies, Achilles in her rear. ”

“ For nine long years the Greeks besieged Troy, but for all their plans and manœuvres the city held out against them. They pillaged and overran the neighboring towns but Troy stood fast.
Never were brave men pitted against a braver enemy. The lives of many heroes were sacrificed, Hector’s, the greatest of the Trojan champions, and the valiant Achilles among them, at whose loss the Greeks almost despaired. Force had failed. Their leader had fallen. They must outwit their enemy. With the aid of Ulysses they worked out an admirable plan. ”

“ Fall freely; weeping ever softens grief.
Andromache. O pledge of love, light of a fallen house,790
Last of the Trojan dead, fear of the Greeks,
Thy mother's empty hope, for whom I prayed—
Fool that I was—that thou mightst have the years
Of Priam, and thy father's warlike soul,
The gods despise my vows; thou ne'er shalt wield 795
A scepter in the kingly halls of Troy,
Mete justice to thy people, nor shalt send
Thy foes beneath thy yoke, nor put to flight
The Greeks, drag Pyrrhus at thy chariot wheels,
Nor ever in thy slender hands bear arms ”

“ When Heav’n had overturn’d the Trojan state
And Priam’s throne, by too severe a fate;
When ruin’d Troy became the Grecians’ prey,
And Ilium’s lofty tow’rs in ashes lay;
Warn’d by celestial omens, we retreat,
To seek in foreign lands a happier seat.
Near old Antandros, and at Ida’s foot,
The timber of the sacred groves we cut,
And build our fleet; uncertain yet to find
What place the gods for our repose assign’d.
Friends daily flock ”

“ The other Trojans, because of their disguise of Greek armor, are attacked by their own friends stationed at near by points of vantage, and now the Greeks themselves, recognizing the ruse at last, overwhelm the little Trojan band by force of numbers. Other Greeks pour in from all sides and add their testimony that these are Trojans. In the desperate encounter many of the Trojans fall.
Æneas performs Herculean feats of arms, and slays many Greeks, but is himself unhurt. At last he and a few followers escape into a street leading to Priam’s palace, whence loud and continued shouting can be heard. ”

“ Arms, and the man I sing, who, forc'd by fate,
And haughty Juno's unrelenting hate,
Expell'd and exil'd, left the Trojan shore.
Long labors, both by sea and land, he bore,
And in the doubtful war, before he won
The Latian realm, and built the destin'd town;
His banish'd gods restor'd to rites divine,
And settled sure succession in his line,
From whence the race of Alban fathers come,
And the long glories of majestic Rome. ”

“ Troy might win breathing-space, and see at last
The day of freedom: the Gods hearkened not.
Far other issues Fate devised, nor recked
Of Zeus the Almighty, nor of none beside
Of the Immortals. Her unpitying soul
Cares naught what doom she spinneth with her thread
Inevitable, be it for men new-born
Or cities: all things wax and wane through her.
So by her hest the battle-travail swelled
'Twixt Trojan chariot-lords and Greeks that closed
In grapple of fight—they dealt each other death
Ruthlessly: no man quailed, but stout of heart
Fought on; for courage thrusts men into war. ”

“ This is the golden goblet from which his sire Anchises was wont to pour the drink-offering; here is the royal robe and the scepter and tiara of Priam; and these vestments were wrought by the hands of noble Trojan dames.”
For a while Latinus sat silent, pondering on the strange event, which seemed to fulfil the oracle of ancient Faunus. This, thought he, is the foreign bridegroom of which the oracle spoke. Presently he raised his head, and answered, with a look of glad assurance: “Trojan, thou hast thy wish; and may the gods speed our designs! ”

“ But pierced his foot, and nailed it to the plain.
The laughing Trojan, with a joyful spring,
Leaps from his ambush, and insults the king:
⁠"He bleeds!" he cries, "some god has sped my dart;
Would the same god had fixed it in his heart!
So Troy, relieved from that wide-wasting hand,
Should breathe from slaughter, and in combat stand,
Whose sons now tremble at his darted spear,
As scattered lambs the rushing lion fear."
⁠He dauntless thus: "Thou conqueror of the fair,
Thou woman-warrior with the curling hair ”

“ In gratitude for the services of their able leader, Oxylus, the kingdom of Elis, was conferred upon him by the Heraclidæ.
THE SIEGE OF TROY.
Troy or Ilion was the capital of a kingdom in Asia Minor, situated near the Hellespont, and founded by Ilus, son of Tros. At the time of the famous Trojan war this city was under the government of Priam, a direct descendant of Ilus. Priam was married to Hecuba, daughter of Dymas, king of Thrace; and among the most celebrated of their children were the renowned and [284] valiant Hector, the prophetess Cassandra, and Paris, the cause of the Trojan war. ”

“ You may see the warriors from the islands, with their horned helmets, in old Egyptian pictures.
The commander-in-chief, as we say now, of the Trojans was Hector, the son of Priam. He was thought a match for any one of the Greeks, and was brave and good. His brothers also were leaders, but Paris preferred to fight from a distance with bow and arrows. He and Pandarus, who dwelt on the slopes of Mount Ida, were the best archers in the Trojan army. ”

“ Among those who peopled the eastern Asiatic coast were the Trojans. The story of the Trojan war is extremely simple. The Trojans, in the person of Paris, or Alexander, the son of the reigning monarch, Priam, are represented as having had certain dealings with the Achæans, or Greeks of the Peloponnesus, in the course of which the gay young prince carries off from the palace of Menelaus, king of Sparta, his spouse Helen, the greatest beauty of her age. To revenge this insult, the Greeks banded themselves together and sailed against Troy with a large fleet. ”