Heaven's dark decrees and answers to display,
And how to take the town, and where the secret lay.
Yet this I compassed, and from Troy conveyed
The fatal image of their guardian Maid.
That work was mine; for Pallas, though our friend,
Yet while she was in Troy, did Troy defend.
Now what has Ajax done, or what designed?
A noisy nothing, and an empty wind.
If he be what he promises in show,
Why was I sent, and why feared he to go?
Our boasting champion thought the task not light
Το pass the guards, commit himself to night;
Not only through a hostile town to pass,
But scale, with deep ascent, the sacred place;
With wandering steps to search the citadel,
And from the priests their patroness to steal;
Then through surrounding foes to force my way,
And bear in triumph home the heavenly prey;
Which had I not, Ajax in vain had held
Before that monstrous bulk his seven-fold shield.
That night to conquer Troy I might be said,
When Troy was liable to conquest made.
Why point'st thou to my partner of the war? Tydides had indeed a worthy share
In all my toil, and praise; but when thy might
Our ships protected, didst thou singly fight?
All joined, and thou of many wert but one;
I asked no friend, nor had, but him alone;
Who, had he not been well assured, that art
And conduct were of war the better part,
And more availed than strength, my valiant friend
Had urged a better right, than Ajax can pretend;
As good, at least, Eurypylus may claim,
And the more moderate Ajax of the name;
The Cretan king, and his brave charioteer,
And Menelaus, bold with sword and spear;
All these had been my rivals in the shield,
And yet all these to my pretensions yield.
Thy boisterous hands are then of use, when I
With this directing head those hands apply.
Brawn without brain is thine; my prudent care
Foresees, provides, administers the war:
Thy province is to fight; but when shall be
The time to fight, the king consults with me.
No drachm of judgment with thy force is joined;
Thy body is of profit, and my mind.
But, how much more the ship her safety owes
To him who steers, than him that only rows;
By how much more the captain merits praise
Than he who fights, and, fighting, but obeys;
By so much greater is my worth than thine,
Who canst but execute what I design.
What gain'st thou, brutal man, if I confess
Thy strength superior, when thy wit is less?
Mind is the man; I claim my whole desert
From the mind's vigour, and the immortal part.
But you, O Grecian chiefs, reward my care,
Be grateful to your watchman of the war;
For all my labours in so long a space,
Sure I may plead a title to your grace.
Enter the town; I then unbarred the gates,
When I removed their tutelary fates.
By all our common hopes, if hopes they be,
Which I have now reduced to certainty;
By falling Troy, by yonder tottering towers,
And by their taken gods, which now are ours;
Or, if there yet a farther task remains,
To be performed by prudence or by pains;
If yet some desperate action rests behind,
That asks high conduct, and a dauntless mind;
If aught be wanting to the Trojan doom,
Which none but I can manage and o'ercome;
Award those arms I ask, by your decree;
Or give to this what you refuse to me.
He ceased, and, ceasing, with respect he bowed,
And with his hand at once the fatal statue shewed.
Heaven, air, and ocean rung, with loud applause,
And by the general vote he gained his cause.
Thus conduct won the prize, when courage failed,
And eloquence o'er brutal force prevailed.
He who could often, and alone, withstand The foe, the fire, and Jove's own partial hand, Now cannot his unmastered grief sustain, But yields to rage, to madness, and disdain; Then snatching out his faulchion,-Thou, said he, Art mine; Ulysses lays no claim to thee. O often tried, and ever trusty sword, Now do thy last kind office to thy lord! 'Tis Ajax who requests thy aid, to show None but himself, himself could overthrow.He said, and with so good a will to die, Did to his breast the fatal point apply, It found his heart, a way till then unknown, Where never weapon entered but his own; No hands could force it thence, so fixt it stood, "Till out it rushed, expelled by streams of spouting blood.
The fruitful blood produced a flower, * which grew On a green stem, and of a purple hue;
Like his, whom unaware Apollo slew.
Inscribed in both, the letters are the same,
But those express the grief, and these the name.
ACIS, POLYPHEMUS, AND GALATEA,
FROM THE THIRTEENTH BOOK OF
Acrs, the lovely youth, whose loss I mourn,
From Faunus and the nymph Symethis born,
Was both his parents' pleasure; but to me
Was all that love could make a lover be.
The gods our minds in mutual bands did join ;
I was his only joy, and he was mine.
Now sixteen summers the sweet youth had seen,
And doubtful down began to shade his chin ;
When Polyphemus first disturbed our joy,
And loved me fiercely, as I loved the boy.
Ask not which passion in my soul was higher,
My last aversion, or my first desire;
Nor this the greater was, nor that the less,
Both were alike, for both were in excess.
Thee, Venus, thee both heaven and earth obey;
Immense thy power, and boundless is thy sway.
The Cyclops, who defied the ætherial throne,
And thought no thunder louder than his own,
The terror of the woods, and wilder far
Than wolves in plains, or bears in forests are;
The inhuman host, who made his bloody feasts
On mangled members of his butchered guests,
Yet felt the force of love, and fierce desire,
And burnt for me, with unrelenting fire;
Forgot his caverns, and his woolly care,
Assumed the softness of a lover's air,
And combed, with teeth of rakes, his rugged hair.
Now with a crooked scythe his beard he sleeks,
And mows the stubborn stubble of his cheeks;
Now in the crystal stream he looks, to try
His simagres, and rolls his glaring eye.
His cruelty and thirst of blood are lost;
And ships securely sail along the coast.
The prophet Telemus (arrived by chance
Where Etna's summits to the seas advance,
Who marked the tracks of every bird that flew,
And sure presages from their flying drew,)
Foretold the Cyclops, that Ulysses' hand
In his broad eye should thrust a flaming brand.
The giant, with a scornful grin, replied,
Vain augur, thou hast falsely prophesied :
Already Love his flaming brand has tost;
Looking on two fair eyes, my sight I lost.-
Thus, warned in vain, with stalking pace he strode,
And stamped the margin of the briny flood
With heavy steps, and, weary, sought agen
The cool retirement of his gloomy den.
A promontory, sharpening by degrees, Ends in a wedge, and overlooks the seas; On either side, below, the water flows: This airy walk the giant-lover chose;
Simagres, one of our author's Gallicisms, for affected contor tions of the face.
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