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374 Stout Tarchon and the Trojan sire

Are rearing many a funeral pyre

Along the winding shore.

Here, as his country's rites ordain,

Each brings his brave compatriots slain,

And while the dusk flames mount on high

A veil of darkness shrouds the sky.

Thrice ride they round each lighted pyre,

Encased in glittering mail,

Thrice circle the funereal fire,

And raise their piercing wail.

Earth, armour, all with tears arc dewed,

And warrior shouts and clarions rude

The vault of heaven assail.

There others on the embers throw

Rich booty, reft from slaughtered foe,

The helm, the ivory-hilted steel,

The bridle and the glowing wheel:

While some cast in the dead man's gear,

The treacherous shield, the luckless spear.

Around they butcher herds of kine,

And sooth the shades with bristly swine,

And cattle, from the neighbouring mead

Swift harried, o'er the death-fires bleed.

Far down the line of coast they gaze

On kinsmen shrivelling in the blaze,

And fondly watch the bier,

Nor tear them from the hallowed ground,

Till dewy night the sky rolls round

And makes the stars appear.

Sad Latium for her part the while

Builds otherwhere full many a pile;

Some on the field their slain inhume,

Some send them forth to distant tomb,

Or to the city bear: