Page:Homer - Iliad, translation Pope, 1909.djvu/296

294 Perhaps yon relics of the Grecian name,

Doomed in their ships to sink by fire and sword,

And pay the forfeit of their haughty lord?

Whate'er the cause, reveal thy secret care,

And speak those sorrows which a friend would share."

A sigh, that instant, from his bosom broke,

Another followed, and Patroclus spoke:

"Let Greece at length with pity touch thy breast,

Thyself a Greek; and, once, of Greeks the best!

Lo! every chief that might her fate prevent,

Lies pierced with wounds, and bleeding in his tent:

Eurypylus, Tydides, Atreus' son,

And wise Ulysses, at the navy groan,

More for their country's wounds, than for their own.

Their pain soft arts of pharmacy can ease;

Thy breast alone no lenitives appease.

"May never rage like thine my soul enslave,

O great in vain! unprofitably brave!

Thy country slighted in her last distress,

What friend, what man, from thee shall hope redress?

No: men unborn, and ages yet behind,

Shall curse that fierce, that unforgiving mind.

"O man unpitying! if of man thy race—

But sure thou spring'st not from a soft embrace,

Nor ever amorous hero caused thy birth

Nor ever tender goddess brought thee forth.

Some rugged rock's hard entrails gave thee form,

And raging seas produced thee in a storm,

A soul well-suiting that tempestuous kind,

So rough thy manners, so untamed thy mind.

"If some dire oracle thy breast alarm,

If aught from Jove, or Thetis, stop thy arm,

Some beam of comfort yet on Greece may shine,

If I but lead the Myrmidonian line:

Clad in thy dreadful arms if I appear,

Proud Troy shall tremble and desert the war:

Without thy person Greece shall win the day,

And thy mere image chase her foes away.

Pressed by fresh forces, her O'erlaboured train

Shall quit the ships, and Greece respire again."

Thus, blind to fate, with supplicating breath,

Thou begg'st his arms, and in his arms thy death,

Unfortunately good! A boding sigh

Thy friend returned, and with it, this reply:

"Patroclus! thy Achilles know no fears;

Nor words from Jove, nor oracles, he hears;

Nor aught a mother's caution can suggest;

The tyrant's pride lies rooted in my breast.

My wrongs, my wrongs, my constant thought engage,