Page:Homer - Iliad, translation Pope, 1909.djvu/439

458—506 The living image of my father shines."

"Thy words, that speak benevolence of mind,

Are true, my son!" the godlike sire rejoined:

"Great are my hazards; but the gods survey

My steps, and send thee guardian of my way.

Hail I and be blest; for scarce of mortal kind

Appear thy form, thy feature, and thy mind."

"Nor true are all thy words, nor erring wide,"

The sacred messenger of heaven replied:

"But say, convey'st thou through the lonely plains

What yet most precious of thy store remains,

To lodge in safety with some friendly hand,

Prepared perchance to leave thy native land?

Or fliest thou now? What hopes can Troy retain,

Thy matchless son, her guard and glory, slain?"

The king, alarmed: "Say what, and whence thou art,

Who search the sorrows of a parent's heart,

And know so well how godlike Hector died?"

Thus Priam spoke, and Hermes thus replied:

"You tempt me, father, and with pity touch:

On this sad subject you inquire too much.

Oft have these eyes the godlike Hector viewed

In glorious fight, with Grecian blood imbrued:

I saw him when, like Jove, his flames he tossed

On thousand ships, and withered half a host:

I saw, but helped not; stern Achilles' ire

Forbade assistance, and enjoyed the fire.

For him I serve, of Myrmidonian race;

One ship conveyed us from our native place;

Polyctor is my sire, an honoured name,

Old, like thyself, and not unknown to fame;

Of seven his sons, by whom the lot was cast

To serve our prince, it fell on me the last.

To watch this quarter my adventure falls;

For with the morn the Greeks attack your walls;

Sleepless they sit, impatient to engage,

And scarce their rulers check their martial rage."

"If then thou art of stern Pelides' train,"

The mournful monarch thus rejoined again,

"Ah, tell me truly, where, oh I where are laid

My son's dear relics? what befalls him dead?

Have dogs dismembered on the naked plains,

Or yet unmangled rest his cold remains?"

"O favoured of the skies!" thus answered then

The power that mediates between gods and men,

"Nor dogs nor vultures have thy Hector rent,

But whole he lies, neglected in the tent:

This the twelfth evening since he rested there,

Untouched by worms, untainted by the air.