Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 2.djvu/296

244 touch him, nor heard it fall; and Wotton might have escaped to his army, with the honour of having remitted his lance against so great a leader, unrevenged; but Apollo enraged, that a javelin, flung by the assistance of so foul a goddess, should pollute his fountain, put on the shape of, and softly came to young Boyle, who then accompanied Temple: he pointed first to the lance, then to the distant modern that flung it, and commanded the young hero to take immediate revenge. Boyle, clad in a suit of armour which had been given him by all the gods, immediately advanced against the trembling foe, who now fled before him. As a young lion in the Lybian plains, or Araby desert, sent by his aged sire to hunt for prey, or health, or exercise; he scours along, wishing to meet some tiger from the mountains, or a furious boar; if chance a wild ass, with brayings importune, affronts his ear, the generous beast, though loathing to distain his claws with blood so vile, yet much provoked at the offensive noise, which Echo, foolish nymph, like her ill-judging sex, repeats much louder and with more delight than Philomela's song; he vindicates the honour of the forest, and hunts the noisy long-ear'd animal. So Wotton fled, so Boyle pursued. But Wotton heavy-armed, and slow of foot, began to slack his course; when his lover Bentley appeared, returning laden with the spoils of the two sleeping ancients. Boyle observed him well, and soon discovering the helmet