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Rh Of gladness, that a woman fled, and fain

To fly for ever, should be turned again!

So the days waned, and armies on the shore

Of Simois stood and strove and died. Wherefore?

No man had moved their landmarks; none had shook

Their wallèd towns.—And they whom Ares took,

Had never seen their children: no wife came

With gentle arms to shroud the limbs of them

For burial, in a strange and angry earth

Laid dead. And there at home, the same long dearth:

Women that lonely died, and aged men

Waiting for sons that ne'er should turn again,

Nor know their graves, nor pour drink-offerings,

To still the unslakèd dust. These be the things

The conquering Greek hath won!

But we—what pride,

What praise of men were sweeter?—fighting died

To save our people. And when war was red

Around us, friends upbore the gentle dead

Home, and dear women's hands about them wound

White shrouds, and here they sleep in the old ground

Belovèd. And the rest long days fought on,

Dwelling with wives and children, not alone

And joyless, like these Greeks.

And Hector's woe,

What is it? He is gone, and all men know

His glory, and how true a heart he bore.

It is the gift the Greek hath brought! Of yore

Men saw him not, nor knew him. Yea, and even

Paris hath loved withal a child of heaven: