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Their heads thrown back avoid the stroke;

Their mighty arms the fight provoke.

That on elastic youth relies,

This on vast limbs and giant size;

But the huge knees with age are slack,

And fitful gasps the deep chest rack.

Full many a blow the heroes rain

Each on the other, still in vain:

Their hollow sides return the sound,

Their battered chests the shock rebound:

'Mid ears and temples come and go

The wandering gauntlets to and fro:

The jarred teeth chatter 'neath the blow.

Firm stands Entellus in his place,

A column rooted on its base;

His watchful eye and shrinking frame

Alone avoid the gauntlet's aim.

Like leaguer who invests a town,

Or sits before a hill-fort down,

The younger champion tasks his art

To find the bulwark's weakest part;

This way and that unwearied scans,

And vainly tries a thousand plans.

Entellus, rising to the blow,

Puts forth his hand: the wary foe

Midway in air the mischief spied,

And, deftly shifting, slipped aside.

Entellus' force on air is spent:

Heavily down with prone descent

He falls, as from its roots uprent

A pine falls hollow, on the side

Of Erymanth or lofty Ide."

Acestes rushes in, like an attentive second, to raise his friend; and Entellus, roused to fury by his fall, renews the fight savagely:—