Priam's

Therewith the royal sceptre, which of yore / Ilione, Priam's eldest daughter, bore; / her shining necklace, strung with costly beads, / and diadem, rimmed with gold and studded o'er / with sparkling gems. Thus charged, Achates heeds, / and towards the ships forthwith in eager haste proceeds.

"Then, but for folly or Fate's adverse power, / his word had made us with our trusty glaive / lay bare the Argive ambush, and this hour / should Ilion stand, and thou, O Priam's lofty tower!"

"'Once had your hands,' said Calchas, 'dared profane / Minerva's gift, dire plagues' (which Heaven forestall / or turn on him) 'should Priam's realm sustain; / but if by Trojan aid it scaled your wall, / proud Asia then should Pelops' sons enthrall, / and children rue the folly of the sire.'"

To such vain quest he cared not to reply, / but, heaving from his breast a deep-drawn sigh, / "Fly, Goddess-born! and get thee from the fire! / The foes", he said, "are on the ramparts. Fly! / All Troy is tumbling from her topmost spire. / No more can Priam's land, nor Priam's self require."

Here warlike Epytus, renowned in fight, / and valiant Rhipeus gather to our side, / and Hypanis and Dymas, matched in might, join with us, by the glimmering moon descried. / Here Mygdon's son, Coroebus, we espied, / who came to Troy, Cassandra's love to gain, / and now his troop with Priam's hosts allied; / poor youth and heedless! whom in frenzied strain / his promised bride had warned, but warned, alas! in vain.

Behind the palace, unobserved and free, / there stood a door, a secret thoroughfare / through Priam's halls. Here poor Andromache / while Priam's kingdom flourished and was fair, / to greet her husband's parents would repair / alone, or carrying with tendance fain / to Hector's father Hector's son and heir.

Saw where among a hundred daughters, stood / pale Hecuba, saw Priam's life-blood stain / the fires his hands had hallowed in the fane.

See, now, Polites, one of Priam's sons, / scarce slipt from Pyrrhus' butchery, and lame, / through foes, through darts, along the cloisters runs / and empty courtyards.

Such close had Priam's fortunes; so his days / were finished, such the bitter end he found, / now doomed by Fate with dying eyes to gaze / on Troy in flames and ruin all around, / and Pergamus laid level with the ground. / Lo, he to whom once Asia bowed the knee, / proud lord of many peoples, far-renowned, / now left to welter by the rolling sea, / a huge and headless trunk, a nameless corpse is he.

Sooth, then, shall she return / to Sparta and Mycenae, ay, and see / home, husband, sons and parents, safe and free, / with Ilian wives and Phrygians in her train, / a queen, in pride of triumph? Shall this be, / and Troy have blazed and Priam's self been slain, / and Trojan blood so oft have soaked the Dardan plain?