No More Learning

Thy father's skill, O Phereclus! was thine,
The graceful fabric and the fair design;
For loved by Pallas, Pallas did impart
To him the shipwright's and the builder's art.
Beneath his hand the fleet of Paris rose,
The fatal cause of all his country's woes;
But he, the mystic will of heaven unknown,
Nor saw his country's peril, nor his own.
The hapless artist, while confused he fled,
The spear of Merion mingled with the dead.
Through his right hip, with forceful fury cast,
Between the bladder and the bone it pass'd;
Prone on his knees he falls with fruitless cries,
And death in lasting slumber seals his eyes.

From Meges' force the swift Pedaeus fled,
Antenor's offspring from a foreign bed,
Whose generous spouse, Theanor, heavenly fair,
Nursed the young stranger with a mother's care.
How vain those cares! when Meges in the rear
Full in his nape infix'd the fatal spear;
Swift through his crackling jaws the weapon glides,
And the cold tongue and grinning teeth divides.

Then died Hypsenor, generous and divine,
Sprung from the brave Dolopion's mighty line,
Who near adored Scamander made abode,
Priest of the stream, and honoured as a god.
On him, amidst the flying numbers found,
Eurypylus inflicts a deadly wound;
On his broad shoulders fell the forceful brand,
Thence glancing downwards, lopp'd his holy hand,
Which stain'd with sacred blood the blushing sand.
Down sunk the priest: the purple hand of death
Closed his dim eye, and fate suppress'd his breath.

Thus toil'd the chiefs, in different parts engaged.
In every quarter fierce Tydides raged;
Amid the Greek, amid the Trojan train,
Rapt through the ranks he thunders o'er the plain;
Now here, now there, he darts from place to place,
Pours on the rear, or lightens in their face.
Thus from high hills the torrents swift and strong
Deluge whole fields, and sweep the trees along,
Through ruin'd moles the rushing wave resounds,
O'erwhelm's the bridge, and bursts the lofty bounds;
The yellow harvests of the ripen'd year,
And flatted vineyards, one sad waste appear! (144)
While Jove descends in sluicy sheets of rain,
And all the labours of mankind are vain.
So raged Tydides, boundless in his ire,
Drove armies back, and made all Troy retire.
With grief the leader of the Lycian band
Saw the wide waste of his destructive hand:
His bended bow against the chief he drew;
Swift to the mark the thirsty arrow flew,
Whose forky point the hollow breastplate tore,
Deep in his shoulder pierced, and drank the gore:
The rushing stream his brazen armour dyed,
While the proud archer thus exulting cried:

"Hither, ye Trojans, hither drive your steeds!
Lo! by our hand the bravest Grecian bleeds,
Not long the deathful dart he can sustain;
Or Phoebus urged me to these fields in vain. "
So spoke he, boastful: but the winged dart
Stopp'd short of life, and mock'd the shooter's art.
The wounded chief, behind his car retired,
The helping hand of Sthenelus required;
Swift from his seat he leap'd upon the ground,
And tugg'd the weapon from the gushing wound;
When thus the king his guardian power address'd,
The purple current wandering o'er his vest:

"O progeny of Jove! unconquer'd maid!
If e'er my godlike sire deserved thy aid,
If e'er I felt thee in the fighting field;
Now, goddess, now, thy sacred succour yield.
O give my lance to reach the Trojan knight,
Whose arrow wounds the chief thou guard'st in fight;
And lay the boaster grovelling on the shore,
That vaunts these eyes shall view the light no more. "

Thus pray'd Tydides, and Minerva heard,
His nerves confirm'd, his languid spirits cheer'd;
He feels each limb with wonted vigour light;
His beating bosom claim'd the promised fight.
"Be bold, (she cried), in every combat shine,
War be thy province, thy protection mine;
Rush to the fight, and every foe control;
Wake each paternal virtue in thy soul:
Strength swells thy boiling breast, infused by me,
And all thy godlike father breathes in thee;
Yet more, from mortal mists I purge thy eyes,(145)
And set to view the warring deities.
These see thou shun, through all the embattled plain;
Nor rashly strive where human force is vain.
If Venus mingle in the martial band,
Her shalt thou wound: so Pallas gives command. "

With that, the blue-eyed virgin wing'd her flight;
The hero rush'd impetuous to the fight;
With tenfold ardour now invades the plain,
Wild with delay, and more enraged by pain.
As on the fleecy flocks when hunger calls,
Amidst the field a brindled lion falls;
If chance some shepherd with a distant dart
The savage wound, he rouses at the smart,
He foams, he roars; the shepherd dares not stay,
But trembling leaves the scattering flocks a prey;
Heaps fall on heaps; he bathes with blood the ground,
Then leaps victorious o'er the lofty mound.
Not with less fury stern Tydides flew;
And two brave leaders at an instant slew;
Astynous breathless fell, and by his side,
His people's pastor, good Hypenor, died;
Astynous' breast the deadly lance receives,
Hypenor's shoulder his broad falchion cleaves.