Not with so fierce a rage the foaming flood Roars, when he finds his rapid course withstood; Bears down the dams with unresisted sway, And sweeps the cattle and the cots away. These eyes beheld him when he march’d between The brother kings: I saw th’ unhappy queen, The hundred wives, and where old Priam stood, To stain his hallow’d altar with his brood. The fifty nuptial beds (such hopes had he, So large a promise, of a progeny), The posts, of plated gold, and hung with spoils, Fell the reward of the proud victor’s toils. Where’er the raging fire had left a space, The Grecians enter and possess the place. “Perhaps you may of Priam’s fate enquire. He, when he saw his regal town on fire, His ruin’d palace, and his ent’ring foes, On ev’ry side inevitable woes, In arms, disus’d, invests his limbs, decay’d, Like them, with age; a late and useless aid. His feeble shoulders scarce the weight sustain; Loaded, not arm’d, he creeps along with pain, Despairing of success, ambitious to be slain! Uncover’d but by heav’n, there stood in view An altar; near the hearth a laurel grew, Dodder’d with age, whose boughs encompass round The household gods, and shade the holy ground. Here Hecuba, with all her helpless train Of dames, for shelter sought, but sought in vain. Driv’n like a flock of doves along the sky, Their images they hug, and to their altars fly. The Queen, when she beheld her trembling lord, And hanging by his side a heavy sword, ‘What rage,’ she cried, ‘has seiz’d my husband’s mind? What arms are these, and to what use design’d? These times want other aids! Were Hector here, Ev’n Hector now in vain, like Priam, would appear. With us, one common shelter thou shalt find, Or in one common fate with us be join’d.’ She said, and with a last salute embrac’d The poor old man, and by the laurel plac’d. Behold! Polites, one of Priam’s sons, Pursued by Pyrrhus, there for safety runs. Thro’ swords and foes, amaz’d and hurt, he flies Thro’ empty courts and open galleries. Him Pyrrhus, urging with his lance, pursues, And often reaches, and his thrusts renews. The youth, transfix’d, with lamentable cries, Expires before his wretched parent’s eyes: Whom gasping at his feet when Priam saw, The fear of death gave place to nature’s law; And, shaking more with anger than with age, ‘The gods,’ said he, ‘requite thy brutal rage! As sure they will, barbarian, sure they must, If there be gods in heav’n, and gods be just: Who tak’st in wrongs an insolent delight; With a son’s death t’ infect a father’s sight. Not he, whom thou and lying fame conspire To call thee his; not he, thy vaunted sire,