How big Achilles was; and Diomedes, What were his horses like? “Tell us, my guest,” She pleads, “from the beginning, all the story, The treachery of the Greeks, the wanderings, The perils of the seven tiresome years.” BOOK II THE FALL OF TROY They all were silent, watching. From his couch Aeneas spoke: “A terrible grief, O Queen, You bid me live again, how Troy went down Before the Greeks, her wealth, her pitiful kingdom, Sorrowful things I saw myself, wherein I had my share and more. Even Ulysses, Even his toughest soldiery might grieve At such a story. And the hour is late Already; night is sliding down the sky And setting stars urge slumber. But if you long To learn our downfall, to hear the final chapter Of Troy, no matter how I shrink, remembering, And turn away in grief, let me begin it. Broken in war, set back by fate, the leaders Of the Greek host, as years went by, contrived, With Pallas’ help, a horse as big as a mountain. They wove its sides with planks of fir, pretending This was an offering for their safe return, At least, so rumor had it. But inside They packed, in secret, into the hollow sides The fittest warriors; the belly’s cavern, Huge as it was, was filled with men in armor. There is an island, Tenedos, well-known, Rich in the days of Priam; now it is only A bay, and not too good an anchorage For any ship to trust. They sailed there, hid On the deserted shore. We thought they had gone, Bound for Mycenae, and Troy was very happy, Shaking off grief, throwing the gates wide open. It was a pleasure, for a change, to go See the Greek camp, station and shore abandoned; Why, this was where Achilles camped, his minions, The Dolopes, were here; and the fleet just yonder, And that was the plain where we used to meet in battle. Some of us stared in wonder at the horse, Astounded by its vastness, Minerva’s gift, Death from the virgin goddess, had we known it. Thymoetes, whether in treachery, or because The fates of Troy so ordered, was the first one To urge us bring it in to the heart of the city, But Capys, and some others, knowing better, Suspicious of Greek plotting, said to throw it Into the sea, to burn it up with fire, To cut it open, see what there was inside it. The wavering crowd could not make up its mind.