Hector, the son of Priam; with whose blood He long’d to glut th’ insatiate Lord of War. Apollo then, the spirit-stirring God, Æneas mov’d Achilles to confront, And fill’d with courage high; and thus, the voice Assuming of Lycaon, Priam’s son, Apollo, son of Jove, the chief address’d: “Æneas, prince and councillor of Troy, Where are the vaunts, which o’er the wine-cup late Thou mad’st amid th’ assembled chiefs of Troy, That hand to hand thou wouldst Achilles meet?” To whom Æneas thus in answer spoke: “Why, son of Priam, urge me to contend, Against my will, with Peleus’ mighty son? Not for the first time should I now engage Achilles swift of foot: I met him once, And fled before his spear, on Ida’s hill, When on our herds he fell; Lyrnessus then He raz’d, and Pedasus; me Jove preserv’d, With strength, endowing, and with speed of foot. Else had I fall’n beneath Achilles’ hand, By Pallas aided; who before him moves, Light of his life, and guides his brazen spear Trojans and Leleges alike to slay. ’Tis not in mortal man with him to fight, Whom still some God attends, and guards from harm; And, e’en unaided, to the mark his spear Unerring flies, uncheck’d until it pierce A warrior’s breast; yet if the Gods the scale Impartial held, all brass-clad as he is, O’er me no easy triumph should he gain.” To whom the King Apollo, son of Jove: “Brave chief, do thou too to th’ immortal Gods Address thy pray’r; men say that thou art sprung From Venus, child of Jove; his mother owns A humbler origin; one born to Jove, The other to the aged Ocean God. On then with dauntless spear, nor be dismay’d By his high tone and vaunting menaces.” His words with courage fill’d the hero’s breast, And on he sprang, in dazzling arms arrayed; But not unmark’d of white-arm’d Juno pass’d, To meet Achilles, through the press of men, Who thus address’d the Gods, to council call’d: “Neptune and Pallas both, bethink ye well What now should be our course; Æneas comes, In dazzling arms array’d, to meet in fight The son of Peleus; Phoebus sends him forth. Say, then, shall we, encount’ring, to retreat Perforce constrain him? or shall one of us Beside Achilles stand, and give him strength That he may nothing lack; and know himself By all the mightiest of th’ immortal Gods Belov’d, and those how pow’rless, by whose aid The Trojans yet maintain defensive war? Therefore, to join the battle, came we all From high Olympus, that in this day’s fight No ill befall him; though the time shall come For him to meet the doom, by fate decreed, When at his birth his thread of life was spun. But if Achilles from a voice divine Receive not this assurance, he may well Be struck with fear, if haply to some God He find himself oppos’d: ’tis hard for man To meet, in presence visible, a God.”