Have pertinence; the jav’lin’s head did out his entrails cut, His forc’d soul breaking through the wound; night’s black hand clos’d his eyes. Then Ajax, great Oïleus’ son, had divers victories, For when Saturnius suffer’d flight, of all the Grecian race Not one with swiftness of his feet could so enrich a chace. THE END OF THE FOURTEENTH BOOK. [1] This first verse (after the first four syllables) is to be read as one of our tens. THE FIFTEENTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ILIADS THE ARGUMENT Jove waking, and beholding Troy in flight, Chides Juno, and sends Iris to the fight To charge the Sea-god to forsake the field, And Phœbus to invade it, with his shield Recov’ring Hector’s bruis’d and eraséd pow’rs, To field he goes, and makes new conquerors, The Trojans giving now the Grecians chace Ev’n to their fleet. Then Ajax turns his face, And feeds, with many Trojan lives, his ire; Who then brought brands to set the fleet on fire. ANOTHER ARGUMENT Jove sees in O his oversight, Chides Juno, Neptune calls from fight. The Trojans, beat past pale and dike, and numbers prostrate laid, All got to chariot, fear-driv’n all, and fear’d as men dismay’d. Then Jove on Ida’s top awak’d, rose from Saturnia’s side, Stood up, and look’d upon the war; and all inverted spied Since he had seen it; th’ Ilians now in rout, the Greeks in fight; King Neptune, with his long sword, chief; great Hector put down quite, Laid flat in field, and with a crown of princes compasséd So stopp’d up that he scarce could breathe, his mind’s sound habit fled, And he still spitting blood. Indeed, his hurt was not set on By one that was the weakest Greek. But him Jove look’d upon With eyes of pity; on his wife with horrible aspéct, To whom he said: “O thou in ill most cunning architect, All arts and comments that exceed’st! not only to enforce Hector from fight, but, with his men, to show the Greeks a course. I fear, as formerly, so now, these ills have with thy hands Their first fruits sown, and therefore could load all thy limbs with bands, Forgett’st thou, when I hang’d thee up, how to thy feet I tied Two anvils, golden manacles on thy false wrists implied, And let thee mercilessly hang from our refinéd heav’n Ev’n to earth’s vapours; all the Gods in great Olympus giv’n To mutinies about thee, yet, though all stood staring on, None durst dissolve thee, for these hands, had they but seiz’d upon Thy friend, had headlong thrown him off from our star-bearing round, Till he had tumbled out his breath, and piece-meal dash’d the ground? Nor was my angry spirit calm’d so soon, for those foul seas, On which, inducing northern flaws, thou shipwrack’dst Hercules, And toss’d him to the Coan shore, that thou shouldst tempt again My wrath’s importance, when thou seest, besides, how grossly vain My pow’rs can make thy policies; for from their utmost force I freed my son, and set him safe in Argos, nurse of horse. These I remember to thy thoughts, that thou may’st shun these sleights,