XXXVI. "'Twas now the time, when on tired mortals crept First slumber, sweetest that celestials pour. Methought I saw poor Hector, as I slept, All bathed in tears and black with dust and gore, Dragged by the chariot and his swoln feet sore With piercing thongs. Ah me! how sad to view, How changed from him, that Hector, whom of yore Returning with Achilles' spoils we knew, When on the ships of Greece his Phrygian fires he threw. XXXVII. "Foul is his beard, his hair is stiff with gore, And fresh the wounds, those many wounds, remain, Which erst around his native walls he bore. Then, weeping too, I seem in sorrowing strain To hail the hero, with a voice of pain. 'O light of Troy, our refuge! why and how This long delay? Whence comest thou again, Long-looked-for Hector? How with aching brow, Worn out by toil and death, do we behold thee now! XXXVIII. "'But oh! what dire indignity hath marred The calmness of thy features? Tell me, why With ghastly wounds do I behold thee scarred?' To such vain quest he cared not to reply, But, heaving from his breast a deep-drawn sigh, 'Fly, Goddess-born! and get thee from the fire! The foes,' he said, 'are on the ramparts. Fly! All Troy is tumbling from her topmost spire. No more can Priam's land, nor Priam's self require. XXXIX. "'Could Troy be saved by mortal prowess, mine, Yea, mine had saved her. To thy guardian care She doth her Gods and ministries consign. Take them, thy future destinies to share, And seek for them another home elsewhere, That mighty city, which for thee and thine O'er traversed ocean shall the Fates prepare.' He spake, and quickly snatched from Vesta's shrine The deathless fire and wreaths and effigy divine. XL. "Meanwhile a mingled murmur through the street Rolls onward,--wails of anguish, shrieks of fear, And though my father's mansion stood secrete, Embowered in foliage, nearer and more near Peals the dire clang of arms, and loud and clear, Borne on fierce echoes that in tumult blend, War-shout and wail come thickening on the ear. I start from sleep, the parapet ascend, And from the sloping roof with eager ears attend. XLI. "Like as a fire, when Southern gusts are rude, Falls on the standing harvest of the plain, Or torrent, hurtling with a mountain flood, Whelms field and oxens' toil and smiling grain, And rolls whole forests headlong to the main, While, weetless of the noise, on neighbouring height, Tranced in mute wonder, stands the listening swain, Then, then I see that Hector's words were right, And all the Danaan wiles are naked to the light.