“All, all the treasure that enrich’d our throne Before your rapines, join’d with all your own, If offer’d, vainly should for mercy call; ’Tis you that offer, and I scorn them all; Your blood is my demand, your lives the prize, Till pale as yonder wretch each suitor lies. Hence with those coward terms; or fight or fly; This choice is left you, to resist or die: And die I trust ye shall.” He sternly spoke: With guilty fears the pale assembly shook. Alone Eurymachus exhorts the train: “Yon archer, comrades, will not shoot in vain; But from the threshold shall his darts be sped, (Whoe’er he be), till every prince lie dead? Be mindful of yourselves, draw forth your swords, And to his shafts obtend these ample boards (So need compels). Then, all united, strive The bold invader from his post to drive: The city roused shall to our rescue haste, And this mad archer soon have shot his last.” Swift as he spoke, he drew his traitor sword, And like a lion rush’d against his lord: The wary chief the rushing foe repress’d, Who met the point and forced it in his breast: His falling hand deserts the lifted sword, And prone he falls extended o’er the board! Before him wide, in mix’d effusion roll The untasted viands, and the jovial bowl. Full through his liver pass’d the mortal wound, With dying rage his forehead beats the ground; He spurn’d the seat with fury as he fell, And the fierce soul to darkness dived, and hell. Next bold Amphinomus his arm extends To force the pass; the godlike man defends. Thy spear, Telemachus, prevents the attack, The brazen weapon driving through his back. Thence through his breast its bloody passage tore; Flat falls he thundering on the marble floor, And his crush’d forehead marks the stone with gore. He left his javelin in the dead, for fear The long encumbrance of the weighty spear To the fierce foe advantage might afford, To rush between and use the shorten’d sword. With speedy ardour to his sire he flies, And, “Arm, great father! arm (in haste he cries). Lo, hence I run for other arms to wield, For missive javelins, and for helm and shield; Fast by our side let either faithful swain In arms attend us, and their part sustain.” “Haste, and return (Ulysses made reply) While yet the auxiliar shafts this hand supply; Lest thus alone, encounter’d by an host, Driven from the gate, the important past be lost.”