She spoke; but willing longer to survey The sire and son’s great acts withheld the day! By farther toils decreed the brave to try, And level poised the wings of victory; Then with a change of form eludes their sight, Perch’d like a swallow on a rafter’s height, And unperceived enjoys the rising fight. Damastor’s son, bold Agelaus, leads, The guilty war, Eurynomus succeeds; With these, Pisander, great Polyctor’s son, Sage Polybus, and stern Amphimedon, With Demoptolemus: these six survive: The best of all the shafts had left alive. Amidst the carnage, desperate as they stand, Thus Agelaus roused the lagging band: “The hour has come, when yon fierce man no more With bleeding princes shall bestrew the floor; Lo! Mentor leaves him with an empty boast; The four remain, but four against an host. Let each at once discharge the deadly dart, One sure of six shall reach Ulysses’ heart: The rest must perish, their great leader slain: Thus shall one stroke the glory lost regain.” Then all at once their mingled lances threw, And thirsty all of one man’s blood they flew; In vain! Minerva turned them with her breath, And scattered short, or wide, the points of death! With deaden’d sound one on the threshold falls, One strikes the gate, one rings against the walls: The storm passed innocent. The godlike man Now loftier trod, and dreadful thus began: “‘Tis now (brave friends) our turn, at once to throw, (So speed them Heaven) our javelins at the foe. That impious race to all their past misdeeds Would add our blood, injustice still proceeds.” He spoke: at once their fiery lances flew: Great Demoptolemus Ulysses slew; Euryades received the prince’s dart; The goatherd’s quiver’d in Pisander’s heart; Fierce Elatus by thine, Eumaeus, falls; Their fall in thunder echoes round the walls. The rest retreat: the victors now advance, Each from the dead resumes his bloody lance. Again the foe discharge the steely shower; Again made frustrate by the virgin-power. Some, turn’d by Pallas, on the threshold fall, Some wound the gate, some ring against the wall; Some weak, or ponderous with the brazen head, Drop harmless on the pavement, sounding dead. Then bold Amphimedon his javelin cast: Thy hand, Telemachus, it lightly razed: And from Ctesippus’ arm the spear elanced: On good Eumaeus’ shield and shoulder glanced; Not lessened of their force (so light the wound) Each sung along and dropped upon the ground. Fate doom’d thee next, Eurydamus, to bear, Thy death ennobled by Ulysses’ spear. By the bold son Amphimedon was slain, And Polybus renown’d, the faithful swain. Pierced through the breast the rude Ctesippus bled, And thus Philaetius gloried o’er the dead: “There end thy pompous vaunts and high disdain; O sharp in scandal, voluble and vain! How weak is mortal pride! To Heaven alone The event of actions and our fates are known: Scoffer, behold what gratitude we bear: The victim’s heel is answered with this spear.”