'It was just the time when first slumber comes to heal numan suffering, stealing on men by heaven's blessing with balmiest influence. Lo! as I slept, before my eyes Hector, in deepest sorrow, seemed to be standing by me, shedding rivers of tears-mangled from dragging at the car, as I remember him of old, and black with gory dust, and with his swollen feet bored by the thong Ay me! what a sight was there! what a change from that Hector of ours, who comes back to us clad in the spoils of Achilles, or from hurling Phrygian fire on Danaan vessels! with stiffened beard and hair matted with blood, and those wounds fresh about him, which fell on him so thickly round his country's walls. Methought I addressed him first with tears like his own, fetching from my breast the accents of sorrow—“O light of Dardan land, surest hope that Trojans ever had! What delay has kept you so long? From what clime is the Hector of our longings returned to us at last? O the eyes with which, after long months of death among your people, months of manifold suffering to Troy and her sons, spent and weary, we look upon you now! What unworthy cause has marred the clear beauty of those features, or why do I behold these wounds?" He answers nought, and gives no idle heed to my vain inquiries, but with a deep sigh, heaved from the bottom of his heart-"Ah! fly, goddess-born !" cries he, "and escape from these flames-the walls are in the enemy's hand-Troy is tumbling from its summit-the claims of country and king are satisfied-if Pergamus could be defended by force of hand, it would have been defended by mine, in my day. Your country's worship and her gods are what she entrusts to you now -take them to share your destiny-seek for them a mighty city, which you shall one day build when you have wandered the ocean over." With these words he brings out Queen Vesta with her fillets and the ever-burning fire from the secret shrine.

'Meanwhile the city in its various quarters is being convulsed with agony-and ever more and more, though my father Anchises' palace was retired in the privacy of embosoming trees, the sounds deepen, and the alarm of battle swells. I start up from sleep, mount the sloping roof, and stand intently listening-even as, when among standing corn a spark falls with a fierce south wind to fan it, or the impetuous stream of a mountain torrent sweeps the fields, sweeps the joyous crops and the bullocks' toil, and drives the woods headlong before it, in perplexed amazement a shepherd takes in the crash from a rock's tall summit. Then, indeed, all doubt was over, and the wiles of the Danaans stood confessed. Already Deiphobus' palace has fallen with a mighty overthrow before the mastering fire-god-already his neighbour Ucalegon is in flames--the expanse of the Sigean sea shines again with the blaze. Up rises at once the shouting of men and the braying of trumpets. To arms I rush in frenzy-not that good cause is shown for arms-but to muster a troop for fight, and run to the citadel with my comrades is my first burning impulse-madness and rage drive my mind headlong, and I think how glorious to die with arms in my hand.

'But see! Panthus, escaped from an Achæan volley, Panthus, Othrys' son, priest of Phoebus in the citadel, comes dragging along with his own hand the vanquished gods of his worship and his young grandchild, and making distractedly for my door. "How goes the day, Panthus? What hold have we of the citadel?" The words were scarcely uttered when with a groan he replies, "It is come, the last day, the inevitable hour-on Dardan land no more Trojans; no more of Ilion, and the great renown of the sons of Teucer; Jove, in his cruelty, has carried all over to Argos; the town is on fire, and the Danaans are its masters. There, planted high in the

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heart of the city, the horse is pouring out armed men, and Sinon is flinging about fire in the insolence of conquest; some are crowding into the unfolded gates-thousands, many as ever came from huge Mycena; some are blocking up the parrow streets, with weapons pointed at all comers; the sharp steel with its gleaming blade stands drawn, ready for slaughter; hardly, even on the threshold, the sentinels of the gates are attempting resistance, in a struggle where the powers of war are blind."

'At these words of the son of Othrys, and heaven's will thus expressed, I plunge into the fire and the battle, following the war-fiend's yell, the din of strife, and the shout that rose to the sky. There join me Rhipeus and Epytus, bravest in fight, crossing my way in the moonlight, as also Hypanis and Dymas, and form at my side; young Coroebus, too, Mygdon's son; he happened to be just then come to Troy, with a frantic passion for Cassandra, and was bringing a son-in-law's aid to Priam and his Phrygians-poor boy! to have given no heed to the warnings of his heaven-struck bride! Seeing them gathered in a mass and nerved for battle, I begin thereon:-"Young hearts, full of unavailing valour, if your desire is set to follow a desperate man, you see what the plight of our affairs is gone in a body from shrine and altar are the gods who upheld this our empire-the city you succour is a blazing ruin; choose we then death, and rush we into the thick of the fight. The one safety for vanquished men is to hope for none." These words stirred their young spirits to madness; then, like ravenous wolves in night's dark cloud, driven abroad by the blind rage of lawless hunger, with their cubs left at home waiting their return with parched jaws, among javelins, among foemen, on we go with no uncertain fate before us, keeping our way through the heart of the town, while night flaps over us its dark, overshadowing wings. Who could unfold in

speech the carnage, the horrors of that night, or make his tears keep pace with our suffering? It is an ancient city, falling from the height where she queened it many a year; and heaps of unresisting bodies are lying confusedly in the streets, in the houses, on the hallowed steps of temples. Nor is it on Teucer's sons alone that bloody vengeance lights. There are times when even the vanquished feel courage rushing back to their hearts, and the conquering Danaans fall. Everywhere is relentless agony; everywhere terror, and the vision of death in many a manifestation.

'First of the Danaans, with a large band at his back, Androgeos crosses our way, taking us for a troop of his friends in his ignorance, and hails us at once in words of fellowship: "Come, my men, be quick. Why, what sloth is keeping you so late? Pergamus is on fire, and the rest of us are spoiling and sacking. it, and here are you, but just disembarked from your tall ships." He said, and instantly, for no reply was forthcoming to reassure him, saw that he had fallen into the thick of the enemy. Struck with consternation, he drew back foot and tongue. Just as a

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man who at unawares has trodden, on a snake among thorns and briers in his walk, and recoils at once in sudden alarm from the angry uplifted crest and the black swelling neck, so Androgeos, appalled at the sight, was retiring. But we rush on him, and close round, weapons in hand; and, in their ignorance of the ground, and the surprise of their terror, they fall before us everywhere. Fortune smiles on our first encounter. Hereon Coroebus, flushed with success and daring, "Come, my friends," he cries, "where Fortune at starting directs us to the path of safety, and reveals herself as our ally, be it ours to follow on. Let us change shields, and see if Danaan decorations will fit us. Trick or strength of hand, who, in dealing with an enemy, asks which? They shall arm.

us against themselves." So saying, he puts on Androgeos' crested helm, and his shield with its goodly device, and fastens to his side an Argive sword. So does Rhipeus, so Dymas too, and all our company, with youthful exultation, each arming himself out of the new-won spoils. On we go, mixing with the Greeks, under auspices not our own, and many are the combats in which we engage in the blindness of night, many the Danaans whom we send down to the shades. They fly on all hands: some to the ships, making at full speed for safety on the shore; others, in the debasement of terror, climb once more the horse's huge sides, and hide themselves in the womb they knew so well.

'Alas! it is not for man to throw himself on the gods against their will!

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'Lo! there was a princess of Priam's house being dragged by her dishevelled hair from the temple, from the very shrine of Minerva, Cassandra, straining her flashing eyes to heaven. in vain her eyes-for those delicate hands were confined by manacles. The sight was too much for the infuriate mind of Coroebus rushing to his doom, he flung himself into the middle of the hostile force. One and all, we follow, close our ranks, and fall on. And now, first from the temple's lofty top we are overwhelmed by a shower of our own countrymen's darts, and a most piteous carnage ensues, all along of the appearance of our arms and our mistaken Grecian crests. Then the Danaans, groaning and enraged at the rescue of the maiden, rally from all sides, and fall on us. Ajax, in all his fury, and the two sons of Atreus, and the whole array of the Dolopes-even as one day when the tempest is broken loose, and wind meets wind-west, and south, and east exulting in his orient steeds there is crashing in the woods, and Nereus, in a cloud of foam, is plying his ruthless trident, and stirring up the sea from its very bottom. Such of the foe, moreover, as in the