Book XIV

How the conquerors sailed from Troy unto judgment of tempest and shipwreck.

  Then rose from Ocean Dawn the golden-throned
  Up to the heavens; night into Chaos sank.
  And now the Argives spoiled fair-fenced Troy,
  And took her boundless treasures for a prey.
  Like river-torrents seemed they, that sweep down,
  By rain, floods swelled, in thunder from the hills,
  And seaward hurl tall trees and whatsoe'er
  Grows on the mountains, mingled with the wreck
  Of shattered cliff and crag; so the long lines
  Of Danaans who had wasted Troy with fire
  Seemed, streaming with her plunder to the ships.
  Troy's daughters therewithal in scattered bands
  They haled down seaward—virgins yet unwed,
  And new-made brides, and matrons silver-haired,
  And mothers from whose bosoms foes had torn
  Babes for the last time closing lips on breasts.

  Amidst of these Menelaus led his wife
  Forth of the burning city, having wrought
  A mighty triumph—joy and shame were his.
  Cassandra heavenly-fair was haled the prize
  Of Agamemnon: to Achilles' son
  Andromache had fallen: Hecuba
  Odysseus dragged unto his ship. The tears
  Poured from her eyes as water from a spring;
  Trembled her limbs, fear-frenzied was her heart;
  Rent were her hoary tresses and besprent
  With ashes of the hearth, cast by her hands
  When she saw Priam slain and Troy aflame.
  And aye she deeply groaned for thraldom's day
  That trapped her vainly loth. Each hero led
  A wailing Trojan woman to his ship.
  Here, there, uprose from these the wild lament,
  The woeful-mingling cries of mother and babe.
  As when with white-tusked swine the herdmen drive
  Their younglings from the hill-pens to the plain
  As winter closeth in, and evermore
  Each answereth each with mingled plaintive cries;
  So moaned Troy's daughters by their foes enslaved,
  Handmaid and queen made one in thraldom's lot.

  But Helen raised no lamentation: shame
  Sat on her dark-blue eyes, and cast its flush
  Over her lovely cheeks. Her heart beat hard
  With sore misgiving, lest, as to the ships
  She passed, the Achaeans might mishandle her.
  Therefore with fluttering soul she trembled sore;
  And, her head darkly mantled in her veil,
  Close-following trod she in her husband's steps,
  With cheek shame-crimsoned, like the Queen of Love,
  What time the Heaven-abiders saw her clasped
  In Ares' arms, shaming in sight of all
  The marriage-bed, trapped in the myriad-meshed
  Toils of Hephaestus: tangled there she lay
  In agony of shame, while thronged around
  The Blessed, and there stood Hephaestus' self:
  For fearful it is for wives to be beheld
  By husbands' eyes doing the deed of shame.
  Lovely as she in form and roseate blush
  Passed Helen mid the Trojan captives on
  To the Argive ships. But the folk all around
  Marvelled to see the glory of loveliness
  Of that all-flawless woman. No man dared
  Or secretly or openly to cast
  Reproach on her. As on a Goddess all
  Gazed on her with adoring wistful eyes.
  As when to wanderers on a stormy sea,
  After long time and passion of prayer, the sight
  Of fatherland is given; from deadly deeps
  Escaped, they stretch hands to her joyful-souled;
  So joyed the Danaans all, no man of them
  Remembered any more war's travail and pain.
  Such thoughts Cytherea stirred in them, for grace
  To Helen starry-eyed, and Zeus her sire.

  Then, when he saw that burg beloved destroyed,
  Xanthus, scarce drawing breath from bloody war,
  Mourned with his Nymphs for ruin fallen on Troy,
  Mourned for the city of Priam blotted out.
  As when hail lashes a field of ripened wheat,
  And beats it small, and smites off all the ears
  With merciless scourge, and levelled with the ground
  Are stalks, and on the earth is all the grain
  Woefully wasted, and the harvest's lord
  Is stricken with deadly grief; so Xanthus' soul
  Was utterly whelmed in grief for Ilium made
  A desolation; grief undying was his,
  Immortal though he was. Mourned Simois
  And long-ridged Ida: all who on Ida dwelt
  Wailed from afar the ruin of Priam's town.

  But with loud laughter of glee the Argives sought
  Their galleys, chanting the triumphant might
  Of victory, chanting now the Blessed Gods,
  Now their own valour, and Epeius' work
  Ever renowned. Their song soared up to heaven,
  Like multitudinous cries of daws, when breaks
  A day of sunny calm and windless air
  After a ruining storm: from their glad hearts
  So rose the joyful clamour, till the Gods
  Heard and rejoiced in heaven, all who had helped
  With willing hands the war-fain Argive men.
  But chafed those others which had aided Troy,
  Beholding Priam's city wrapped in flame,
  Yet powerless for her help to override
  Fate; for not Cronos' Son can stay the hand
  Of Destiny, whose might transcendeth all
  The Immortals, and Zeus sanctioneth all her deeds.

  The Argives on the flaming altar-wood
  Laid many thighs of oxen, and made haste
  To spill sweet wine on their burnt offerings,
  Thanking the Gods for that great work achieved.
  And loudly at the feast they sang the praise
  Of all the mailed men whom the Horse of Tree
  Had ambushed. Far-famed Sinon they extolled
  For that dire torment he endured of foes;
  Yea, song and honour-guerdons without end
  All rendered him: and that resolved soul
  Glad-hearted joyed for the Argives victory,
  And for his own misfeaturing sorrowed not.
  For to the wise and prudent man renown
  Is better far than gold, than goodlihead,
  Than all good things men have or hope to win.

  So, feasting by the ships all void of fear,
  Cried one to another ever and anon:
  "We have touched the goal of this long war, have won
  Glory, have smitten our foes and their great town!
  Now grant, O Zeus, to our prayers safe home-return!"
  But not to all the Sire vouchsafed return.

  Then rose a cunning harper in their midst.
  And sang the song of triumph and of peace
  Re-won, and with glad hearts untouched by care
  They heard; for no more fear of war had they,
  But of sweet toil of law-abiding days
  And blissful, fleeting hours henceforth they dreamed.
  All the War's Story in their eager ears
  He sang—how leagued peoples gathering met
  At hallowed Aulis—how the invincible strength
  Of Peleus' son smote fenced cities twelve
  In sea-raids, how he marched o'er leagues on leagues
  Of land, and spoiled eleven—all he wrought
  In fight with Telephus and Eetion—
  How he slew giant Cycnus—all the toil
  Of war that through Achilles' wrath befell
  The Achaeans—how he dragged dead Hector round
  His own Troy's wall, and how he slew in fight
  Penthesileia and Tithonus' son:—
  How Aias laid low Glaucus, lord of spears,
  Then sang he how the child of Aeacus' son
  Struck down Eurypylus, and how the shafts
  Of Philoctetes dealt to Paris death.
  Then the song named all heroes who passed in
  To ambush in the Horse of Guile, and hymned
  The fall of god-descended Priam's burg;
  The feast he sang last, and peace after war;
  Then many another, as they listed, sang.

  But when above those feasters midnight's stars
  Hung, ceased the Danaans from the feast and wine,
  And turned to sleep's forgetfulness of care,
  For that with yesterday's war-travail all
  Were wearied; wherefore they, who fain all night
  Had revelled, needs must cease: how loth soe'er,
  Sleep drew them thence; here, there, soft slumbered they.

  But in his tent Menelaus lovingly
  With bright-haired Helen spake; for on their eyes
  Sleep had not fallen yet. The Cyprian Queen
  Brooded above their souls, that olden love
  Might be renewed, and heart-ache chased away.

  Helen first brake the silence, and she said:
  "O Menelaus, be not wroth with me!
  Not of my will I left thy roof, thy bed,
  But Alexander and the sons of Troy
  Came upon me, and snatched away, when thou
  Wast far thence. Oftentimes did I essay
  By the death-noose to perish wretchedly,
  Or by the bitter sword; but still they stayed
  Mine hand, and still spake comfortable words
  To salve my grief for thee and my sweet child.
  For her sake, for the sake of olden love,
  And for thine own sake, I beseech thee now,
  Forget thy stern displeasure against thy wife."

  Answered her Menelaus wise of wit:
  "No more remember past griefs: seal them up
  Hid in thine heart. Let all be locked within
  The dim dark mansion of forgetfulness.
  What profits it to call ill deeds to mind?"

  Glad was she then: fear flitted from her heart,
  And came sweet hope that her lord's wrath was dead.
  She cast her arms around him, and their eyes
  With tears were brimming as they made sweet moan;
  And side by side they laid them, and their hearts
  Thrilled with remembrance of old spousal joy.
  And as a vine and ivy entwine their stems
  Each around other, that no might of wind
  Avails to sever them, so clung these twain
  Twined in the passionate embrace of love.

  When came on these too sorrow-drowning sleep,
  Even then above his son's head rose and stood
  Godlike Achilles' mighty shade, in form
  As when he lived, the Trojans' bane, the joy
  Of Greeks, and kissed his neck and flashing eyes
  Lovingly, and spake comfortable words:
  "All hail, my son! Vex not thine heart with grief
  For thy dead sire; for with the Blessed Gods
  Now at the feast I sit. Refrain thy soul
  From sorrow, and plant my strength within thy mind.
  Be foremost of the Argives ever; yield
  To none in valour, but in council bow
  Before thine elders: so shall all acclaim
  Thy courtesy. Honour princely men and wise;
  For the true man is still the true man's friend,
  Even as the vile man cleaveth to the knave.
  If good thy thought be, good shall be thy deeds:
  But no man shall attain to Honour's height,
  Except his heart be right within: her stem
  Is hard to climb, and high in heaven spread
  Her branches: only they whom strength and toil
  Attend, strain up to pluck her blissful fruit,
  Climbing the Tree of Honour glow-crowned.
  Thou therefore follow fame, and let thy soul
  Be not in sorrow afflicted overmuch,
  Nor in prosperity over-glad. To friends,
  To comrades, child and wife, be kindly of heart,
  Remembering still that near to all men stand
  The gates of doom, the mansions of the dead:
  For humankind are like the flower of grass,
  The blossom of spring; these fade the while those bloom:
  Therefore be ever kindly with thy kind.
  Now to the Argives say—to Atreus' son
  Agamemnon chiefly—if my battle-toil
  Round Priam's walls, and those sea-raids I led
  Or ever I set foot on Trojan land,
  Be in their hearts remembered, to my tomb
  Be Priam's daughter Polyxeina led—
  Whom as my portion of the spoil I claim—
  And sacrificed thereon: else shall my wrath
  Against them more than for Briseis burn.
  The waves of the great deep will I turmoil
  To bar their way, upstirring storm on storm,
  That through their own mad folly pining away
  Here they may linger long, until to me
  They pour drink-offerings, yearning sore for home.
  But, when they have slain the maiden, I grudge not
  That whoso will may bury her far from me."

  Then as a wind-breath swift he fleeted thence,
  And came to the Elysian Plain, whereto
  A path to heaven reacheth, for the feet
  Ascending and descending of the Blest.
  Then the son started up from sleep, and called
  His sire to mind, and glowed the heart in him.

  When to wide heaven the Child of Mist uprose,
  Scattering night, unveiling earth and air,
  Then from their rest upsprang Achaea's sons
  Yearning for home. With laughter 'gan they hale
  Down to the sea the keels: but lo, their haste
  Was reined in by Achilles' mighty son:

  He assembled them, and told his sire's behest:
  "Hearken, dear sons of Argives battle-staunch,
  To this my glorious father's hest, to me
  Spoken in darkness slumbering on my bed:
  He saith, he dwells with the Immortal Gods:
  He biddeth you and Atreus' son the king
  To bring, as his war-guerdon passing-fair,
  To his dim dark tomb Polyxeina queenly-robed,
  To slay her there, but far thence bury her.
  But if ye slight him, and essay to sail
  The sea, he threateneth to stir up the waves
  To bar your path upon the deep, and here
  Storm-bound long time to hold you, ships and men."

  Then hearkened they, and as to a God they prayed;
  For even now a storm-blast on the sea
  Upheaved the waves, broad-backed and thronging fast
  More than before beneath the madding wind.
  Tossed the great deep, smit by Poseidon's hands
  For a grace to strong Achilles. All the winds
  Swooped on the waters. Prayed the Dardans all
  To Achilles, and a man to his fellow cried:
  "Great Zeus's seed Achilles verily was;
  Therefore is he a God, who in days past
  Dwelt among us; for lapse of dateless time
  Makes not the sons of Heaven to fade away."

  Then to Achilles' tomb the host returned,
  And led the maid, as calf by herdmen dragged
  For sacrifice, from woodland pastures torn
  From its mother's side, and lowing long and loud
  It moans with anguished heart; so Priam's child
  Wailed in the hands of foes. Down streamed her tears
  As when beneath the heavy sacks of sand
  Olives clear-skinned, ne'er blotched by drops of storm,
  Pour out their oil, when the long levers creak
  As strong men strain the cords; so poured the tears
  Of travail-burdened Priam's daughter, haled
  To stern Achilles' tomb, tears blent with moans.
  Drenched were her bosom-folds, glistened the drops
  On flesh clear-white as costly ivory.

  Then, to crown all her griefs, yet sharper pain
  Fell on the heart of hapless Hecuba.
  Then did her soul recall that awful dream,
  The vision of sleep of that night overpast:
  Herseemed that on Achilles' tomb she stood
  Moaning, her hair down-streaming to the ground,
  And from her breasts blood dripped to earth the while,
  And drenched the tomb. Fear-haunted touching this,
  Foreboding all calamity, she wailed
  Piteously; far rang her wild lament.
  As a dog moaning at her master's door,
  Utters long howls, her teats with milk distent,
  Whose whelps, ere their eyes opened to the light,
  Her lords afar have flung, a prey to kites;
  And now with short sharp cries she plains, and now
  Long howling: the weird outcry thrills the air;
  So wailed and shrieked for her child Hecuba:
  "Ah me! what sorrows first or last shall I
  Lament heart-anguished, who am full of woes?
  Those unimagined ills my sons, my king
  Have suffered? or my city, or daughters shamed?
  Or my despair, my day of slavery?
  Oh, the grim fates have caught me in a net
  Of manifold ills! O child, they have spun for thee
  Dread weird of unimagined misery!
  They have thrust thee away, when near was Hymen's hymn,
  From thine espousals, marked thee for destruction
  Dark, unendurable, unspeakable!
  For lo, a dead man's heart, Achilles' heart,
  Is by our blood made warm with life to-day!
  O child, dear child, that I might die with thee,
  That earth might swallow me, ere I see thy doom!"
  So cried she, weeping never-ceasing tears,
  For grief on bitter grief encompassed her.
  But when these reached divine Achilles' tomb,
  Then did his son unsheathe the whetted sword,
  His left hand grasped the maid, and his right hand
  Was laid upon the tomb, and thus he cried:
  "Hear, father, thy son's prayer, hear all the prayers
  Of Argives, and be no more wroth with us!
  Lo, unto thee now all thine heart's desire
  Will we fulfil. Be gracious to us thou,
  And to our praying grant sweet home-return."

  Into the maid's throat then he plunged the blade
  Of death: the dear life straightway sobbed she forth,
  With the last piteous moan of parting breath.
  Face-downward to the earth she fell: all round
  Her flesh was crimsoned from her neck, as snow
  Stained on a mountain-side with scarlet blood
  Rushing, from javelin-smitten boar or bear.
  The maiden's corpse then gave they, to be borne
  Unto the city, to Antenor's home,
  For that, when Troy yet stood, he nurtured her
  In his fair halls, a bride for his own son
  Eurymachus. The old man buried her,
  King Priam's princess-child, nigh his own house,
  By Ganymedes' shrine, and overagainst
  The temple of Pallas the Unwearied One.
  Then were the waves stilled, and the blast was hushed
  To sleep, and all the sea-flood lulled to calm.

  Swift with glad laughter hied they to the ships,
  Hymning Achilles and the Blessed Ones.
  A feast they made, first severing thighs of kine
  For the Immortals. Gladsome sacrifice
  Steamed on all sides: in cups of silver and gold
  They drank sweet wine: their hearts leaped up with hope
  Of winning to their fatherland again.
  But when with meats and wine all these were filled,
  Then in their eager ears spake Neleus' son:
  "Hear, friends, who have 'scaped the long turmoil of war,
  That I may say to you one welcome word:
  Now is the hour of heart's delight, the hour
  Of home-return. Away! Achilles soul
  Hath ceased from ruinous wrath; Earth-shaker stills
  The stormy wave, and gentle breezes blow;
  No more the waves toss high. Haste, hale the ships
  Down to the sea. Now, ho for home-return!"

  Eager they heard, and ready made the ships.
  Then was a marvellous portent seen of men;
  For all-unhappy Priam's queen was changed
  From woman's form into a pitiful hound;
  And all men gathered round in wondering awe.
  Then all her body a God transformed to stone—
  A mighty marvel for men yet unborn!
  At Calchas' bidding this the Achaeans bore
  In a swift ship to Hellespont's far side.
  Then down to the sea in haste they ran the keels:
  Their wealth they laid aboard, even all the spoil
  Taken, or ever unto Troy they came,
  From conquered neighbour peoples; therewithal
  Whatso they took from Ilium, wherein most
  They joyed, for untold was the sum thereof.
  And followed with them many a captive maid
  With anguished heart: so went they aboard the ships.
  But Calchas would not with that eager host
  Launch forth; yea, he had fain withheld therefrom
  All the Achaeans, for his prophet-soul
  Foreboded dread destruction looming o'er
  The Argives by the Rocks Capherean.
  But naught they heeded him; malignant
  Fate Deluded men's souls: only Amphilochus
  The wise in prophet-lore, the gallant son
  Of princely Amphiaraus, stayed with him.
  Fated were these twain, far from their own land,
  To reach Pamphylian and Cilician burgs;
  And this the Gods thereafter brought to pass.

  But now the Achaeans cast the hawsers loose
  From shore: in haste they heaved the anchor-stones.
  Roared Hellespont beneath swift-flashing oars;
  Crashed the prows through the sea. About the bows
  Much armour of slain foes was lying heaped:
  Along the bulwarks victory-trophies hung
  Countless. With garlands wreathed they all the ships,
  Their heads, the spears, the shields wherewith they had fought
  Against their foes. The chiefs stood on the prows,
  And poured into the dark sea once and again
  Wine to the Gods, to grant them safe return.
  But with the winds their prayers mixed; far away
  Vainly they floated blent with cloud and air.

  With anguished hearts the captive maids looked back
  On Ilium, and with sobs and moans they wailed,
  Striving to hide their grief from Argive eyes.
  Clasping their knees some sat; in misery some
  Veiled with their hands their faces; others nursed
  Young children in their arms: those innocents
  Not yet bewailed their day of bondage, nor
  Their country's ruin; all their thoughts were set
  On comfort of the breast, for the babe's heart
  Hath none affinity with sorrow. All
  Sat with unbraided hair and pitiful breasts
  Scored with their fingers. On their cheeks there lay
  Stains of dried tears, and streamed thereover now
  Fresh tears full fast, as still they gazed aback
  On the lost hapless home, wherefrom yet rose
  The flames, and o'er it writhed the rolling smoke.
  Now on Cassandra marvelling they gazed,
  Calling to mind her prophecy of doom;
  But at their tears she laughed in bitter scorn,
  In anguish for the ruin of her land.

  Such Trojans as had scaped from pitiless war
  Gathered to render now the burial-dues
  Unto their city's slain. Antenor led
  To that sad work: one pyre for all they raised.

  But laughed with triumphing hearts the Argive men,
  As now with oars they swept o'er dark sea-ways,
  Now hastily hoised the sails high o'er the ships,
  And fleeted fast astern Dardania-land,
  And Hero Achilles' tomb. But now their hearts,
  How blithe soe'er, remembered comrades slain,
  And sorely grieved, and wistfully they looked
  Back to the alien's land; it seemed to them
  Aye sliding farther from their ships. Full soon
  By Tenedos' beaches slipt they: now they ran
  By Chrysa, Sminthian Phoebus' holy place,
  And hallowed Cilla. Far away were glimpsed
  The windy heights of Lesbos. Rounded now
  Was Lecton's foreland, where is the last peak
  Of Ida. In the sails loud hummed the wind,
  Crashed round the prows the dark surge: the long waves
  Showed shadowy hollows, far the white wake gleamed.

  Now had the Argives all to the hallowed soil
  Of Hellas won, by perils of the deep
  Unscathed, but for Athena Daughter of Zeus
  The Thunderer, and her indignation's wrath.
  When nigh Euboea's windy heights they drew,
  She rose, in anger unappeasable
  Against the Locrian king, devising doom
  Crushing and pitiless, and drew nigh to Zeus
  Lord of the Gods, and spake to him apart
  In wrath that in her breast would not be pent:
  "Zeus, Father, unendurable of Gods
  Is men's presumption! They reck not of thee,
  Of none of the Blessed reck they, forasmuch
  As vengeance followeth after sin no more;
  And ofttimes more afflicted are good men
  Than evil, and their misery hath no end.
  Therefore no man regardeth justice: shame
  Lives not with men! And I, I will not dwell
  Hereafter in Olympus, not be named
  Thy daughter, if I may not be avenged
  On the Achaeans' reckless sin! Behold,
  Within my very temple Oileus' son
  Hath wrought iniquity, hath pitied not
  Cassandra stretching unregarded hands
  Once and again to me; nor did he dread
  My might, nor reverenced in his wicked heart
  The Immortal, but a deed intolerable
  He did. Therefore let not thy spirit divine
  Begrudge mine heart's desire, that so all men
  May quake before the manifest wrath of Gods."

  Answered the Sire with heart-assuaging words:
  "Child, not for the Argives' sake withstand I thee;
  But all mine armoury which the Cyclops' might
  To win my favour wrought with tireless hands,
  To thy desire I give. O strong heart, hurl
  A ruining storm thyself on the Argive fleet."

  Then down before the aweless Maid he cast
  Swift lightning, thunder, and deadly thunderbolt;
  And her heart leapt, and gladdened was her soul.
  She donned the stormy Aegis flashing far,
  Adamantine, massy, a marvel to the Gods,
  Whereon was wrought Medusa's ghastly head,
  Fearful: strong serpents breathing forth the blast
  Of ravening fire were on the face thereof.
  Crashed on the Queen's breast all the Aegis-links,
  As after lightning crashes the firmament.
  Then grasped she her father's weapons, which no God
  Save Zeus can lift, and wide Olympus shook.
  Then swept she clouds and mist together on high;
  Night over earth was poured, haze o'er the sea.
  Zeus watched, and was right glad as broad heaven's floor
  Rocked 'neath the Goddess's feet, and crashed the sky,
  As though invincible Zeus rushed forth to war.
  Then sped she Iris unto Acolus,
  From heaven far-flying over misty seas,
  To bid him send forth all his buffering winds
  O'er iron-bound Caphereus' cliffs to sweep
  Ceaselessly, and with ruin of madding blasts
  To upheave the sea. And Iris heard, and swift
  She darted, through cloud-billows plunging down—
  Thou hadst said: "Lo, in the sky dark water and fire!"
  And to Aeolia came she, isle of caves,
  Of echoing dungeons of mad-raging winds
  With rugged ribs of mountain overarched,
  Whereby the mansion stands of Aeolus
  Hippotas' son. Him found she therewithin
  With wife and twelve sons; and she told to him
  Athena's purpose toward the homeward-bound
  Achaeans. He denied her not, but passed
  Forth of his halls, and in resistless hands
  Upswung his trident, smiting the mountain-side
  Within whose chasm-cell the wild winds dwelt
  Tempestuously shrieking. Ever pealed
  Weird roarings of their voices round its vaults.
  Cleft by his might was the hill-side; forth they poured.
  He bade them on their wings bear blackest storm
  To upheave the sea, and shroud Caphereus' heights.
  Swiftly upsprang they, ere their king's command
  Was fully spoken. Mightily moaned the sea
  As they rushed o'er it; waves like mountain-cliffs
  From all sides were uprolled. The Achaeans' hearts
  Were terror-palsied, as the uptowering surge
  Now swung the ships up high through palling mist,
  Now hurled them rolled as down a precipice
  To dark abysses. Up through yawning deeps
  Some power resistless belched the boiling sand
  From the sea's floor. Tossed in despair, fear-dazed,
  Men could not grasp the oar, nor reef the sail
  About the yard-arm, howsoever fain,
  Ere the winds rent it, could not with the sheets
  Trim the torn canvas, buffeted so were they
  By ruining blasts. The helmsman had no power
  To guide the rudder with his practised hands,
  For those ill winds hurled all confusedly.
  No hope of life was left them: blackest night,
  Fury of tempest, wrath of deathless Gods,
  Raged round them. Still Poseidon heaved and swung
  The merciless sea, to work the heart's desire
  Of his brother's glorious child; and she on high
  Stormed with her lightnings, ruthless in her rage.
  Thundered from heaven Zeus, in purpose fixed
  To glorify his daughter. All the isles
  And mainlands round were lashed by leaping seas
  Nigh to Euboea, where the Power divine
  Scourged most with unrelenting stroke on stroke
  The Argives. Groan and shriek of perishing men
  Rang through the ships; started great beams and snapped
  With ominous sound, for ever ship on ship
  With shivering timbers crashed. With hopeless toil
  Men strained with oars to thrust back hulls that reeled
  Down on their own, but with the shattered planks
  Were hurled into the abyss, to perish there
  By pitiless doom; for beams of foundering ships
  From this, from that side battered out their lives,
  And crushed were all their bodies wretchedly.
  Some in the ships fell down, and like dead men
  Lay there; some, in the grip of destiny,
  Clinging to oars smooth-shaven, tried to swim;
  Some upon planks were tossing. Roared the surge
  From fathomless depths: it seemed as though sea, sky,
  And land were blended all confusedly.

  Still from Olympus thundering Atrytone
  Wielded her Father's power unshamed, and still
  The welkin shrieked around. Her ruin of wrath
  Now upon Aias hurled she: on his ship
  Dashed she a thunderbolt, and shivered it
  Wide in a moment into fragments small,
  While earth and air yelled o'er the wreck, and whirled
  And plunged and fell the whole sea down thereon.
  They in the ship were all together flung
  Forth: all about them swept the giant waves,
  Round them leapt lightnings flaming through the dark.
  Choked with the strangling surf of hissing brine,
  Gasping out life, they drifted o'er the sea.

  But even in death those captive maids rejoiced,
  As some ill-starred ones, clasping to their breasts
  Their babes, sank in the sea; some flung their arms
  Round Danaans' horror-stricken heads, and dragged
  These down with them, so rendering to their foes
  Requital for foul outrage down to them.
  And from on high the haughty Trito-born
  Looked down on all this, and her heart was glad.

  But Aias floated now on a galley's plank,
  Now through the brine with strong hands oared his path,
  Like some old Titan in his tireless might.
  Cleft was the salt sea-surge by the sinewy hands
  Of that undaunted man: the Gods beheld
  And marvelled at his courage and his strength.
  But now the billows swung him up on high
  Through misty air, as though to a mountain's peak,
  Now whelmed him down, as they would bury him
  In ravening whirlpits: yet his stubborn hands
  Toiled on unwearied. Aye to right and left
  Flashed lightnings down, and quenched them in the sea;
  For not yet was the Child of Thunderer Zeus
  Purposed to smite him dead, despite her wrath,
  Ere he had drained the cup of travail and pain
  Down to the dregs; so in the deep long time
  Affliction wore him down, tormented sore
  On every side. Grim Fates stood round the man
  Unnumbered; yet despair still kindled strength.
  He cried: "Though all the Olympians banded come
  In wrath, and rouse against me all the sea,
  I will escape them!" But no whit did he
  Elude the Gods' wrath; for the Shaker of Earth
  In fierceness of his indignation marked
  Where his hands clung to the Gyraean Rock,
  And in stern anger with an earthquake shook
  Both sea and land. Around on all sides crashed
  Caphereus' cliffs: beneath the Sea-king's wrath
  The surf-tormented beaches shrieked and roared.
  The broad crag rifted reeled into the sea,
  The rock whereto his desperate hands had clung;
  Yet did he writhe up round its jutting spurs,
  While flayed his hands were, and from 'neath his nails
  The blood ran. Wrestling with him roared the waves,
  And the foam whitened all his hair and beard.

  Yet had he 'scaped perchance his evil doom,
  Had not Poseidon, wroth with his hardihood,
  Cleaving the earth, hurled down the chasm the rock,
  As in the old time Pallas heaved on high
  Sicily, and on huge Enceladus
  Dashed down the isle, which burns with the burning yet
  Of that immortal giant, as he breathes
  Fire underground; so did the mountain-crag,
  Hurled from on high, bury the Locrian king,
  Pinning the strong man down, a wretch crushed flat.
  And so on him death's black destruction came
  Whom land and sea alike were leagued to slay.

  Still over the great deep were swept the rest
  Of those Achaeans, crouching terror-dazed
  Down in the ships, save those that mid the waves
  Had fallen. Misery encompassed all;
  For some with heavily-plunging prows drave on,
  With keels upturned some drifted. Here were masts
  Snapped from the hull by rushing gusts, and there
  Were tempest-rifted wrecks of scattered beams;
  And some had sunk, whelmed in the mighty deep,
  Swamped by the torrent downpour from the clouds:
  For these endured not madness of wind-tossed sea
  Leagued with heaven's waterspout; for streamed the sky
  Ceaselessly like a river, while the deep
  Raved round them. And one cried: "Such floods on men
  Fell only when Deucalion's deluge came,
  When earth was drowned, and all was fathomless sea!"

  So cried a Danaan, seeing soul-appalled
  That wild storm. Thousands perished; corpses thronged
  The great sea-highways: all the beaches were
  Too strait for them: the surf belched multitudes
  Forth on the land. The heavy-booming sea
  With weltering beams of ships was wholly paved,
  And here and there the grey waves gleamed between.

  So found they each his several evil fate,
  Some whelmed beneath broad-rushing billows, some
  Wretchedly perishing with their shattered ships
  By Nauplius' devising on the rocks.
  Wroth for that son whom they had done to death,
  He; when the storm rose and the Argives died,
  Rejoiced amid his sorrow, seeing a God
  Gave to his hands revenge, which now he wreaked
  Upon the host he hated, as o'er the deep
  They tossed sore-harassed. To his sea-god sire
  He prayed that all might perish, ships and men
  Whelmed in the deep. Poseidon heard his prayer,
  And on the dark surge swept them nigh his land.
  He, like a harbour-warder, lifted high
  A blazing torch, and so by guile he trapped
  The Achaean men, who deemed that they had won
  A sheltering haven: but sharp reefs and crags
  Gave awful welcome unto ships and men,
  Who, dashed to pieces on the cruel rocks
  In the black night, crowned ills with direr ills.
  Some few escaped, by a God or Power unseen
  Plucked from death's hand. Athena now rejoiced
  Her heart within, and now was racked with fears
  For prudent-souled Odysseus; for his weird
  Was through Poseidon's wrath to suffer woes
  Full many.

                 But Earth-shaker's jealousy now
  Burned against those long walls and towers uppiled
  By the strong Argives for a fence against
  The Trojans' battle-onset. Swiftly then
  He swelled to overbrimming all the sea
  That rolls from Euxine down to Hellespont,
  And hurled it on the shore of Troy: and Zeus,
  For a grace unto the glorious Shaker of Earth,
  Poured rain from heaven: withal Far-darter bare
  In that great work his part; from Ida's heights
  Into one channel led he all her streams,
  And flooded the Achaeans' work. The sea
  Dashed o'er it, and the roaring torrents still
  Rushed on it, swollen by the rains of Zeus;
  And the dark surge of the wide-moaning sea
  Still hurled them back from mingling with the deep,
  Till all the Danaan walls were blotted out
  Beneath their desolating flood. Then earth
  Was by Poseidon chasm-cleft: up rushed
  Deluge of water, slime and sand, while quaked
  Sigeum with the mighty shock, and roared
  The beach and the foundations of the land
  Dardanian. So vanished, whelmed from sight,
  That mighty rampart. Earth asunder yawned,
  And all sank down, and only sand was seen,
  When back the sea rolled, o'er the beach outspread
  Far down the heavy-booming shore. All this
  The Immortals' anger wrought. But in their ships
  The Argives storm-dispersed went sailing on.
  So came they home, as heaven guided each,
  Even all that 'scaped the fell sea-tempest blasts.