Then round war-wise Odysseus men renowned,
By that great captain’s battle cunning ruled,
Locked shields together, raised them o’er their heads
Ranged side by side, that many were made one.
Thou hadst said it was a great hall’s solid roof,
Which no tempestuous wind-blast misty wet
Can pierce, nor rain from heaven in torrents poured.
So fenced about with shields firm stood the ranks
Of Argives, one in heart for fight, and one
In that array close-welded. From above
The Trojans hailed great stones; as from a rock
Rolled these to earth. Full many a spear and dart
And galling javelin in the pierced shields stood;
Some in the earth stood; many glanced away
With bent points falling baffled from the shields
Battered on all sides. But that clangorous din
None feared; none flinched; as pattering drops of rain
They heard it. Up to the rampart’s foot they marched:
None hung back; shoulder to shoulder on they came
Like a long lurid cloud that o’er the sky
Cronion trails in wild midwinter-tide.
On that battalion moved, with thunderous tread
Of tramping feet: a little above the earth
Rose up the dust; the breeze swept it aside
Drifting away behind the men. There went
A sound confused of voices with them, like
The hum of bees that murmur round the hives,
And multitudinous panting, and the gasp
Of men hard-breathing. Exceeding glad the sons
Of Atreus, glorying in them, saw that wall
Unwavering of doom-denouncing war.
In one dense mass against the city-gate
They hurled themselves, with twibills strove to breach
The long walls, from their hinges to upheave
The gates, and dash to earth. The pulse of hope
Beat strong in those proud hearts. But naught availed
Targes nor levers, when Aeneas’ might
Swung in his hands a stone like a thunderbolt,
Hurled it with uttermost strength, and dashed to death
All whom it caught beneath the shields, as when
A mountain’s precipice-edge breaks off and falls
On pasturing goats, and all that graze thereby
Tremble; so were those Danaans dazed with dread.
Stone after stone he hurled on the reeling ranks,
As when amid the hills Olympian Zeus
With thunderbolts and blazing lightnings rends
From their foundations crags that rim a peak,
And this way, that way, sends them hurtling down;
Then the flocks tremble, scattering in wild flight;
So quailed the Achaeans, when Aeneas dashed
To sudden fragments all that battle-wall
Moulded of adamant shields, because a God
Gave more than human strength. No man of them
Could lift his eyes unto him in that fight,
Because the arms that lapped his sinewy limbs
Flashed like the heaven-born lightnings. At his side
Stood, all his form divine in darkness cloaked,
Ares the terrible, and winged the flight
Of what bare down to the Argives doom or dread.
He fought as when Olympian Zeus himself
From heaven in wrath smote down the insolent bands
Of giants grim, and shook the boundless earth,
And sea, and ocean, and the heavens, when reeled
The knees of Atlas neath the rush of Zeus.
So crumbled down beneath Aeneas’ bolts
The Argive squadrons. All along the wall
Wroth with the foeman rushed he: from his hands
Whatso he lighted on in onslaught-haste
Hurled he; for many a battle-staying bolt
Lay on the walls of those staunch Dardan men.
With such Aeneas stormed in giant might,
With such drave back the thronging foes. All round
The Trojans played the men. Sore travail and pain
Had all folk round the city: many fell,
Argives and Trojans. Rang the battle-cries:
Aeneas cheered the war-fain Trojans on
To fight for home, for wives, and their own souls
With a good heart: war-staunch Achilles’ son
Shouted: “Flinch not, ye Argives, from the walls,
Till Troy be taken, and sink down in flames!”
And round these twain an awful measureless roar
Rang, daylong as they fought: no breathing-space
Came from the war to them whose spirits burned,
These, to smite Ilium, those, to guard her safe.
But from Aeneas valiant-souled afar
Fought Aias, speeding midst the men of Troy
Winged death; for now his arrow straight through air
Flew, now his deadly dart, and smote them down
One after one: yet others cowered away
Before his peerless prowess, and abode
The fight no more, but fenceless left the wall
Then one, of all the Locrians mightiest,
Fierce-souled Alcimedon, trusting in his prince
And his own might and valour of his youth,
All battle-eager on a ladder set
Swift feet, to pave for friends a death-strewn path
Into the town. Above his head he raised
The screening shield; up that dread path he went
Hardening his heart from trembling, in his hand
Now shook the threatening spear, now upward climbed
Fast high in air he trod the perilous way.
Now on the Trojans had disaster come,
But, even as above the parapet
His head rose, and for the first time and the last
From her high rampart he looked down on Troy,
Aeneas, who had marked, albeit afar,
That bold assault, rushed on him, dashed on his head
So huge a stone that the hero’s mighty strength
Shattered the ladder. Down from on high he rushed
As arrow from the string: death followed him
As whirling round he fell; with air was blent
His lost life, ere he crashed to the stony ground.
Strong spear, broad shield, in mid fall flew from his hands,
And from his head the helm: his corslet came
Alone with him to earth. The Locrian men
Groaned, seeing their champion quelled by evil doom;
For all his hair and all the stones around
Were brain-bespattered: all his bones were crushed,
And his once active limbs besprent with gore.
Then godlike Poeas’ war-triumphant son
Marked where Aeneas stormed along the wall
In lion-like strength, and straightway shot a shaft
Aimed at that glorious hero, neither missed
The man: yet not through his unyielding targe
To the fair flesh it won, being turned aside
By Cytherea and the shield, but grazed
The buckler lightly: yet not all in vain
Fell earthward, but between the targe and helm
Smote Medon: from the tower he fell, as falls
A wild goat from a crag, the hunter’s shaft
Deep in its heart: so nerveless-flung he fell,
And fled away from him the precious life.
Wroth for his friend, a stone Aeneas hurled,
And Philoctetes’ stalwart comrade slew,
Toxaechmes; for he shattered his head and crushed
Helmet and skull-bones; and his noble heart
Was stilled. Loud shouted princely Poeas’ son:
“Aeneas, thou, forsooth, dost deem thyself
A mighty champion, fighting from a tower
Whence craven women war with foes! Now if
Thou be a man, come forth without the wall
In battle-harness, and so learn to know
In spear-craft and in bow-craft Poeas’ son!”
So cried he; but Anchises’ valiant seed,
How fain soe’er, naught answered, for the stress
Of desperate conflict round that wall and burg
Ceaselessly raging: pause from fight was none:
Yea, for long time no respite had there been
For the war-weary from that endless toil.
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