ll mindful, when before
The cruel altar brought; when all prepar'd
The savage-urg'd oblation of herself
She saw; and Neoptolemus beheld
There stand, the steel there grasping; on his face
Her eyes firm-fixing, spoke.--"My noble blood
"This instant spill. Delay not--plunge thy blade
"Or in my throat, or bosom;"--and her throat
And bosom, as she spoke she bar'd--"for ne'er
"Polyxena, a slavish life had borne.
"Yet grateful is this victim to no god!
"My only wish, that from my mother dear
"May be my death conceal'd: my mother clogs
"My final passage; damps the joys of death.
"Yet should she wail my death not, but my life.
"But distant stand ye all, that to the shades
"Inviolate I sink; if what I ask
"Be just, let every hand of man avoid
"A virgin's touch. Whoe'er your steel prepares
"To move propitiatory with my blood,
"A victim quite untainted best must please.
"And should the final accents that I speak,
"(King Priam's daughter, not a captive sues)
"My corse unransom'd to my mother give.
"Let her not buy the sad sepulchral rites
"With gold, but tears. Yet time has been, with gold
"I might have been redeem'd."--The princess ceas'd,
And save her own no cheek unwet was seen.
And ev'n the priest reluctant, and in tears,
Op'd by a sudden plunge the offer'd breast.
She, to earth sinking, 'neath her tottering limbs,
Wore to the last a face unmov'd; ev'n then
Her final care was in her fall to veil
Limbs that a veil demanded, as she sank;
And decent pride of modesty preserve.

The Trojan dames receive her, and recount
The woes of Priam's house, the streams of blood
That single stock has spent. Thee too, O, maid!
They weep; and thee, a royal spouse so late,
And royal parent stil'd; pride of the realm
Of glorious Asia; now a mournful lot
Amid the spoil; whom Ithacus would scorn
To own, great Hector hadst thou not brought forth:
The name of Hector scarce a master finds,
To claim his mother. She, the lifeless trunk
Embracing, which had held a soul so brave,
Tears pour'd; tears often had she pour'd before,
For country, husband, children--now for her
Those tears gush'd in the wound; lips press'd to lips;
And beat that breast which oft with grievous blows
Was punish'd. Sweeping 'mid the clotted blood
Her silver'd tresses; all these plaints, and more
She utter'd, as she still her bosom rent.

"My child, thy mother