My home, my father, and my sons to see,
Whom they, enraged, will kill for my offence,
And punish, for my guilt, their innocence.
Those gods who know the truths I now relate, 140
That faith which yet remains inviolate
By mortal men, by these I beg; redress
My causeless wrongs, and pity such distress.'--
And now true pity in exchange he finds
For his false tears, his tongue his hands unbinds.
Then spake the king, 'Be ours, whoe'er thou art;
Forget the Greeks. But first the truth impart,
Why did they raise, or to what use intend
This pile? to a warlike or religious end?'
Skilful in fraud (his native art) his hands 150
T'ward heaven he raised, deliver'd now from bands.
'Ye pure ethereal flames! ye powers adored
By mortal men! ye altars, and the sword
I 'scaped! ye sacred fillets that involved
My destined head! grant I may stand absolved
From all their laws and rights, renounce all name
Of faith or love, their secret thoughts proclaim;
Only, O Troy! preserve thy faith to me,
If what I shall relate preserveth thee.
From Pallas' favour all our hopes, and all 160
Counsels and actions took original,
Till Diomed (for such attempts made fit
By dire conjunction with Ulysses' wit)
Assails the sacred tower, the guards they slay,
Defile with bloody hands, and thence convey
The fatal image; straight with our success
Our hopes fell back, whilst prodigies express
Her just disdain, her flaming eyes did throw
Flashes of lightning, from each part did flow
A briny sweat; thrice brandishing her spear, 170
Her statue from the ground itself did rear;
Then, that we should our sacrilege restore,
And re-convey their gods from Argos' shore,
Calchas persuades, till then we urge in vain
The fate of Troy. To measure back the main
They all consent, but to return again,
When reinforced with aids of gods and men.
Thus Calchas; then instead of that, this pile
To Pallas was design'd; to reconcile
Th' offended power, and expiate our guilt; 180
To this vast height and monstrous stature built,
Lest through your gates received, it might renew
Your vows to her, and her defence to you.
But if this sacred gift you disesteem,
Then cruel plagues (which Heaven divert on them!)
Shall fall on Priam's state: but if the horse
Your walls ascend, assisted by your force,
A league 'gainst Greece all Asia shall contract;
Our sons then s