And call'd to fill the number of the dead?

Adrestus first; Autonous then succeeds;

Echeclus follows; next young Megas bleeds,

Epistor, Melanippus, bite the ground;

The slaughter, Elasus and Mulius crown'd:

Then sunk Pylartes to eternal night;

The rest, dispersing, trust their fates to flight.

Now Troy had stoop'd beneath his matchless power,

But flaming Phoebus kept the sacred tower

Thrice at the battlements Patroclus strook;(246)

His blazing aegis thrice Apollo shook;

He tried the fourth; when, bursting from the cloud,

A more than mortal voice was heard aloud.

Patroclus! cease; this heaven-defended wall

Defies thy lance; not fated yet to fall;

Thy friend, thy greater far, it shall withstand,

Troy shall not stoop even to Achilles' hand."

So spoke the god who darts celestial fires;

The Greek obeys him, and with awe retires.

While Hector, checking at the Scaean gates

His panting coursers, in his breast debates,

Or in the field his forces to employ,

Or draw the troops within the walls of Troy.

616

The Iliad of Homer