With flaming eyes, and jaws besmear'd with blood;

At length the sovereign savage wins the strife;

And the torn boar resigns his thirst and life.

Patroclus thus, so many chiefs o'erthrown,

So many lives effused, expires his own.

As dying now at Hector's feet he lies,

He sternly views him, and triumphant cries:

"Lie there, Patroclus! and with thee, the joy

Thy pride once promised, of subverting Troy;

The fancied scenes of Ilion wrapt in flames,

And thy soft pleasures served with captive dames.

Unthinking man! I fought those towers to free,

And guard that beauteous race from lords like thee:

But thou a prey to vultures shalt be made;

Thy own Achilles cannot lend thee aid;

Though much at parting that great chief might say,

And much enjoin thee, this important day.

'Return not, my brave friend (perhaps he said),

Without the bloody arms of Hector dead.'

He spoke, Patroclus march'd, and thus he sped."

Supine, and wildly gazing on the skies,

With faint, expiring breath, the chief replies:

622

The Iliad of Homer