And weighs, with equal hand, their destinies.

Low sinks the scale surcharged with Hector's fate;

Heavy with death it sinks, and hell receives the weight.

Then Phoebus left him. Fierce Minerva flies

To stern Pelides, and triumphing, cries:

"O loved of Jove! this day our labours cease,

And conquest blazes with full beams on Greece.

Great Hector falls; that Hector famed so far,

Drunk with renown, insatiable of war,

Falls by thy hand, and mine! nor force, nor flight,

Shall more avail him, nor his god of light.

See, where in vain he supplicates above,

Roll'd at the feet of unrelenting Jove;

Rest here: myself will lead the Trojan on,

And urge to meet the fate he cannot shun."

Her voice divine the chief with joyful mind

Obey'd; and rested, on his lance reclined

While like Deiphobus the martial dame

(

Her face, her gesture, and her arms the same),

In show an aid, by hapless Hector's side

Approach'd, and greets him thus with voice belied:

Too long, O Hector! have I borne the sight

Of this distress, and sorrow'd in thy flight:

The Iliad of Homer