Patriotic

grief.

Grief with affection.

The day when thou, imperial Troy! must bend; Must see thy warriors fall, thy glories end. And yet no presage dire so wounds my mind, My mother's death, the ruin of my kind; Not Priam's hoary hairs defil'd with gore, Not all my brothers gasping on the shore, As thine, Andromache!-thy griefs I dread! I see thee trembling, weeping, captive led, In Argive looms our battles to design, And woes, of which so large a part was thine: There while you groan beneath the load of life, Insulting. They cry, 'Behold the mighty Hector's wife!'

Pity.

Narration.

Some haughty Greek, who lives thy tears to see,
Embitters all thy woes by naming me.

The thoughts of glory past, and present shame,
A thousand griefs shall waken at the name!
May I lie cold before that dreadful day,
Press'd with a load of monumental clay!
Thy Hector, wrapt in everlasting sleep,
Shall neither hear thee sigh, nor see thee weep."

Thus having spoke, th' illustrious chief of Troy
Stretch'd his fond arms to clasp the lovely boy.
Tenderness. The babe clung, crying, to his nurse's breast
Scar'd with the dazzled helm and nodding crest.
With sacred pleasure each fond parent smil'd,
And Hector hastened to relieve his child;
The glittring terrors from his brows unbound,
And plac'd the beaming helmet on the ground.
Then kiss'd the child, and lifting high in air,
Thus to the gods preferr'd a parent's prayer.

Intercession.

"O Thou, whose glory fills th' ethereal throne,
And all ye deathless Pow'rs! protect my son!
Grant him, like me, to purchase just renown,
To guard the Trojans, to defend the crown,
Against his country's foes the war to wage,
And rise the Hector of the future age!

So when triumphant from successful toils,
Of heroes slain, he bears the reeking spoils,
Whole hosts may hail him with deserv'd acclaim,
And say, This chief transcends his father's fame.'
While pleas'd amidst the gen'ral shouts of Troy,
His mother's conscious heart o'erflows with joy."

He spoke, and fondly gazing on her charms,
Restor❜d the pleasing burden to her arms;
Soft on her fragrant breast the babe she laid,
Hush'd to repose, and with a smile survey'd.
The troubled pleasure soon chastis'd with fear,
She mingled with the smile a falling tear.

Tenderness.

Apprehension.

XV.-MOURNFUL DESCRIPTION.

From Æneas's account of the Sack of Troy.

ALL were attentive to the godlike man,
When from his lofty couch he thus began:
Great queen! what you command me to relate
Renews the sad remembrance of our fate ;
An empire from its old foundations rent,
And ev'ry wo the Trojans underwent ;
A pop'lous city made a desert place;
All that I saw, and part of which I was;

Not ev❜n the hardest of our foes could hear,
Nor stern Ulysses tell without a tear.

Attention.

Respect.

Grief.

Pity.

'Twas now the dead of night, when sleep repairs Horror. Our bodies worn with toils, our minds with cares, When Hector's ghost before my sight appears; Shrouded in blood he stood, and bath'd in tears. Such as when by the fierce Pelides slain, Thessalian coursers dragg'd him o'er the plain. Swoll'n were his feet, as when the thongs were thrust Through the pierc'd limbs: his body black with dust.

Courage.

Pity.

Grief.

Horror.

Warning.

Unlike that Hector, who return'd from toils
Of war triumphant in Æacian spoils;
Or him, who made the fainting Greeks retire,
Hurling amidst their fleets the Phrygian fire.
His hair and beard were clotted stiff with gore;
The ghastly wounds he for his country bore,
Now stream'd afresh.

I wept to see the visionary man,

And whilst my trance continu'd, thus began:
O light of Trojans, and support of Troy,
Thy father's champion, and thy country's joy!
Oh, long expected by thy friends! from whence
Art thou so late return'd to our defence?

Alas! what wounds are these? What new disgrace
Deforms the manly honours of thy face?

'The spectre, groaning from his inmost breast,
This warning in these mournful words express'd;
Haste, goddess-born! Escape, by timely flight,
The flames and horrors of this fatal night.
The foes already have possess'd our wall;
Troy nods from high, and totters to her fall.
Enough is paid to Priam's royal name,
Enough to country, and to deathless fame
If by a mortal arm my father's throne

Could have been sav'd, this arm the feat had done.
Troy now commends to thee her future state,
And gives her gods companions of thy fate.

Directing. Under their umbrage2 hope for happier walls,
And follow where thy various fortune calls.

"He said, and brought from forth the sacred choir, The gods, and relics of th' immortal fire.

1 "The spectre," &c. These two lines, and the ghost's speech, are to be spoken in a deep and hollow voice, slowly and solemnly, with little rising or falling.

[2" Umbrage" is here used in its primary sense, namely, shade; protection; auspices.]

"He said, and," &c. Here the voice resumes its usual key.

Now peals of shouts came thund'ring from afar,
Cries, threats, and loud lament, and mingled war.
The noise approaches, though our palace stood
Aloof from streets, embosom'd close with wood;
Louder and louder still, I hear th' alarms
Of human cries distinct, and clashing arms.
Fear broke my slumbers.

I mount the terrace; thence the town survey,
And listen what the swelling sounds convey.
Then Hector's faith was manifestly clear'd;
And Grecian fraud in open light appear'd.
The palace of Deiphobus ascends

In smoky flames, and catches on his friends.
Ucalegon' burns next; the seas are bright

With splendours not their own, and shine with spark-
ling light.

New clamours and new clangours now arise,
The trumpet's voice, with agonizing cries.
With frenzy seiz'd I run to meet th' alarms,
Resolv'd on death, resolv'd to die in arms.
But first to gather friends, with whom t' oppose,
If fortune favour'd, and repel the foes,
By courage rous'd, by love of country fir'd,
With sense of honour and revenge inspir'd.
Pantheus, Apollo's priest, a sacred name,

Trepidation.

Courage.

Trepidation.

Had 'scap'd the Grecian swords, and pass'd the flame.
With relics loaded to my doors he fled,

And by the hand his tender grandson ted.

What hope, O Pantheus? Whither can we run? Questioning. Where make a stand? Or what may yet be done? Scarce had I spoke, when Pantheus, with a groan, Troy-is no more! Her glories now are gone.

[1"Ucalegon burns next." In imitation of the original, the owner of the house is, by metonymy, put for the house itself.] 2" Troy is no more." Such short periods, comprehending much in few words, may often receive additional force by a short pause between the nominative and the verb.

Grief.

Awe.

Horror.

The fatal day, th' appointed hour is come,
When wrathful Jove's irrevocable doom
Transfers the Trojan state to Grecian hands:
Our city's wrapt in flames; the foe commands.
To sev'ral posts their parties they divide ;

Some block the narrow streets; some scour the wide.
The bold they kill; th' unwary they surprise;

Who fights meets death, and death finds him who
flies.

Dryden's Virgil.

Cringing.

Reproof.

Wonder.

XVI.-ASKING, REPROOF, APPROBATION.

A troop came next, who crowns and armour wore,1
And proud defiance in their looks they bore.

"For thee," they cried, "amidst alarms and strife,
We sail'd in tempests down the stream of life;
For thee whole nations fill'd with fire and blood,
And swam to empire through the purple flood.
Those ills, we dar'd, thy inspiration own;
What virtue seem'd, was done for thee alone."
"Ambitious fools!" the queen replied and frown'd,
"Be all your deeds in dark oblivion drown'd.
There sleep forgot with mighty tyrants gone;
Your statues moulder'd and your names unknown.”
A sudden cloud straight snatch'd them from my sight,
And each majestic phantom sunk in night.

Then came the smallest tribe I yet had seen;
Plain was their dress, and modest was their mien,

The pupil, if he has not read the " Temple of Fame," (from which this extract is taken,) must be informed of the plot of the poem, viz. The author represents numbers of the pursuers of fame, as repairing, in crowds, to the temple of that goddess, in quest of her approbation, who are differently received by her, according to their respective merits, &c.

2 "Those ills," &c. The meaning of this line (which is not too obvious) is, "Our being guilty of such extravagances, shows how eager we were to obtain a name."