Horses and dogs in panic through the town Fled from the flames, trampling beneath their feet The dead, and dashing into living men To their sore hurt. Shrieks rang through all the town.
In through his blazing porchway rushed a man To rescue wife and child. Through smoke and flame Blindly he groped, and perished while he cried Their names, and pitiless doom slew those within.
The fire-glow upward mounted to the sky, The red glare o'er the firmament spread its wings, And all the tribes of folk that dwelt around Beheld it, far as Ida's mountain-crests, And sea-girt Tenedos, and Thracian Samos.
And men that voyaged on the deep sea cried:
"The Argives have achieved their mighty task After long toil for star-eyed Helen's sake.
All Troy, the once queen-city, burns in fire:
For all their prayers, no God defends them now;
For strong Fate oversees all works of men, And the renownless and obscure to fame She raises, and brings low the exalted ones.
Oft out of good is evil brought, and good From evil, mid the travail and change of life."
So spake they, who from far beheld the glare Of Troy's great burning. Compassed were her folk With wailing misery: through her streets the foe Exulted, as when madding blasts turmoil The boundless sea, what time the Altar ascends To heaven's star-pavement, turned to the misty south Overagainst Arcturus tempest-breathed, And with its rising leap the wild winds forth, And ships full many are whelmed 'neath ravening seas;
Wild as those stormy winds Achaea's sons Ravaged steep Ilium while she burned in flame.
As when a mountain clothed with shaggy woods Burns swiftly in a fire-blast winged with winds, And from her tall peaks goeth up a roar, And all the forest-children this way and that Rush through the wood, tormented by the flame;
So were the Trojans perishing: there was none To save, of all the Gods. Round these were staked The nets of Fate, which no man can escape.
Then were Demophoon and Acamas By mighty Theseus' mother Aethra met.
Yearning to see them was she guided on To meet them by some Blessed One, the while 'Wildered from war and fire she fled. They saw In that red glare a woman royal-tall, Imperial-moulded, and they weened that this Was Priam's queen, and with swift eagerness Laid hands on her, to lead her captive thence To the Danaans; but piteously she moaned:
"Ah, do not, noble sons of warrior Greeks, To your ships hale me, as I were a foe!
I am not of Trojan birth: of Danaans came My princely blood renowned. In Troezen's halls Pittheus begat me, Aegeus wedded me, And of my womb sprang Theseus glory-crowned.
For great Zeus' sake, for your dear parents' sake, I pray you, if the seed of Theseus came Hither with Atreus' sons, O bring ye me Unto their yearning eyes. I trow they be Young men like you. My soul shall be refreshed If living I behold those chieftains twain."
Hearkening to her they called their sire to mind, His deeds for Helen's sake, and how the sons Of Zeus the Thunderer in the old time smote Aphidnae, when, because these were but babes, Their nurses hid them far from peril of fight;
And Aethra they remembered -- all she endured Through wars, as mother-in-law at first, and thrall Thereafter of Helen. Dumb for joy were they, Till spake Demophoon to that wistful one:
"Even now the Gods fulfil thine heart's desire:
We whom thou seest are the sons of him, Thy noble son: thee shall our loving hands Bear to the ships: with joy to Hellas' soil Thee will we bring, where once thou wast a queen."
Then his great father's mother clasped him round With clinging arms: she kissed his shoulders broad, His head, his breast, his bearded lips she kissed, And Acamas kissed withal, the while she shed Glad tears on these who could not choose but weep.
As when one tarries long mid alien men, And folk report him dead, but suddenly He cometh home: his children see his face, And break into glad weeping; yea, and he, His arms around them, and their little heads Upon his shoulders, sobs: echoes the home With happy mourning's music-beating wings;
So wept they with sweet sighs and sorrowless moans.
Then, too, affliction-burdened Priam's child, Laodice, say they, stretched her hands to heaven, Praying the mighty Gods that earth might gape To swallow her, ere she defiled her hand With thralls' work; and a God gave ear, and rent Deep earth beneath her: so by Heaven's decree Did earth's abysmal chasm receive the maid In Troy's last hour. Electra's self withal, The Star-queen lovely-robed, shrouded her form In mist and cloud, and left the Pleiad-band, Her sisters, as the olden legend tells.
Still riseth up in sight of toil-worn men Their bright troop in the skies; but she alone Hides viewless ever, since the hallowed town Of her son Dardanus in ruin fell, When Zeus most high from heaven could help her not, Because to Fate the might of Zeus must bow;
And by the Immortals' purpose all these things Had come to pass, or by Fate's ordinance.
Still on Troy's folk the Argives wreaked their wrath, And battle's issues Strife Incarnate held.
