Story of Aeneas | Page 6

and Men-e-la'us, husband of the celebrated Hel'en whom Paris, son of Priam, had carried off from Greece, which was the cause of the war. Ulysses and his companions then rushed to the walls, and after slaying the sentinels, threw open the gates of the city to the main body of the Greeks who had by this time landed from their ships. Thus Troy was taken.
And the long baffled legions, bursting in Through gate and bastion, blunted sword and spear With unresisted slaughter. LEWIS MORRIS.
Meanwhile AEneas, sleeping in the house of his father, An-chi'ses, had a dream in which the ghost of Hector appeared to him, shedding abundant tears, and disfigured with wounds as when he had been dragged around the walls of Troy behind the chariot of the victorious Achilles. In a mournful voice, AEneas, seeming to forget that Hector was dead, inquired why he had been so long absent from the defense of his native city, and from what distant shores he had now returned. But the spirit answered only by a solemn warning to AEneas, the "goddess- born" (being the son of Venus) to save himself by immediate flight.
"O goddess-born! escape by timely flight, The flames and horrors of this fatal night. The foes already have possessed the wall; Troy nods from high, and totters to her fall. Enough is paid to Priam's royal name, More than enough to duty and to fame. If by a mortal hand my father's throne Could be defended, 'twas by mine alone. Now Troy to thee commends her future state, And gives her gods companions of thy fate; From their assistance, happier walls expect, Which, wand'ring long, at last thou shalt erect." DRYDEN, AEneid, BOOK I.
Awaking from his sleep, AEneas was startled by the clash of arms and by cries of battle, which he now heard on all sides. Rushing to the roof of the house and gazing around, he saw the palaces of many of the Trojan princes in flames, and he heard the shouts of the victorious Greeks, and the blaring of their trumpets. Notwithstanding the warning of Hector, he ran for his weapons.
Resolved on death, resolved to die in arms, But first to gather friends, with them to oppose (If fortune favored) and repel the foes. DRYDEN, AEneid, BOOK II.
At the door, as he was going forth to join the combat, he met the Trojan Pan'thus, a priest of Apollo, who had just escaped by flight from the swords of the Greeks. In reply to the questions of AEneas, the priest told him, in words of grief and despair, that Troy's last day had come.
"'Tis come, our fated day of death. We have been Trojans; Troy has been; She sat, but sits no more, a queen; Stern Jove an Argive rule proclaims; Greece holds a city wrapt in flames. There in the bosom of the town The tall horse rains invasion down, And Sinon, with a conqueror's pride, Deals fiery havoc far and wide. Some keep the gates, as vast a host As ever left Myce'nae's coast; Some block the narrows of the street, With weapons threatening all they meet; The stark sword stretches o'er the way, Quick-glancing, ready drawn to slay, While scarce our sentinels resist, And battle in the flickering mist." CONINGTON, AEneid, BOOK II.
As Panthus ceased speaking, several Trojan chiefs came up, and eagerly joined AEneas in resolving to make a last desperate attempt to save their native city. Together they rushed into the thick of the fight. Some were slain, and some with Aeneas succeeded in forcing their way to the palace of King Priam, where a fierce struggle was then raging. Entering by a secret door, AEneas climbed to the roof, from which he and the other brave defenders of the palace hurled stones and beams of wood upon the enemy below. But all their heroic efforts were in vain. In front of the principal gate, battering upon it with his huge battle-axe, stood Neoptolemus (also called Pyr'rhus) the son of Achilles. Soon its posts, though plated with bronze, gave way before his mighty strokes, and a great breach was made, through which the Greeks poured into the stately halls of the Trojan king. Then there was a scene of wild confusion and terror.
The house is filled with loud laments and cries And shrieks of women rend the vaulted skies. DRYDEN, AEneid BOOK II.
The aged king when he saw that the enemy was beneath his roof, put on his armor "long disused," and was about to rush forth to meet the foe, but Hec'u-ba, his queen, persuaded him to take refuge with her in a court of the palace in which were placed the altars of their gods. Here he was shortly afterwards cruelly slain by Pyrrhus.
Thus Priam fell, and shared one common fate