TRANSLATIONS FROM THE SUPPLEMENTAL ILIAD OF QUINTUS CALABER.

(Concluded from our last Number.)

teresting Odyssey. I use the language of orthodox critics, not my own; for I have the misfortune to be a heretic, and my perdition is classically sealed.

There might, moreover, be some slight curiosity to see how Quintus and Virgil have treated the same inciVIDA. dents.

THE STORMING OF TROY-DEATH OF PRIAM-CAPTIVITY OF ANDROMACHE
AND ESCAPE OF ENEAS.

MEANTIME the Trojans feast in every street
With shrilling pipes and flutes; the dancers beat
The ground, and singers troll the song, and high
The goblet-din, and roar of revelry.

Each, grasping in his hand the brimming bowl,
Slakes in full ease the fever of his soul.

Then sinks o'erwhelm'd th' internal man: the sight
Is snatch'd away in whirls of dazzling light:
Maim'd from the tongue each word successive falls;
The hall spins circling with its garnish'd walls:
One motion seizes all; in wheeling flight
The city turns before the darkling sight;
For quench'd in floods of wine the vision reels,
And thought itself the dim confusion feels;
When through the gaping jaws the draughts o'ersway
Th' unbalanced mind, and steal the brain away:
Some youth with head o'er-heavy lisping frames
His witless speech, and valiant thus exclaims:
"Troth, but in vain the Greeks have spent their toil,
And drawn their marshall'd myriads to our soil;
Each with his work undone now flees from Troy,..
Like a weak woman or a puling boy."

So spake some Trojan mazed with wine, nor knew
How near, ev'n to the doors, the slaughter drew.
For, soon as one by one had sunk to rest,
Sated with food and deep with wine opprest,
Sinon at length upheld the torch on high,
That flash'd its signal gleam against the sky:
Throbb'd every Grecian heart, lest Troy behold,
And the bright sign their hidden wile unfold,
But all now slept the sleep that was their last,
Drown'd in their cups and full with high repast.
The Greeks descried, and hasten'd to unmoor
From Tenedos, and dash'd the billows hoar.
Then Sinon with low voice approach'd the steed,
Low, that no Trojan might awaken'd heed;
But Grecian chiefs alone o'erhear; for they
Watch'd to be bold in deeds, and slumber fled away.
They caught the words within; and bent their ear
To wise Ulysses with a wholesome fear:
Silent and safe he warn'd them to descend;
They at his summons to th' encounter bend,
And from the horse are hasting to the ground,
Eager to deal the blows of battle round,

But he restrains the thronging rush: then wide,
Yet softly, opes the wooden courser's side,
His swift hands aided by Epéus' spear,
And slow emerges with a glance of fear,
And scans the city, lest some sentinel be near.

As roused by hunger from the mountain rocks
The wolf steals prowling towards the folded flocks;
He shuns the guardian dogs and watchful men,
And with hush'd step encroaches on the pen;

So slid Ulysses from the steed: the rest
With their successive feet the ladder press'd,
Framed by Epéus, that the chiefs might bend
Their upward steps and easy re-descend.
They, one by one, to bold adventure bound,
With gradual step descended to the ground.
As wasps, by woodman's foot disturb'd, arouse
Their legions, clustering on the darkening boughs,
So burst they on the town of fenced Troy,
The heart within them panting fierce with joy;
And ranged the streets, and slew on every side:
The ships already breast the ocean tide:
For Thetis sent a favouring gale, and bore
The glad Greeks to the Hellespontine shore;
And there they furl the sails, the galleys moor.
Then, disembarking in their dense array,

To Troy's doom'd walls they shape their dauntless way.
As the throng'd sheep their forest pasture leave
'Midst the flush'd lights of autumn's shadowy eve,
Blithe crowding towards the fold, so march'd the train
In trampling phalanx Troy-ward o'er the plain,

Prepared to aid their chiefs and pile the streets with slain.
As troops of wolves, sore-hunger'd, down the steeps
Scour through the woods, while tired the shepherd sleeps,
Now these, now those they rend within the fold,
Cover'd by night, thus wide the carnage roll'd:
Corse rose on corse, and slaughter crimson'd all,
Though the great host was yet without the wall.

But when the mightier army enter'd Troy,
Fierce was the rush, and keen the vengeful joy:
Breathing the strength of Mars th' embattled throng
Through streets with carnage glutted pour along:
On every side the conflagration rolls,

And dismal flames bring transport to their souls:
Then from the crashing roofs that sink and burn,
Grim on the men of Troy their arms they turn :
Mars ranged among them and Enýo stood
Dispersing groans and blackening earth with blood.
Trojans, allies, in gore all prostrate lay,
And others on them gasp'd their lives away.
Some held their gushing entrails, taking flight
From house to house in miserable plight;

Others with amputated feet now trail'd

Their bodies midst the dead, and piteous wail'd;
Heads and lopp'd hands were scatter'd in the dust,
And many a flying wretch with speary thrust
Was through the back transfix'd unto the heart;
Or through the loins in front emerged the dart

Where keenest Mars's wound and bitterest is the smart.

The howl of dogs throughout the city rose,
The groans of youths beneath the murderous blows;
And from each house shriek'd women's shrill despair-
As when an eagle, poised in buoyant air,

O'erhangs the scattering cranes, they rend the sky
With heartless screamings as he stoops from high;

So here and there the Trojan women flew,

So thick, so mingled, their lamentings grew.

Some starting from their beds; some prostrate thrown
On the bare floor, and some.begirt alone

With the slight sark, and careless of the zone,

Roved wildly forth, nor heeded, mazed with dread,
The mantling robe or fillet for their head;
Bewilder'd with astounding fear they fly,

Their bended hands supply the veil of modesty :
While others wailing pluck their rooted hair,

And smite their breasts, and thrill with shrieks the circling air:
But some had dared to mingle in the fray,

And aid the spouse or son, who bleeding lay,
Their courage equal to the great essay.

The general cry of consternation scared

The children's sleep, whom sorrow yet had spared:
Babes by each other's sides were stretch'd in death,
And seem'd in dreams to yield their little breath.
The Fates, in horrid rapture, held their breath,
And gloated on the scene, and snuff'd the scent of death.
The kill'd were laid in heaps, like swine that fall
To feast a king's guests in the palace hall;
The wine that in the hollow goblets stood,

Blush'd with new tinct and swam with mantling blood.
No Greek, but some poor victim's breast explored,
And e'en the stripling flesh'd his maiden sword.

As the gaunt wolves, or fleet hill-panthers, run
Down to the vales beneath noon's parching sun,
When home the shepherd has the milk convey'd,
And left his cluster'd flock in woodland shade;
They fill their ravening maw; the lingering hind
Shall there a melancholy banquet find;
So did the Greeks range Priam's city through,
So in that desperate strife they smote and slew.
None of the Trojan people 'scaped a wound,
Maim'd their lithe limbs, and black with gore around.

Nor bloodless to the Greeks the combat sped;
Some, tables, goblets, hurried to the dead:
Some smit with smouldering firebrands sank to rest,
And prongs hot hissing spear'd the quivering breast:
Some cleft with axes gasp'd, in life-blood drown'd,
And hilt-dissever'd fingers strew'd the ground,
The hand yet writhing from the fateful wound:
And oft from arm of happier vigour thrown,
The brains came rushing to the shattering stone.
They as wild beasts, surprized within the fold,
Raged with their wounds, and on each other roll'd
In darkness of that fated night; the rest
To Priam's palace cheer'd and cheering press'd.
There many a Greek by spears of Trojans bled;
They, as they might, with spears and falchions sped,
Caught up with hasty hand: their foes recline
As though they stagger'd with the weight of wine.
Meanwhile a light, by Grecian torches shed,
Its quivering blaze o'er all the city spread,
From many a lifted hand; and thus they know
Th' illumin'd face of either friend or foe.

Achilles' son, with battle-searching lance,
Cut short Polites in his bold advance:
From Pammon, Tisiphon, he reft the life,
And smote Agenor in the closing strife:
Round Priam's sons death's shadows hovering flew,
He ranged the courts, and whom he cross'd he slew.
His veins high-mounting with Achilles' blood,
He sought the king, and found him where he stood,