"Too daring prince! ah, whither dost thou run! Ah, too forgetful of thy wife and son!
And think'st thou not how wretched we shall be,
A widow I, an helpless orphan he !
For sure such courage length of life denies,
And thou must fall, thy virtue's sacrifice.
Greece in her single heroes strove in vain;
Now hosts oppose thee, and thou must be slain !
Oh, grant me, gods! ere Hector meets his doom,
All I can ask of Heaven, an early tomb!
So shall my days in one sad tenor run,
And end with sorrows as they first begun.
No parent now remains, my griefs to share,
No father's aid, no mother's tender care.
The fierce Achilles wrapt our walls in fire,
Laid Thebe waste, and slew my warlike sire!
His fate compassion in the victor bred;
Stern as he was, he yet revered the dead,
His radiant arms preserved from hostile spoil,
And laid him decent on the funeral pile;
Then raised a mountain where his bones were burn'd,
The mountain nymphs the rural tomb adorn’d.
Jove's sylvan daughters bade their elms bestow
A barren shade, and in his honour grow.
By the same arm my seven brave brothers fell,
In one sad day beheld the gates of hell;
While the fat herds and snowy flocks they fed,
Amid their fields the hapless heroes bled!
My mother lived to bear the victor's bands,
The queen of Hippoplacia's sylvan lands:
Redeem'd too late, she scarce beheld again
Her pleasing empire and her native plain,
When ah! opprest by life-consuming woe,
She fell a victim to Diana's bow.
Yet while my Hector still survives, I see
My father, mother, brethren, all, in thee.
Alas! my parents, brothers, kindred, all,
Once more will perish if my Hector fall.
Thy wife, thy infant, in thy danger share:
Oh, prove a husband's and a father's care!
That quarter most the skilful Greeks annoy,
Where yon wild fig-trees join the wall of Troy:
Thou, from this tower defend the important post
There Agamemnon points his dreadful host,
That pass Tydides, Ajax, strive to gain,
And there the vengeful Spartan fires his train.
Thrice our bold foes the fierce attack had given,
Or led by hopes, or dictated from Heaven.
Let others in the field their arm employ,
But stay my Hector here, and guard his Troy."
The chief replied: "That post shall be my care,
Nor that alone, but all the works of war.
How would the sons of Troy, in arms renown'd,
And Troy's proud dames, whose garments sweep the ground,
Attaint the lustre of my former name,
Should Hector basely quit the field of fame!
My early youth was bred to martial pains,
My soul impels me to the embattled plains;
Let me be foremost to defend the throne,
And guard my father's glories, and my own.
"Yet come it will, the day decreed by fates;
(How my heart trembles while my tongue relates!)
The day when thou, imperial Troy! must bend,
And see thy warriors fall, thy glories end.
And yet no dire presage so wounds my mind,
My mother's death, the ruin of my kind,
Not Priam's hoary hairs defiled 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!
To bear the victor's hard commands, or bring
The weight of waters from Hyperia's spring.
There, while you groan beneath the load of life,
They cry, 'Behold the mighty Hector's wife!"
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 lay cold before that dreadful day,
Prest with a load of monumental clay!
Thy Hector, wrapt in everlasting sleep,
Shall neither hear thee sigh nor see thee weep."
Thus having spoke, the illustrious chief of Troy,
Stretch'd his fond arms to clasp his lovely boy.
The babe clung crying to his nurse's breast,
Scared at the dazzling helm, and nodding crest.
With secret pleasure each fond parent smiled,
And Hector hasten'd to relieve his child;
The glittering terrors from his brows unbound,
And placed the beaming helmet on the ground;
Then kiss'd the child, and lifting high in air,
Thus to the gods preferr'd a father's prayer.
"O Thou, whose glory fills the ethereal throne, And all ye deathless powers! 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 deserved acclaim, And say, 'This chief transcends his father's fame;' While pleased amidst the general shouts of Troy, His mother's conscious heart o'erflows with joy."
He spoke, and fondly gazing on her charms,
Restored 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 chastised by fear,
She mingled with a smile a tender tear.
The soften'd chief with kind compassion view'd,
And dry'd the falling drops, and thus pursued.
"Andromache! my soul's far better part,
Why with untimely sorrows heaves thy heart?
No hostile hand can antedate my doom,
Till fate condemns me to the silent tomb.
Fix'd is the term to all the race of earth,
And such the hard condition of our birth;
No force can then resist, no flight can save;
All sink alike, the fearful and the brave.
No more-but hasten to thy tasks at home,
There guide the spindle and direct the loom.
Me glory summons to the martial scene;
The field of combat is the sphere for men.
Where heroes war, the foremost place I claim,
The first in danger, as the first in fame."
Thus having said, the glorious chief resumes
His towery helmet, black with shading plumes;
His princess parts with a prophetic sigh,
Unwilling parts, and oft reverts her eye,
That stream'd at every look: then moving slow,
Sought her own palace and indulged her woe.
There, while her tears deplored the godlike man,
Through all her train the soft infection ran;
The pious maids their mingled sorrows shed,
And mourn'd the living Hector, as the dead."
THOMAS TICKELL was born 1686, and died 1740. He was much patronised by Addison, but of his poems the present ballad is infinitely the best, both in pathos and delicacy.
OF Leinster, famed for maidens fair,
Bright Lucy was the grace,
Nor e'er did Liffy's limpid stream
Reflect so sweet a face;
Till luckless love, and pining care,
Impair'd her rosy hue,
Her coral lips, and damask cheeks,
And eyes of glossy blue.
Oh! have you seen a lily pale
When beating rains descend?
So droop'd the slow-consuming maid,
Her life now near its end.
By Lucy warn'd, of flattering swains
Take heed, ye casy fair!
Of vengeance due to broken vows,
Ye perjured swains! beware.
Three times all in the dead of night
A bell was heard to ring,
And shrieking, at her window thrice
The raven flapp'd his wing.
Too well the love-lorn maiden knew
The solemn boding sound,
And thus in dying words bespoke
The virgins weeping round:
"I hear a voice you cannot hear,
Which says I must not stay;
I see a hand you cannot see,
Which beckons me away.
"By a false heart and broken vows
In early youth I die;
Was I to blame because his bride
Was thrice as rich as I?
"Ah, Colin! give not her thy vows,
Vows due to me alone;
Nor thou, fond maid! receive his kiss,
Nor think him all thy own.
"To-morrow in the church to wed,
Impatient both prepare;
But know, fond maid! and know, false man! That Lucy will be there.
"Then bear my corse, my comrades! bear This bridegroom blithe to meet;
He in his wedding trim so gay,
I in my winding sheet."
She spoke; she died. Her corpse was borne
The bridegroom blithe to meet;
He in his wedding trim so gay,
She in her winding sheet.
Then what were perjured Colin's thoughts?
How were these nuptials kept?
The bridesmen flocked round Lucy dead,
And all the village wept.
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