with power they wrong'd." To him the monarch: "Just is thy decree, Thy words give joy, and wisdom breathes in thee. Each due atonement gladly I prepare; And heaven regard me as I justly swear! Here then awhile let Greece assembled stay, Nor great Achilles grudge this short delay. Till from the fleet our presents be convey'd, And Jove attesting, the firm compact made. A train of noble youths the charge shall bear; These to select, Ulysses, be thy care: In order rank'd let all our gifts appear, And the fair train of captives close the rear: Talthybius shall the victim boar convey, Sacred to Jove, and yon bright orb of day." "For this (the stern Ćacides replies) Some less important season may suffice, When the stern fury of the war is o'er, And wrath, extinguish'd, burns my breast no more. By Hector slain, their faces to the sky, All grim with gaping wounds, our heroes lie: Those call to war! and might my voice incite, Now, now, this instant, shall commence the fight: Then, when the day's complete, let generous bowls, And copious banquets, glad your weary souls. Let not my palate know the taste of food, Till my insatiate rage be cloy'd with blood: Pale lies my friend, with wounds disfigured o'er, And his cold feet are pointed to the door. Revenge is all my soul! no meaner care, Interest, or thought, has room to harbour there; Destruction be my feast, and mortal wounds, And scenes of blood, and agonizing sounds." "O first of Greeks, (Ulysses thus rejoin'd,) The best and bravest of the warrior kind! Thy praise it is in dreadful camps to shine, But old experience and calm wisdom mine. Then hear my counsel, and to reason yield, The bravest soon are satiate of the field; Though vast the heaps that strow the crimson plain, The bloody harvest brings but little gain: The scale of conquest ever wavering lies, Great Jove but turns it, and the victor dies! The great, the bold, by thousands d