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Near Ilus’ tomb, in order ranged around, The Trojan lines possess’d the rising ground: There wise Polydamas and Hector stood; Æneas, honour’d as a guardian god; Bold Polybus, Agenor the divine; The brother-warriors of Antenor’s line: With youthful Acamas, whose beauteous face And fair proportion match’d the ethereal race. Great Hector, cover’d with his spacious shield, Plies all the troops, and orders all the field. As the red star now shows his sanguine fires Through the dark clouds, and now in night retires, Thus through the ranks appear’d the godlike man, Plunged in the rear, or blazing in the van; While streamy sparkles, restless as he flies, Flash from his arms, as lightning from the skies. As sweating reapers in some wealthy field, Ranged in two bands, their crooked weapons wield, Bear down the furrows, till their labours meet; Thick fall the heapy harvests at their feet: So Greece and Troy the field of war divide, And falling ranks are strow’d on every side. None stoop’d a thought to base inglorious flight;[221] But horse to horse, and man to man they fight, Not rabid wolves more fierce contest their prey; Each wounds, each bleeds, but none resign the day. Discord with joy the scene of death descries, And drinks large slaughter at her sanguine eyes: Discord alone, of all the immortal train, Swells the red horrors of this direful plain: The gods in peace their golden mansions fill, Ranged in bright order on the Olympian hill: But general murmurs told their griefs above, And each accused the partial will of Jove. Meanwhile apart, superior, and alone, The eternal Monarch, on his awful throne, Wrapt in the blaze of boundless glory sate; And fix’d, fulfill’d the just decrees of fate. On earth he turn’d his all-considering eyes, And mark’d the spot where Ilion’s towers arise; The sea with ships, the fields with armies spread, The victor’s rage, the dying, and the dead.

Even if they were to leave Europe and inhabit the deserts of the new world, yet one of the first results of those sympathies for which the dæmon thirsted would be children, and a race of devils would be propagated upon the earth who might make the very existence of the species of man a condition precarious and full of terror. Had I right, for my own benefit, to inflict this curse upon everlasting generations? I had before been moved by the sophisms of the being I had created; I had been struck senseless by his fiendish threats; but now, for the first time, the wickedness of my promise burst upon me; I shuddered to think that future ages might curse me as their pest, whose selfishness had not hesitated to buy its own peace at the price, perhaps, of the existence of the whole human race.

Now the night came on stormy and very dark, for there was no moon. It poured without ceasing, and the wind blew strong from the West, which is a wet quarter, so Ulysses thought he would see whether Eumaeus, in the excellent care he took of him, would take off his own cloak and give it him, or make one of his men give him one. “Listen to me,” said he, “Eumaeus and the rest of you; when I have said a prayer I will tell you something. It is the wine that makes me talk in this way; wine will make even a wise man fall to singing; it will make him chuckle and dance and say many a word that he had better leave unspoken; still, as I have begun, I will go on. Would that I were still young and strong as when we got up an ambuscade before Troy. Menelaus and Ulysses were the leaders, but I was in command also, for the other two would have it so. When we had come up to the wall of the city we crouched down beneath our armour and lay there under cover of the reeds and thick brushwood that grew about the swamp. It came on to freeze with a North wind blowing; the snow fell small and fine like hoar frost, and our shields were coated thick with rime. The others had all got cloaks and shirts, and slept comfortably enough with their shields about their shoulders, but I had carelessly left my cloak behind me, not thinking that I should be too cold, and had gone off in nothing but my shirt and shield. When the night was two-thirds through and the stars had shifted their places, I nudged Ulysses who was close to me with my elbow, and he at once gave me his ear.

“So I have murdered Sibyl Vane,” said Dorian Gray, half to himself, “murdered her as surely as if I had cut her little throat with a knife. Yet the roses are not less lovely for all that. The birds sing just as happily in my garden. And to-night I am to dine with you, and then go on to the opera, and sup somewhere, I suppose, afterwards. How extraordinarily dramatic life is! If I had read all this in a book, Harry, I think I would have wept over it. Somehow, now that it has happened actually, and to me, it seems far too wonderful for tears. Here is the first passionate love-letter I have ever written in my life. Strange, that my first passionate love-letter should have been addressed to a dead girl. Can they feel, I wonder, those white silent people we call the dead? Sibyl! Can she feel, or know, or listen? Oh, Harry, how I loved her once! It seems years ago to me now. She was everything to me. Then came that dreadful night—was it really only last night?—when she played so badly, and my heart almost broke. She explained it all to me. It was terribly pathetic. But I was not moved a bit. I thought her shallow. Suddenly something happened that made me afraid. I can’t tell you what it was, but it was terrible. I said I would go back to her. I felt I had done wrong. And now she is dead. My God! My God! Harry, what shall I do? You don’t know the danger I am in, and there is nothing to keep me straight. She would have done that for me. She had no right to kill herself. It was selfish of her.”

“If I,” said Mr. Collins, “were so fortunate as to be able to sing, I should have great pleasure, I am sure, in obliging the company with an air; for I consider music as a very innocent diversion, and perfectly compatible with the profession of a clergyman. I do not mean, however, to assert that we can be justified in devoting too much of our time to music, for there are certainly other things to be attended to. The rector of a parish has much to do. In the first place, he must make such an agreement for tithes as may be beneficial to himself and not offensive to his patron. He must write his own sermons; and the time that remains will not be too much for his parish duties, and the care and improvement of his dwelling, which he cannot be excused from making as comfortable as possible. And I do not think it of light importance that he should have attentive and conciliatory manners towards everybody, especially towards those to whom he owes his preferment. I cannot acquit him of that duty; nor could I think well of the man who should omit an occasion of testifying his respect towards anybody connected with the family.” And with a bow to Mr. Darcy, he concluded his speech, which had been spoken so loud as to be heard by half the room. Many stared--many smiled; but no one looked more amused than Mr. Bennet himself, while his wife seriously commended Mr. Collins for having spoken so sensibly, and observed, in a half-whisper to Lady Lucas, that he was a remarkably clever, good kind of young man.