Page:Masterpieces of Greek Literature (1902).djvu/45

And, rolling in the dust, entreated all
Who stood around him, calling them by name: 510
"Refrain, my friends, though kind be your intent.
Let me go forth alone, and at the fleet
Of Greece will I entreat this man of blood
And violence. He may perchance be moved
With reverence for my age, and pity me 515
In my gray hairs; for such a one as I
Is Peleus, his own father, by whose care
This Greek was reared to be a scourge to Troy,
And, more than all, a cause of grief to me,
So many sons of mine in life's fresh prime 520
Have fallen by his hand. I mourn for them,
But not with such keen anguish as I mourn
For Hector. Sorrow for his death will bring
My soul to Hades. Would that he had died
Here in my arms! this solace had been ours, 525
His most unhappy mother and myself
Had stooped to shed these tears upon his bier."
He spake, and wept, and all the citizens
Wept with him. Hecuba among the dames
Took up the lamentation and began: 530
"Why do I live, my son, when thou art dead,
And I so wretched?—thou who wert my boast
Ever, by night and day, where'er I went.
And whom the Trojan men and matrons called
Their bulwark, honoring thee as if thou wert 535
A god. They glory in thy might no more,
Since fate and death have overtaken thee."
Weeping she spake. Meantime Andromache
Had heard no tidings of her husband yet.
No messenger had even come to say 540
That he was still without the gates. She sat
In a recess of those magnificent halls,