Broad-glitt'ring breast-plates, spears with pointed rays Mix in one stream, reflecting blaze on blaze : Thick beats the centre as the courfers bound, With splendour flame the fkies, and laugh the fields around. Full in the midft, high-tow'ring o'er the reft, 390 His limbs in arms divine, Achilles dreft ; Arms which the father of the fires bestow'd, Forg'd on th' eternal anvils of the God. Grief and revenge his furious heart infpire, His glowing eye-balls roll with living fire, He grinds his teeth, and furious with delay O'erlooks th' embattled hoft, and hopes the bloody day. The filver cuifhes firft his thighs infold; - 395 400 Then o'er his breast was brac'd the hollow gold; So to night-wand'ring failors, pale with fears, thefe books. My author is to anfwer for it, but it may be alledged in his excufe, that when it was the cuftom for every foldier to ferve in armour, and when those arms were of brais before the use of iron became common, these images of iuftre were lefs avoidable, and more neceffarily frequent in defcriptions of this nature. V. 391. Achilles arming himself, &c.] There is a won derful pomp in this defcription of Achilles arming himself; every reader, without being pointed to it, will fee the extreme grandeur of all these images; but what is particular, iɛ, in what a noble fcale they rife one above another, and how the bero is fet ftill in a stronger point of light than before; till he is at laft in a manner covered over with glories: He is at firft likened to the moon-light, then to the fames of a beacon, then to a comet, and laftly to the funitIf Which on the far-feen mountain blazing high, fhed. 415 The chief beholds himself with wond'ring eyes; His arms he poifes, and his notions tries; Buoy'd by fome inward force he feems to fwim, And feels a pinion lifting every limb. And now he shakes his great paternal spear, 420 Pond'rous and huge! which not a Greek could rear : From Pelion s cloudy top an afh entire Old Chiron fell'd, and fhap'd it for his fire; A fpear which ftern Achilles only wields, The death of heroes, and the dread of fields. “Automedon and Alcimus prepare Th' immortal courfers and the radiant car, (The filver traces fweeping at their fide) Their fiery mouths refplendent bridles ty'd, 425 The iv'ry-ftudded reins, return'd behind, 430 Way'd o'er their backs, and to the chariot join'd. All bright in heav'nly arms, above his squire 435 High High o'er the hoft, all terrible he stands, And thunders to his fteeds these dread commands. 440 Xanthus and Balius! of Podarges' strain, (Unless ye boat that heav'nly race in vain) Be fwift, be mindful of the load ye bear, And learn to make your master more your care: Thro' falling fquadrons bear my flaught'ring fword, Nor, as ye left Patroclus, leave your Lord. 445 The gen'rous. Xanthus, as the words he faid, "Seem'd fenfible of woe, and droop'd his head: Trembling he stood before the golden wain, And bow'd to duft the honours of his mane ; When strange to tell! (fo Jung will'd) he broke 450 Eternal filence, and portentous spoke. Achilles! V. 450. It is remarked, in excufe for this extravagant fiction of a horse fpeaking, that Homer was authorised herein by fable, tradition, and hiftory. Livy makes mention of two oxen that spoke on different occafions, and recites the fpeech of one, which was Roma, cave tibi. Pliny tells us, these animals were particularly gifted this way 7. 8. c. 45. Eft frequens in prodigiis prifcob.vem locutum. Befides Homer had prepared us for expecting fomething miraculous from thefe horfes of Achilles, by representing them to be immortal. We have feen them already fenfible, and weeping at the death of Patroclus: And we must add to all this, that a Goddess is concerned in working this wonder: It is Juno that does it. Oppian alludes to this in a beautiful paffage of his first book: Not having the original by me, I fhall quote (what I believe is no lefs beautiful) Mr. Fenton's tranflation of it. When frange to tell! (fo Juno will'd) he broke rum, Of all the prone creation, none display A friendlier fenfe of man's fuperior fway: Cyneg. lib. T. Achilles! yes! this day at least we bear Thy rage in fafety through the files of war: Nor ours the fault, but God decrees thy doom. 455 All were in vain-the fates thy death demand, Then ceas'd for ever, by the Furies ty'd, His fate-ful voice. Th' intrepid chief reply'd 465 With unabated rage-So let it be! Portents and prodigies are loft on me. Spondanus and Dacier fail not to bring up Balaam's Afs on this occafion, But methinks the commentators are at too much pains to discharge the poet from the imputation of extravagant fiction, by accounting for wonders of this kind: I' am afraid, that next to the extravagance of inventing them, is that of endeavouring to reconcile fuch actions to probability. Would not one general answer do better, to say once for all, that the above-cited authors lived in the age of wonders: The tafte of the world has been generally turned to the miraculous; wonders were what the people would have, and what not only the poets, but the priests gave them.. V. 464. Then ceas'd for ever, by the furies ty'd, His fate ful voice The poet had offended against probability if he had made Juno take away the voice; for Juno (which fignifies the air) is the cause of the voice. Befides, the Poet was willing to intimate that the privation of the voice is a thing fo dismal and melancholy, that none but the Furies can take upon them fo cruel an employment. Euftathius, |