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(From The Induction)
BUT Troy, alas, methought, above them all, | |
| It made mine eyes in very tears consume: | |
| When I beheld the woful word befall, | |
| That by the wrathful will of gods was come; | |
| And Jove’s unmoved sentence and foredoom | 5 |
| On Priam king, and on his town so bent. | |
| I could not lin but I must there lament. | |
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| And that the more, sith destiny was so stern | |
| As, force perforce, there might no force avail, | |
| But she must fall; and by her fall we learn | 10 |
| That cities, towers, wealth, world, and all shall quail: | |
| No manhood might, nor nothing might prevail; | |
| All were there prest full many a prince, and peer, | |
| And many a knight that sold his death full dear. | |
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| Not worthy Hector, worthiest of them all, | 15 |
| Her hope, her joy, his force is now for naught: | |
| O Troy, Troy, Troy, there is no boot but bale, | |
| The hugy horse within thy walls is brought; | |
| Thy turrets fall, thy knights, that whilom fought | |
| In arms amid the field, are slain in bed, | 20 |
| Thy gods defiled, and all thy honor dead. | |
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| The flames upspring, and cruelly they creep | |
| From wall to roof, till all to cinders waste: | |
| Some fire the houses where the wretches sleep, | |
| Some rush in here, some run in there as fast; | 25 |
| In everywhere or sword or fire they taste: | |
| The walls are torn, the towers whirled to the ground; | |
| There is no mischief but may there be found. | |
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| Cassandra yet there saw I how they haled | |
| From Pallas’ house, with spercled tress undone, | 30 |
| Her wrists fast bound, and with Greeks’ rout empaled: | |
| And Priam eke, in vain how he did run | |
| To arms, whom Pyrrhus with despite hath done | |
| To cruel death, and bathed him in the baign | |
| Of his son’s blood, before the altar slain. | 35 |
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| But how can I describe the doleful sight, | |
| That in the shield so lively fair did shine? | |
| Sith in this world I think was never wight | |
| Could have set forth the half, not half so fine: | |
| I can no more, but tell how there is seen | 40 |
| Fair Ilium fall in burning red gledes down, | |
| And, from the soil, great Troy, Neptunus’ town. | |
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