words in which the poet sums up Hector's creed in such matters have passed into a proverb with patriots of every age and nation—
"The best of omens is our country's cause."
Sarpedon the Lycian, who claims none less than Jupiter for his father, has taken chief command of the Trojan auxiliaries, and, gallantly seconded by his countryman Glaucus, sweeps "like a black storm" on the tower where Mnestheus, the Athenian, commands, and is like to have carried it, when Glaucus falls wounded by an arrow from Teucer. The slaughter is terrible on both sides, and the ditch and palisade are red with blood. "The balance of the fight hangs even;" until at last the Trojan prince lifts a huge fragment of rock, and heaves it at the wooden gates which bar the entrance at his point of attack.
"This way and that the severed portals flew
Before the crashing missile; dark as night
His low'ring brow, great Hector sprang within;
Bright flashed the brazen armour on his breast,
As through the gates, two javelins in his hand,
He sprang; the gods except, no power might meet
That onset; blazed his eyes with lurid fire.
Then to the Trojans, turning to the throng,
He called aloud to scale the lofty wall;
They heard, and straight obeyed; some scaled the wall;
Some through the strong-built gates continuous poured;
While in confusion irretrievable
Fled to their ships the panic-stricken Greeks." (D.)
Neptune has been watching the fight from the wooded heights of Samothrace, and sees the imminent peril of his friends. "In four mighty strides"—the woods and mountains trembling beneath his feet—he reaches the bay of Œge, in Achaia, where far in the
