hope to introduce our readers more fully hereafter. Euripides, in his 'Phœnissæ,' adopts the very same machinery; and Tasso has also imitated the scene in his 'Jerusalem Delivered'[1] where he brings Erminia on the walls, pointing out to King Aladine the persons of the most renowned of the besieging knights.
The interruption is as little satisfactory to Priam as to the reader. A herald summons the king of Troy to a conference in the mid-space between the city walls and the enemy's leaguer, in order to ratify the armistice, while Paris and Menelaus decide their quarrel in single combat. The old man mounts his chariot, "shuddering," as foreboding the defeat and death of his son. Agamemnon and Ulysses on the one side, Priam and Antenor on the other, duly slay the sacrificial lambs, and make joint appeal to Jupiter, the Avenger of oaths, pouring the red wine upon the earth with solemn imprecation, that so may flow forth the heart's blood of him who on either part shall break the truce. And the god listens as before, but does not accept the appeal. Priam withdraws, for he cannot bear to be a spectator of his son's peril. Hector and Ulysses, precisely in the fashion of the marshals in the tournaments of chivalry, measure out the lists; the rest of the Greeks lie down on the ground beside their horses and chariots, while the lots are cast which shall first throw the spear. The chance falls to Paris. He throws, and strikes full and fair in the centre of Menelaus' round shield. But the seasoned bull's hide turns the point, and it does not penetrate. Next comes the turn of Menelaus. Paris has ventured no appeal to heaven; but the Greek king lifts Iris voice in prayer to Jupiter for vengeance on
- ↑ Book iii. st. 12.
