The Battle at the Grecian Wall
Division of the Trojan army, by advice of Polydamas, into five bodies, to storm the Greek entrenchments—A breach in the wall made by Sarpedon—One of the gates beaten open by Hector with a stone—His entrance at the head of his troops.
Thus in the camp Menoetius’ valiant son Tended Eurypylus, and dressed his wounds; While yet in mingled throngs the warriors fought— Trojans and Greeks. Nor longer was the trench A barrier for the Greeks, nor the broad wall Which they had built above it to defend Their fleet; for all around it they had drawn The trench, yet not with chosen hecatombs Paid to the gods, that so it might protect The galleys and the heaps of spoil they held. Without the favor of the gods it rose, And therefore was not long to stand entire. As long as Hector lived, and Peleus’ son Was angered, and King Priam’s city yet Was not o’erthrown, so long the massive wall Built by the Greeks stood firm. But when at length The bravest of the Trojans had been slain, And many of the Greeks were dead—though still Others survived—and when in the tenth year The city of Priam fell, and in their ships The Greeks went back to their beloved land, Then did Apollo and the god of sea Consult together to destroy the wall By turning on it the resistless might Of rivers, all that from the Idaean heights Flow to the ocean—Rhesus, Granicus, Heptaporus, Caresus, Rhodius, Aesepus, and Scamander’s hallowed stream, And Simoïs, in whose bed lay many shields And helms and bodies of slain demigods. Phoebus Apollo turned the mouths of these All toward one spot; nine days against the wall He bade their currents rush, while Jupiter Poured constant rain, that floods might overwhelm The rampart; and the god who shakes the earth, Wielding his trident, led