“O Father Jove! Thou then art wholly false. I did not look to see the men of Greece Stand thus before our might and our strong arms; Yet they, like pliant-bodied wasps or bees, That build their cells beside the rocky way, And quit not their abode, but, waiting there The hunter, combat for their young⁠—so these, Although but two, withdraw not from the gates, Nor will, till they be slain or seized alive.”

He spake; but moved not thus the will of Jove, Who planned to give the glory of the day To Hector. Meanwhile, at the other gates Fought other warriors⁠—but ’twere hard for me, Were I a god, to tell of all their deeds; For round the wall on every side there raged, Fierce as consuming fire, a storm of stones. The Greeks, in bitter anguish, yet constrained, Fought for their fleet; and sorrowful were all The gods who in the battle favored Greece.