Helen of Troy

Helen of Troy, by Andrew Lang

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Title: Helen of Troy

Author: Andrew Lang

Release Date: October 15, 2007 [eBook #3229]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HELEN OF TROY***

Transcribed from the 1882 George Bell and Sons edition by David Price, email [email protected]

HELEN OF TROY

by

A. LANG

LONDON: GEORGE BELL AND SONS

YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN

1882

chiswick press:—charles whittingham and co., tooks court,

chancery lane.

Le joyeulx temps passé souloit estre occasion que je faisoie de plaisants diz et gracieuses chançonnetes et ballades.  Mais je me suis mis à faire cette traittié d’affliction contre ma droite nature . . . et suis content de l’avoir prinse, car mes douleurs me semblent en estre allegées.—Le Romant de Troilus.

To all old Friends; to all who dwell

   Where Avon dhu and Avon gel

   Down to the western waters flow

Through valleys dear from long ago;

To all who hear the whisper’d spell

Of Ken; and Tweed like music swell

Hard by the Land Debatable,

   Or gleaming Shannon seaward go,—

      To all old Friends!

To all that yet remember well

What secrets Isis had to tell,

   How lazy Cherwell loiter’d slow

   Sweet aisles of blossom’d May below—

Whate’er befall, whate’er befell,

      To all old Friends.

BOOK I—THE COMING OF PARIS

Of the coming of Paris to the house of Menelaus, King of Lacedaemon, and of the tale Paris told concerning his past life.

I.

All day within the palace of the King

   In Lacedaemon, was there revelry,

Since Menelaus with the dawn did spring

   Forth from his carven couch, and, climbing high

   The tower of outlook, gazed along the dry

White road that runs to Pylos through the plain,

   And mark’d thin clouds of dust against the sky,

And gleaming bronze, and robes of purple stain.

II.

Then cried he to his serving men, and all

   Obey’d him, and their labour did not spare,

And women set out tables through the hall,

   Light polish’d tables, with the linen fair.

   And water from the well did others bear,

And the good house-wife busily brought forth

   Meats from her store, and stinted not the rare

Wine from Ismarian vineyards of the North.

III.

The men drave up a heifer from the field

   For sacrifice, and sheath’d her horns with gold;

And strong Boethous the axe did wield

   And smote her; on the fruitful earth she roll’d,

   And they her limbs divided; fold on fold

They laid the fat, and cast upon the fire

   The barley grain.  Such rites were wrought of old

When all was order’d as the Gods desire.

IV.

And now the chariots came beneath the trees

   Hard by the palace portals, in the shade,

And Menelaus knew King Diocles

   Of Pherae, sprung of an unhappy maid

   Whom the great Elian River God betray’d

In the still watches of a summer night,

   When by his deep green water-course she stray’d

And lean’d to pluck his water-lilies white.

V.

Besides King Diocles there sat a man

   Of all men mortal sure the fairest far,

For o’er his purple robe Sidonian

   His yellow hair shone brighter than the star

   Of the long golden locks that bodeth war;

His face was like the sunshine, and his blue

   Glad eyes no sorrow had the spell to mar

Were clear as skies the storm hath thunder’d through.

VI.

Then Menelaus spake unto his folk,

   And eager at his word they ran amain,

And loosed the sweating horses from the yoke,

   And cast before them spelt, and barley grain.

   And lean’d the polish’d car, with golden rein,

Against the shining spaces of the wall;

   And called the sea-rovers who follow’d fain

Within the pillar’d fore-courts of the hall.

VII.

The stranger-prince was follow’d by a band

   Of men, all clad like rovers of the sea,

And brown’d were they as is the desert sand,

   Loud in their mirth, and of their bearing free;

   And gifts they bore, from the deep treasury

And forests of some far-off Eastern lord,

   Vases of gold, and bronze, and ivory,

That might the Pythian fane have over-stored.

VIII.

Now when the King had greeted Diocles

   And him that seem’d his guest, the twain were led

To the dim polish’d baths, where, for their ease,

   Cool water o’er their lustrous limbs was shed;

   With oil anointed was each goodly head

By Asteris and Phylo fair of face;

   Next, like two gods for loveliness, they sped

To Menelaus in the banquet-place.

IX.

There were they seated at the King’s right hand,

   And maidens bare them bread, and meat, and wine,

Within that fair hall of the Argive land

   Whose doors and roof with gold and silver shine

   As doth the dwelling-place of Zeus divine.

And Helen came from forth her fragrant bower

   The fairest lady of immortal line,

Like morning, when the rosy dawn doth flower.

X.

Adraste set for her a shining chair,

   Well-wrought of cedar-wood and ivory;

And beautiful Alcippe led the fair,

   The well-beloved child, Hermione,—

   A little maiden of long summers three—

Her star-like head on Helen’s breast she laid,

   And peep’d out at the strangers wistfully

As is the wont of children half afraid.

XI.

Now when desire of meat and drink was done,

   And ended was the joy of minstrelsy,

Queen Helen spake, beholding how the sun

   Within the heaven of bronze was riding high:

   "Truly, my friends, methinks the hour is nigh

When men may crave to know what need doth bring

   To Lacedaemon, o’er wet ways and dry,

This prince that bears the sceptre of a king?

XII.

"Yea, or perchance a God is he, for still

   The great Gods wander on our mortal ways,

And watch their altars upon mead or hill

   And taste our sacrifice, and hear our lays,

   And now, perchance, will heed if any prays,

And now will vex us with unkind control,

   But anywise must man live out his days,

For Fate hath given him an enduring soul.

XIII.

"Then tell us, prithee, all that may be told,

   And if thou art a mortal, joy be thine!

And if thou art a God, then rich with gold

   Thine altar in our palace court shall shine,

   With roses garlanded and wet with wine,

And we shall praise thee with unceasing breath;

   Ah, then be gentle as thou art divine,

And bring not on us baneful Love or Death!"

XIV.

Then spake the stranger,—as when to a maid

   A young man speaks, his voice was soft and low,—

"Alas, no God am I; be not afraid,

   For even now the nodding daisies grow

   Whose seed above my grassy cairn shall blow,

When I am nothing but a drift of white

   Dust in a cruse of gold; and nothing know

But darkness, and immeasurable Night.

XV.

"The dawn, or noon, or twilight, draweth near

   When one shall smite me on the bridge of war,

Or with the ruthless sword, or with the spear,

   Or with the bitter arrow flying far.

   But as a man’s heart, so his good days are,

That Zeus, the Lord of Thunder, giveth him,

   Wherefore I follow Fortune, like a star,

Whate’er may wait me in the distance dim.

XVI.

"Now all men call me Paris, Priam’s son,

   Who widely rules a peaceful folk and still.

Nay, though ye dwell afar off, there is none

   But hears of Ilios on the windy hill,

   And of the plain that the two rivers fill

With murmuring sweet streams the whole year long,

   And walls the Gods have wrought with wondrous skill

Where cometh never man to do us wrong.

XVII.

"Wherefore I sail’d not here for help in war,

   Though well the Argives in such need can aid.

The force that comes on me is other far;

   One that on all men comes: I seek the maid

   Whom golden Aphrodite shall persuade

To lay her hand in mine, and follow me,

   To my white halls within the