Lives of the English Poets : Prior, Congreve, Blackmore, Pope

And heaped the camp with millions of the dead:
The King of men the sacred sire defied,
And for the King’s offence the people died.

For Chryses sought with costly gifts to gain
His captive daughter from the Victor’s chain;
Suppliant the venerable father stands,
Apollo’s awful ensigns grace his hands,
By these he begs, and, lowly bending down,
Extends the sceptre and the laurel crown.

For Chryses sought by presents to regain
costly gifts to gain
His captive daughter from the Victor’s chain;
Suppliant the venerable father stands,
Apollo’s awful ensigns graced his hands.
By these he begs, and, lowly bending down
The golden sceptre and the laurel crown,
Presents the sceptre
For these as ensigns of his god he bare,
The god who sends his golden shaft afar;
Then low on earth the venerable man,
Suppliant before the brother kings began.

He sued to all, but chief implored for grace,
The brother kings of Atreus’ royal race;
Ye kings and warriors, may your vows be crowned,
And Troy’s proud walls lie level with the ground;
May Jove restore you, when your toils are o’er,
Safe to the pleasures of your native shore.

To all he sued, but chief implored for grace
The brother kings of Atreus’ royal race.
Ye sons of Atreus, may your vows be crowned,
kings and warriors
Your labours, by the gods be all your labours crowned;
So may the gods your arms with conquest bless,
And Troy’s proud walls lie level with the ground;
Till      laid
And crown your labours with desired success;
May Jove restore you when your toils are o’er
Safe to the pleasures of your native shore.

But, oh! relieve a wretched parent’s pain,
And give Chryses to these arms again;
If mercy fail, yet let my present move,
And dread avenging Phœbus, son of Jove.

But, oh! relieve a hapless parent’s pain,
And give my daughter to these arms again;
Receive my gifts, if mercy fails, yet let my present move,
And fear the god who deals his darts around,
avenging Phœbus, son of Jove.

The Greeks, in shouts, their joint assent declare,
The priest to reverence, and release the fair:
Not so Atrides; he, with kingly pride,
Repulsed the sacred sire, and thus replied.

He said, the Greeks their joint assent declare,
The father said, the generous Greeks relent,
To accept the ransom, and restore the fair:
Revere the priest, and speak their joint assent;
Not so the tyrant; he, with kingly pride,
Atrides,
Repulsed the sacred sire, and thus replied
[Not so the tyrant. Dryden.]

Of these lines, and of the whole first book, I am told that there was yet a former copy, more varied, and more deformed with interlineations.

The beginning of the second book varies very little from the printed page, and is therefore set down without any parallel.  The few slight differences do not require to be elaborately displayed.

Now pleasing sleep had sealed each mortal eye:
Stretched in the tents the Grecian leaders lie;
The Immortals slumbered on their thrones above,
All but the ever-wakeful eye of Jove.
To honour Thetis’ son he bends his care,
And plunge the Greeks in all the woes of war.
Then bids an empty phantom rise to sight,
And thus commands the vision of the night: directs
Fly hence, delusive dream, and, light as air,
To Agamemnon’s royal tent repair;
Bid him in arms draw forth the embattled train,
March all his legions to the dusty plain.
Now tell the King ’tis given him to destroy
Declare even now
The lofty walls of wide-extended Troy; towers
For now no more the gods with fate contend;
At Juno’s suit the heavenly factions end.
Destruction hovers o’er yon devoted wall, hangs
And nodding Ilion waits the impending fall.

Invocation to the catalogue of ships.

Say, virgins, seated round the throne divine,
All-knowing goddesses! immortal nine!
Since earth’s wide regions, heaven’s unmeasured height,
And hell’s abyss, hide nothing from your sight
(We, wretched mortals! lost in doubts below,
But guess by rumour, and but boast we know),