rnal city, O Pergamum! O ancient
Priam, thy day is past! Thou shalt be badly, badly beaten--
out of four hundred golden sovereigns. Ah yes, these tablets
here, (_showing them_) sealed and signed, which I bear, are
no tablets, but a horse sent by the Greeks--a wooden horse.[25]

tum quae his sunt scriptae litterae, hoc in equo insunt milites 941
armati atque animati probe. ita res successit mi usque adhuc.
atque hic equos non in arcem, verum in arcam faciet impetum;
exitium excidium exlecebra fiet hic equos hodie auro senis.

Moreover, the words herein inscribed are the soldiers within
this horse, soldiers armed to the teeth and full of fight.
Thus has my scheme progressed up till now. Aye, and this
horse will proceed to assail not a stronghold, but a
strongbox. The wreck, ruin, and rape of the old man's
gold will this horse prove to-day.

nostro seni huic stolido, ei profecto nomen facio ego Ilio;
miles Menelaust, ego Agamemno, idem Vlixes Lartius,
Mnesilochust Alexander, qui erit exitio rei patriae suae;
is Helenam avexit, cuia causa nunc facio obsidium Ilio.

This silly old man of ours--I dub him Ilium, I certainly
do. The Captain is Menelaus, I Agamemnon: I am likewise
Laertian Ulysses: Mnesilochus is Alexander,[M] who will be
the destruction of his native city; he is the one that
carried off Helen, on account of whom I now besiege Ilium.

[Footnote M: Paris]

nam illi itidem Vlixem audivi, ut ego sum,
fuisse et audacem et malum:
in dolis ego prensus sum,
ille mendicans paene inventus interiit, 950
dum ibi exquirit fata Iliorum; adsimiliter mi hodie optigit.
vinctus sum. sed dolis me exemi: item se ille servavit dolis.

At that Ilium Ulysses, so they say, was a bold, bad man,
just as I am now. I was caught in my wiles; he was found
begging and almost perished, while he was seeking to learn
there the destinies of the Ilians. What befell me to-day
was quite similar. I was bound, but released myself by
wiles: by wiles he likewise saved himself.

Ilio tria fuisse audivi fata quae illi forent exitio:
signum ex arce si periisset; alterum etiamst Troili mors;
tertium, cum portae Phrygiae limen superum scinderetur:
paria item tria eis tribus sunt fata nostro huic Ilio.

In the case of that Ilium, so they say