"Each shield-sun streams a day of triumph forth."
Far in advance of the returning battalions speeds Uriel, "Angel with swiftest wing," bearing the message of victory. With incredible velocity—for he is winged with good news—he flashes through the air, in his "aery wheels" exultingly waving his "flaming, keen, two-edged sword." He has reached the serene altitude of Heaven. He has gained the farthest wall. He is at hand.
Rafael is full of eagerness to hear the details of the fight, the particulars of "this the first campaign in Heaven." Uriel then, "with sequence just," gives a vivid account of the preparations for battle, beginning with the moment when Gabriel first informed Michael of the defection of the Stadtholder.
He tells how the countless loyal legions, at their chief's command, deploy themselves in battle line until they form in serried rank
"One firm
Trilateral host that like a triangle
Thrust out its edges sharp upon the eye."
Michael, the Field-marshal, stands in the heart of this triangle, towering high above his fellows, the personification of judgment,
"With the glow
Of lurid lightnings in his lifted hand."
Splendid is the picture of the infernal host; their squadrons,
"Battalion on battalion, riders pale
On dim mysterious chargers,"
advance in the form of a crescent moon. Belzebub and Belial command the two horns of this formidable array,