With his brass-heavy club at its roots he smote, till he loosed earth’s grip.
Low down did he grasp the stem about with either hand,
Putting trust in his might: with shoulder against it thrust did he stand
With feet wide set. From the ground, deep-rooted albeit it grew,
Hath his grip upheaved it with all the clods that clave thereto. {1200}
And as when unawares the mast of a ship, in the very hour
When Orion’s storm-fraught setting is working in baleful power,
Is struck from on high by a tempest’s swiftly-swooping squall,
And with snapped stays rent from its box, and the wedges therewithal,
Even so he upwrenched that tree; and he gathered up arrows and bow,