And the young men straightway made ready the meat for the stricken in years,—
The last ordained for the Harpies’ spoil,—and anigh to him stood
Those twain, to smite with the sword those fiends when they swooped on the food.
Then first his hands on the meats did he lay, that grey-haired sire:—
But sudden as bitter blasts, or as flashes of levin-fire,
Unawares from the clouds they had darted, and swooping adown they yelled
Their awful scream, fierce-eager for prey; but the heroes beheld,
And shouted amidst of their onrush. The fiends at the challenge of war {270}
Swift ravined the meats from the boards, and over the sea afar
Soared they away, but there did their foul sick stench remain.