The Iliad

Translated by William Cullen Bryant.

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Preface

Having now nearly completed my translation of the Iliad of Homer, I sit down to write the Preface, that it may be prefixed to the first volume. To this task of translation, which I began in 1865, I afterwards gave myself the more willingly because it helped in some measure to divert my mind from a great domestic sorrow. I am not sure that, when it shall be concluded, it may not cost me some regret to part with so interesting a companion as the old Greek poet, whose thoughts I have, for four years past, been occupied, though with interruptions, in the endeavor to transfer from his own grand and musical Greek to our less sonorous but still manly and flexible tongue.

In what I shall say of my own translation I do not mean to speak in disparagement of any of the previous English versions of the Iliad, nor to extenuate my obligations to some of them. I acknowledge that although Homer is, as Cowper has well observed, the most perspicuous of poets, I have been sometimes, perhaps often, guided by the labors of my predecessors to a better mode of dealing with certain refractory passages of my author than I should otherwise have found. Let me, without detracting from their merits, state what I have endeavored to do. I have endeavored to be strictly faithful in my rendering; to add nothing of my own, and to give the reader, so far as our language would allow, all that I found in the original. There are, however, in Homer, frequently recurring, certain expressions which are merely a kind of poetical finery, introduced when they are convenient to fill out a line or to give it a sonorous termination, and omitted when they are not needed for this purpose. The Greeks, for example, almost whenever they are spoken of, are magnanimous, or valiant, or warlike, or skilled in taming steeds: the Trojans are magnanimous also, and valiant, and warlike, and equally eminent in horsemanship. The warriors of the Iliad are all sons of some magnanimous or warlike parent. Achilles is the son of Peleus, and Peleus is magnanimous; and these epithets are repeated upon page after page throughout the poem. Achilles is spoken of as swift-footed or godlike almost whenever he appears, and sometimes is honored by both epithets. Hector is illustrious, and knightly, and distinguished by his beamy crest. Even the coxcomb Paris, for whom Homer seems to entertain a proper contempt, is godlike. These complimentary additions to the name of the warrior are, however, dispensed with whenever the hexameter is rounded to a well-sounding conclusion without them. Where they appear in the Greek, I have in nearly all instances retained them, making Achilles swift-footed and Ulysses fertile in resources, to the end of the poem; but in a very few cases, where they embarrassed the versification, I have used the liberty taken by Homer himself, and left them out. Everywhere else it has been my rule not to exclude from the translation anything which I found in the text of my author.

There is another point in regard to which I have taken equal pains, and which seems to me equally important. I have endeavored to preserve the simplicity of style which distinguishes the old Greek poet, who wrote for the popular ear and according to the genius of his language, and I have chosen such English as offers no violence to the ordinary usages and structure of our own. I have sought to attain what belongs to the original⁠—a fluent narrative style, which shall carry the reader forward without the impediment of unexpected inversions and capricious phrases, and in which, if he find nothing to stop at and admire, there will at least be nothing to divert his attention from the story and the characters of the poem, from the events related and the objects described. I think that not many readers of the present day would agree with Pope, who, as Spence relates, after remarking that he had nothing to say for rhyme, went on to observe that he doubted whether a poem could be supported without it in our language, unless it were stiffened with such strange words as would destroy our language itself. It is remarkable that this should have been said by one who had given the reading world an edition of Shakespeare, in whose dramas are to be found passages of blank verse which might be instanced as the perfection of that form of versification⁠—not to be excelled in sweetness of modulation, and grace and freedom of language⁠—without a single harsh inversion, or any of that clumsy stiffening which Pope so disapproved, yet seemed to think so necessary. The other dramatists of the Elizabethan period also supply examples of the same noble simplicity of language and construction, suited to the highest poetry. In this translation the natural order of the words has been carefully preserved, as far as the exigencies of versification would allow, and I have ventured only upon those easy deviations from it which form no interruptions to the sense, and at most only remind the reader that he is reading verse.

I have chosen blank verse for this reason among others, that it enabled me to keep more closely to the original in my rendering, without any sacrifice either of ease or of spirit in the expression. The use of rhyme in a translation is a constant temptation to petty infidelities, and to the employment of expressions which have an air of constraint, and do not the most adequately convey the thought. I had my reasons also for not adopting the ballad measure, which some have thought to allow the nearest approach to the manner of Homer. There are, it is true, certain affinities between the style of Homer and that of the old ballad poems of Great Britain. Both were the productions of a rude age; both were composed to be sung to public audiences; and this gave occasion to certain characteristics in which they resemble each other. But the Homeric poems, as it seems to me, are beyond the popular ballads of any modern nation in reach of thought and in richness of phraseology; and if I had adopted that form of poetry there would have been, besides the disadvantage of rhyme, a temptation to make the version conform in style and spirit to the old ballads of our own literature, in a degree which the original does not warrant, and which, as I think, would lead to some sacrifice of its dignity. I did not adopt the hexameter verse, principally for the reason that in our language it is confessedly an imperfect form of versification, the true rhythm of which it is difficult for those whose ear is accustomed only to our ordinary metres to perceive. I found that I could not possibly render the Greek hexameters line for line, like Voss in his marvellous German version, in which he has not only done this, but generally preserved the pauses in the very part of the line in which Homer placed them. We have so many short words in English, and so few of the connective particles which are lavishly used by Homer, that often when I reached the end of the Greek line I found myself only in the middle of my line in English. This difficulty of subduing the thought⁠—by compression or expansion of phrase⁠—to the limits it must fill would alone have been sufficient to deter me from attempting a translation in hexameters. I therefore fell back upon blank verse, which has been the vehicle of some of the noblest poetry in our language; both because it seemed to me by the flexibility of its construction best suited to a narrative poem, and because, while it enabled me to give the sense of my author more perfectly than any other form of verse, it allowed me also to avoid in a greater degree the appearance of constraint which is too apt to belong to a translation.

I make no apology for employing in my version the names Jupiter, Juno, Venus, and others of Latin origin, for Zeus, Hera, Aphrodite, and other Greek names of the deities of whom Homer speaks. The names which I have adopted have been naturalized in our language for centuries, and some of them, as Mercury, Vulcan, and Dian, have even been provided with English terminations. I was translating from Greek into English, and I therefore translated the names of the gods, as well as the other parts of the poem.

In explanation of what may appear to some readers an unauthorized abridgment of the famous simile of the moon and stars at the end of the Eighth Book, I will mention here, by way of note⁠—the only one which I shall have occasion to make⁠—that in translating I have omitted two lines of the text, which the best critics regard as not properly belonging to it, but as transferred by some interpolator from another simile in the Sixteenth Book, where they are found in their proper place.

In the intimate acquaintance with the Iliad which the work of translation has given me, an impression has been revived which was made upon my mind when in my boyhood I first read that poem in an English version. I recollect very well the eager curiosity with which I seized upon the translation of Pope when it came within my reach, and with what avidity I ran through the pages which rendered into our language what was acknowledged to be the greatest production of poetic genius that the world had seen. I read with a deep interest for the fate of Troy, and with a kindly feeling toward Hector, whose part I took warmly against the bloodthirsty Achilles; and great as might have been the guilt of Paris, I read with an earnest wish that Troy might be delivered from its besiegers. When I came to the end of the poem, I laid it down with a feeling of disappointment. I was not told, save in certain dim predictions, what became of Troy, which the Greeks had mustered from so many regions to besiege, nor what was the fate of the mild and venerable Priam, and the aged Hecuba, and Andromache, the gentle and affectionate wife, and her infant son⁠—personages for whose fortunes the poet had so powerfully awakened my concern and my curiosity. Helen, to recover whom the war was waged, was still in Troy, and Paris, her effeminate husband, was still alive and unharmed. Why the Trojans, who hated Paris⁠—why Hector and the other sons of Priam, who disapproved of their brother’s conduct⁠—why Priam himself, who is never said to have approved of it, did not insist that the seducer should restore Helen to her first and proper husband, for whom she seems to have still entertained a lingering regard, I could never imagine. Particularly strange it seemed that Paris was not forced by his countrymen to give up Helen after the combat between him and Menelaus, in which he was clearly overcome, and by the terms of the solemn treaty which preceded the duel was bound to restore his stolen bride and her wealth to the Greeks. The poet has chosen to leave that circumstance without adequate explanation. The breaking of the truce by Pandarus, and the sudden renewal of the war in consequence, does not explain it, for afterwards, in the Seventh Book, we have Antenor proposing, in council, to restore Helen and her wealth, as a certain way of ending the war⁠—a proposal which is not adopted simply because Paris objects to it. Paris would not consent to restore Helen, and the Trojan princes and leaders, as if Paris were their absolute monarch, allowed him to have his way, and to prolong a war which Hector foresaw⁠—as he says in the famous interview with Andromache⁠—was to end in the destruction of Troy. The impression to which I refer has been confirmed by the minute study which I have recently made of the poem. I can make nothing of it but a detached chapter of the poetic history of the Trojan war⁠—an episode in the narrative of that long siege which was to be concluded by a greater event than any recorded in the Iliad, the taking of the city of Troy;⁠—a work of an inexhaustible imagination, with characters vigorously drawn and finely discriminated, and incidents rapidly succeeding each other and infinitely diversified⁠—everywhere a noble simplicity, mellifluous numbers, and images of beauty and grandeur; yet everywhere indications that the poem had a continuation. It is full of references to events which are yet to be related, and provokes a desire for further disclosures, which it fails to gratify. There are frequent allusions to the brief term of life allotted to Achilles, and several, one of which I have already mentioned, to the final capture of Troy. Thetis predicts that her son, perishing almost immediately after taking the life of Hector, will not live to see the fall of the besieged city. The audiences before whom the books of the Iliad were recited by the minstrels would naturally say: “You speak of the capture of Troy; tell us how it was taken at last. Achilles, the mightiest of warriors, you say, was to be slain soon after the death of Hector. Relate the manner of his death, and how it was received by the Greeks and the Trojans. Describe his funeral, as you described those of his friend Patroclus and his adversary Hector. Tell us what became of Andromache, and Astyanax, her son, and all the royal family of Priam.” Thus may we suppose that, until Aristotle arose to demonstrate the contrary, the fable of the Iliad must have appeared to the general mind to be incomplete.

Let me say a word or two of the personage whom the critics call the hero of the Iliad. Achilles is ill-used by Agamemnon, the general-in-chief of the Greeks⁠—and so far he has the sympathy of the reader; but he is a ferocious barbarian at best, and as the narrative proceeds, he loses all title to our interest. His horrid prayer that the Greeks may be slaughtered by thousands until they learn to despise a monarch who has done him a personal injury, and his inhuman delight in the havoc made of them by the Trojans under Hector, cause us to turn from him with the horror and aversion due to a selfish and cruel nature which imposes no reserve or restraint upon its own impulses. His warm affection for his gentle friend and companion, Patroclus, partly restores him to our favor; but his pitiless treatment of the Trojans who supplicate him for quarter, and his capture of twelve Trojan youths in order to cut their throats at the funeral pile of Patroclus, as he afterwards does in cold blood, bring back our disgust; and when Hector with his dying voice warns him of his approaching death, the reader has no objection to offer. If Achilles be the hero of the poem, the poet has not succeeded in obtaining for him either our good opinion or our good wishes. In the fortunes of Hector, however, whose temper is noble and generous, who while grieving at the crime of Paris defends his country with all his valor, whose character is as gentle and affectionate as it is spirited and manly, it is impossible for the reader not to feel a strong interest. The last book of the Iliad relates the recovery of his dead body from the Greeks, and the celebration of his funeral in Troy. In this book, also, the character of Achilles appears less unamiable, since he grants the rites of hospitality to Priam, and is persuaded by his entreaties to restore, for a princely ransom, the dead body of Hector, contrary to his first resolution. It is to be observed, however, that he is moved to this, not by his own native magnanimity, but by considerations which indirectly relate to himself⁠—that is to say, by being artfully led to think of his own father, Peleus, an aged man like Priam, anxiously waiting in his distant palace for the return of his son from the war, and fearing that he may never behold him again. Once in the interview with Priam the fierce and brutal nature of Achilles breaks out in threats, which terrify the old king into silence. Priam is himself warned by the gods that he is not safe in remaining overnight in the tent of Achilles, and, lest he should not be protected from the ferocity of Agamemnon, withdraws by stealth in the darkness and returns to Troy.

I have no answer to make to those who regard it as a blemish in the great work of Homer that he represents the gods in their dealings with men as governed, for the most part, by motives either mean and base, or frivolous and childish. In the Trojan war everything happens by their direction or their prompting. In the system of Homer it is they who stir up men to strife, who bring on the battles, promote the slaughter, and bring it to an end, urge the personages of the fable to ruinous follies and imprudences, and give or withhold victory at their pleasure; and in all this their rule is not one of justice and beneficence, but of caprice. Their favor is purchased by hecatombs, and their hatred incurred by acts which have no moral quality that should give offence to an upright judge. They are debauched, mercenary, rapacious, and cruel; they dwell in a world in which the rules of right and the maxims necessary to the well-being of human society find no recognition. It was for this reason that Plato, the earliest author of an Index expurgatorius, forbade the circulation of the writings of the Greek poets in his imaginary commonwealth.

Yet let me say this in favor of my author, that in one part of the poem the absolute rectitude of the Divine government is solemnly recognized. In the Third Book of the Iliad, a truce is agreed upon between the Trojans and the Greeks, while Menelaus and Paris are to decide by single combat the quarrel which has occasioned the siege of Troy. A compact is made, according to which the victor is to possess Helen and her wealth, and the Trojans and Greeks are ever afterward to remain friends and allies. The gods are invoked to be witnesses of the treaty, and to pursue with their vengeance those by whom it shall be violated, whether they be Greeks or Trojans. Few passages in the Iliad are more striking or of graver import than this appeal to the justice of the gods⁠—this testimony, given by two warring nations, of their confidence in the equity with which the immortals govern the world. Paris is overcome by Menelaus in the combat; the truce is broken by a Trojan, who wounds Menelaus severely; the treaty is not fulfilled by delivering up Helen; and, as the action of the poem proceeds in the next book, Agamemnon exhorts the Greeks to fight valiantly, in the full assurance that Jupiter and the other gods will never permit treachery to remain unpunished; and accordingly he predicts a terrible retribution already hanging over Troy. And whatever may be our admiration for the amiable and noble qualities of Hector, and our sympathy for the thousands of innocent persons dwelling in his populous city, it cannot be denied that the interference of the gods in the affairs of Troy leads in the end to a great result consistent with substantial justice. Paris, the violator of the laws of hospitality, the adulterer and robber, is sheltered, protected, and countenanced in Troy⁠—the Trojan people make themselves partakers in his guilt; and in the end they share in its punishment. Hector, the prop of their state, the champion in whom they put their trust, is slain; and we are allowed, by means of predictions, a glimpse of the coming destruction of Troy, and learn that the sceptre of the kingdom will pass from the house of Priam, whose son committed the crime which led to the war, and will be swayed by the posterity of the blameless Aeneas.

Here I leave my translation in the hands of the reading public, who, if they do not wholly neglect it, will judge whether I have made any approach toward the fulfilment of the design set forth in the beginning of this Preface.

The Iliad

O Goddess! Sing the wrath of Peleus’ son,
Achilles; sing the deadly wrath that brought
Woes numberless upon the Greeks, and swept
To Hades many a valiant soul, and gave
Their limbs a prey to dogs and birds of air⁠—
For so had Jove appointed⁠—from the time
When the two chiefs, Atrides, king of men,
And great Achilles, parted first as foes.

Which of the gods put strife between the chiefs,
That they should thus contend? Latona’s son
And Jove’s. Incensed against the king, he bade
A deadly pestilence appear among
The army, and the men were perishing.
For Atreus’ son with insult had received
Chryses the priest, who to the Grecian fleet
Came to redeem his daughter, offering
Uncounted ransom. In his hand he bore
The fillets of Apollo, archer-god,
Upon the golden sceptre, and he sued
To all the Greeks, but chiefly to the sons
Of Atreus, the two leaders of the host:⁠—

“Ye sons of Atreus, and ye other chiefs,
Well-greaved Achaians, may the gods who dwell
Upon Olympus give you to o’erthrow
The city of Priam, and in safety reach
Your homes; but give me my beloved child,
And take her ransom, honoring him who sends
His arrows far, Apollo, son of Jove.”

Then all the other Greeks, applauding, bade
Revere the priest and take the liberal gifts
He offered, but the counsel did not please
Atrides Agamemnon; he dismissed
The priest with scorn, and added threatening words:⁠—

“Old man, let me not find thee loitering here,
Beside the roomy ships, or coming back
Hereafter, lest the fillet thou dost bear
And sceptre of thy god protect thee not.
This maiden I release not till old age
Shall overtake her in my Argive home,
Far from her native country, where her hand
Shall throw the shuttle and shall dress my couch.
Go, chafe me not, if thou wouldst safely go.”

He spake; the aged man in fear obeyed
The mandate, and in silence walked apart,
Along the many-sounding ocean-side,
And fervently he prayed the monarch-god,
Apollo, golden-haired Latona’s son:⁠—

“Hear me, thou bearer of the silver bow,
Who guardest Chrysa, and the holy isle
Of Cilia, and art lord in Tenedos,
O Smintheus! If I ever helped to deck
Thy glorious temple, if I ever burned
Upon thy altar the fat thighs of goats
And bullocks, grant my prayer, and let thy shafts
Avenge upon the Greeks the tears I shed.”

So spake he supplicating, and to him
Phoebus Apollo hearkened. Down he came,
Down from the summit of the Olympian mount,
Wrathful in heart; his shoulders bore the bow
And hollow quiver; there the arrows rang
Upon the shoulders of the angry god,
As on he moved. He came as comes the night,
And, seated from the ships aloof, sent forth
An arrow; terrible was heard the clang
Of that resplendent bow. At first he smote
The mules and the swift dogs, and then on man
He turned the deadly arrow. All around
Glared evermore the frequent funeral piles.
Nine days already had his shafts been showered
Among the host, and now, upon the tenth,
Achilles called the people of the camp
To council. Juno, of the snow-white arms,
Had moved his mind to this, for she beheld
With sorrow that the men were perishing.
And when the assembly met and now was full,
Stood swift Achilles in the midst and said:⁠—

“To me it seems, Atrides, that ’twere well,
Since now our aim is baffled, to return
Homeward, if death o’ertake us not; for war
And pestilence at once destroy the Greeks.
But let us first consult some seer or priest,
Or dream-interpreter⁠—for even dreams
Are sent by Jove⁠—and ask him by what cause
Phoebus Apollo has been angered thus;
If by neglected vows or hecatombs,
And whether savor of fat bulls and goats
May move the god to stay the pestilence.”

He spake, and took again his seat; and next
Rose Calchas, son of Thestor, and the chief
Of augurs, one to whom were known things past
And present and to come. He, through the art
Of divination, which Apollo gave,
Had guided Iliumward the ships of Greece.
With words well ordered courteously he spake:⁠—

“Achilles, loved of Jove, thou biddest me
Explain the wrath of Phoebus, monarch-god,
Who sends afar his arrows. Willingly
Will I make known the cause; but covenant thou,
And swear to stand prepared, by word and hand,
To bring me succor. For my mind misgives
That he who rules the Argives, and to whom
The Achaian race are subject, will be wroth.
A sovereign is too strong for humbler men,
And though he keep his choler down awhile,
It rankles, till he sate it, in his heart.
And now consider: wilt thou hold me safe?”

Achilles, the swift-footed, answered thus:⁠—
“Fear nothing, but speak boldly out whate’er
Thou knowest, and declare the will of Heaven.
For by Apollo, dear to Jove, whom thou,
Calchas, dost pray to, when thou givest forth
The sacred oracles to men of Greece,
No man, while yet I live, and see the light
Of day, shall lay a violent hand on thee
Among our roomy ships; no man of all
The Grecian armies, though thou name the name
Of Agamemnon, whose high boast it is
To stand in power and rank above them all.”

Encouraged thus, the blameless seer went on:⁠—
“ ’Tis not neglected vows or hecatombs
That move him, but the insult shown his priest,
Whom Agamemnon spurned, when he refused
To set his daughter free, and to receive
Her ransom. Therefore sends the archer-god
These woes, and still will send them on the Greeks,
Nor ever will withdraw his heavy hand
From our destruction, till the dark-eyed maid
Freely, and without ransom, be restored
To her beloved father, and with her
A sacred hecatomb to Chrysa sent.
So may we haply pacify the god.”

Thus having said, the augur took his seat.
And then the hero-son of Atreus rose,
Wide-ruling Agamemnon, greatly chafed.
His gloomy heart was full of wrath, his eyes
Sparkled like fire; he fixed a menacing look
Full on the augur Calchas, and began:⁠—

“Prophet of evil! Never hadst thou yet
A cheerful word for me. To mark the signs
Of coming mischief is thy great delight.
Good dost thou ne’er foretell nor bring to pass.
And now thou pratest, in thine auguries,
Before the Greeks, how that the archer-god
Afflicts us thus, because I would not take
The costly ransom offered to redeem
The virgin child of Chryses. ’Twas my choice
To keep her with me, for I prize her more
Than Clytemnestra, bride of my young years,
And deem her not less nobly graced than she,
In form and feature, mind and pleasing arts.
Yet will I give her back, if that be best;
For gladly would I see my people saved
From this destruction. Let meet recompense,
Meantime, be ready, that I be not left,
Alone of all the Greeks, without my prize.
That were not seemly. All of you perceive
That now my share of spoil has passed from me.”

To him the great Achilles, swift of foot,
Replied: “Renowned Atrides, greediest
Of men, where wilt thou that our noble Greeks
Find other spoil for thee, since none is set
Apart, a common store? The trophies brought
From towns which we have sacked have all been shared
Among us, and we could not without shame
Bid every warrior bring his portion back.
Yield, then, the maiden to the god, and we,
The Achaians, freely will appoint for thee
Threefold and fourfold recompense, should Jove
Give up to sack this well-defended Troy.”

Then the king Agamemnon answered thus:⁠—
“Nay, use no craft, all valiant as thou art,
Godlike Achilles; thou hast not the power
To circumvent nor to persuade me thus.
Think’st thou that, while thou keepest safe thy prize,
I shall sit idly down, deprived of mine?
Thou bid’st me give the maiden back. ’Tis well,
If to my hands the noble Greeks shall bring
The worth of what I lose, and in a shape
That pleases me. Else will I come myself,
And seize and bear away thy prize, or that
Of Ajax or Ulysses, leaving him
From whom I take his share with cause for rage.
Another time we will confer of this.
Now come, and forth into the great salt sea
Launch a black ship, and muster on the deck
Men skilled to row, and put a hecatomb
On board, and let the fair-cheeked maid embark,
Chryseis. Send a prince to bear command⁠—
Ajax, Idomeneus, or the divine
Ulysses;⁠—or thyself, Pelides, thou
Most terrible of men, that with due rites
Thou soothe the anger of the archer-god.”

Achilles the swift-footed, with stern look,
Thus answered: “Ha, thou mailed in impudence
And bent on lucre! Who of all the Greeks
Can willingly obey thee, on the march,
Or bravely battling with the enemy?
I came not to this war because of wrong
Done to me by the valiant sons of Troy.
No feud had I with them; they never took
My beeves or horses, nor, in Phthia’s realm,
Deep-soiled and populous, spoiled my harvest fields.
For many a shadowy mount between us lies,
And waters of the wide-resounding sea.
Man unabashed! We follow thee that thou
Mayst glory in avenging upon Troy
The grudge of Menelaus and thy own,
Thou shameless one! And yet thou hast for this
Nor thanks nor care. Thou threatenest now to take
From me the prize for which I bore long toils
In battle; and the Greeks decreed it mine.
I never take an equal share with thee
Of booty when the Grecian host has sacked
Some populous Trojan town. My hands perform
The harder labors of the field in all
The tumult of the fight; but when the spoil
Is shared, the largest share of all is thine,
While I, content with little, seek my ships,
Weary with combat. I shall now go home
To Phthia; better were it to return
With my beaked ships; but here, where I am held
In little honor, thou wilt fail, I think,
To gather, in large measure, spoil and wealth.”

Him answered Agamemnon, king of men:⁠—
“Desert, then, if thou wilt; I ask thee not
To stay for me; there will be others left
To do me honor yet, and, best of all,
The all-providing Jove is with me still.
Thee I detest the most of all the men
Ordained by him to govern; thy delight
Is in contention, war, and bloody frays.
If thou art brave, some deity, no doubt,
Hath thus endowed thee. Hence, then, to thy home,
With all thy ships and men! There domineer
Over thy Myrmidons; I heed thee not,
Nor care I for thy fury. Thus, in turn,
I threaten thee; since Phoebus takes away
Chryseis, I will send her in my ship
And with my friends, and, coming to thy tent,
Will bear away the fair-cheeked maid, thy prize,
Briseis, that thou learn how far I stand
Above thee, and that other chiefs may fear
To measure strength with me, and brave my power.”

The rage of Peleus’ son, as thus he spake,
Grew fiercer; in that shaggy breast his heart
Took counsel, whether from his thigh to draw
The trenchant sword, and, thrusting back the rest,
Smite down Atrides, or subdue his wrath
And master his own spirit. While he thus
Debated with himself, and half unsheathed
The ponderous blade, Pallas Athene came,
Sent from on high by Juno, the white-armèd,
Who loved both warriors and made both her care.
She came behind him, seen by him alone,
And plucked his yellow hair. The hero turned
In wonder, and at once he knew the look
Of Pallas and the awful-gleaming eye,
And thus accosted her with wingèd words:⁠—
“Why com’st thou hither, daughter of the god
Who bears the aegis? Art thou here to see
The insolence of Agamemnon, son
Of Atreus? Let me tell thee what I deem
Will be the event. That man may lose his life,
And quickly too, for arrogance like this.”

Then thus the goddess, blue-eyed Pallas, spake:⁠—
“I came from heaven to pacify thy wrath,
If thou wilt heed my counsel. I am sent
By Juno the white-armed, to whom ye both
Are dear, who ever watches o’er you both.
Refrain from violence; let not thy hand
Unsheathe the sword, but utter with thy tongue
Reproaches, as occasion may arise,
For I declare what time shall bring to pass;
Threefold amends shall yet be offered thee,
In gifts of princely cost, for this day’s wrong.
Now calm thy angry spirit, and obey.”

Achilles, the swift-footed, answered thus:⁠—
“O goddess, be the word thou bring’st obeyed,
However fierce my anger; for to him
Who hearkens to the gods, the gods give ear.”

So speaking, on the silver hilt he stayed
His strong right hand, and back into its sheath
Thrust his good sword, obeying. She, meantime,
Returned to heaven, where aegis-bearing Jove
Dwells with the other gods. And now again
Pelides, with opprobrious words, bespake
The son of Atreus, venting thus his wrath:⁠—

“Wine-bibber, with the forehead of a dog
And a deer’s heart! Thou never yet hast dared
To arm thyself for battle with the rest,
Nor join the other chiefs prepared to lie
In ambush⁠—such thy craven fear of death.
Better it suits thee, midst the mighty host
Of Greeks, to rob some warrior of his prize
Who dares withstand thee. King thou art, and yet
Devourer of thy people. Thou dost rule
A spiritless race, else this day’s insolence,
Atrides, were thy last. And now I say,
And bind my saying with a mighty oath:
By this my sceptre, which can never bear
A leaf or twig, since first it left its stem
Among the mountains⁠—for the steel has pared
Its boughs and bark away, to sprout no more⁠—
And now the Achaian judges bear it⁠—they
Who guard the laws received from Jupiter,
Such is my oath⁠—the time shall come when all
The Greeks shall long to see Achilles back,
While multitudes are perishing by the hand
Of Hector, the man-queller; thou, meanwhile,
Though thou lament, shalt have no power to help,
And thou shalt rage against thyself to think
That thou hast scorned the bravest of the Greeks.

As thus he spake, Pelides to the ground
Flung the gold-studded wand, and took his seat.
Fiercely Atrides raged; but now uprose
Nestor, the master of persuasive speech,
The clear-toned Pylian orator, whose tongue
Dropped words more sweet than honey. He had seen
Two generations that grew up and lived
With him on sacred Pylos pass away,
And now he ruled the third. With prudent words
He thus addressed the assembly of the chiefs:⁠—

“Ye gods! What new misfortunes threaten Greece!
How Priam would exult and Priam’s sons,
And how would all the Trojan race rejoice,
Were they to know how furiously ye strive⁠—
Ye who in council and in fight surpass
The other Greeks. Now hearken to my words⁠—
Ye who are younger than myself⁠—for I
Have lived with braver men than you, and yet
They held me not in light esteem. Such men
I never saw, nor shall I see again⁠—
Men like Pirithoüs and like Druas, lord
Of nations, Caeneus and Exadius,
And the great Polypheme, and Theseus, son
Of Aegeus, likest to the immortal gods.
Strongest of all the earth-born race they fought⁠—
The strongest with the strongest of their time⁠—
With Centaurs, the wild dwellers of the hills,
And fearfully destroyed them. With these men
Did I hold converse, coming to their camp
From Pylos in a distant land. They sent
To bid me join the war, and by their side
I fought my best, but no man living now
On the wide earth would dare to fight with them.
Great as they were, they listened to my words
And took my counsel. Hearken also ye,
And let my words persuade you for the best.
Thou, powerful as thou art, take not from him
The maiden; suffer him to keep the prize
Decreed him by the sons of Greece; and thou,
Pelides, strive no longer with the king,
Since never Jove on sceptred prince bestowed
Like eminence to his. Though braver thou,
And goddess-born, yet hath he greater power
And wider sway. Atrides, calm thy wrath⁠—
’Tis I who ask⁠—against the chief who stands
The bulwark of the Greeks in this fierce war.”

To him the sovereign Agamemnon said:⁠—
“The things which thou hast uttered, aged chief,
Are fitly spoken; but this man would stand
Above all others; he aspires to be
The master, over all to domineer,
And to direct in all things; yet, I think,
There may be one who will not suffer this.
For if by favor of the immortal gods
He was made brave, have they for such a cause
Given him the liberty of insolent speech?”

Hereat the great Achilles, breaking in,
Answered: “Yea, well might I deserve the name
Of coward and of wretch, should I submit
In all things to thy bidding. Such commands
Lay thou on others, not on me; nor think
I shall obey thee longer. This I say⁠—
And bear it well in mind⁠—I shall not lift
My hand to keep the maiden whom ye gave
And now take from me; but whatever else
May be on board that swift black ship of mine,
Beware thou carry not away the least
Without my leave. Come, make the trial now,
That these may see thy black blood bathe my spear.

Then, rising from that strife of words, the twain
Dissolved the assembly at the Grecian fleet.
Pelides to his tents and well manned ships
Went with Patroclus and his warrior friends,
While Agamemnon bade upon the sea
Launch a swift barque with twenty chosen men
To ply the oar, and put a hecatomb
Upon it for the god. He thither led
The fair-cheeked maid Chryseis; the command
He gave to wise Ulysses; forth they went,
Leader and crew, upon their watery path.
Meanwhile, he bade the camp be purified;
And straight the warriors purified the camp,
And, casting the pollutions to the waves,
They burned to Phoebus chosen hecatombs
Of bulls and goats beside the barren main,
From which the savor rose in smoke to heaven.

So was the host employed. But not the less
Did Agamemnon persevere to urge
His quarrel with Pelides; and he thus
Addressed Talthybius and Eurybates.
His heralds and his faithful ministers:⁠—

“Go ye to where Achilles holds his tent,
And take the fair Briseis by the hand,
And bring her hither. If he yield her not,
I shall come forth to claim her with a band
Of warriors, and it shall be worse for him.”

He spake, and sent them forth with added words
Of menace. With unwilling steps they went
Beside the barren deep, until they reached
The tents and vessels of the Myrmidons,
And found Achilles seated by his tent
And his black ship; their coming pleased him not.
They, moved by fear and reverence of the king,
Stopped, and bespake him not, nor signified
Their errand; he perceived their thought and said:⁠—

“Hail, heralds, messengers of Jove and men!
Draw near; I blame you not. I only blame
Atrides, who hath sent you for the maid.
Noble Patroclus! Bring the damsel forth,
And let them lead her hence. My witnesses
Are ye, before the blessed deities,
And mortal men, and this remorseless king,
If ever he shall need me to avert
The doom of utter ruin from his host.
Most sure it is, he madly yields himself
To fatal counsels, thoughtless of the past
And of the future, nor forecasting how
The Greeks may fight, unvanquished, by their fleet.”

He spake. Meantime Patroclus had obeyed
The word of his beloved friend. He brought
The fair-cheeked maid Briseis from the tent,
And she was led away. The messengers
Returned to where their barques were moored, and she
Unwillingly went with them. Then in tears
Achilles, from his friends withdrawing, sat
Beside the hoary ocean-marge, and gazed
On the black deep beyond, and stretched his hands,
And prayed to his dear mother, earnestly:⁠—

“Mother! Since thou didst bring me forth to dwell
Brief space on earth, Olympian Jupiter,
Who thunders in the highest, should have filled
That space with honors, but he grants them not.
Wide-ruling Agamemnon takes and holds
The prize I won, and thus dishonors me.”

Thus, shedding tears, he spake. His mother heard,
Sitting within the ocean deeps, beside
Her aged father. Swiftly from the waves
Of the gray deep emerging like a cloud,
She sat before him as he wept, and smoothed
His brow with her soft hand, and kindly said:⁠—

“My child, why weepest thou? What grief is this?
Speak, and hide nothing, so that both may know.”

Achilles, swift of foot, sighed heavily,
And said: “Thou know’st already. Why relate
These things to thee, who art apprised of all?

“To Thebé, to Eëtion’s sacred town,
We marched, and plundered it, and hither brought
The booty, which was fairly shared among
The sons of Greece, and Agamemnon took
The fair-cheeked maid Chryseis as his prize.
But Chryses, priest of Phoebus, to the fleet
Of the Achaian warriors, brazen-mailed,
Came, to redeem his daughter, offering
Ransom uncounted. In his hand he bore
The fillets of Apollo, archer-god,
Upon the golden sceptre, and he sued
To all the Greeks, but chiefly to the sons
Of Atreus, the two leaders of the host.
Then all the other chiefs, applauding, bade
Revere the priest and take the liberal gifts
He offered; but the counsel did not please
Atrides Agamemnon: he dismissed
The priest with scorn, and added threatening words.
The aged man indignantly withdrew;
And Phoebus⁠—for the priest was dear to him⁠—
Granted his prayer and sent among the Greeks
A deadly shaft. The people of the camp
Were perishing in heaps. His arrows flew
Among the Grecian army, far and wide.
A seer expert in oracles revealed
The will of Phoebus, and I was the first
To counsel that the god should be appeased.
But Agamemnon rose in sudden wrath,
Uttering a threat, which he has since fulfilled.
And now the dark-eyed Greeks are taking back
His child to Chryses, and with her they bear
Gifts to the monarch-god; while to my tent
Heralds have come, and borne away the maid
Briseis, given me by the sons of Greece.
But succor thou thy son, if thou hast power;
Ascend to heaven and bring thy prayer to Jove,
If e’er by word or act thou gav’st him aid.
For I remember, in my father’s halls
I often heard thee, glorying, tell how thou,
Alone of all the gods, didst interpose
To save the cloud-compeller, Saturn’s son,
From shameful overthrow, when all the rest
Who dwell upon Olympus had conspired
To bind him⁠—Juno, Neptune, and with them
Pallas Athene. Thou didst come and loose
His bonds, and call up to the Olympian heights
The hundred-handed, whom the immortal gods
Have named Briareus, but the sons of men
Aegeon, mightier than his sire in strength;
And he, rejoicing in the honor, took
His seat by Jove, and all the immortals shrank
Aghast before him, and let fall the chains.
Remind him of all this, and, sitting down,
Embrace his knees, and pray him to befriend
The Trojans, that the Greeks, hemmed in and slain
Beside their ships and by the shore, may learn
To glory in their king, and even he,
Wide-ruling Agamemnon, may perceive
How grievous was his folly when he dared
To treat with scorn the bravest of the Greeks.”

And Thetis answered, weeping as she spake:⁠—
“Alas, my son, why did I rear thee, born
To sorrow as thou wert? O would that thou
Unwronged, and with no cause for tears, couldst dwell
Beside thy ships, since thou must die so soon.
I brought thee forth in an unhappy hour,
Short-lived and wronged beyond all other men.
Yet will I climb the Olympian height among
Its snows and make my suit to Jupiter
The Thunderer, if haply he may yield
To my entreaties. Thou, meanwhile, abide
By thy swift ships, incensed against the Greeks,
And take no part in all their battles more.
But yesterday did Jove depart to hold
A banquet far in Ocean’s realm, among
The blameless Ethiopians, and with him
Went all the train of gods. Twelve days must pass
Ere he return to heaven, and I will then
Enter his brazen palace, clasp his knees,
And hope to move his purpose by my prayers.”

So saying, she departed, leaving him
In anger for the shapely damsel’s sake,
Whom forcibly they took away. Meantime
Ulysses, with the sacred hecatomb,
Arrived at Chrysa. Entering the deep port,
They folded up the sails and laid them down
In the black ship, and lowering the mast,
With all its shrouds, they brought it to its place,
Then to the shore they urged the barque with oars,
And cast the anchors and secured the prow
With fastenings. Next, they disembarked and stood
Upon the beach and placed the hecatomb
In sight of Phoebus, the great archer. Last,
Chryseis left the deck, and, leading her
Up to the altar, wise Ulysses gave
The maid to her dear father, speaking thus:⁠—

“O Chryses! Agamemnon, king of men,
Sends me in haste to bring this maid to thee
And offer up this hallowed hecatomb
To Phoebus, for the Greeks: that so the god,
Whose wrath afflicts us sore, may be appeased.

So speaking, to her father’s hands he gave
The maiden; joyfully the priest received
The child he loved. Then did the Greeks array
The noble hecatomb in order round
The sculptured altar, and with washen hands
They took the salted meal, while Chryses stood
And spread abroad his hands and prayed aloud:⁠—

“Hear me, thou bearer of the glittering bow,
Who guardest Chrysa and the pleasant isle
Of Cilia and art lord in Tenedos!
Already hast thou listened to my prayer
And honored me, and terribly hast scourged
The Achaian people. Hear me yet again,
And cause the plague that wastes the Greeks to cease.”

So spake he, supplicating, and to him
Phoebus Apollo hearkened. When the prayers
Were ended, and the salted meal was flung,
Backward they turned the necks of the fat beeves,
And cut their throats, and flayed the carcasses,
And hewed away the thighs, and covered them
With caul in double folds; and over this
They laid raw fragments of the other parts.
O’er all the aged priest poured dark red wine,
And burned them on dry wood. A band of youths
With five-pronged spits, beside him, thrust these through
The entrails, which they laid among the flames.
And when the thighs were all consumed, and next
The entrails tasted, all the rest was carved
Into small portions and transfixed with spits
And roasted with nice care and then withdrawn
From the hot coals. This task performed, they made
The banquet ready. All became its guests
And all were welcome to the equal feast.
And when their thirst and hunger were allayed,
Boys crowned the ample urns with wreaths, and served
The wine to all, and poured libations forth. Meantime the
Argive youths, that whole day long,
Sang to appease the god; they chanted forth
High anthems to the archer of the skies.
He listened to the strain, and his stern mood
Was softened. When, at length, the sun went down
And darkness fell, they gave themselves to sleep
Beside the fastenings of their ships, and when
Appeared the rosy-fingered Dawn, the child
Of Morning, they returned to the great host
Of the Achaians. Phoebus deigned to send
A favoring breeze; at once they reared the mast
And opened the white sails; the canvas swelled
Before the wind, and hoarsely round the keel
The dark waves murmured as the ship flew on.
So ran she, cutting through the sea her way.
But when they reached the great Achaian host,
They drew their vessel high upon the shore
Among the sands, and underneath its sides
They laid long beams to prop the keel, and straight
Dispersed themselves among the tents and ships.

The goddess-born Achilles, swift of foot,
Beside his ships still brooded o’er his wrath,
Nor came to council with the illustrious chiefs,
Nor to the war, but suffered idleness
To eat his heart away; for well he loved
Clamor and combat. But when now, at length,
The twelfth day came, the ever-living gods
Returned together to the Olympian mount
With Jove, their leader. Thetis kept in mind
Her son’s desire, and, with the early morn,
Emerging from the depths of ocean, climbed
To the great heaven and the high mount, and found
All-seeing Jove, who, from the rest apart,
Was seated on the loftiest pinnacle
Of many-peaked Olympus. She sat down
Before the son of Saturn, clasped his knees
With her left arm, and lifted up her right
In supplication to the Sovereign One:⁠—

“O Jupiter, my father, if among
The immortals I have ever given thee aid
By word or act, deny not my request.
Honor my son, whose life is doomed to end
So soon; for Agamemnon, king of men,
Hath done him shameful wrong: he takes from him
And keeps the prize he won in war. But thou,
Olympian Jupiter, supremely wise,
Honor him thou, and give the Trojan host
The victory, until the humbled Greeks
Heap large increase of honors on my son.”

She spake, but cloud-compelling Jupiter
Answered her not; in silence long he sat.
But Thetis, who had clasped his knees at first,
Clung to them still, and prayed him yet again:⁠—

“O promise me, and grant my suit; or else
Deny it⁠—for thou need’st not fear⁠—and I
Shall know how far below the other gods
Thou holdest me in honor.” As she spake,
The Cloud-compeller, sighing heavily,
Answered her thus: “Hard things dost thou require,
And thou wilt force me into new disputes
With Juno, who will anger me again
With contumelious words; forever thus,
In presence of the immortals, doth she seek
Cause of contention, charging that I aid
The Trojans in their battles. Now depart,
And let her not perceive thee. Leave the rest
To be by me accomplished; and that thou
Mayst be assured, behold, I give the nod;
For this, with me, the immortals know, portends
The highest certainty: no word of mine
Which once my nod confirms can be revoked,
Or prove untrue, or fail to be fulfilled.”

As thus he spake, the son of Saturn gave
The nod with his dark brows. The ambrosial curls
Upon the Sovereign One’s immortal head
Were shaken, and with them the mighty mount
Olympus trembled. Then they parted, she
Plunging from bright Olympus to the deep,
And Jove returning to his palace home;
Where all the gods, uprising from their thrones,
At sight of the Great Father, waited not
For his approach, but met him as he came.

And now upon his throne the Godhead took
His seat, but Juno knew⁠—for she had seen⁠—
That Thetis of the silver feet, and child
Of the gray Ancient of the Deep, had held
Close council with her consort. Therefore she
Bespake the son of Saturn harshly, thus:⁠—

“O crafty one, with whom, among the gods,
Plottest thou now? Thus hath it ever been
Thy pleasure to devise, apart from me,
Thy plans in secret; never willingly
Dost thou reveal to me thy purposes.”

Then thus replied the Father of the gods
And mortals: “Juno, do not think to know
All my designs, for thou wilt find the task
Too hard for thee, although thou be my spouse.
What fitting is to be revealed, no one
Of all the immortals or of men shall know
Sooner than thou; but when I form designs
Apart from all the gods, presume thou not
To question me or pry into my plans.”

Juno, the large-eyed and august, rejoined:⁠—
“What words, stern son of Saturn, hast thou said!
It never was my wont to question thee
Or pry into thy plans, and thou art left
To form them as thou wilt; yet now I fear
The silver-footed Thetis has contrived⁠—
That daughter of the Ancient of the Deep⁠—
To o’erpersuade thee, for, at early prime,
She sat before thee and embraced thy knees;
And thou hast promised her, I cannot doubt,
To give Achilles honor and to cause
Myriads of Greeks to perish by their fleet.”

Then Jove, the cloud-compeller, spake again:⁠—
“Harsh-tongued! thou ever dost suspect me thus,
Nor can I act unwatched; and yet all this
Profits thee nothing, for it only serves
To breed dislike, and is the worse for thee.
But were it as thou deemest, ’tis enough
That such has been my pleasure. Sit thou down
In silence, and obey, lest all the gods
Upon Olympus, when I come and lay
These potent hands on thee, protect thee not.”

He spake, and Juno, large-eyed and august,
O’erawed, and curbing her high spirit, sat
In silence; meanwhile all the gods of heaven
Within the halls of Jove were inly grieved.
But Vulcan, the renowned artificer,
Sought to console his mother in her grief⁠—
The white-armed Juno⁠—and thus interposed:⁠—

“Great will the evil be and hard to bear,
If, for the sake of mortals, ye are moved
To such contention and the assembled gods
Disturbed with discord. Even the pleasant feast
Will lose its flavor when embittered thus.
And let me warn my mother while I speak,
Wise as she is, that she defer to Jove,
Lest the All-Father angrily again
Reply, and spoil the banquet of the day.
The Thunderer of Olympus, if he choose
To make a wreck of all things, wields a power
Far greater than we all. Accost him thou
With gentle speeches, and the Lord of heaven
Will then regard us in a kindly mood.”

As thus he spake, he gave into the hands
Of his beloved mother the round cup
Of double form, and thus he spake again:⁠—

“Mother, be patient and submit, although
In sadness, lest these eyes behold thee yet
Beaten with stripes, and though I hold thee dear
And grieve for thee, I cannot bring thee help;
For hard it is to strive with Jupiter.
Already once, when I took part with thee,
He seized me by the foot and flung me o’er
The battlements of heaven. All day I fell,
And with the setting sun I struck the earth
In Lemnos. Little life was left in me,
What time the Sintians took me from the ground.”

He spake, and Juno, the white-shouldered, smiled,
And smiling took the cup her son had brought;
And next he poured to all the other gods
Sweet nectar from the jar, beginning first
With those at the right hand. As they beheld
Lame Vulcan laboring o’er the palace-floor,
An inextinguishable laughter broke
From all the blessed gods. So feasted they
All day till sunset. From that equal feast
None stood aloof, nor from the pleasant sound
Of harp, which Phoebus touched, nor from the voice
Of Muses singing sweetly in their turn.

But when the sun’s all-glorious light was down,
Each to his sleeping-place betook himself;
For Vulcan, the lame god, with marvellous art,
Had framed for each the chamber of his rest.

And Jupiter, the Olympian Thunderer,
Went also to his couch, where ’twas his wont,
When slumber overtook him, to recline.
And there, beside him, slept the white-armed queen
Juno, the mistress of the golden throne.

All other deities, all mortal men,
Tamers of war-steeds, slept the whole night through;
But no sweet slumber came to Jove; his thoughts
Were ever busy with the anxious care
To crown with honor Peleus’ son, and cause
Myriads to perish at the Grecian fleet.
At last, this counsel seemed the best⁠—to send
A treacherous dream to Agamemnon, son
Of Atreus. Then he called a Dream, and thus
Addressing it with wingèd words, he said:⁠—

“Go, fatal Vision, to the Grecian fleet,
And, entering Agamemnon’s tent, declare
Faithfully what I bid thee. Give command
That now he arm, with all the array of war,
The long-haired Greeks, for lo, the hour is come
That gives into his hands the city of Troy
With all its spacious streets. The powers who dwell
In the celestial mansions are no more
At variance; Juno’s prayers have moved them all,
And o’er the Trojans hangs a fearful doom.”

So spake the God; the Vision heard, and went
At once to where the Grecian barques were moored,
And entered Agamemnon’s tent and found
The king reposing, with the balm of sleep
Poured all around him. At his head the Dream
Took station in the form of Neleus’ son,
Nestor, whom Agamemnon honored most
Of all the aged men. In such a shape
The heaven-sent Dream to Agamemnon spake:⁠—

“O warrior-son of Atreus, sleepest thou?
Tamer of steeds! It ill becomes a chief,
Who has the charge of nations and sustains
Such mighty cares, to sleep the livelong night.
Give earnest heed to me, for I am come
A messenger from Jove, who, though far off,
Takes part in thy concerns and pities thee.
He bids thee arm, with all the array of war,
The long-haired Greeks, for now the hour is come
Which gives into thy hands the city of Troy
With all its spacious streets. The powers that dwell
In the celestial mansions are no more
At variance; Juno’s prayers have moved them all,
And o’er the Trojans hangs a fearful doom,
Decreed by Jove. Bear what I say in mind,
And when thy sleep departs forget it not.”

He spake, and, disappearing, left the king
Musing on things that never were to be;
For on that very day he thought to take
The city of Priam. Fool! who little knew
What Jupiter designed should come to pass,
And little thought by his own act to bring
Great woe and grief on Greeks and Trojans both
In hard-fought battles. From his sleep he woke,
The heavenly voice still sounding in his ears,
And sat upright, and put his tunic on,
Soft, fair, and new, and over that he cast
His ample cloak, and round his shapely feet
Laced the becoming sandals. Next, he hung
Upon his shoulders and his side the sword
With silver studs, and took into his hand
The ancestral sceptre, old, but undecayed,
And with it turned his footsteps toward the fleet
Of the Achaian warriors brazen-mailed.

Now Dawn, the goddess, climbed the Olympian height,
Foretelling Day to Jupiter and all
The immortal gods, when Agamemnon bade
The shrill-voiced heralds call the long-haired Greeks
Together; they proclaimed his will, and straight
The warriors came in throngs. But first he bade
A council of large-minded elders meet
On Pylian Nestor’s royal barque, and there
Laid his well-pondered thought before them:⁠—

“My friends, give ear: a Vision from above
Came to me sleeping in the balmy night;
Most like to noble Nestor was its look,
Its face, its stature, and its garb. It stood
Beside me at my head, and thus it spake:⁠—

“O warrior-son of Atreus, sleepest thou?
Tamer of steeds! It ill becomes a chief,
Who has the charge of nations and sustains
Such mighty cares, to sleep the livelong night.
Give earnest heed to me, for I am come
A messenger from Jove, who, though far off,
Takes part in thy concerns and pities thee.
He bids thee arm, with all the array of war,
The long-haired Greeks, for now the hour is come
Which gives into thy hands the city of Troy
With all its spacious streets. The powers who dwell
In the celestial mansions are no more
At variance; Juno’s prayers have moved them all,
And o’er the Trojans hangs a fearful doom,
Decreed by Jove. Bear what I say in mind.’

“It spake and passed away, and with it fled
My slumbers. Now must we devise a way
To bring into the field the sons of Greece.
I first will try, as best I may, with words,
And counsel flight from Troy with all our ships.
Ye each, with different counsels, do your part.”

He spake, and took his seat, and after him
Nestor, the king of sandy Pylus, rose,
With well-considered words. “O friends,” he said,
“Leaders and princes of the Grecian race,
Had any other of the Argive host
Related such a dream, we should have said
The tale is false, and spurned the counsel given,
But he has seen it who in rank and power
Transcends us all, and ours it is to see
How we may arm for war the sons of Greece.”

He spake, and left the council, and the rest,
All sceptred kings, arose, prepared to obey
The shepherd of the people. All the Greeks
Meanwhile came thronging to the appointed place.
As, swarming forth from cells within the rock,
Coming and coming still, the tribe of bees
Fly in a cluster o’er the flowers of spring,
And some are darting out to right and left,
So from the ships and tents a multitude
Along the spacious beach, in mighty throngs,
Moved toward the assembly. Rumor went with them,
The messenger of Jove, and urged them on.
And now, when they were met, the place was stunned
With clamor; earth, as the great crowd sat down,
Groaned under them; a din of mingled cries
Arose; nine shouting heralds strove to hush
The noisy crowd to silence, that at length
The heaven-descended monarchs might be heard.

And when the crowd was seated and had paused
From clamor, Agamemnon rose. He held
The sceptre; Vulcan’s skill had fashioned it,
And Vulcan gave it to Saturnian Jove,
And Jove bestowed it on his messenger,
The Argus-queller Hermes. He in turn
Gave it to Pelops, great in horsemanship;
And Pelops passed the gift to Atreus next,
The people’s shepherd. Atreus, when he died,
Bequeathed it to Thyestes, rich in flocks;
And last, Thyestes left it to be borne
By Agamemnon, symbol of his rule
O’er many isles and all the Argive realm.
Leaning on this, he spake these wingèd words:⁠—

“Friends, Grecian heroes, ministers of Mars,
Saturnian Jove hath in an evil net
Entangled me most cruelly. He gave
His promise and his nod, that, having razed
Troy with her strong defences, I should see
My home again; but now he meditates
To wrong me, and commands me to return,
With lessened glory and much people lost,
To Argos. Thus hath it seemed good to Jove
The mighty, who hath overthrown the towers
Of many a city, and will yet o’erthrow.
The ages yet to come will hear with shame
That such a mighty army of the Greeks
Have waged a fruitless war, and fought in vain
A foe less numerous; yet no end appears
To this long strife. Should Greeks and Trojans make
A treaty, faithfully to number each,
And should the Trojans count their citizens,
And we the Greeks, disposed in rows of tens,
Should call the Trojans singly to pour out
The wine for us, full many a company
Of ten would lack its cup-bearer; so far,
I judge, the sons of Greece outnumber those
Who dwell in Troy. But they have yet allies
From many a city, men who wield the spear,
Withstanding my attempt to overthrow
That populous town. Nine years of mighty Jove
Have passed already, and the planks that form
Our barques are mouldering, and the cables drop
In pieces, and our wives within their homes,
With their young children, sit expecting us;
Yet is the enterprise for which we came
Still unperformed. Now let us all obey
The mandate I reveal, and hasten hence,
With all our fleet, to our beloved homes;
For Troy with her broad streets we cannot take.”

He spake, and in the bosoms of the crowd
Stirred every heart; even those who heard him not
Were moved: the assembly wavered to and fro
Like the long billows of the Icarian Sea,
Roused by the East wind and the South, that rush
Forth from the cloudy seat of Father Jove;
Or like the harvest-field, when west winds stoop
Suddenly from above, and toss the wheat.
So was the whole assembly swayed; they ran
With tumult to the ships; beneath their feet
Rose clouds of dust, and each exhorted each
To seize the ships and drag them to the deep.
They cleared the channels mid the clamorous cries
Of multitudes, who hastened to return,
And drew the props from underneath their barques.

Then had the Greeks returned before their time
If Juno had not to Minerva said:⁠—

“Unconquerable child of Jove! What change
Is this? Shall then the Argive army thus
Flee to their homes across the deep and leave
Glory to Priam, and to Ilium’s sons
The Argive Helen, for whose sake have died
So many Greeks upon the Trojan strand,
Far from the land they loved? But hasten thou
To the host of Argive warriors mailed in brass,
And with persuasive words restrain their men.
Nor let them launch their barques upon the sea.”

She spake; nor did the blue-eyed Pallas fail
To heed the mandate, but with quick descent
She left the Olympian height and suddenly
Stood by the swift ships of the Grecian host.
She found Ulysses there, the man endowed
With wisdom like to Jove’s; he had not touched
His well-appointed barque, for grief had seized
The hero’s heart. The blue-eyed goddess took
Her place beside him, and addressed him thus:⁠—

“Son of Laertes, nobly born and sage
Ulysses, will ye, entering your good ships,
Return in flight to your own land and leave
Glory to Priam, and to Ilium’s sons
The Argive Helen, for whose sake have died
So many Greeks upon the Trojan strand,
Far from the land they loved? Go thou at once
And seek the Argive warriors and restrain
With thy persuasive words the impatient men,
Nor let them launch their well-appointed ships.”

She spake; Ulysses knew the heavenly voice,
And hastened back, and as he ran cast by
His cloak. Eurybates of Ithaca,
The herald, caught it as he followed him.
And now before Atrides, king of men,
The warrior stood, and from his hand received
The ancestral sceptre, old, but undecayed;
And bearing this, he went among the ships
Which brought the Achaian army, mailed in brass;
And whomsoe’er he met upon his way,
Monarch or eminent among the host,
He stopped him, and addressed him blandly, thus:⁠—

“Good friend, this eager haste as if from fear
Befits thee not. Sit down, and cause the rest
To sit. What Agamemnon’s will may be
Thou canst not yet be certain; he intends
To try the Greeks, and soon will punish those
Who act amiss. We cannot all have heard
What he has said; beware, then, lest his wrath
Fall heavily upon the sons of Greece.
The monarch, foster-child of Jupiter,
Is terrible enraged. Authority
Is given by Jove, all-wise, who loves the king.”

But when he found one of the lower sort
Shouting and brawling, with the royal wand
He smote him, and reproved him sharply, thus:⁠—

“Friend, take thy seat in quiet, and attend
To what thy betters say; thou art not strong
Nor valiant, and thou art of mean repute
In combat and in council. We, the Greeks,
Cannot be all supreme in power. The rule
Of the many is not well. One must be chief
In war, and one the king, to whom the son
Of Saturn gives the sceptre, making him
The lawgiver, that he may rule the rest.”

Thus did he act the chief, and make the host
Obey his word; they to the council ground
Came rushing back from all the ships and tents
With tumult, as, on the long-stretching shore
Of ocean many-voiced, his billows fling
Themselves in fury, and the deep resounds.

All others took their seats and kept their place;
Thersites only, clamorous of tongue,
Kept brawling. He, with many insolent words,
Was wont to seek unseemly strife with kings,
Uttering whate’er it seemed to him might move
The Greeks to laughter. Of the multitude
Who came to Ilium, none so base as he⁠—
Squint-eyed, with one lame foot, and on his back
A lump, and shoulders curving towards the chest;
His head was sharp, and over it the hairs
Were thinly scattered. Hateful to the chiefs
Achilles and Ulysses, he would oft
Revile them. He to Agamemnon now
Called with shrill voice and taunting words. The Greeks
Heard him impatiently, with strong disgust
And vehement anger, yet he shouted still
To Agamemnon, and kept railing on:⁠—

“Of what dost thou complain; what wouldst thou more,
Atrides? In thy tents are heaps of gold;
Thy tents are full of chosen damsels, given
To thee before all others, by the Greeks,
Whene’er we take a city. Dost thou yet
Hanker for gold, brought by some Trojan knight,
A ransom for his son, whom I shall lead⁠—
I, or some other Greek⁠—a captive bound?
Or dost thou wish, for thy more idle hours,
Some maiden, whom thou mayst detain apart?
Ill it beseems a prince like thee to lead
The sons of Greece, for such a cause as this,
Into new perils. O ye coward race!
Ye abject Greeklings, Greeks no longer, haste
Homeward with all the fleet, and let us leave
This man at Troy to win his trophies here,
That he may learn whether the aid we give
Avails him aught or not, since he insults
Achilles, a far braver man than he,
And takes from him by force and holds his prize.
And yet, Achilles is not moved by this
To anger: he is spiritless, or else,
Atrides, this injustice were thy last.”

Taunting the shepherd of the people thus,
Thersites shouted to the king of men.
But great Ulysses, coming quickly up,
Rebuked him with a frown: “Thou garrulous wretch!
Glib as thou art of tongue, Thersites, cease,
Nor singly dare to seek dispute with kings.
There came, I deem, no viler wretch than thou
To Troy with Agamemnon. Prate no more
Of kings, reviling them, and keeping watch
For pretexts to return. We know not yet
Whether to go or to remain were best.
Thou railest at the shepherd of the host,
Atrides Agamemnon, for thou seest
The Grecian heroes load him with rewards,
While thou insultest him with scurrilous words.
I tell thee now⁠—and I shall keep my word⁠—
If e’er again I find thee railing on,
As now thou dost, then let Ulysses wear
His head no longer, let me not be called
The father of Telemachus, if I
Shall fail to seize thee, and to strip thee bare
Of cloak and tunic, and whatever else
Covers thy carcass, and to send thee forth,
Howling, to our swift barques upon the shore,
Scourged from the council with a storm of blows.”

He spake, and with his sceptre smote the back
And shoulders of the scoffer, who crouched low
And shed a shower of tears. A bloody whelk
Rose where the golden sceptre fell. He took
His seat, dismayed, and still in pain wiped off
The tears from his smutched face. The multitude
Around him, though in anxious mood, were moved
To smiles, and one addressed his neighbor thus:⁠—

“Strange that Ulysses does a thousand things
So well⁠—so wise in council, and in war
So brave; and for the Grecian army now
He does the best of all, in silencing
The chatter of this saucy slanderer,
Whose acrid temper will not soon again
Move him to rail with insolent speech at kings.”

So talked the multitude. Ulysses then,
Holding the sceptre, rose, and by his side
The blue-eyed Pallas, in a herald’s form,
Commanded silence, that the Argive host⁠—
The mightiest and the meanest⁠—might attend
To what should now be said, and calmly weigh
The counsel given them. With a prudent art
Ulysses framed his speech, and thus he spake:⁠—

“The Greeks, O Atreus’ son, would bring on thee
Dishonor in the eyes and speech of men,
Breaking the promise made when first they came
From Argos, famed for steeds, that, having spoiled
This well-defended Troy, thou shouldst return
A conqueror. And now, like tender boys
Or widowed women, all give way to grief
And languish to return. ’Twere hard to bear
If, after all our sufferings and our toils,
We go back now. And yet, whoe’er remains
A single month away from wife and home
Chafes if the winter storms and angry sea
Detain him still on board his well-oared barque;
And we have seen the ninth full year roll round
Since we came hither. Therefore blame I not
The Greeks if they in their beaked ships repine
At this delay. But then it were disgrace
To linger here so long and journey home
With empty hands. Bear with us yet, and wait
Till it be certain whether Calchas speaks
Truly or not. For we remember well,
And all of you whom cruel death has spared
Are witnesses with me, that when the ships
Of Greece⁠—it seems as if but yesterday⁠—
Mustered in Aulis on their way to bring
Woe upon Priam and the town of Troy,
And we, beside a fountain, offered up
On sacred altars chosen hecatombs,
Under a shapely plane-tree, from whose root
Flowed the clear water, there appeared to us
A wondrous sign. A frightful serpent, marked
With crimson spots, which Jupiter sent forth
To daylight from beneath the altar-stone,
Came swiftly gliding toward the tree, whereon
A sparrow had her young⁠—eight unfledged birds⁠—
Upon the topmost bough and screened by leaves;
The mother was the ninth. The serpent seized
The helpless brood and midst their piteous cries
Devoured them, while the mother fluttered round,
Lamenting, till he caught her by the wing;
And when he had destroyed the parent bird
And all her brood, the god who sent him forth
Made him a greater marvel still. The son
Of crafty Saturn changed the snake to stone;
And we who stood around were sore amazed.
Such was the awful portent which the gods
Showed at that sacrifice. But Calchas thus
Instantly spake, interpreting the sign:⁠—
“ ‘O long haired Greeks,’ he said, ‘why stand ye thus
In silence? All-foreseeing Jupiter
Hath sent this mighty omen; late it comes
And late will be fulfilled, yet gloriously,
And with a fame that never shall decay.
For as the snake devoured the sparrow’s brood,
Eight nestlings, and the mother-bird the ninth⁠—
So many years the war shall last; the tenth
Shall give into our hands the stately Troy.’

“So spake the seer; thus far his words are true.
Bide ye then here, ye well-greaved sons of Greece,
Until the city of Priam shall be ours.”

He spake, and loud applause thereon ensued
From all the Greeks, and fearfully the ships
Rang with the clamorous voices uttering
The praises of Ulysses and his words.
Then Nestor, the Gerenian knight, arose
And thus addressed them: “Strangely ye behave,
Like boys unwonted to the tasks of war.
Where now are all your promises and oaths?
Shall all our counselings and all our cares,
Leagues made with wine, religiously outpoured,
And plightings of the strong right hand, be cast
Into the flames? Idly we keep alive
A strife of words, which serves no end though long
We loiter here! But thou, Atrides, firm
Of purpose, give command that now the Greeks
Move to the war, and leave to meet their fate
Those⁠—one or more⁠—who, parting from our host,
Meditate⁠—but I deem in vain⁠—to flee
Homeward to Argos ere they are assured
Whether the word of Jove omnipotent
Be false or true. For when the Greeks embarked
In their swift ships, to carry death and fate
To Ilium’s sons, almighty Jupiter
Flung down his lightnings on the right and gave
Propitious omens. Therefore let no Greek
Go home till he possess a Trojan wife
And ye have signally avenged the wrongs
And griefs of Helen. Yet, if one be here
Who longs to go, let him but lay his hand
On his black ship, prepared to cross the deep,
And he shall die before the rest. But thou,
O king, be wisely counselled, lend an ear
To others, nor neglect what I propose.
Marshal the Greeks by tribes and brotherhoods,
That tribe may stand by tribe, and brotherhoods
Succor each other; if thou thus command
And they obey, thou shalt discern which chief
Or soldier is faint-hearted, which is brave,
For each will fight his best, and thou shalt know
Whether through favor of the gods to Troy,
Or our own cowardice and shameful lack
Of skill in war, the town is not o’erthrown.”

In turn the monarch Agamemnon spake:⁠—
“O aged warrior, thou excellest all
The Greeks in council. Would to Jupiter,
To Pallas and Apollo, that with me
There were but ten such comrades. Priam’s town
Would quickly fall before us and be made
A desolation. But the god who bears
The aegis, Saturn’s son, hath cast on me
Much grief, entangling me in idle strifes
And angry broils. Achilles and myself
Have quarrelled for a maid with bitter words,
And I was first incensed. But if again
We meet and act as friends, the overthrow
That threatens Ilium will not be delayed⁠—
Not for an hour. Now all to your repast!
And then prepare for battle. First let each
See that his spear be sharp, and put his shield
In order, give to his swift-footed steeds
Their ample forage, and o’erlook his car
That it be strong for war; for all the day
Shall we maintain the stubborn fight, nor cease
Even for a moment, till the night come down
To part the wrathful combatants. The band
Of each broad buckler shall be moist with sweat
On every breast, and weary every arm
That wields the spear, and every horse that drags
The polished chariot o’er the field shall smoke
With sweat. But whosoever shall be found
By the beaked ships and skulking from the fray
Shall be the feast of birds of prey and dogs!”

He spake; the Argives raised a mighty shout,
Loud as when billows lash the beetling shore,
Rolled by the south-wind toward some jutting rock
On which the waves, whatever wind may blow,
Beat ceaselessly. In haste the people rose
And went among the ships, and kindled fires
Within their tents and took their meal. And one
Made offerings to one god; another paid
Vows to another of the immortal race;
And all implored deliverance from death
And danger. Agamemnon, king of men,
Offered a fatted ox of five years old
To Jupiter Almighty, summoning
The elder princes of the Grecian host⁠—
Nestor the first, the king Idomeneus,
And then the warriors Ajax and the son
Of Tydeus, with Ulysses, like to Jove
In council, sixth and last. Unbidden came
The valiant Menelaus, for he knew
The cares that weighed upon his brother’s heart.
Then, as they stood around the fatted ox
And took in hand the salted barley-meal,
King Agamemnon in the circle prayed:⁠—

“O Jove, most great and glorious! who dost rule
The tempest⁠—dweller of the ethereal space!
Let not the sun go down and night come on
Ere I shall lay the halls of Priam waste
With fire, and give their portals to the flames,
And hew away the coat of mail that shields
The breast of Hector, splitting it with steel.
And may his fellow-warriors, many a one,
Fall round him to the earth and bite the dust.”

He spake; the son of Saturn hearkened not,
But took the sacrifice and made more hard
The toils of war. And now when they had prayed,
And strown the salted meal, they drew the neck
Of the victim back and cut the throat and flayed
The carcass, hewed away the thighs and laid
The fat upon them in a double fold,
On which they placed raw strips of flesh, and these
They burned with leafless billets. Then they fixed
The entrails on the spits and held them forth
Above the flames, and when the thighs were burned
And entrails tasted, all the rest was carved
Into small portions and transfixed with spits
And roasted carefully and drawn away.
And when these tasks were finished and the board
Was spread, they feasted; from that equal feast
None went unsated. When they had appeased
Their thirst and hunger, the Gerenian knight
Nestor stood forth and spake: “Most glorious son
Of Atreus, Agamemnon, king of men!
Waste we no time in prattle, nor delay
The work appointed by the gods, but send
The heralds of the Achaians, brazen-mailed,
To call the people to the fleet, while we
Pass in a body through their vast array
And wake the martial spirit in their breasts.”

He spake, and Agamemnon, king of men,
Followed the counsel. Instantly he bade
The loud-voiced herald summon to the war
The long-haired Argives. At the call they came,
Quickly they came together, and the kings,
Nurslings of Jupiter, who stood beside
Atrides, hastened through the crowd to form
The army into ranks. Among them walked
The blue-eyed Pallas, bearing on her arm
The priceless aegis, ever fair and new,
And undecaying; from its edge there hung
A hundred golden fringes, fairly wrought,
And every fringe might buy a hecatomb.
With this and fierce, defiant looks she passed
Through all the Achaian host, and made their hearts
Impatient for the march and strong to endure
The combat without pause⁠—for now the war
Seemed to them dearer than the wished return,
In their good galleys, to the land they loved.

As when a forest on the mountain-top
Is in a blaze with the devouring flame
And shines afar, so, while the warriors marched,
The brightness of their burnished weapons flashed
On every side and upward to the sky.

And as when water-fowl of many tribes⁠—
Geese, cranes, and long-necked swans⁠—disport themselves
In Asia’s fields beside Cayster’s streams,
And to and fro they fly with screams, and light,
Flock after flock, and all the fields resound;
So poured, from ships and tents, the swarming tribes
Into Scamander’s plain, where fearful’y
Earth echoed to the tramp of steeds and men;
And there they mustered on the river’s side,
Numberless as the flowers and leaves of spring,
And as when flies in swarming myriads haunt
The herdsman’s stalls in spring-time, when new milk
Has filled the pails⁠—in such vast multitudes
Mustered the long-haired Greeks upon the plain,
Impatient to destroy the Trojan race.

Then, as the goatherds, when their mingled flocks
Are in the pastures, know and set apart
Each his own scattered charge, so did the chiefs,
Moving among them, marshal each his men.
There walked King Agamemnon, like to Jove
In eye and forehead, with the loins of Mars,
And ample chest like him who rules the sea.
And as a bull amid the horned herd
Stands eminent and nobler than the rest,
So Jove to Agamemnon on that day
Gave to surpass the chiefs in port and mien.

O Muses, goddesses who dwell on high,
Tell me⁠—for all things ye behold and know,
While we know nothing and may only hear
The random tales of rumor⁠—tell me who
Were chiefs and princes of the Greeks; for I
Should fail to number and to name them all⁠—
Had I ten tongues, ten throats, a voice unapt
To weary, uttered from a heart of brass⁠—
Unless the Muses aided me. I now
Will sing of the commanders and the ships.

Peneleus, Prothoenor, Leitus,
And Clonius, and Arcesilaus led
The warriors of Boeotia, all who dwelt
In Hyria and in rocky Aulis, all
From Schoenus and from Scolus and the hill
Of Eteonus and Thespeia’s fields,
And Graia and the Mycalesian plain,
All who from Herma and Ilesius came,
And Erythrae, and those who had their homes
In Eleon, Hyla, and Ocalea,
And Peteona, and the stately streets
Of Medeon, Copae, Thisbè full of doves,
And those whose dwelling-place was Eutresis,
And Coronaea, and the grassy lawns
Of Haliartus, all the men who held
Plataea, or in Glissa tilled the soil,
Or dwelt in Hypothebae nobly built,
Or in Onchestus with its temple-walls
Sacred to Neptune, or inhabited
Arnè with fruitful vineyards, Midea
And Nyssa the divine, and Anthedon
The distant⁠—fifty were their barques, and each
Held sixscore youths of the Boeotian race.

Next, over those who came from Aspledon
And from Orchomenus in Minyas
Ascalaphus ruled with his brother chief
Ialmenus⁠—two sons of mighty Mars.
These, in the halls of Actor, Azis’ son,
Astyoche bore to the god of war,
Who met by stealth the bashful maid, as once
She sought the upper palace-rooms. Their ships
Were thirty, ranged in order on the shore.

Then Schedius and Epistrophus, two chiefs
Born to Iphitus, son of Naubolus
The large of soul, led the Phocean host,
Those who in Cyparissus had their homes,
In Panopè and Crissa the divine
And Daulis, or about Hyampolis
Anemoreia, and upon the banks of broad
Cephissus, and with them the race
Who held Lilaea by Cephissus’ springs.
With these came forty ships. Their leaders went
Among them, ranging them in due array
And close to the Boeotians on the left.

Ajax the swift of foot, Oileus’ son,
Was leader of the Locrians⁠—less in limb
And stature than the other Ajax⁠—nay,
Much smaller than that son of Telamon,
Wearing a linen corselet; but to wield
The spear he far excelled all other men
Of Hellas and Achaia. Those who dwelt
In Cynus, Opus, Bessa, and the fields
Of Scarpha and Calliarus and green
Augeia, Tarpha, and the meadows where
Boagrius waters Thronium, followed him
With forty dark-hulled Locrian barques, that came
From coasts beyond Eubrea’s sacred isle.

The Euboeans breathing valor, they who held
Chalcis, Eretria, and the vineyard slopes
Of Histiaea, and the lofty walls
Of Dium and Cerinthus by the sea,
And Styra, and Earystus; these obeyed
Elphenor of the line of Mars, and son
Of the large-souled Chalcodon ruler o’er
The Abantes. Him with loosely flowing locks
The Abantes followed, swift of foot and fierce
In combat, and expert to break the mail
Upon the enemies’ breasts with ashen spears;
With forty dark-hulled barques they followed him.

Next they who came from Athens nobly built,
The city of Erechtheus, great of soul,
Son of the teeming Earth, whom Pallas reared,
That daughter of the Highest, and within
Her sumptuous temple placed him, where the sons
Of Athens, with the circling year’s return,
Paid worship at her altars, bringing bulls
And lambs to lay upon them; these obeyed
Menestheus, son of Peteus, whom no chief
On earth could equal in the art to place
Squadrons of men and horse in due array
For battle. Nestor only sought to share
This praise, but Nestor was the elder chief.
Fifty dark galleys with Menestheus came.

Ajax had brought twelve ships from Salamis,
And these he stationed near the Athenian host.

But they who dwelt in Argos, or within
The strong-walled Tiryns, or Hermione
And Asine with their deep, sheltering bays,
Troezenè and Eïonae, and hills
Of Epidaurus planted o’er with vines,
And they who tilled Aeigina and the coast
Of Mases⁠—Grecian warriors⁠—over these
Brave Diomed bore sway, with Sthenelus,
Beloved son of far-famed Campaneus,
And, third in rule, Euryalus, who seemed
Like to a god, Mecisteus’ royal son
Who sprung from Talaus; yet the chief command
Was given to Diomed, the great in war.
A fleet of eighty galleys came with them.

The dwellers of Mycenae nobly built,
Of Corinth famed for riches, and the town
Of beautiful Cleonae, they who tilled
Orneia, Araethyrea’s pleasant land,
And Sicyon, where of yore Adrastus reigned,
And Hyperesia and the airy heights
Of Gonoessa, and Pellene’s fields,
And they who came from Aegium and the shores
Around it, and broad lands of Helicè⁠—
These had a hundred barques, and over them
Atrides Agamemnon bore command;
And with him came the largest train of troops
And bravest. He was cased in gleaming mail,
And his heart gloried when he thought how high
He stood among the heroes⁠—mightier far
In power, and leader of a mightier host.

Then they who dwelt within the hollow vale
Of queenly Lacedsemon, they who held
Phare and Sparta, Messa full of doves,
Bryseiae, and Augeia’s rich domain,
Amyclae and the town of Helos, built
Close to the sea, and those who had their homes
In Laäs and the fields of Oetylus;
All these obeyed the brother of the king,
The valiant Menelaus. Sixty ships
They brought, but these he ranged apart from those
Of Agamemnon. Through the ranks he went,
And, trusting in his valor, quickened theirs
For battle; for his heart within him burned
To avenge the wrongs of Helen and her tears.

Then came the men who tilled the Pylean coast
And sweet Arenè, Thrya at the fords
Of Alpheus, and the stately palace homes
Of Aepy, or in Cyparissus dwelt,
Or in Amphigeneia, Pteleum,
Helos and Dorium, where the Muses once
Met, journeying from Oecalian Eurytus,
The Thracian Thamyris, and took from him
His power of voice. For he had made his boast
To overcome in song the daughters nine
Of Jove the Aegis-bearer. They in wrath
Smote him with blindness, took the heavenly gift
Of song away, and made his hand forget
Its cunning with the harp. All those were led
By Nestor, the Gerenian knight, who came
To war on Troy with fourscore ships and ten.

The Arcadians, dwelling by the lofty mount
Cyllene, near the tomb of Epytus,
Warriors who combat hand to hand, and they
Who tilled the fields of Pheneus and possessed
Orchomenus with all its flocks, or dwelt
In Ripa and in Stratia, and the bleak
Enispe, beaten with perpetual winds,
And in Tegea, and the lovely land
Of Mantinea, and in Stymphalus
And in Parrhasia, came in sixty ships
To Troy, with Agapenor for their chief,
Son of Ancaeus. Every ship was thronged
With warriors of Arcadia, for the king
Of men, Atrides, gave them well-oared barques
To cross the dark blue deep, since not to them
Pertained the cares and labors of the sea.

Then from Buprasium and the sacred coast
Of Elis, from Hyrmine and remote
Myrsinus and the Olenian precipice,
And from Alisium came, with chieftains four,
The warriors, ten swift galleys following
Each chieftain, crowded with Epean troops.
And part obeyed Amphimacus, the son
Of Cteatus, and part with Thalpius came,
The son of Eurytus Actorides,
And part with brave Diores, of the line
Of Amarynceus. Last, Polyxenus,
The godlike offspring of Agasthenes,
Whose father was Augeias, led the rest.

They from Dulichium and the Echinades,
Those holy isles descried from Elis o’er
The waters, had for leader Megas, brave
As Mars⁠—the son of Phyleus, dearly loved
By Jove. He left his father’s house in wrath
And dwelt within Dulichium. With the troops
Of Megas came a fleet of forty ships.

Ulysses led the Cephallenian men,
Who dwelt in Ithaca, or whose abode
Was leafy Neritus, and those who came
From Crocyleia, and from Aegilips
The craggy, and Zacynthus, and the isle
Of Samos, and Epirus, and from all
The bordering lands. O’er these Ulysses ruled,
A chief like Jove in council, and with him
There came twelve galleys with their scarlet prows.

Then with the Aetolians came Andraemon’s son
Thoas, their leader. With him were the men
Of Pleuron and Pylene, Olenus,
And Chalcis on the sea-coast and the rocks
Of Calydon; for now no more the sons
Of large-souled Oeneus were alive on earth,
Nor lived the chief himself, and in his tomb
Was Meleager of the golden hair;
And thus the Aetolian rule to Thoas came.
A fleet of fourscore galleys followed him.

Idomeneus, expert to wield the spear,
Commanded those of Crete, the men who dwelt
In Cnosus or Gortyna, strongly walled
Lyctus, Miletus, and the glimmering
Lycastus, Phaestus, Rhytium’s populous town,
And all the warrior train inhabiting
The hundred towns of Crete. Idomeneus
The mighty spearman, and Meriones,
Fierce as the god of war, commanded these,
And came to Troy with eighty dark-ribbed barques.

Tlepolemus, a warrior of the stock
Of Hercules, was leader of the troops
Of Rhodes, and brought nine vessels to the war,
Manned with the haughty Rhodians. These were ranged
In threefold order: those of Lindus, those
Who dwell in white Camirus, lastly those
Of Ialassa. These Tlepolemus,
The valiant spearman, ruled. Astyoche
Bore him to mighty Hercules, who led
The maid from Ephyra, upon the banks
Of Selleis, to be his wife, what time
His valor had o’erthrown and made a spoil
Of many a city full of noble youths.
Tlepolemus, when in the palace-halls
He grew to manhood, slew an aged man,
An uncle of his father, whom he loved,
Lycimnius, of the line of Mars, and straight
He rigged a fleet of ships and led on board
A numerous host and fled across the sea.
For fearful were the threats of other sons
And grandsons of the mighty Hercules.
In Rhodes they landed after wanderings long
And many hardships. There they dwelt in tribes,
Three tribes⁠—and were beloved of Jupiter,
The ruler over gods and men, who poured
Abundant riches on their new abode.

Nireus with three good ships from Syma came,
Nireus, Aglaia’s son by Charopus
The monarch⁠—Nireus who in comeliness
Surpassed all Greeks that came to Ilium, save
The faultless son of Peleus. Yet was he
Unwarlike and few people followed him.

The dwellers of Nisyrus, Crapathus,
And Cos, the city of Eurypylus,
Casus, and the Calydnian isles, obeyed
Phidippus and his brother Antiphus,
Sons of the monarch Thessalus, who sprang
From Hercules. With thirty ships they came.

But those who held Pelasgian Argos, those
Who dwelt in Alos, Trachys, Alope,
Phthia, and Hellas full of lovely dames⁠—
Named Myrmidons, Achaians, Hellenes,
Achilles led their fifty ships; but they
Now heeded not the summons to the war,
For there was none to form their ranks for fight.
The great Achilles, swift of foot, remained
Within his ships, indignant for the sake
Of the fair-haired Briscis, whom he brought
A captive from Lyrnessus after toils
And dangers many. He had sacked and spoiled
Lyrnessus, and o’erthrown the walls of Thebes
And smitten Mynes and Epistrophus,
The warlike sons of King Evenus, sprung
From old Selapius. For this cause he kept
Within his ships, full soon to issue forth.

The men of Phylacè, of Pyrasus⁠—
Sacred to Ceres and o’erspread with flowers,
And of Itona, mother of white flocks,
Antrona on the sea, and Pteleum green
With herbage⁠—over these while yet he lived
The brave Protesilaüs ruled; but now
The dark earth covered him, and for his sake
His consort, desolate in Phylacè,
Tore her fair cheeks, and all unfinished stood
His palace, for a Dardan warrior slew
Her husband as he leaped upon the land,
The foremost of the Achaians. Yet his troops
Were not without a leader, though they mourned
Their brave old chief. Podarces, loved by Mars⁠—
Son of Iphiclus, rich in flocks, who sprang
From Phylacus⁠—led them and formed their ranks.
A younger brother of the slain was he.
The slain was braver. Though the warriors grieved
To lose their glorious chief, they did not lack
A general. Forty dark ships followed him.

Then they who dwelt in Pherae, by the lake
Boebeis, and in Boebe, Glaphyrae,
And nobly built Iolchos, came to Troy,
Filling eleven galleys, and obeyed
Eumelus, whom Alcestis the divine
Bore to Admetus⁠—fairest, she, of all
The house of Pelias and of womankind.

Those from Methone and Olizon’s rocks,
And Meliboea and Thaumacia, filled
Seven ships, with Philoctetes for their chief,
A warrior skilled to bend the bow. Each barque
Held fifty rowers, bowmen all, and armed
For stubborn battle. But their leader lay
Far in an island, suffering grievous pangs⁠—
The hallowed isle of Lemnos. There the Greeks
Left him, in torture from a venomed wound
Made by a serpent’s fangs. He lay and pined.
Yet was the moment near when they who thus
Forsook their king should think of him again.
Meantime his troops were not without a chief;
Though greatly they desired their ancient lord,
For now the base-born Medon marshalled them,
Son of Oileus. Rhene brought him forth
To that destroyer of strong fortresses.

The men of Tricca and Ithome’s hills,
And they who held Oechalia and the town
Of Eurytus the Aechalian, had for chiefs two
sons of Aesculapius, healers both,
And skilful⁠—Podalirius one, and one
Machaon. Thirty hollow barques were theirs.

The dwellers of Ormenium, they whose homes
Were by the Hyperian fount, and they
Who held Asterium and the snowy peaks
Of Titanus, obeyed Eurypylus,
Evaemon’s son, and far renowned. A fleet
Of forty dark-ribbed vessels followed him.

Those who possessed Argissa, those who held
Gyrtonè, Orthè, and Helonè, those
Who dwelt in Oloösson with white walls,
The sturdy warrior Polypoetes led,
Son of Pirithoüs, who derived his birth
From deathless Jove. Hippodameia bore
The warrior to Pirithoüs on the day
When he took vengeance on the shaggy brood
Of Centaurs, and from Pelion drove them forth
To Aethicae. Yet not alone in rule
Was Polypoetes, for Leonteus, sprung
From the large-souled Coronus, Caeneus’ son,
Shared with him the command. With them a fleet
Of forty dark-hulled vessels came to Troy.

Then Guneus came, with two and twenty ships
From Cythus. Under his command he held
The Enienes, and that sturdy race,
The Periboean warriors, and the men
Who built on cold Dodona, or who tilled
The fields where pleasant Titaresius flows
And into Peneus pours his gentle stream,
Yet with its silver eddies mingles not,
But floats upon the current’s face like oil⁠—
A Stygian stream by which the immortals swear.

With Prothous, Tenthredon’s son, there came
The warriors of Magnesia, who abode
By Peneus, and by Pelion hung with woods;
Swift-footed Prothous led these. They came
With forty dark-hulled galleys to the war.

These were the chiefs and princes of the Greeks.
Say, Muse, who most excelled among the kings,
And which the noblest steeds, of all that came
With the two sons of Atreus to the war?
The noblest steeds were those in Pherae bred,
That, guided by Eumelus, flew like birds⁠—
Alike in hue and age; the plummet showed
Their height the same, and both were mares, and, reared
By Phoebus of the silver bow among
The meadows of Pieria, they became
The terror of the bloody battle-field.
The mightiest of the chiefs, while yet in wrath
Achilles kept aloof, was Ajax, son
Of Telamon; yet was Pelides far
The greater warrior, and the steeds which bore
That perfect hero were of noblest breed.
In his beaked galleys, swift to cut the sea,
Achilles lay, meanwhile, and nursed the wrath
He bore to Agamemnon, Atreus’ son,
The shepherd of the people. On the beach
His warriors took their sport with javelins
And quoits and bows, while near the chariots tied
The horses, standing, browsed on lotus-leaves
And parsley from the marshes. But beneath
The tents the closely covered chariots stood,
While idly through the camp the charioteers,
Hither and thither sauntering, missed the sight
Of their brave lord and went not to the field.

The army swept the earth as when a fire
Devours the herbage of the plains. The ground
Groaned under them as when the Thunderer Jove
In anger with his lightnings smites the earth
About Typhosus⁠—where they say he lies⁠—
In Arimi. So fearfully the ground
Groaned under that swift army as it moved.

Now to the Trojans the swift Iris came
A messenger from aegis-bearing Jove,
Tidings of bale she brought. They all had met⁠—
Old men and youths⁠—in council at the gates
Of Priam’s mansion. There did Iris take
Her station near the multitude, and spake,
In voice and gesture like Polites, son
Of Priam, who, confiding in his speed,
Had stood a watcher for the sons of Troy
On aged Aesyeta’s lofty tomb,
To give them warning when the Achaian host
Should issue from their galleys. Thus disguised,
Swift Iris spake her message from the skies:⁠—

“Father! Thou art delighted with much speech,
As once in time of peace, but now’t is war,
Inevitable war, and close at hand.
I have seen many battles, yet have ne’er
Beheld such armies, and so vast as these⁠—
In number like the sands and summer leaves.
They march across the plain, prepared to give
Battle beneath the city walls. To thee,
O Hector, it belongs to heed my voice
And counsel. Many are the allies within
The walls of this great town of Priam, men
Of diverse race and speech. Let every chief
Of these array his countrymen for war,
And give them orders for the coming fight.”

She spake, and Hector heeded and obeyed
The counsel of the goddess; he dismissed
The assembly; all the Trojans rushed to arms,
And all the gates were opened. Horse and foot
Poured forth together in tumultuous haste.

In the great plain before the city stands
A mound of steep ascent on every side;
Men named it Batiea, but the gods
Called it the swift Myrinna’s tomb; and here
Mustered the sons of Troy and their allies.

Great Hector of the beamy helm, the son
Of Priam, led the Trojan race. The host
Of greatest multitude was marshalled there,
And there the bravest, mighty with the spear.

Aeneas marshalled the Dardanian troops⁠—
The brave son of Anchises. Venus bore
The warrior to Anchises on the heights
Of Ida, where the mortal lover met
The goddess. Yet he ruled them not alone;
Two chiefs, Antenor’s sons Archelochus
And Acamas, were with him in command,
Expert in all the many arts of war.

The Trojans from Zeleia, opulent men,
Who drank the dark Aesepus⁠—over these
Ruled Pandarus, Lycaon’s valiant son,
To whom the god Apollo gave his bow.

The troops from Adrasteia, they who dwelt
Within Apaesus’ walls, or tilled the soil
Of Pityeia and Tereia’s heights,
Were led by Amphius and Adrastus, clad
In linen corselets for the war, the sons
Of Merops the Percosian, skilled beyond
All other men in the diviner’s art.
Nor would he that his sons should seek the field
Of slaughter. They obeyed him not; the fates
Decreed their early death and urged them on.

The dwellers of Percote, Practium,
And Sestus, and Abydus, and divine
Arisba, followed Asius, great among
The heroes and the son of Hyrtacus⁠—
Asius, who came with strong and fiery steeds,
Borne from Arisba and from Selleis’ banks.

Hippothoüs over the Pelasgian tribes⁠—
Skilled spearman, who abode among the fields
Of the deep-soiled Larissa⁠—bore command⁠—
Hippothoüs with Pyteus, who derived
Their race from Mars, and for their father claimed
Pelasgian Lethus, son of Teutamus.

And Acamas, and Peiroüs, valiant chief,
Were captains of the Thracian men, whose fields
Were bounded by the rushing Hellespont.
Euphemus led the Cicones, expert
To wield the spear in fight. The nobly-born
Troezenus was his father. Ceas’ son
Pyraechmes with Paeonia’s archers came
From the broad Axius in far Amydon⁠—
Axius, the fairest river of the earth.

Pytamenes, a chief of fearless heart,
Led from the region of the Eneti,
Where first the stubborn race of mules was bred,
The Paphlagonian warriors, they who held
Cytorus, Sesamus, and fair abodes
Built where Parthenius wanders on, and those
Who dwelt in Cromna and Aegialus,
And on the lofty Erythinian heights.

And Hodius and Epistrophus led on
The Halezonians from the distant land
Of Alyba, where ores of silver lie.
And Chromis and the augur Ennomus
Were leaders of the Mysians; but his skill
Saved not the augur from the doom of death,
Slain by the swift of foot, Aeacides,
With other men of Troy where Xanthus flows.
And Phorcys and Ascanius, who was like
A god in beauty, led the Phrygian troops
From far Ascania, eager for the fray.
And Antiphus and Mesthles were the chiefs
Of the Maeonian warriors, reared beside
The ships of Tmolus. There Gygaea’s lake
Brought forth both chieftains to Pylsemenes.

Nastes was leader of the Carian troops,
Who spake in barbarous accents and possessed
Miletus and the leafy mountain heights
Where dwell the Phthirians, and Maeauder’s stream,
And airy peaks of Mycalè. O’er these
Amphimachus and Nastes held command⁠—
Amphimachus and Nastes, far renowned
Sons of Nomion, him who, madly vain,
Went to the battle pranked like a young girl
In golden ornaments. They spared him not
The bitter doom of death; he fell beneath
The hand of swift Aeacides within
The river’s channel. There the great in war,
Achilles, spoiled Nomion of his gold.

Sarpedon and the noble Glaucus bore
Rule o’er the Eycians coming from afar,
Where eddying Xanthus runs through Lycia’s meads.

Now when both armies were arrayed for war,
Each with its chiefs, the Trojan host moved on
With shouts and clang of arms, as when the cry
Of cranes is in the air, that, flying south
From winter and its mighty breadth of rain,
Wing their way over ocean, and at dawn
Bring fearful battle to the pygmy race,
Bloodshed and death. But silently the Greeks
Went forward, breathing valor, mindful still
To aid each other in the coming fray.

As when the south wind shrouds a mountain-top
In vapors that awake the shepherd’s fear⁠—
A surer covert for the thief than night⁠—
And round him one can only see as far
As one can hurl a stone⁠—such was the cloud
Of dust that from the warriors’ trampling feet
Rose round their rapid march and filled the air.

Now drew they near each other, face to face,
And Paris in the Trojan van pressed on,
In presence like a god. A leopard’s hide
Was thrown across his shoulders, and he bore
A crooked bow and falchion. Brandishing
Two brazen-pointed javelins, he defied
To mortal fight the bravest of the Greeks.

Him, Menelaus, loved of Mars, beheld
Advancing with large strides before the rest;
And as a hungry lion who has made
A prey of some large beast⁠—a horned stag
Or mountain goat⁠—rejoices, and with speed
Devours it, though swift hounds and sturdy youth
Press on his flank, so Menelaus felt
Great joy when Paris, of the godlike form,
Appeared in sight, for now he thought to wreak
His vengeance on the guilty one, and straight
Sprang from his car to earth with all his arms.

But when the graceful Paris saw the chief
Come toward him from the foremost ranks, his heart
Was troubled, and he turned and passed among
His fellow-warriors and avoided death.
As one, who meets within a mountain glade
A serpent, starts aside with sudden fright,
And takes the backward way with trembling limbs
And cheeks all white⁠—the graceful Paris thus
Before the son of Atreus shrank in fear,
And mingled with the high-souled sons of Troy.
Hector beheld and thus upbraided him
Harshly: “O luckless Paris, nobly formed,
Yet woman-follower and seducer! Thou
Shouldst never have been born, or else at best
Have died unwedded; better were it far,
Than thus to be a scandal and a scorn
To all who look on thee. The long-haired Greeks,
How they will laugh, who for thy gallant looks
Deemed thee a hero, when there dwells in thee
No spirit and no courage? Wast thou such
When, crossing the great deep in thy stanch ships
With chosen comrades, thou didst make thy way
Among a stranger-people and bear off
A beautiful woman from that distant land,
Allied by marriage-ties to warrior-men⁠—
A mischief to thy father and to us
And all the people, to our foes a joy,
And a disgrace to thee? Why couldst thou not
Await Atrides? Then hadst thou been taught
From what a valiant warrior thou didst take
His blooming spouse. Thy harp will not avail,
Nor all the gifts of Venus, nor thy locks,
Nor thy fair form, when thou art laid in dust.
Surely the sons of Troy are faint of heart,
Else hadst thou, for the evil thou hast wrought,
Been laid beneath a coverlet of stone.”

Then Paris, of the godlike presence, spake
In answer: “Hector, thy rebuke is just;
Thou dost not wrong me. Dauntless is thy heart;
’Tis like an axe when, wielded by the hand
That hews the shipwright’s plank, it cuts right through,
Doubling the wielder’s force. Such tameless heart
Dwells in thy bosom. Yet reproach me not
With the fair gifts which golden Venus gave.
Whatever in their grace the gods bestow
Is not to be rejected: ’tis not ours
To choose what they shall give us. But if thou
Desirest to behold my prowess shown
In combat, cause the Trojans and the Greeks
To pause from battle, while, between the hosts, as
I and the warlike Menelaus strive
In single fight for Helen and her wealth.
Whoever shall prevail and prove himself
The better warrior, let him take with him
The treasure and the woman, and depart;
While all the other Trojans, having made
A faithful league of amity, shall dwell
On Ilium’s fertile plain, and all the Greeks
Return to Argos, famed for noble steeds,
And to Achaia, famed for lovely dames.”

He spake, and Hector, hearing him, rejoiced,
And went between the hosts, and with his spear,
Held by the middle, pressed the phalanxes
Of Trojans back, and made them all sit down.
The long-haired Greeks meanwhile, with bended bows,
Took aim against him, just about to send
Arrows and stones; but Agamemnon, king
Of men, beheld, and thus he cried aloud:⁠—

“Restrain yourselves, ye Argives; let not fly
Your arrows, ye Achaians; Hector asks⁠—
He of the beamy helmet asks to speak.”

He spake, and they refrained, and all, at once,
Were silent. Hector then stood forth and said:⁠—

“Hearken, ye Trojans and ye nobly-armed
Achaians, to what Paris says by me.
He bids the Trojans and the Greeks lay down
Their shining arms upon the teeming earth,
And he and Menelaus, loved of Mars,
Will strive in single combat, on the ground
Between the hosts, for Helen and her wealth;
And he who shall o’ercome, and prove himself
The better warrior, to his home shall bear
The treasure and the woman, while the rest
Shall frame a solemn covenant of peace.”

He spake, and both the hosts in silence heard.
Then Menelaus, great in battle, said:⁠—

“Now hear me also⁠—me whose spirit feels
The wrong most keenly. I propose that now
The Greeks and Trojans separate reconciled,
For greatly have ye suffered for the sake
Of this my quarrel, and the original fault
Of Paris. Whomsoever fate ordains
To perish, let him die; but let the rest
Be from this moment reconciled, and part.
And bring an offering of two lambs⁠—one white,
The other black⁠—to Earth and to the Sun,
And we ourselves will offer one to Jove.
And be the mighty Priam here, that he
May sanction this our compact⁠—for his sons
Are arrogant and faithless⁠—lest some hand
Wickedly break the covenant of Jove.
The younger men are of a fickle mood;
But when an elder shares the act he looks
Both to the past and future, and provides
What is most fitting and the best for all.”

He spake, and both the Greeks and Trojans heard
His words with joy, and hoped the hour was come
To end the hard-fought war. They reined their steeds
Back to the ranks, alighted, and put off
Their armor, which they laid upon the ground
Near them in piles, with little space between.

Then Hector sent two heralds forth with speed
Into the town, to bring the lambs and call
King Priam. Meanwhile Agamemnon bade
Talthybius seek the hollow ships and find
A lamb for the altar. He obeyed the words
Of noble Agamemnon, king of men.

Meanwhile to white-armed Helen Iris came
A messenger. She took a form that seemed
Laodice, the sister of Paris, whom
Antenor’s son, King Helicaon, wed⁠—
Fairest of Priam’s daughters. She drew near
To Helen, in the palace, weaving there
An ample web, a shining double-robe,
Whereon were many conflicts fairly wrought,
Endured by the horse-taming sons of Troy
And brazen-mailed Achaians for her sake
Upon the field of Mars. Beside her stood
Swift-footed Iris, and addressed her thus:⁠—

“Dear lady, come and see the Trojan knights
And brazen mailed Achaians doing things
To wonder at. They who, in this sad war,
Eager to slay each other, lately met
In murderous combat on the field, are now
Seated in silence, and the war hath ceased.
They lean upon their shields, their massive spears
Are near them, planted in the ground upright.
Paris, and Menelaus, loved of Mars,
With their long lances will contend for thee,
And thou wilt be declared the victor’s spouse.”

She said, and in the heart of Helen woke
Dear recollections of her former spouse
And of her home and kindred. Instantly
She left her chamber, robed and veiled in white.
And shedding tender tears; yet not alone,
For with her went two maidens⁠—Aethra, child
Of Pitheus, and the large-eyed Clymenè.
Straight to the Scaean gates they walked, by which
Panthoüs, Priam, and Thymoetes sat,
Lampus and Clytius, Hicetaon sprung
From Mars, Antenor and Ucalegon,
Two sages⁠—elders of the people all.
Beside the gates they sat, unapt, through age,
For tasks of war, but men of fluent speech,
Like the cicadas that within the wood
Sit on the trees and utter delicate sounds.
Such were the nobles of the Trojan race
Who sat upon the tower. But when they marked
The approach of Helen, to each other thus
With wingèd words, but in low tones, they said:⁠—

“Small blame is theirs, if both the Trojan knights
And brazen-mailed Achaians have endured
So long so many evils for the sake
Of that one woman. She is wholly like
In feature to the deathless goddesses.
So be it: let her, peerless as she is,
Return on board the fleet, nor stay to bring
Disaster upon us and all our race.”

So spake the elders. Priam meantime called
To Helen: “Come, dear daughter, sit by me.
Thou canst behold thy former husband hence,
Thy kindred and thy friends. I blame thee not;
The blame is with the immortals who have sent
These pestilent Greeks against me. Sit and name
For me this mighty man, the Grecian chief,
Gallant and tall. True, there are taller men;
But of such noble form and dignity
I never saw: in truth, a kingly man.”

And Helen, fairest among women, thus
Answered: “Dear second father, whom at once
I fear and honor, would that cruel death
Had overtaken me before I left,
To wander with thy son, my marriage-bed,
And my dear daughter, and the company
Of friends I loved. But that was not to be;
And now I pine and weep. Yet will I tell
What thou dost ask. The hero whom thou seest
Is the wide-ruling Agamemnon, son
Of Atreus, and is both a gracious king
And a most dreaded warrior. He was once
Brother-in-law to me, if I may speak⁠—
Lost as I am to shame⁠—of such a tie.”

She said, the aged man admired, and then
He spake again: “O son of Atreus, born
Under a happy fate, and fortunate
Among the sons of men! A mighty host
Of Grecian youths obey thy rule. I went
To Phrygia once⁠—that land of vines⁠—and there
Saw many Phrygians, heroes on fleet steeds,
The troops of Otreus, and of Mygdon, shaped
Like one of the immortals. They encamped
By the Sangarius. I was an ally;
My troops were ranked with theirs upon the day
When came the unsexed Amazons to war.
Yet even there I saw not such a host
As this of black-eyed Greeks who muster here.”

Then Priam saw Ulysses, and inquired:⁠—
“Dear daughter, tell me also who is that,
Less tall than Agamemnon, yet more broad
In chest and shoulders. On the teeming earth
His armor lies, but he, from place to place,
Walks round among the ranks of soldiery,
As when the thick-fleeced father of the flocks
Moves through the multitude of his white sheep.”

And Jove-descended Helen answered thus:⁠—
“That is Ulysses, man of many arts,
Son of Laertes, reared in Ithaca,
That rugged isle, and skilled in every form
Of shrewd device and action wisely planned.”

Then spake the sage Antenor: “Thou hast said
The truth, O lady. This Ulysses once
Came on an embassy, concerning thee,
To Troy with Menelaus, great in war;
And I received them as my guests, and they
Were lodged within my palace, and I learned
The temper and the qualities of both.
When both were standing mid the men of Troy,
I marked that Menelaus’s broad chest
Made him the more conspicuous, but when both
Were seated, greater was the dignity
Seen in Ulysses. When they both addressed
The council, Menelaus briefly spake
In pleasing tones, though with few words⁠—as one
Not given to loose and wandering speech⁠—although
The younger. When the wise Ulysses rose,
He stood with eyes cast down, and fixed on earth,
And neither swayed his sceptre to the right
Nor to the left, but held it motionless,
Like one unused to public speech. He seemed
An idiot out of humor. But when forth
He sent from his full lungs his mighty voice,
And words came like a fall of winter snow,
No mortal then would dare to strive with him
For mastery in speech. We less admired
The aspect of Ulysses than his words.”

Beholding Ajax then, the aged king
Asked yet again: “Who is that other chief
Of the Achaians, tall, and large of limb⁠—
Taller and broader-chested than the rest?”

Helen, the beautiful and richly-robed,
Answered: “Thou seest the mighty Ajax there,
The bulwark of the Greeks. On the other side,
Among his Cretans, stands Idomeneus,
Of godlike aspect, near to whom are grouped
The leaders of the Cretans. Oftentimes
The warlike Menelaus welcomed him
Within our palace, when he came from Crete.
I could point out and name the other chiefs
Of the dark-eyed Achaians. Two alone,
Princes among their people, are not seen⁠—
Castor the fearless horseman, and the skilled
In boxing, Pollux⁠—twins; one mother bore
Both them and me. Came they not with the rest
From pleasant Lacedaemon to the war?
Or, having crossed the deep in their good ships,
Shun they to fight among the valiant ones
Of Greece, because of my reproach and shame?”

She spake; but they already lay in earth
In Lacedaemon, their dear native land.

And now the heralds through the city bore
The sacred pledges of the gods⁠—two lambs,
And joyous wine, the fruit of Earth, within
A goat-skin. One of them⁠—Idasus⁠—brought
A glistening vase and golden drinking-cups,
And summoned, in these words, the aged king:⁠—

“Son of Laomedon, arise! The chiefs
Who lead the Trojan knights and brazen-mailed
Achaians pray thee to descend at once
Into the plain, that thou mayst ratify
A faithful compact. Alexander now
And warlike Menelaus will contend
With their long spears for Helen. She and all
Her treasures are to be the conqueror’s prize;
While all the other Trojans, having made
A faithful league of amity, shall dwell
On Ilium’s fertile plain, and all the Greeks
Return to Argos, famed for noble steeds,
And to Achaia, famed for lovely dames.”

He spake, and Priam, shuddering, heard and bade
The attendants yoke the horses to his car.
Soon were they yoked; he mounted first and drew
The reins; Antenor took a place within
The sumptuous car, and through the Scaean gates
They guided the fleet coursers toward the field.

Now when the twain had come where lay the hosts
Of Trojans and Achaians, down they stepped
Upon the teeming earth, and went among
The assembled armies. Quickly, as they came,
Rose Agamemnon, king of men, and next
Uprose the wise Ulysses. To the spot
The illustrious heralds brought the sacred things
That bind a treaty, and with mingled wine
They filled a chalice, and upon the hands
Of all the kings poured water. Then the son
Of Atreus drew a dagger which he wore
Slung by his sword’s huge sheath, and clipped away
The forelocks of the lambs, and parted them
Among the Trojan and Achaian chiefs,
And stood with lifted hands and prayed aloud:⁠—

“O Father Jupiter, who rulest all
From Ida, mightiest, most august! And thou,
O all-beholding and all-hearing Sun!
Ye Rivers, and thou Earth, and ye who dwell
Beneath the earth and punish after death
Those who have sworn false oaths, bear witness ye,
And keep unbroken this day’s promises.
If Alexander in the combat slay
My brother Menelaus, he shall keep
Helen and all her wealth, while we return
Homeward in our good ships. If, otherwise,
The bright-haired Menelaus take the life
Of Alexander, Helen and her wealth
Shall be restored, and they of Troy shall pay
Such fine as may be meet, and may be long
Remembered in the ages yet to come.
And then if, after Alexander’s fall,
Priam and Priam’s sons refuse the fine,
I shall make war for it, and keep my place
By Troy until I gain the end I seek.”

So spake the king, and with the cruel steel
Cut the lambs’ throats, and laid them on the ground,
Panting and powerless, for the dagger took
Their lives away. Then over them they poured
Wine from the chalice, drawn in golden cups,
And prayed to the ever-living gods; and thus
Were Trojans and Achaians heard to say:⁠—

“O Jupiter most mighty and august!
Whoever first shall break these solemn oaths,
So may their brains flow down upon the earth⁠—
Theirs and their children’s⁠—like the wine we pour,
And be their wives the wives of other men.”

Such was the people’s vow. Saturnian Jove
Confirmed it not. Then Priam, of the line
Of Dardanus, addressed the armies thus:⁠—

“Hear me, ye Trojans, and ye well-greaved Greeks!
For me I must return to wind-swept Troy.
I cannot bear, with these old eyes, to look
On my dear son engaged in desperate fight
With Menelaus, the beloved of Mars.
Jove and the ever-living gods alone
Know which of them shall meet the doom of death.”

So spake the godlike man, and placed the lambs
Within his chariot, mounted, and drew up
The reins. Antenor by him took his place
Within the sumptuous chariot. Then they turned
The horses and retraced their way to Troy.

But Hector, son of Priam, and the great
Ulysses measured off a fitting space,
And in a brazen helmet, to decide
Which warrior first should hurl the brazen spear,
They shook the lots, while all the people round
Lifted their hands to heaven and prayed the gods;
And thus the Trojans and Achaians said:⁠—

“O Father Jove, who rulest from the top
Of Ida, mightiest one and most august!
Whichever of these twain has done the wrong,
Grant that he pass to Pluto’s dwelling, slain,
While friendship and a faithful league are ours.”

So spake they. Hector of the beamy helm
Looked back and shook the lots. Forth leaped at once
The lot of Paris. Then they took their seats
In ranks beside their rapid steeds, and where
Lay their rich armor. Paris the divine,
Husband of bright-haired Helen, there put on
His shining panoply⁠—upon his legs
Fair greaves, with silver clasps, and on his breast
His brother’s mail, Lycaon’s, fitting well
His form. Around his shoulders then he hung
His silver-studded sword, and stout, broad shield,
And gave his glorious brows the dreadful helm,
Dark with its horse-hair plume. A massive spear
Filled his right hand. Meantime the warlike son
Of Atreus clad himself in like array.

And now when both were armed for fight, and each
Had left his host, and, coming forward, walked
Between the Trojans and the Greeks, and frowned
Upon the other, a mute wonder held
The Trojan cavaliers and well-greaved Greeks.
There near each other in the measured space
They stood in wrathful mood with lifted spears.

First Paris hurled his massive spear; it smote
The round shield of Atrides, but the brass
Broke not beneath the blow; the weapon’s point
Was bent on that strong shield. The next assault
Atrides Menelaus made, but first
Offered this prayer to Father Jupiter:⁠—

“O sovereign Jove! Vouchsafe that I avenge
On guilty Paris wrongs which he was first
To offer; let him fall beneath my hand,
That men may dread hereafter to requite
The friendship of a host with injury.”

He spake, and flung his brandished spear; it smote
The round shield of Priamides; right through
The shining buckler went the rapid steel,
And, cutting the soft tunic near the flank,
Stood fixed in the fair corselet. Paris bent
Sideways before it and escaped his death.
Atrides drew his silver studded sword,
Lifted it high and smote his enemy’s crest.
The weapon, shattered to four fragments, fell.
He looked to the broad heaven, and thus exclaimed:⁠—

“O Father Jove! Thou art of all the gods
The most unfriendly. I had hoped to avenge
The wrong by Paris done me, but my sword
Is broken in my grasp, and from my hand
The spear was vainly flung and gave no wound.”

He spake, and, rushing forward, seized the helm
Of Paris by its horse-hair crest, and turned
And dragged him toward the well-armed Greeks. Beneath
His tender throat the embroidered band that held
The helmet to the chin was choking him.
And now had Menelaus dragged him thence,
And earned great glory, if the child of Jove,
Venus, had not perceived his plight in time.
She broke the ox-hide band; an empty helm
Followed the powerful hand; the hero saw,
Swung it aloft and hurled it toward the Greeks,
And there his comrades seized it. He again
Rushed with his brazen spear to slay his foe.
But Venus⁠—for a goddess easily
Can work such marvels⁠—rescued him, and, wrapped
In a thick shadow, bore him from the field
And placed him in his chamber, where the air
Was sweet with perfumes. Then she took her way
To summon Helen. On the lofty tower
She found her, midst a throng of Trojan dames,
And plucked her perfumed robe. She took the form
And features of a spinner of the fleece,
An aged dame, who used to comb for her
The fair white wool in Lacedaemon’s halls,
And loved her much. In such an humble guise
The goddess Venus thus to Helen spake:⁠—

“Come hither, Alexander sends for thee;
He now is in his chamber and at rest
On his carved couch; in beauty and attire
Resplendent, not like one who just returns
From combat with a hero, but like one
Who goes to mingle in the choral dance,
Or, when the dance is ended, takes his seat.”

She spake, and Helen heard her, deeply moved;
Yet when she marked the goddess’s fair neck,
Beautiful bosom, and soft, lustrous eyes,
Her heart was touched with awe, and thus she said:⁠—

“Strange being! Why wilt thou delude me still?
Wouldst thou decoy me further on among
The populous Phrygian towns, or those that stud
Pleasant Maeonia, where there haply dwells
Someone of mortal race whom thou dost deign
To make thy favorite. Hast thou seen, perhaps,
That Menelaus, having overpowered
The noble Alexander, seeks to bear
Me, hated as I must be, to his home?
And hast thou therefore fallen on this device?
Go to him, sit by him, renounce for him
The company of gods, and never more
Return to heaven, but suffer with him; watch
Beside him till he take thee for his wife
Or handmaid. Thither I shall never go,
To adorn his couch and to disgrace myself.
The Trojan dames would taunt me. O, the griefs
That press upon my soul are infinite!”

Displeased, the goddess Venus answered: “Wretch,
Incense me not, lest I abandon thee
In anger, and detest thee with a zeal
As great as is my love, and lest I cause
Trojans and Greeks to hate thee, so that thou
Shalt miserably perish.” Thus she spake;
And Helen, Jove-begotten, struck with awe,
Wrapped in a robe of shining white, went forth
In silence from amidst the Trojan dames,
Unheeded, for the goddess led the way.

When now they stood beneath the sumptuous roof
Of Alexander, straightway did the maids
Turn to their wonted tasks, while she went up,
Fairest of women, to her chamber. There
The laughing Venus brought and placed a seat
Right opposite to Paris. Helen sat,
Daughter of aegis-bearing Jove, with eyes
Averted, and reproached her husband thus:⁠—

“Com’st thou from battle? Rather would that thou
Hadst perished by the mighty hand of him
Who was my husband. It was once, I know,
Thy boast that thou wert more than peer in strength
And power of hand, and practice with the spear,
To warlike Menelaus. Go then now,
Defy him to the combat once again.
And yet I counsel thee to stand aloof,
Nor rashly seek a combat, hand to hand,
With fair haired Menelaus, lest perchance
He smite thee with his spear and thou be slain.”

Then Paris answered: “Woman, chide me not
Thus harshly. True it is, that, with the aid
Of Pallas, Menelaus hath obtained
The victory; but I may vanquish him
In turn, for we have also gods with us.
Give we the hour to dalliance; never yet
Have I so strongly proved the power of love⁠—
Not even when I bore thee from thy home
In pleasant Lacedaemon, traversing
The deep in my good ships, and in the isle
Of Cranaë made thee mine⁠—such glow of love
Possesses me, and sweetness of desire.”

He spake, and to the couch went up; his wife
Followed, and that fair couch received them both.

Meantime Atrides, like a beast of prey,
Went fiercely ranging through the crowd in search
Of godlike Alexander. None of all
The Trojans, or of their renowned allies,
Could point him out to Menelaus, loved
Of Mars; and had they known his lurking-place
They would not for his sake have kept him hid,
For like black death they hated him. Then stood
Among them Agamemnon, king of men,
And spake: “Ye Trojans and Achaians, hear,
And ye allies. The victory belongs
To warlike Menelaus. Ye will then
Restore the Argive Helen and her wealth,
And pay the fitting fine, which shall remain
A memory to men in future times.”

Thus spake the son of Atreus, and the rest
Of the Achaian host approved his words.

Meantime the immortal gods with Jupiter
Upon his golden pavement sat and held
A council. Hebe, honored of them all,
Ministered nectar, and from cups of gold
They pledged each other, looking down on Troy.
When, purposely to kindle Juno’s mood
To anger, Saturn’s son, with biting words
That well betrayed his covert meaning, spake:⁠—

“Two goddesses⁠—the Argive Juno one,
The other Pallas, her invincible friend⁠—
Take part with Menelaus, yet they sit
Aloof, content with looking on, while still
Venus, the laughter-loving one, protects
Her Paris, ever near him, warding off
The stroke of fate. Just now she rescued him
When he was near his death. The victory
Belongs to Menelaus, loved of Mars.
Now let us all consider what shall be
The issue⁠—whether we allow the war,
With all its waste of life, to be renewed,
Or cause the warring nations to sit down
In amity. If haply it shall be
The pleasure and the will of all the gods,
Let Priam’s city keep its dwellers still,
And Menelaus lead his Helen home.”

He spake, but Juno and Minerva sat,
And with closed lips repined, for secretly
They plotted evil for the Trojan race.
Minerva held her peace in bitterness
Of heart and sore displeased with Father Jove.
But Juno could not curb her wrath, and spake:⁠—

“What words, austere Saturnius, hast thou said!
Wilt thou then render vain the toils I bear,
And all my sweat? My very steeds even now
Are weary with the mustering of the host
That threaten woe to Priam and his sons.
Yet do thy will; but be at least assured
That all the other gods approve it not.”

The cloud-compelling Jupiter replied
In anger: “Pestilent one! What grievous wrong
Hath Priam done to thee, or Priam’s sons,
That thou shouldst persevere to overthrow
His noble city? Shouldst thou through the gates
Of Ilium make thy way, and there devour,
Within the ramparts, Priam and his sons
And all the men of Troy alive, thy rage
Haply might be appeased. Do as thou wilt,
So that this difference breed no lasting strife
Between us. Yet I tell thee this⁠—and thou
Bear what I say in mind: In time to come,
Should I design to level in the dust
Some city where men dear to thee are born,
Seek not to thwart my vengeance, but submit.
For now I fully yield me to thy wish,
Though with unwilling mind. Wherever dwell
The race of humankind beneath the sun
And starry heaven, of all their cities Troy
Has been by me most honored⁠—sacred Troy⁠—
And Priam, and the people who obey
Priam, the wielder of the ashen spear;
For there my altars never lacked their rites⁠—
Feasts, incense, and libations duly paid.”

Then Juno, the majestic, with large eyes,
Rejoined: “The cities most beloved by me
Are three⁠—Mycenae, with her spacious streets,
Argos, and Sparta. Raze them to the ground,
If they be hateful to thee. I shall ne’er
Contend to save them, nor repine to see
Their fall; for, earnestly as I might seek
To rescue them from ruin, all my aid
Would not avail, so much the mightier thou.
Yet doth it ill become thee thus to make
My efforts vain. I am a goddess, sprung
From the same stock with thee; I am the child
Of crafty Saturn, and am twice revered⁠—
Both for my birth and that I am the spouse
Of thee who rulest over all the gods.
Now let us each yield somewhat⁠—I to thee
And thou to me; the other deathless gods
Will follow us. Let Pallas be despatched
To that dread battle-field on which are ranged
The Trojans and Achaians, and stir up
The Trojan warriors first to lift their hands
Against the elated Greeks and break the league,”

She ended, and the Father of the gods
And mortals instantly complied, and called
Minerva, and in wingèd accents said:⁠—
“Haste to the battle-field, and there, among
The Trojan and Achaian armies, cause
The Trojan warriors first to lift their hands
Against the elated Greeks and break the league.”

So saying, Jupiter to Pallas gave
The charge she wished already. She in haste
Shot from the Olympian summits, like a star
Sent by the crafty Saturn’s son to warn
The seamen or some mighty host in arms⁠—
A radiant meteor scattering sparkles round.
So came and lighted Pallas on the earth
Amidst the armies. All who saw were seized
With wonder⁠—Trojan knights and well-armed Greeks;
And many a one addressed his comrade thus:⁠—

“Sure we shall have the wasting war again,
And stubborn combats; or, it may be, Jove,
The arbiter of wars among mankind,
Decrees that the two nations dwell in peace.”

So Greeks and Trojans said. The goddess went
Among the Trojan multitude disguised;
She seemed Laodocus, Antenor’s son,
A valiant warrior, seeking through the ranks
For godlike Pandarus. At length she found
Lycaon’s gallant and illustrious son,
Standing with bucklered warriors ranged around,
Who followed him from where Aesepus flows;
And, standing near, she spake these wingèd words:⁠—

“Son of Lycaon! Wilt thou hear my words,
Brave as thou art? Then wilt thou aim a shaft
At Menelaus; thus wilt thou have earned
Great thanks and praise from all the men of Troy,
And chiefly from Prince Paris, who will fill,
Foremost of all, thy hands with lavish gifts,
When he shall look on Menelaus slain⁠—
The warlike son of Atreus⁠—by thy hand,
And laid upon his lofty funeral pile.
Aim now at Menelaus the renowned
An arrow, while thou offerest a vow
To Lycian Phoebus, mighty with the bow,
That thou wilt bring to him a hecatomb
Of firstling lambs, when thou again shalt come
Within thine own Zeleia’s sacred walls.”

So spake Minerva, and her words o’ercame
The weak one’s purpose. He uncovered straight
His polished bow, made of the elastic horns
Of a wild goat, which, from his lurking-place,
As once it left its cavern lair, he smote,
And pierced its breast, and stretched it on the rock.
Full sixteen palms in length the horns had grown
From the goat’s forehead. These an artisan
Had smoothed, and, aptly fitting each to each,
Polished the whole and tipped the work with gold.
To bend that bow, the warrior lowered it
And pressed an end against the earth. His friends
Held up, meanwhile, their shields before his face,
Lest the brave sons of Greece should lift their spears
Against him ere the champion of their host,
The warlike Menelaus, should have felt
The arrow. Then the Lycian drew aside
The cover from his quiver, taking out
A well-fledged arrow that had never flown⁠—
A cause of future sorrows. On the string
He laid that fatal arrow, while he made
To Lycian Phoebus, mighty with the bow,
A vow to sacrifice before his shrine
A noble hecatomb of firstling lambs
When he should come again to his abode
Within his own Zeleia’s sacred walls.
Grasping the bowstring and the arrow’s notch,
He drew them back, and forced the string to meet
His breast, the arrow-head to meet the bow,
Till the bow formed a circle. Then it twanged.
The cord gave out a shrilly sound; the shaft
Leaped forth in eager haste to reach the host.

Yet, Menelaus, then the blessed gods,
The deathless ones, forgot thee not; and first,
Jove’s daughter, gatherer of spoil, who stood
Before thee, turned aside the deadly shaft.
As when a mother, while her child is wrapped
In a sweet slumber, scares away the fly,
So Pallas turned the weapon from thy breast,
And guided it to where the golden clasps
Made fast the belt, and where the corselet’s mail
Was doubled. There the bitter arrow struck
The belt, and through its close contexture passed,
And fixed within the well-wrought corselet stood,
Yet reached the plated quilt which next his skin
The hero wore⁠—his surest guard against
The weapon’s force⁠—and broke through that alike;
And there the arrow gashed the part below,
And the dark blood came gushing from the wound.
As when some Carian or Maeonian dame
Tinges with purple the white ivory,
To form a trapping for the cheeks of steeds⁠—
And many a horseman covets it, yet still
It lies within her chamber, to become
The ornament of some great monarch’s steed
And make its rider proud⁠—thy shapely thighs,
Thy legs, and thy fair ankles thus were stained,
O Menelaus! with thy purple blood.

When Agamemnon, king of men, beheld
The dark blood flowing from his brother’s wound,
He shuddered. Menelaus, great in war,
Felt the like horror; yet, when he perceived
That still the arrow, neck and barb, remained
Without the mail, the courage rose again
That filled his bosom. Agamemnon, then,
The monarch, sighing deeply, took the hand
Of Menelaus⁠—while his comrades round
Like him lamented⁠—sighing as he spake:⁠—

“Dear brother, when I sent thee forth alone
To combat with the Trojans for the Greeks,
I ratified a treaty for thy death,
Since now the Trojans smite and under foot
Trample the league. Yet not in vain shall be
The treaty, nor the blood of lambs, nor wine
Poured to the gods, nor right hands firmly pledged;
For though it please not now Olympian Jove
To make the treaty good, he will in time
Cause it to be fulfilled, and they shall pay
Dearly with their own heads and with their wives
And children for this wrong. And this I know
In my undoubting mind⁠—a day will come
When sacred Troy and Priam and the race
Governed by Priam, mighty with the spear,
Shall perish all. Saturnian Jove, who sits
On high, a dweller of the upper air,
Shall shake his dreadful aegis in the sight
Of all, indignant at this treachery.
Such the event will be; but I shall grieve
Bitterly, Menelaus, if thou die,
Thy term of life cut short. I shall go back
To my dear Argos with a brand of shame
Upon me. For the Greeks will soon again
Bethink them of their country; we shall then
Leave Argive Helen to remain the boast
Of Priam and the Trojans⁠—while thy bones
Shall moulder, mingling with the earth of Troy⁠—
Our great design abandoned. Then shall say
Some haughty Trojan, leaping on the tomb
Of Menelaus: ‘So in time to come
May Agamemnon wreak his wrath, as here
He wreaked it, whither he had vainly led
An army, and now hastens to his home
And his own land, with ships that bear no spoil,
And the brave Menelaus left behind.’
So shall some Trojan say; but, ere that time,
May the earth open to receive my bones!”

The fair-haired Menelaus cheerfully
Replied: “Grieve not, nor be the Greeks alarmed
For me, since this sharp arrow has not found
A vital part, but, ere it reached so far,
The embroidered belt, the quilt beneath, and plate
Wrought by the armorer’s cunning, broke its force.”

King Agamemnon took the word and said:⁠—
“Dear Menelaus! Would that it were so,
Yet the physician must explore thy wound,
And with his balsams soothe the bitter pain.”
Then turning to Talthybius, he addressed
The sacred herald: “Hasten with all speed,
Talthybius; call Machaon, warrior-son
Of Aesculapius, that much-honored leech,
And bring him to the Achaian general,
The warlike Menelaus, whom some hand
Of Trojan or of Lycian, skilled to bend
The bow, hath wounded with his shaft⁠—a deed
For him to exult in, but a grief to us.”

He spake; nor failed the herald to obey,
But hastened at the word and passed among
The squadrons of Achaia, mailed in brass,
In search of great Machaon. Him he found
As midst the valiant ranks of bucklered men
He stood⁠—the troops who followed him to war
From Triccae, nurse of steeds. Then, drawing near,
The herald spake to him in wingèd words:⁠—

“O son of Aesculapius, come in haste.
King Agamemnon calls thee to the aid
Of warlike Menelaus, whom some hand
Of Trojan or of Lycian, skilled to bend
The bow, hath wounded with his shaft⁠—a deed
For him to exult in, but a grief to us.”

Machaon’s heart was touched, and forth they went
Through the great throng, the army of the Greeks.
And when they came where Atreus’ warlike son
Was wounded, they perceived the godlike man
Standing amid a circle of the chiefs,
The bravest of the Achaians, who at once
Had gathered round. Without delay he drew
The arrow from the fairly-fitted belt.
The barbs were bent in drawing. Then he loosed
The embroidered belt, the quilted vest beneath,
And plate⁠—the armorer’s work⁠—and carefully
O’erlooked the wound where fell the bitter shaft,
Cleansed it from blood, and sprinkled over it
With skill the soothing balsams which of yore
The friendly Chiron to his father gave.

While round the warlike Menelaus thus
The chiefs were busy, all the Trojans moved
Into array of battle; they put on
Their armor, and were eager for the fight.
Then wouldst thou not have seen, hadst thou been there,
King Agamemnon slumbering, or in fear,
And skulking from the combat, but alert,
Preparing for the glorious tasks of war.
His horses, and his chariot bright with brass,
He left, and bade Eurymedon, his groom,
The son of Ptolemy Piraides,
Hold them apart still panting, yet with charge
To keep them near their master, till the hour
When he should need them, weary with the toil
Of such a vast command. Meantime he went
On foot among his files of soldiery,
And whomsoe’er he found with fiery steeds
Hasting to battle, thus he cheered them on:⁠—

“O Argives! Let not your hot courage cool,
For Father Jove will never take the part
Of treachery. Whosoe’er have been the first
To break the league, upon their lifeless limbs
Shall vultures feast; and doubt not we shall bear
Away in our good ships the wives they love
And their young children, when we take their town.”

But whomsoe’er he saw that kept afar
From the dread field, he angrily rebuked:⁠—

“O Argives! Who with arrows only fight,
Base as ye are, have ye no sense of shame?
Why stand ye stupefied, like fawns, that, tired
With coursing the wide pastures, stop at last,
Their strength exhausted! Thus ye stand amazed,
Nor think of combat. Wait ye for the hour
When to your ships, with their fair-sculptured prows,
Moored on the borders of the hoary deep,
The Trojans come, that haply ye may see
If the great hand of Jove will shield you then?”

Thus Agamemnon, as supreme in power,
Threaded the warrior-files, until he came
Where stood the Cretans. All in arms they stood
Around Idomeneus, the great in war.
Like a wild boar in strength, he led the van,
And, in the rear, Meriones urged on
His phalanxes. The king of men rejoiced,
And blandly thus bespake Idomeneus:⁠—

“Idomeneus! I honor thee above
The other knights of Greece, as well in war
As in all other labors, and no less
In banquets, when the Achaian nobles charge
Their goblets with the dark-red mingled wine
In sign of honor. All the other Greeks
Drink by a certain measure, but thy cup
Stands ever full, like mine, that thou mayst drink
When thou desirest. Hasten to the war
With all the valor thou dost glory in.”

The Cretan chief, Idomeneus, replied:⁠—
“Atrides, I remain thy true ally,
As I have pledged my faith. But thou exhort
The other long-haired Greeks, and bid them rush
To combat, since the Trojans break their oath.
For woe and death must be the lot of those
Who broke the peace they vowed so solemnly.”

He spake. The son of Atreus, glad at heart,
Passed on among the squadrons, till he came
To where the warriors Ajax formed their ranks
For battle, with a cloud of infantry.
As when some goatherd from the hill-top sees
A cloud that traverses the deep before
A strong west wind⁠—beholding it afar,
Pitch-black it seems, and bringing o’er the waves
A whirlwind with it; he is seized with fear,
And drives his flock to shelter in a cave⁠—
So with the warriors Ajax to the war
Moved, dense and dark, the phalanxes of youths
Trained for the combat, and their serried files
Bristling with spears and shields. The king of men
Saw with delight, and spake these wingèd words:⁠—

“O warriors Ajax, leaders of the Greeks
In brazen armor, I enjoin you not
To rouse the courage of your soldiery.
Such word would ill become me, for yourselves
Have made your followers eager to engage
In manful combat. Would to Jupiter,
To Pallas, and Apollo, that there dwelt
In every bosom such a soul as yours!
Then would the city of King Priam fall
At once, o’erthrown and levelled by our hands.”

Thus having said, he left them and went on
To others. There he found the smooth of speech,
Nestor, the Pylian orator, employed
In marshalling his squadrons. Near to him
Alastor and the large-limbed Pelagon,
Chromius, and Haemon, prince among his tribe,
And Bias, shepherd of the people, stood.
The cavalry with steeds and cars he placed
In front. A vast and valiant multitude
Of infantry he stationed in the rear,
To be the bulwark of the war. Between
He made the faint of spirit take their place,
That, though unwillingly, they might be forced
To combat with the rest. And first he gave
His orders to the horsemen, bidding them
To keep their coursers reined, nor let them range
At random through the tumult of the crowd:⁠—

“And let no man, too vain of horsemanship,
And trusting in his valor, dare advance
Beyond the rest to attack the men of Troy,
Nor let him fall behind the rest, to make
Our ranks the weaker. Whoso from his car
Can reach an enemy’s, let him stand and strike
With his long spear, for ’tis the shrewder way.
By rules like these, which their brave hearts obeyed,
The men of yore laid level towns and towers.”

The aged man, long versed in tasks of war,
Counselled them thus. King Agamemnon heard,
Delighted, and in wingèd words he said:⁠—

“O aged man, would that thy knees were firm
As is thy purpose, and thy strength as great!
But age, the common fate of all, has worn
Thy frame: would that some others had thy age,
And thou wert of the number of our youths!”

Then answered Nestor, the Gerenian knight:⁠—
“O son of Atreus, I myself could wish
That I were now as when of yore I struck
The high-born Ereuthalion down. The gods
Bestow not all their gifts on man at once.
If I were then a youth, old age in turn
Is creeping o’er me. Still I keep among
The knights, and counsel and admonish them⁠—
The office of the aged. Younger men,
They who can trust their strength, must wield the spear.”

He spake. The son of Atreus passed him by,
Pleased with his words, and, moving onward, came
Where⁠—with the Athenians, ever prompt to raise
The war-cry, grouped around him⁠—stood the knight
Menestheus, son of Peteus. Near to these
Was wise Ulysses, with his sturdy band
Of Cephalonians. None of these had heard
The clamor of the battle, for the hosts
Of Trojan knights and Greeks had just begun
To move, and there they waited for the advance
Of other squadrons marching on to charge
The Trojans and begin the war anew.
The king of men, Atrides, was displeased,
And spake, and chid them thus with wingèd words:⁠—

“O son of Peteus, foster-child of Jove,
And thou, the man of craft and evil wiles!
Why stand ye here aloof, irresolute,
And wait for others? Ye should be the first
To meet the foe and stem the battle’s rage.
I bid you first to banquets which the Greeks
Give to their leaders, where ye feast at will
On roasted meats and bowls of pleasant wine.
Now, ere ye move, ye willingly would see
Ten Grecian squadrons join the deadly strife.”

The man of many arts, Ulysses, spake,
And frowned: “O Atreus’ son! What words are those
Which pass thy lips? How canst thou say that we
Avoid the battle? Ever when the Greeks
Seek bloody conflict with the Trojan knights,
Thou, if thou wilt, and if thou givest heed
To things like these, shalt with thine eyes behold
The father of Telemachus engaged
In combat with the foremost knights that form
The Trojan van. Thou utterest empty words.”

King Agamemnon, when he saw the chief
Offended, changed his tone, and, smiling, said:⁠—

“Son of Laertes, nobly-born and wise
Ulysses! It is not for me to chide
Nor to exhort thee, for thy heart, I know,
Counsels thee kindly toward me, and thy thought
Agrees with mine. We will discuss all this
Hereafter. If just now too harsh a word
Was uttered, may the immortals make it vain!”

So saying, he departed, and went on
To others. By his steeds and by his car,
That shone with fastenings of brass, he found
The son of Tydeus, large-souled Diomed,
And Sthenelus, the son of Capaneus,
Standing beside him. Looking at them both,
King Agamemnon to Tydides spake
In wingèd words, and thus reproved the chief:⁠—

“O son of Tydeus, that undaunted knight!
What is there to appall thee? Why look through
The spaces that divide the warlike ranks?
Not thus did Tydeus feel the touch of fear,
But ever foremost of his warriors fought.
So they declare who saw his deeds, for I
Was never with him, nor have ever seen
The hero. Yet they say that he excelled
All others. Certain is it that he once
Entered Mycenae as a friendly guest,
With no array of soldiery, but came
With godlike Polynices. ’Twas the time
When warrior-bands were gathered to besiege
The sacred walls of Thebes, and earnestly
They prayed that from Mycenae they might lead
Renowned auxiliars to the war, and we
Would willingly have given the aid they asked⁠—
For we approved the prayer⁠—but Jove, with signs
Of angry omen, changed our purposes.
The chiefs departed, journeying on to where
Asopus flows through reeds and grass, and thence
The Achaians sent an embassy to Thebes
By Tydeus. There he met the many sons
Of Cadmus at the banquets in the hall
Of valiant Eteocles. Though alone
Among so many, and a stranger guest,
The hero feared them not, but challenged them
To vie with him in games; and easily
He won the victory, such aid was given
By Pallas. Then the sons of Cadmus, skilled
In horsemanship, were wroth, and privily
Sent fifty armed youths to lie in wait
For his return. Two leaders had the band⁠—
Maion, the son of Harmon, like a god
In form, and Lycophontes, brave in war,
Son of Autophonos. A bloody death
Did Tydeus give the youths. He slew them all
Save Maion, whom he suffered to return,
Obedient to an omen from the gods.
Such was Aetolian Tydeus; but his son,
A better speaker, is less brave in war.”

He spake; and valiant Diomed, who heard
The king’s reproof with reverence, answered not.
Then spake the son of honored Capaneus:⁠—

“Atrides, speak not falsely, when thou know’st
The truth so well. Assuredly we claim
To be far braver than our fathers were.
We took seven-gated Thebes with fewer troops
Than theirs, when, trusting in the omens sent
From heaven, and in the aid of Jupiter, so
We led our men beneath the city walls
Sacred to Mars. Our fathers perished there
Through their own folly. Therefore never seek
To place them in the same degree with us.”

The brave Tydides with a frown replied:⁠—
“Nay, hold thy peace, my friend, and heed my words.
Of Agamemnon I will not complain⁠—
The shepherd of the people; it is his
To exhort the well-armed Greeks to gallant deeds.
Great glory will attend him if the Greeks
Shall overcome the Trojans, and shall take
The sacred Ilium; but his grief will be
Bitter if we shall fail and be destroyed.
Hence think we only of the furious charge!”

He spake, and from his chariot leaped to earth
All armed; the mail upon the monarch’s breast
Rang terribly as he marched swiftly on.
The boldest might have heard that sound with fear.

As when the ocean-billows, surge on surge,
Are pushed along to the resounding shore
Before the western wind, and first a wave
Uplifts itself, and then against the land
Dashes and roars, and round the headland peaks
Tosses on high and spouts its spray afar,
So moved the serried phalanxes of Greece
To battle, rank succeeding rank, each chief
Giving command to his own troops; the rest
Marched noiselessly: you might have thought no voice
Was in the breasts of all that mighty throng,
So silently they all obeyed their chiefs,
Their showy armor glittering as they moved
In firm array. But, as the numerous flock
Of some rich man, while the white milk is drawn
Within his sheepfold, hear the plaintive call
Of their own lambs, and bleat incessantly⁠—
Such clamors from the mighty Trojan host
Arose; nor was the war-cry one, nor one
The voice, but words of mingled languages,
For they were called from many different climes.
These Mars encouraged to the fight; but those
The blue-eyed Pallas. Terror too was there,
And Fright, and Strife that rages unappeased⁠—
Sister and comrade of man-slaying Mars⁠—
Who rises small at first, but grows, and lifts
Her head to heaven and walks upon the earth.
She, striding through the crowd and heightening
The mutual rancor, flung into the midst
Contention, source of bale to all alike.

And now, when met the armies in the field,
The ox-hide shields encountered, and the spears,
And might of warriors mailed in brass; then clashed
The bossy bucklers, and the battle-din
Was loud; then rose the mingled shouts and groans
Of those who slew and those who fell; the earth
Ran with their blood. As when the winter streams
Rush down the mountain-sides, and fill, below,
With their swift waters, poured from gushing springs,
Some hollow vale, the shepherd on the heights
Hears the far roar⁠—such was the mingled din
That rose from the great armies when they met.

Then first Antilochus, advancing, struck
The Trojan champion Echepolus down,
Son of Thalysius, fighting in the van.
He smote him on the helmet’s cone, where streamed
The horse-hair plume. The brazen javelin stood
Fixed in his forehead, piercing through the bone,
And darkness gathered o’er his eyes. He fell
As falls a tower before some stubborn siege.
Then Elephenor, son of Chalcodon,
Prince of the brave Abrantes, by the foot
Seized the slain chieftain, dragging him beyond
The reach of darts, to strip him of his arms;
Yet dropped him soon, for brave Agenor saw,
And, as he stooped to drag the body, hurled
His brazen spear and pierced the uncovered side
Seen underneath the shield. At once his limbs
Relaxed their hold, and straight the spirit fled.
Then furious was the struggle of the Greeks
And Trojans o’er the slain; they sprang like wolves
Upon each other, and man slaughtered man.

Then by the hand of Ajax Telamon
Fell Simoisius, in the bloom of youth,
Anthemion’s son. His mother once came down
From Ida, with her parents, to their flocks
Beside the Simoïs; there she brought him forth
Upon its banks, and gave her boy the name
Of Simoisius. Unrequited now
Was all the care with which his parents nursed
His early years, and short his term of life⁠—
Slain by the hand of Ajax, large of soul.
For, when he saw him coming, Ajax smote
Near the right pap the Trojan’s breast; the blade
Passed through, and out upon the further side.
He fell among the dust of earth, as falls
A poplar growing in the watery soil
Of some wide marsh⁠—a fair, smooth bole, with boughs
Only on high, which with his gleaming axe
Some artisan has felled to bend its trunk
Into the circle of some chariot-wheel;
Withering it lies upon the river’s bank.
So did the high-born Ajax spoil the corpse
Of Simoisius, Anthemion’s son.
But Antiphus, the son of Priam, clad
In shining armor, saw, and, taking aim,
Cast his sharp spear at Ajax through the crowd.
The weapon struck him not, but pierced the groin
Of one who was Ulysses’ faithful friend⁠—
Leucus⁠—as from the spot he dragged the dead;
He fell, the body dropping from his hold.
Ulysses, stung with fury at his fall,
Rushed to the van, arrayed in shining brass,
Drew near the foe, and, casting a quick glance
Around him, hurled his glittering spear. The host
Of Trojans, as it left his hand, shrank back
Upon each other. Not in vain it flew,
But struck Democoön, the spurious son
Of Priam, who, to join the war, had left
Abydos, where he tended the swift mares.
Ulysses, to revenge his comrade’s death,
Smote him upon the temple with his spear.
Through both the temples passed the brazen point,
And darkness gathered o’er his eyes; he fell,
His armor clashing round him with his fall.
Then did the foremost bands, and Hector’s self,
Fall back. The Argives shouted, dragging off
The slain, and rushing to the ground they won.
Then was Apollo angered, looking down
From Pergamus, and thus he called aloud:⁠—

“Rally, ye Trojans! Tamers of fleet steeds!
Yield not the battle to the Greeks. Their limbs
Are not of stone or iron, to withstand
The trenchant steel ye wield. Nor does the son
Of fair-haired Thetis now, Achilles, take
Part in the battle, but sits, brooding o’er
The choler that devours him, in his ships.”
Thus from the city spake the terrible god.
Meantime Tritonian Pallas, glorious child
Of Jupiter, went through the Grecian ranks
Where’er they wavered, and revived their zeal.

Diores, son of Amarynceus, then
Met his hard fate. The fragment of a rock
Was thrown by hand at his right leg, and struck
The ankle. Piroüs, son of Imbrasus,
Who came from Aenus, leading to the war
His Thracian soldiers, flung it; and it crushed
Tendons and bones, and down the warrior fell
In dust, and toward his comrades stretched his hands,
And gasped for breath. But he who gave the wound,
Piroüs, came up and pierced him with his spear.
Forth gushed the entrails, and the eyes grew dark.

But Piroüs by Aetolian Thoas fell,
Who met him with his spear and pierced his breast
Above the pap. The brazen weapon stood
Fixed in the lungs. Then Thoas came and plucked
The massive spear away, and drew his sword,
And thrusting through him the sharp blade, he took
His life away. Yet could he not despoil
The slain man of his armor, for around
His comrades thronged, the Thracians, with their tufts
Of streaming hair, and, wielding their long spears,
Drove him away. And he, though huge of limb,
And valiant and renowned, was forced to yield
To numbers pressing on him, and withdrew.
Thus near each other stretched upon the ground
Piroüs, the leader of the Thracian band,
And he who led the Epeans, brazen-mailed
Diores, lay with many others slain.

Then could no man, who near at hand beheld
The battle of that day, see cause of blame
In aught, although, unwounded and unbruised
By weapons, Pallas led him by the hand
In safety through the midst, and turned aside
The violence of javelins; for that day
Saw many a Trojan slain, and many a Greek,
Stretched side by side upon the bloody field.

Then Pallas to Tydides Diomed
Gave strength and courage, that he might appear
Among the Achaians greatly eminent,
And win a glorious name. Upon his head
And shield she caused a constant flame to play,
Like to the autumnal star that shines in heaven
Most brightly when new-bathed in ocean tides.
Such light she caused to beam upon his crest
And shoulders, as she sent the warrior forth
Into the thick and tumult of the fight.

Among the Trojans, Dares was the priest
Of Vulcan, rich and blameless. His two sons
Were Phegeus and Idaus, trained in all
The arts of war. They left the host and came
To meet Tydides⁠—on the chariot they,
And he on foot; and now, as they drew near,
First Phegeus hurled his massive lance. It flew
O’er Diomed’s left shoulder and struck not.
Tydides cast his spear, and not in vain;
It smote the breast of Phegeus in the midst,
And dashed him from his seat. Idaeus leaped
To earth, and left the sumptuous car, nor dared
To guard the slain, yet would have met his death
If Vulcan had not borne him swiftly thence
Concealed in darkness, that he might not leave
The aged man, his father, desolate.
The son of Tydeus took the steeds, and bade
His comrades lead them to the fleet. Aghast
The valiant sons of Troy beheld the sons
Of Dares, one in flight, the other slain.

Meantime the blue-eyed Pallas took the hand
Of Mars, and thus addressed the fiery god:⁠—

“Mars, Mars, thou slayer of men, thou steeped in blood,
Destroyer of walled cities! Should we not
Leave both the Greeks and Trojans to contend,
And Jove to crown with glory whom he will,
While we retire, lest we provoke his wrath?”

Thus having said, she led the violent Mars
From where the battle raged, and made him sit
Beside Scamander, on its grassy bank.
And then the Achaians put the sons of Troy
To flight: each leader slew a foe; and first
The king of men, Atrides, from his car
Struck down the huge-limbed Hodius, who was chief
Among the Halizonians. As he turned
To flee, the Achaian, smiting him between
The shoulders, drove the javelin through his breast.
Heavily clashed his armor as he fell.

Then by Idomeneus was Phaestus slain,
Son of Meonian Borus, who had come
From Tarna, rich in harvests. As he sprang
Into his car, Idomeneus, expert
To wield the ponderous javelin, thrust its blade
Through his right shoulder. From the car he fell,
And the dark night of death came over him.
The Achaian warriors following spoiled the slain.

The son of Atreus, Menelaus, slew
With his sharp spear Scamandrius, the son
Of Strophius, practised in the forest chase,
A mighty hunter. Him had Dian taught
To strike whatever beast the woody wild
Breeds on the hills; but now availed him not
The favor of Diana, archer-queen,
Nor skill to throw the javelin afar;
For Menelaus, mighty with the spear,
Followed him as he fled, and in the back
Smote him, between the shoulder-blades, and drave
The weapon through. He fell upon the ground
Headlong, his armor clashing as he fell.
And then Meriones slew Phereclus,
Son of Harmonius, the artificer,
Who knew to shape all works of rare device,
For Pallas loved him. It was he who built
The fleet for Paris⁠—cause of many woes
To all the Trojans and to him⁠—for ill
He understood the oracles of heaven.
Him did Meriones, pursuing long,
O’ertake, and, smiting him on the right hip,
Pierced through the part beneath the bone and near
The bladder. On his knees with sad lament so
He fell, and death involved him in its shade.

And then by Meges was Pedseus slain,
Antenor’s base-born son, whose noble wife,
Theano, reared him with as fond a care
As her own children, for her husband’s sake.
And now the mighty spearman, Phyleus’ son,
Drew near and smote him with his trenchant lance
Where meet the head and spine, and pierced the neck
Beneath the tongue; and forth the weapon came
Between the teeth. He fell, and in the fall
Gnashed with his teeth upon the cold bright blade.

Then did Evaemon’s son Eurypylus
Strike down Hypsenor, nobly born, the son
Of great Dolopion, Scamander’s priest,
Whom all the people honored as a god.
Evaemon’s gallant son, o’ertaking him
In flight; with one stroke of his falchion hewed
His brawny arm away. The bloody limb
Dropped to the ground, and the dark night of death
Came o’er his eyes: so cruel fate decreed.

Thus toiled the heroes in that stubborn fight.
Nor would you now have known to which array⁠—
Trojan or Greek⁠—Tydides might belong;
For through the field he rushed with furious speed,
Like a swollen river when its current takes
The torrent’s swiftness, scattering with a sweep
The bridges; nor can massive dikes withstand
Its fury, nor embankments raised to screen
The grassy meadows, while the rains of Jove
Fall heavily, and harvests, late the joy
Of toiling youth, are beaten to the ground.
Thus by Tydides the close phalanxes
Of Troy were scattered, nor could they endure,
All numerous as they were, his strong assault.
As Pandarus, Lycaon’s eminent son,
Beheld Tydides rush athwart the field,
Breaking the ranks, he drew his crooked bow
And smote the chief’s left shoulder as he came,
Striking the hollow corselet. The sharp point
Broke through, and blood came gushing o’er the mail.
Then called aloud Lycaon’s eminent son:⁠—

“Brave Trojans, great in mastery of steeds,
Press on; the bravest of the Grecian host
Is smitten, nor, I think, can long survive
The grievous wound, if it be true that I,
At the command of Phoebus, son of Jove,
Have left my home upon the Lycian shore.”

Thus boastfully he spake; but his swift shaft
Slew not Tydides, who had now withdrawn.
And, standing by his steeds and chariot, spake
To Sthenelus, the son of Capaneus:⁠—
“Haste down, kind Sthenelus, and with thy hand
Draw the sharp arrow from my shoulder here.”

He spake, and Sthenelus at once leaped down,
Stood by his side, and from his shoulder drew
The wingèd arrow deeply fixed within.
The blood flowed forth upon the twisted rings
Of mail, while Diomed, the valiant, prayed:⁠—

“Hear me, O child of aegis-bearing Jove,
Goddess invincible! If ever thou
Didst aid me or my father in the heat
Of battle, aid me, Pallas, yet again.
Give me to slay this Trojan; bring him near,
Within my javelin’s reach, who wounded me,
And now proclaims⁠—the boaster⁠—that not long
Shall I behold the brightness of the sun.”

So prayed he, and Minerva heard his prayer
And lightened all his limbs⁠—his feet, his hands⁠—
And, standing near him, spake these wingèd words:⁠—

“War boldly with the Trojans, Diomed;
For even now I breathe into thy frame
The ancestral might and fearless soul that dwelt
In Tydeus, peerless with the steed and shield.
Lo! I remove the darkness from thine eyes,
That thou mayst well discern the gods from men;
And if a god should tempt thee to the fight,
Beware to combat with the immortal race;
Only, should Venus, child of Jupiter,
Take part in battle, wound her with thy spear.”

The blue-eyed Pallas spake, and disappeared;
And Diomed went back into the field
And mingled with the warriors. If before
His spirit moved him fiercely to engage
The men of Troy, a threefold courage now
Inspired him. As a lion who has leaped
Into a fold⁠—and he who guards the flock
Has wounded but not slain him⁠—feels his rage
Waked by the blow;⁠—the affrighted shepherd then
Ventures not near, but hides within the stalls,
And the forsaken sheep are put to flight,
And, huddling, slain in heaps, till o’er the fence
The savage bounds into the fields again;⁠—
Such was Tydides midst the sons of Troy.
Astynoüs first he slew, Hypenor next,
The shepherd of the people. One he pierced
High on the bosom with his brazen spear,
And smote the other on the collar-bone
With his good sword, and hewed from neck and spine
The shoulder. There he left the dead, and rushed
To Abas and to Polyeidus, sons
Of old Eurydamas, interpreter
Of visions. Ill the aged man had read
His visions when they joined the war. They died,
And Diomed, the valiant, spoiled the slain.
Xanthus and Thoön he encountered next,
The sons of Phaenops, born in his old age.
No other child had he, to be his heir,
And he was worn with length of years. These two
Tydides smote and took their lives, and left
Grief to their father and regretful cares,
Since he no more should welcome their return
From war, and strangers should divide his wealth.
Then smote he Chromius and Echemon, sons
Of Dardan Priam, in one chariot both.
As on a herd of beeves a lion springs
While midst the shrubs they browse, and breaks their necks⁠—
Heifer or ox⁠—so sprang he on the twain
And struck them, vainly struggling, from their car,
And spoiled them of their arms, and took their steeds,
And bade his comrades lead them to the fleet.

Aeneas, who beheld him scattering thus
The embattled ranks before him, straightway went
Through the thick fight, amid encountering spears,
In search of godlike Pandarus. He found
Lycaon’s blameless and illustrious son,
And stood before him, and addressed him thus:⁠—

“Where is thy bow, O Pandarus, and where
Thy wingèd arrows? Where the old renown
In which no warrior here can vie with thee,
And none upon the Lycian shore can boast
That he excels thee? Hasten, and lift up
Thy hands in prayer to Jupiter, and send
An arrow at this man, whoe’er he be,
Who thus prevails, and thus afflicts our host,
And makes the knees of many a strong man weak.
Strike him⁠—unless he be some god incensed
At Troy for sacrifice withheld, since hard
It is to bear the anger of a god.”

Lycaon’s son, the far-renowned, replied:⁠—
“Aeneas, leader of the Trojans mailed
In brass, to me this man in all things seems
Like warlike Diomed. I know his shield,
High helm, and steeds, and yet I may not say
That this is not a god. But if he be
The chief of whom I speak, the warlike son
Of Tydeus, not thus madly would he fight,
Without some god to aid him. By his side
Is one of the immortals, with a cloud
About his shoulders, turning from its aim
The swiftly flying arrow. ’Twas but late
I aimed a shaft that pierced the hollow mail
On his left shoulder, and I thought him sent
To Pluto, but I slew him not. Some god
Must be offended with me. I have here
No steeds or car to mount. Far off at home
There stand within Lycaon’s palace-walls
Eleven chariots, fair and fresh and new:
Each has an ample cover, and by each
Are horses yoked in pairs, that champ their oats
And their white barley. When I left my home,
Lycaon, aged warrior, counselled me,
Within his sumptuous halls, that with my steeds
And chariot I should lead the sons of Troy
In the fierce battle. I obeyed him not:
Far better if I had. I wished to spare
My horses, lest, so largely fed at home,
They might want food in the beleaguered town.
So, leaving them, I came on foot to Troy,
Confiding in my bow, which yet was doomed
To avail me little, for already I
Have smitten with my arrows the two chiefs,
Tydides and Atrides, and from both
Drew the red blood, but only made their rage
To flame the fiercer. In an evil hour
I took my bow and quiver from the wall
And came to lead the Trojans for the sake
Of Hector. But if ever I return
To see my native country and my wife
And my tall spacious mansion, may some foe
Strike off my head if with these hands I fail
To break my bow in pieces, casting it
Into the flames, a useless weapon now.”

The Trojan chief Aeneas, answering, said:⁠—
“Nay, talk not so; it cannot but be thus,
Until upon a chariot, and with steeds,
We try our prowess with this man in war.
Haste, mount my chariot here, and thou shalt see
How well are Trojan horses trained to range
The field of battle, in the swift pursuit
Hither and thither, or in rapid flight;
And they shall bring us safely to the town
Should Jove a second time bestow the meed
Of glory on Tydides. Haste, and take
The lash and well-wrought reins, while I descend
To fight on foot; or haply thou wilt wait
The foe’s advance while I direct the steeds.”

Then spake again Lycaon’s eminent son:⁠—
“Keep thou the reins, Aeneas, and still guide
The horses. With their wonted charioteer,
The better shall they bear away the car
Should we be forced to fly before the arm
Of Diomed; lest, taking flight, they range
Unmastered when they hear thy voice no more,
Nor bear us from the combat, and the son
Of Tydeus, having slain us, shall lead thence
Thy firm-hoofed coursers. Therefore guide them still,
Them and the chariot, while, with this keen spear,
I wait the Greek, as he is rushing on.”

They spake, and, climbing the magnificent car,
Turned toward Tydides the swift-footed steeds.
The noble son of Capaneus beheld,
And said in wingèd words to Diomed:⁠—

“Tydides Diomed, most dear of men!
I see two warriors, strong, immensely strong,
Coming to combat with thee. Pandarus
Is one, the skilled in archery, who boasts
To be Lycaon’s son; and by his side
There comes Aeneas, glorying that he sprang
From the large-souled Anchises⁠—borne to him
By Venus. Mount we now our car and leave
The ground, nor in thy fury rush along
The van of battle, lest thou lose thy life.”

The brave Tydides, with a frown, replied:⁠—
“Speak not of flight; thou canst not yet persuade
My mind to that. To skulk or shrink with fear
In battle ill becomes me, and my strength
Is unexhausted yet. It suits me not
To mount the chariot; I will meet the foe
Just as I am. Minerva will not let
My spirit falter. Ne’er shall those swift steeds
Bear the two warriors hence⁠—if even one
Escapes me. One thing more have I to say;
And keep it well in mind. Should Pallas deign⁠—
The wise, forecasting Pallas⁠—to bestow
On me the glory of o’ercoming both,
Stop thy swift horses, and tie fast the reins
To our own chariot, and make haste to seize
The horses of Aeneas, guiding them
Hence from the Trojan to the Grecian host;
For they are of the stock which Jupiter
The Thunderer gave to Tros. It was the price
He paid for Ganymede, and they, of all
Beneath the eye of morning and the sun,
Are of the choicest breed. The king of men,
Anchises, stealthily and unobserved,
Brought to the coursers of Laomedon
His brood-mare, and obtained the race. Six colts,
Their offspring, in his courts were foaled. Of these,
Four for himself he kept, and in his stalls
Reared them, and two of them, both apt for war,
He gave Aeneas. If we make them ours,
The exploit will bring us honor and renown.”

Thus they conferred. Meantime their foes drew near,
Urging their fiery coursers on, and first
Lycaon’s eminent son addressed the Greek:⁠—

“My weapon, swift and sharp, the arrow, failed
To slay thee; let me try the javelin now,
And haply that, at least, may reach its mark.”

He spake, and, brandishing his massive spear,
Hurled it against the shield of Diomed.
The brazen point broke through, and reached the mail.
Then shouted with loud voice Lycaon’s son:⁠—

“Ha! Thou art wounded in thy flank; my spear
Bites deep; nor long, I think, canst thou survive,
And great will be my glory gained from thee.”

But thus the valiant Diomed replied.
Incapable of fear: “Thy thought is wrong.
I am not wounded, and I well perceive
That ye will never give the conflict o’er
Till one of you, laid low amid the dust,
Pour out his blood to glut the god of war.”

He spake, and cast his spear. Minerva kept
The weapon faithful to its aim. It struck
The nose, and near the eye; then passing on
Betwixt the teeth, the unrelenting edge
Cleft at its root the tongue; the point came out
Beneath the chin. The warrior from his car
Fell headlong; his bright armor, fairly wrought,
Clashed round him as he fell; his fiery steeds
Started aside with fright; his breath and strength
Were gone at once, Aeneas, with his shield
And his long spear, leaped down to guard the slain,
That the Achaians might not drag him thence.
There, lion-like, confiding in his strength,
He stalked around the corpse, and over it
Held his round shield and lance, prepared to slay
Whoever came, and shouting terribly.

Tydides raised a stone⁠—a mighty weight,
Such as no two men living now could lift;
But he, alone, could swing it round with ease.
With this he smote Aeneas on the hip,
Where the thigh joins its socket. By the blow
He brake the socket and the tendons twain,
And tore the skin with the rough, jagged stone.
The hero fell upon his knees, but stayed
His fall with his strong palm upon the ground;
And o’er his eyes a shadow came like night.

Then had the king of men, Aeneas, died,
But for Jove’s daughter, Venus, who perceived
His danger instantly⁠—his mother, she
Who bore him to Anchises when he kept
His beeves, a herdsman. Round her son she cast
Her white arms, spreading over him in folds
Her shining robe, to be a fence against
The weapons of the foe, lest some Greek knight
Should at his bosom aim the steel to take
His life. And thus the goddess bore away
From that fierce conflict her beloved son.

Nor did the son of Capaneus forget
The bidding of the warlike Diomed,
But halted his firm-footed steeds apart
From the great tumult, with the long reins stretched
And fastened to the chariot. Next, he sprang
To seize the horses with fair-flowing manes,
That drew the chariot of Aeneas. These
He drave away, far from the Trojan host,
To the well-greaved Achaians, giving them
In charge, to lead them to the hollow ships,
To his beloved friend Deipylus,
Whom he of all his comrades honored most,
As likest to himself in years and mind.
And then he climbed his car and took the reins,
And, swiftly drawn by his firm-footed steeds,
Followed Tydides, who with cruel steel
Sought Venus, knowing her unapt for war,
And all unlike the goddesses who guide
The battles of mankind, as Pallas does,
Or as Bellona, ravager of towns.
O’ertaking her at last, with long pursuit,
Amid the throng of warring men, the son
Of warlike Tydeus aimed at her his spear,
And wounded in her hand the delicate one
With its sharp point. It pierced the ambrosial robe,
Wrought for her by the Graces, at the spot
Where the palm joins the wrist, and broke the skin,
And drew immortal blood⁠—the ichor⁠—such
As from the blessed gods may flow; for they
Eat not the wheaten loaf, nor drink dark wine;
And therefore they are bloodless, and are called
Immortal. At the stroke the goddess shrieked,
And dropped her son. Apollo in his arms
Received and in a dark cloud rescued him,
Lest any of the Grecian knights should aim
A weapon at his breast to take his life.
Meantime the brave Tydides cried aloud:⁠—

“Leave wars and battle, goddess. Is it not
Enough that thou delude weak womankind?
Yet, if thou ever shouldst return, to bear
A part in battle, thou shalt have good cause
To start with fear, when war is only named.”

He spake; and she departed, wild with pain,
For grievously she suffered. Instantly
Fleet-footed Iris took her by the hand
And led her from the place, her heart oppressed
With anguish and her fair cheek deathly pale.
She found the fiery Mars, who had withdrawn
From that day’s combat to the left, and sat,
His spear and his swift coursers hid from sight,
In darkness. At his feet she fell, and prayed
Her brother fervently, that he would lend
His steeds that stood in trappings wrought of gold:⁠—

“Dear brother, aid me; let me have thy steeds
To bear me to the Olympian mount, the home
Of gods, for grievously the wound I bear
Afflicts me. ’Twas a mortal gave the wound⁠—
Tydides, who would even fight with Jove.”

She spake; and Mars resigned to her his steeds
With trappings of bright gold. She climbed the car,
Still grieving, and, beside her, Iris took
Her seat, and caught the reins and plied the lash.
On flew the coursers, on, with willing speed,
And soon were at the mansion of the gods
On high Olympus. There the active-limbed,
Fleet Iris stayed them, loosed them from the car,
And fed them with ambrosial food. Meanwhile,
The goddess Venus at Dione’s feet
Had cast herself. The mother round her child
Threw tenderly her arms, and with her hand
Caressed her brow, and spake, and thus inquired:⁠—

“Which of the dwellers of the skies, dear child,
Has dealt thus cruelly with thee, as one
Caught in the doing of some flagrant wrong?”

And thus did Venus, queen of smiles, reply:⁠—
“The son of Tydeus, arrogant Diomed,
Wounded me as I sought to bear away
From battle’s dangers my beloved son
Aeneas, dear beyond all other men:
For now no longer does the battle rage
Between the Greeks and Trojans, but the Greeks
Venture to combat even with the gods.”

Dione, great among the goddesses,
Rejoined: “Submit, my daughter, and endure,
Though inly grieved; for many of us who dwell
Upon the Olympian mount have suffered much
From mortals, and have brought great miseries
Upon each other. First, it was the fate
Of Mars to suffer, when Aloëus’ sons,
Otus and mighty Ephialtes, made
Their fetters fast upon his limbs. He lay
Chained thirteen months within a brazen cell;
And haply there the god, whose thirst of blood
Is never cloyed, had perished, but for aid
Which Eriboea gave, the beautiful,
His step-mother. She made his miseries known
To Mercury, who set him free by stealth,
Withered and weak with long imprisonment.
And Juno suffered when Amphitryon’s son,
The valiant, dared to plant in her right breast
A three-pronged arrow, and she writhed with pain.
And Pluto suffered, when the hero-son
Of aegis-bearing Jove, with a swift shaft,
Smote him beside the portals of the dead,
And left him filled with pain. He took his way
To high Olympus and the home of Jove,
Grieving and racked with pain, for deep the dart
Had pierced his brawny shoulder, torturing him.
There Paean with his pain-dispelling balms
Healed him, for he was not of mortal race.
O daring man and reckless, to make light
Of such impieties and violate
The sacred persons of the Olympian gods!
It was the blue-eyed Pallas who stirred up
Tydides to assail thee thus. The fool!
He knew not that the man who dares to meet
The gods in combat lives not long. No child
Shall prattling call him father when he comes
Returning from the dreadful tasks of war.
Let then Tydides, valiant though he be,
Beware lest a more potent foe than thou
Encounter him, and lest the nobly-born
Aegialeia, in some night to come⁠—
Wise daughter of Adrastus, and the spouse
Of the horse-tamer Diomed⁠—call up
The servants of her household from their sleep,
Bewailing him to whom in youth she gave
Her maiden troth⁠—the bravest of the Greeks.”

She spake, and wiped the ichor from the hand
Of Venus; at her touch the hand was healed
And the pain left it. Meantime Pallas stood,
With Juno, looking on, both teasing Jove
With words of sarcasm. Blue-eyed Pallas thus
Addressed the god: “O Father Jupiter,
Wilt thou be angry at the word I speak?⁠—
As Venus, wheedling some Achaian dame
To join the host she loves, the sons of Troy,
Caressed the fair, arrayed in gay attire,
A golden buckle scratched her tender hand.”

As thus she spake, the Father of the gods
And mortals, calling golden Venus near,
Said, with a smile: “Nay, daughter, not for thee
Are tasks of war; be gentle marriage-rites
Thy care; the labors of the battle-field
Pertain to Pallas and the fiery Mars.”

Thus with each other talked the gods, while still
The great in battle, Diomed, pursued
Aeneas, though he knew that Phoebus stretched
His arm to guard the warrior. Small regard
Had he for the great god, and much he longed
To strike Aeneas down and bear away
The glorious arms he wore; and thrice he rushed
To slay the Trojan, thrice Apollo smote
Upon his glittering shield. But when he made
The fourth assault, as if he were a god,
The archer of the skies, Apollo, thus
With menacing words rebuked him: “Diomed,
Beware; desist, nor think to make thyself
The equal of a god. The deathless race
Of gods is not as those who walk the earth.”

He spake; the son of Tydeus, shrinking back,
Gave way before the anger of the god
Who sends his shafts afar. Then Phoebus bore
Aeneas from the tumult to the height
Of sacred Pergamus, where stands his fane;
And there Latona and the archer-queen,
Diana, in the temple’s deep recess,
Tended him and brought back his glorious strength.
Meantime the bowyer-god, Apollo, formed
An image of Aeneas, armed like him,
Round which the Trojans and Achaians thronged
With many a heavy weapon-stroke that fell
Upon the huge orbs of their ox-hide shields
And lighter bucklers. Now to fiery Mars
Apollo spake: “Mars, Mars, thou plague of men,
Thou steeped in blood, destroyer of walled towns!
Wilt thou not force this man to leave the field?
Wilt thou not meet in arms this daring son
Of Tydeus, who would even fight with Jove?
Already has he wounded, in close fight,
The goddess Venus at the wrist, and since
Assaulted me as if he were a god.”

He said, and on the heights of Pergamus
Sat down, while the destroyer Mars went forth
Among the embattled Trojan ranks, to rouse
Their valor. In the form of Acamus,
The gallant Thracian leader, he bespake
The sons of Jove-descended Priam thus:⁠—

“O sons of Priam, him who claims descent
From Jupiter! How long will ye submit
To see your people slaughtered by the Greeks?
Is it until the battle-storm shall reach
Your city’s stately portals? Even now
A hero whom we honor equally
With the great Hector, our Aeneas, son
Of the large-souled Anchises, is struck down.
Haste, let us rescue our beloved friend.”

He spake, and into every heart his words
Carried new strength and courage. In that hour
Sarpedon chid the noble Hector thus:⁠—
“Where is the prowess, Hector, which was thine
So lately? Thou hast said that thou alone,
Thy kindred and thy brothers, could defend
The city, without armies or allies.
Now I see none of these; they all, like hounds
Before a lion, crouch and slink away,
While the confederates bear the brunt of war.
I am but an auxiliar come from far,
From Lycia, where the eddying Xanthus runs.
There left I a beloved wife, and there
An infant child, and large possessions, such
As poor men covet. Yet do I exhort
My Lycians to the combat, and myself
Would willingly engage this foe of Troy,
Although I here have nothing which the Greeks
Might bear or drive away. Thou standest still,
Meanwhile, nor dost thou bid the rest to keep
Their ground and bear the battle for their wives.
Yet have a care, lest, as if caught at length
In the strong meshes of a mighty net,
Ye find yourselves the captives and the prey
Of enemies, who quickly will destroy
Your nobly-peopled city. These are thoughts
That should engage thy mind by night and day,
And thou shouldst beg the chiefs of thine allies,
Called to thy aid from far, that manfully
They meet the foe, and foil his fierce attack,
And take the cause of this reproach away.”

Sarpedon spake; and Hector, all in arms,
Stung by his words, and leaping from his car,
Brandished his spears, and went among the hosts
And rallied them to battle. Terrible
The conflict that ensued. The men of Troy
Made head against the Greeks: the Greeks stood firm,
Nor ever thought of flight. As when the wind
Strews chaff about the sacred threshing-floors
While wheat is winnowed, and before the breeze
The yellow Ceres separates the grain
From its light husk, which gathers in white heaps⁠—
Even so the Greeks were whitened o’er with dust
Raised in that tumult by the horses’ hoofs
And rising to the brazen firmament,
As toward the fight the charioteers again
Urged on their coursers. Yet the Greeks withstood
The onset, and struck forward with strong arms.
Meantime the furious Mars involved the field
In darkness, to befriend the sons of Troy,
And went through all the ranks, and well fulfilled
The mandate which Apollo gave the god
Who wields the golden falchion, bidding him
Kindle the courage of the Trojan host
Whene’er he saw the auxiliar of the Greeks,
Minerva, leave the combat. Then the god
Brought from the sanctuary’s inner shrine
Aeneas⁠—filling with recovered strength
That shepherd of the people. He beside
His comrades placed himself, and they rejoiced
To see him living and unharmed and strong
As ever; yet they questioned not; their task
Was different, set them by the god who bears
The silver bow, and Mars the slayer of men,
And raging Strife that never is appeased.

The Ajaces and Ulysses and the son
Of Tydeus roused the Achaians to the fight.
For of the strength and clamor of the foe
They felt no fear, but calmly stood, to bide
The assault; as stand in air the quiet clouds
Which Saturn’s son upon the mountain-tops
Piles in still volumes when the north wind sleeps,
And every ruder breath of blustering air
That drives the gathered vapors through the sky.
Thus calmly waited they the Trojan host,
Nor thought of flight. And now Atrides passed
In haste along their ranks, and gave command:⁠—

“O friends, be men, and let your hearts be strong,
And let no warrior in the heat of fight
Do what may bring him shame in others’ eyes;
For more of those who shrink from shame are safe
Than fall in battle, while with those who flee
Is neither glory nor reprieve from death.”

So spake the king, and hurled his spear and smote
Deïcoön, the son of Pergasis,
A chief, and a companion in the war
Of the great-souled Aeneas. He in Troy
Was honored as men honored Priam’s sons,
For he was ever foremost in the fight.
The weapon struck his shield, yet stopped not there,
But, breaking through its folds and through the belt,
Transfixed the part beneath. The Trojan fell
To earth, his armor clashing with his fall.

Aeneas slew the sons of Diodes⁠—
Orsilochus and Crethon, eminent Greeks.
Their father dwelt in Pherae nobly built,
Amid his riches. From Alpheius he
Derived his race⁠—a river whose long stream
Flows through the meadows of the Pylian land.
Orsilochus was to Alpheius born,
Lord over many men, and he became
The father of great Diocles, to whom
Twin sons were born, well trained in all the arts
Of warfare⁠—Crethon and Orsilochus.
These, in the prime of youth, with their black ships
Followed the Argives to the coast of Troy
Famed for its generous steeds. They left their home
To vindicate the honor of the sons
Of Atreus⁠—Agamemnon, king of men,
And Menelaus⁠—but they found their death.

As two young lions, nourished by their dam
Amid the thickets of some mighty wood,
Seizing the beeves and fattened sheep, lay waste
The stables, till at length themselves are slain
By trenchant weapons in the shepherd’s hand,
So by the weapons of Aeneas died
These twain; they fell as lofty fir-trees fall.
But now, when Menelaus saw their fate,
The mighty warrior, deeply sorrowing, rushed
Among the foremost, armed in glittering brass,
And brandishing his spear; for Mars had roused
His soul to fury, trusting he would meet
Aeneas, and would perish by his hand.
Antilochus, the generous Nestor’s son,
Came also to the van, for anxiously
He feared mischance might overtake the king,
To make the toils of their long warfare vain;
And there he found the combatants prepared
For battle, with their trusty spears in hand,
And standing face to face. At once he took
His stand beside the monarch of the Greeks.
At sight of the two warriors side by side,
All valiant as he was, Aeneas shunned
The encounter. They, when they had drawn the dead
Among the Grecian ranks, and to their friends
Given up the hapless brothers, turned to take
Their place among the foremost in the fight.
Then, too, Pykemenes, a chief like Mars,
And leader of the Paphlagonian host⁠—
A valiant squadron armed with shields⁠—was slain.
Atrides Menelaus, skilled to wield
The javelin, gave his death-wound. He transfixed
The shoulder at the collar-bone. Meanwhile
Antilochus against his charioteer,
Mydon, the brave son of Atymnias, hurled
A stone that smote his elbow as he wheeled
His firm-paced steeds in flight. He dropped the reins,
Gleaming with ivory as they trailed in dust.
Antilochus leaped forward, smiting him
Upon the temples with his sword. He fell
Gasping amidst the sand, his head immersed
Up to his shoulders⁠—for the sand was deep⁠—
And there remained till he was beaten down
Before the horses’ hoofs. Antilochus,
Lashing the horses, drave them to the Greeks.

Hector beheld, and, springing with loud shouts,
Stood mid the wavering ranks. The phalanxes
Of the brave Trojans followed him, for Mars
And terrible Bellona led them on⁠—
Bellona bringing Tumult in her train,
And Mars with brandished lance⁠—a mighty weight⁠—
Now stalking after Hector, now before.

Him when the valiant Diomed beheld,
He trembled; and, as one who, journeying
Along a way he knows not, having crossed
A place of drear extent, before him sees
A river rushing swiftly toward the deep,
And all its tossing current white with foam,
And stops and turns, and measures back his way,
So then did Diomed withdraw, and spake:⁠—

“O friends, how greatly must we all admire
This noble Hector, mighty with the spear
And terrible in war. There is some god
Forever near him, warding off the stroke
Of death; beside him yonder even now
Stands Mars in semblance of a mortal man.
Yield, then, and with your faces toward the foe
Fall back, and strive not with the gods of heaven.”

Even as he spake, the Trojan host drew near,
And Hector slew two warriors trained to arms⁠—
Menesthes and Anchialus⁠—who came
Both in one chariot to the war. Their fall
Ajax, the son of Telamon, beheld,
And pitied, and drew near, and stood, and hurled
His glittering spear. It smote Ampheius, son
Of Selagus, who, rich in lands and goods,
Abode in Paesus. In an evil hour
He joined the cause of Priam and his sons.
Him at the belt the spear of Ajax smote,
And pierced the bowels. With a crash he fell,
Then hastened mighty Ajax to strip off
The armor, but the Trojans at him cast
Their pointed spears that glittered as they flew,
And many struck his shield. He pressed his heel
Against the slain, and from the body drew
His brazen spear, but could not from the breast
Loose the bright mail, so thick the weapons came,
And such the wary dread with which he saw
The bravest of the Trojans closing round,
Many and fierce, and all with spears outstretched;
And he, though strong and valiant and renowned,
Driven from the ground, gave way to mightier force.

So toiled the warriors through that stubborn fight,
When cruel fate urged on Tlepoemus,
The great and valiant son of Hercules,
To meet Sarpedon, mighty as a god.
And now as each to each advanced⁠—the son
And grandson of the cloud-compeller Jove⁠—
Thus first Tlepolemus addressed his foe:⁠—

“Sarpedon, Lycian monarch, what has brought
Thee hither, trembling thus, and inexpert
In battle? Lying flatterers are they
That call thee son of Jupiter who bears
The aegis; for unlike the heroes thou,
Born to the Thunderer in times of old,
Nor like my daring father, Hercules
The lion-hearted, who once came to Troy
To claim the coursers of Laomedon.
With but six ships, and warriors but a few,
He laid the city waste and made its streets
A desolation. Thou art weak of heart,
And round thee are thy people perishing;
Yet, even wert thou brave, thy presence here
From Lycia’s coast would prove of small avail
To Troy; for, slain in combat here by me,
Thou to the gates of Hades shalt go down.”

Sarpedon, leader of the Lycians, thus
Made answer: “True it is, Tlepolemus,
That he laid waste the sacred city of Troy
For the base dealings of Laomedon,
The monarch who with railing words repaid
His great deservings, and kept back the steeds
For which he came so far. But thou⁠—thy fate
Is slaughter and black death from this my spear;
And fame will come to me, and one more soul
Go down to Hades.” As Sarpedon spake,
Tlepolemus upraised his ashen spear,
And from the hands of both the chiefs at once
Their massive weapons flew. Sarpedon smote
Full in the throat his foe; the cruel point
Passed through the neck, and night came o’er his eyes.
Tlepolemus, in turn, on the left thigh
Had struck Sarpedon with his ponderous lance.
The weapon, cast with vigorous hand and arm,
Pierced deep, and touched the bone; but Jupiter
Averted from his son the doom of death.