The Iliad, Homer [big screen ebook reader .txt] 📗

the bossed shields pressed hard on one another--death--cry and
shout of triumph of slain and slayers, and the earth ran red with blood.

Now so long as the day waxed and it was still morning their weapons
beat against one another, and the people fell, but when the sun had
reached mid-heaven, the sire of all balanced his golden scales, and put
two fates of death within them, one for the Trojans and the other for
the Achaeans. He took the balance by the middle, and when he lifted it
up the day of the Achaeans sank; the death-fraught scale of the
Achaeans settled down upon the ground, while that of the Trojans rose
heavenwards. Then he thundered aloud from Ida, and sent the glare of
his lightning upon the Achaeans; when they saw this, pale fear fell
upon them and they were sore afraid.

Idomeneus dared not stay nor yet Agamemnon, nor did the two Ajaxes,
servants of Mars, hold their ground. Nestor knight of Gerene alone
stood firm, bulwark of the Achaeans, not of his own will, but one of
his horses was disabled. Alexandrus husband of lovely Helen had hit it
with an arrow just on the top of its head where the mane begins to grow
away from the skull, a very deadly place. The horse bounded in his
anguish as the arrow pierced his brain, and his struggles threw others
into confusion. The old man instantly began cutting the traces with his
sword, but Hector's fleet horses bore down upon him through the rout
with their bold charioteer, even Hector himself, and the old man would
have perished there and then had not Diomed been quick to mark, and
with a loud cry called Ulysses to help him.

"Ulysses," he cried, "noble son of Laertes where are you flying to,
with your back turned like a coward? See that you are not struck with a
spear between the shoulders. Stay here and help me to defend Nestor
from this man's furious onset."

Ulysses would not give ear, but sped onward to the ships of the
Achaeans, and the son of Tydeus flinging himself alone into the thick
of the fight took his stand before the horses of the son of Neleus.
"Sir," said he, "these young warriors are pressing you hard, your force
is spent, and age is heavy upon you, your squire is naught, and your
horses are slow to move. Mount my chariot and see what the horses of
Tros can do--how cleverly they can scud hither and thither over the
plain either in flight or in pursuit. I took them from the hero Aeneas.
Let our squires attend to your own steeds, but let us drive mine
straight at the Trojans, that Hector may learn how furiously I too can
wield my spear."

Nestor knight of Gerene hearkened to his words. Thereon the doughty
squires, Sthenelus and kind-hearted Eurymedon, saw to Nestor's horses,
while the two both mounted Diomed's chariot. Nestor took the reins in
his hands and lashed the horses on; they were soon close up with
Hector, and the son of Tydeus aimed a spear at him as he was charging
full speed towards them. He missed him, but struck his charioteer and
squire Eniopeus son of noble Thebaeus in the breast by the nipple while
the reins were in his hands, so that he died there and then, and the
horses swerved as he fell headlong from the chariot. Hector was greatly
grieved at the loss of his charioteer, but let him lie for all his
sorrow, while he went in quest of another driver; nor did his steeds
have to go long without one, for he presently found brave Archeptolemus
the son of Iphitus, and made him get up behind the horses, giving the
reins into his hand.

All had then been lost and no help for it, for they would have been
penned up in Ilius like sheep, had not the sire of gods and men been
quick to mark, and hurled a fiery flaming thunderbolt which fell just
in front of Diomed's horses with a flare of burning brimstone. The
horses were frightened and tried to back beneath the car, while the
reins dropped from Nestor's hands. Then he was afraid and said to
Diomed, "Son of Tydeus, turn your horses in flight; see you not that
the hand of Jove is against you? To-day he vouchsafes victory to
Hector; to-morrow, if it so please him, he will again grant it to
ourselves; no man, however brave, may thwart the purpose of Jove, for
he is far stronger than any."

Diomed answered, "All that you have said is true; there is a grief
however which pierces me to the very heart, for Hector will talk among
the Trojans and say, 'The son of Tydeus fled before me to the ships.'
This is the vaunt he will make, and may earth then swallow me."

"Son of Tydeus," replied Nestor, "what mean you? Though Hector say that
you are a coward the Trojans and Dardanians will not believe him, nor
yet the wives of the mighty warriors whom you have laid low."

So saying he turned the horses back through the thick of the battle,
and with a cry that rent the air the Trojans and Hector rained their
darts after them. Hector shouted to him and said, "Son of Tydeus, the
Danaans have done you honour hitherto as regards your place at table,
the meals they give you, and the filling of your cup with wine.
Henceforth they will despise you, for you are become no better than a
woman. Be off, girl and coward that you are, you shall not scale our
walls through any flinching upon my part; neither shall you carry off
our wives in your ships, for I shall kill you with my own hand."

The son of Tydeus was in two minds whether or no to turn his horses
round again and fight him. Thrice did he doubt, and thrice did Jove
thunder from the heights of Ida in token to the Trojans that he would
turn the battle in their favour. Hector then shouted to them and said,
"Trojans, Lycians, and Dardanians, lovers of close fighting, be men, my
friends, and fight with might and with main; I see that Jove is minded
to vouchsafe victory and great glory to myself, while he will deal
destruction upon the Danaans. Fools, for having thought of building
this weak and worthless wall. It shall not stay my fury; my horses will
spring lightly over their trench, and when I am at their ships forget
not to bring me fire that I may burn them, while I slaughter the
Argives who will be all dazed and bewildered by the smoke."

Then he cried to his horses, "Xanthus and Podargus, and you Aethon and
goodly Lampus, pay me for your keep now and for all the honey-sweet
corn with which Andromache daughter of great Eetion has fed you, and
for she has mixed wine and water for you to drink whenever you would,
before doing so even for me who am her own husband. Haste in pursuit,
that we may take the shield of Nestor, the fame of which ascends to
heaven, for it is of solid gold, arm-rods and all, and that we may
strip from the shoulders of Diomed the cuirass which Vulcan made him.
Could we take these two things, the Achaeans would set sail in their
ships this self-same night."

Thus did he vaunt, but Queen Juno made high Olympus quake as she shook
with rage upon her throne. Then said she to the mighty god of Neptune,
"What now, wide ruling lord of the earthquake? Can you find no
compassion in your heart for the dying Danaans, who bring you many a
welcome offering to Helice and to Aegae? Wish them well then. If all of
us who are with the Danaans were to drive the Trojans back and keep
Jove from helping them, he would have to sit there sulking alone on
Ida."

King Neptune was greatly troubled and answered, "Juno, rash of tongue,
what are you talking about? We other gods must not set ourselves
against Jove, for he is far stronger than we are."

Thus did they converse; but the whole space enclosed by the ditch, from
the ships even to the wall, was filled with horses and warriors, who
were pent up there by Hector son of Priam, now that the hand of Jove
was with him. He would even have set fire to the ships and burned them,
had not Queen Juno put it into the mind of Agamemnon, to bestir himself
and to encourage the Achaeans. To this end he went round the ships and
tents carrying a great purple cloak, and took his stand by the huge
black hull of Ulysses' ship, which was middlemost of all; it was from
this place that his voice would carry farthest, on the one hand towards
the tents of Ajax son of Telamon, and on the other towards those of
Achilles--for these two heroes, well assured of their own strength, had
valorously drawn up their ships at the two ends of the line. From this
spot then, with a voice that could be heard afar, he shouted to the
Danaans, saying, "Argives, shame on you cowardly creatures, brave in
semblance only; where are now our vaunts that we should prove
victorious--the vaunts we made so vaingloriously in Lemnos, when we ate
the flesh of horned cattle and filled our mixing-bowls to the brim? You
vowed that you would each of you stand against a hundred or two hundred
men, and now you prove no match even for one--for Hector, who will be
ere long setting our ships in a blaze. Father Jove, did you ever so
ruin a great king and rob him so utterly of his greatness? Yet, when to
my sorrow I was coming hither, I never let my ship pass your altars
without offering the fat and thigh-bones of heifers upon every one of
them, so eager was I to sack the city of Troy. Vouchsafe me then this
prayer--suffer us to escape at any rate with our lives, and let not the
Achaeans be so utterly vanquished by the Trojans."

Thus did he pray, and father Jove pitying his tears vouchsafed him that
his people should live, not die; forthwith he sent them an eagle, most
unfailingly portentous of all birds, with a young fawn in its talons;
the eagle dropped the fawn by the altar on which the Achaeans
sacrificed to Jove the lord of omens; when, therefore, the people saw
that the bird had come from Jove, they sprang more fiercely upon the
Trojans and fought more boldly.

There was no man of all the many Danaans who could then boast that he
had driven his horses over the trench and gone forth to fight sooner
than the son of Tydeus; long before any one else could do so he slew an
armed warrior of the Trojans, Agelaus the son of Phradmon. He had
turned his horses in flight, but the spear struck him in the back
midway between his shoulders and went right through his chest, and his
armour rang rattling round him as he fell forward from his chariot.

After him came Agamemnon and Menelaus, sons of Atreus, the two Ajaxes
clothed in valour as with a garment, Idomeneus and his companion in
arms Meriones, peer of murderous Mars, and Eurypylus the brave son of
Euaemon. Ninth came Teucer with his bow, and took his place under cover
of the shield of Ajax son of Telamon. When Ajax lifted his shield
Teucer would peer round, and when he had hit any one in the throng, the
man would fall dead; then