The Iliad by Homer (book club recommendations txt) 📕

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