The Iliad by Homer (book club recommendations txt) 📕

Meantime was Neptune moved with grief to see
His grandson perish in that desperate fray,
And passed among the Achaian tents and ships
Encouraging the men, and planning woes
For Ilium. There he met Idomeneus,
Expert to wield the spear, as he returned
From caring for a comrade who had left
The battle, wounded in the knee, and whom
His friends had carried in. Idomeneus
Had called the surgeons to his aid, and now
Was hastening to the field, intent to bear
His part in battle. Him the monarch god
Of ocean thus addressed, but first he took
The voice of Thoas, King Andraemon’s son,
Whose father ruled the Aetolians through the bounds
Of Pleuron, and in lofty Calydon,
And like a god was honored in the land.

“O counsellor of Crete, Idomeneus!
Where are the threats which late the sons of Greece
Uttered against the Trojans?” Promptly came
The Cretan leader’s answer: “No man here,
O Thoas, seems blameworthy, for we all
Are skilled in war, nor does unmanly fear
Hold any back; nor from the difficult strife
Does sloth detain one warrior. So it is
Doubtless that it seems good to Saturn’s son,
The All-disposer, that the Greeks, afar
From Argos, should ingloriously fall
And perish. Thoas, thou wert ever brave,
And didst exhort the laggards. Cease not now
To combat, cease not to exhort the rest.”

And Neptune, he who shakes the earth, rejoined:⁠—
“Idomeneus, whoever keeps aloof
From battle, willingly, today, may he
Never return from Troy, but be the prey
Of dogs. Take thou thy arms and come with me,
For we must quit ourselves like men, and strive
To aid our cause, although we be but two.
Great is the strength of feeble arms combined,
And we can combat even with the brave.”

So speaking, Neptune turned to share the toils
Of war. Idomeneus, who now had reached
His princely tent, put on his glorious mail,
And seized two spears, and flew upon his way,
Like lightning grasped by Saturn’s son and flung
Quivering above Olympus’ gleaming peak,
A sign to mortals, dazzled by the blaze,
So glittered, as he ran, his brazen mail.
His fellow-warrior, good Meriones,
Met him beside the tent, for he had come
To fetch a brazen javelin thence, and thus
The stout Idomeneus addressed his friend:⁠—

“O son of Molus, swift Meriones,
Dearest of all my comrades! Why hast thou
Thus left the battle-field? Hast thou a wound⁠—
A weapon’s point that galls thee? Dost thou bring
A message to me? Think not that I sit
Within my tent an idler: I must fight.”

Discreetly did Meriones reply:⁠—
“Idomeneus, whose sovereign counsels rule
The well-armed Cretans, I am come to seek
A spear if one be left within thy tents.
I broke the one I bore, in hurling it
Against the shield of fierce Deïphobus.”

The Cretan chief, Idomeneus, rejoined:⁠—
“If spears thou seek, there stand within my tent
Twenty and one against the shining walls.
I took them from slain Trojans. ’Tis my wont
Never to fight at distance from the foe,
And therefore have I spears, and bossy shields,
And helms, and body-mail of polished brass.”

Then spake in turn discreet Meriones:⁠—
“Within my tent are also many spoils
Won from the Trojans, and in my black ship;
But they are far away. I do not think
That I forget what valor is. I fight
Among the foremost in the glorious strife
Where’er the battle calls me. Other men
Among the well-armed Greeks may not have seen
What I perform, but thou must know me well.”

Idomeneus, the Cretan leader, spake:⁠—
“I know thy courage well. What need hast thou
To speak as thou hast done? If all of us,
The bravest of the Greeks, were set apart
To form an ambush;⁠—for an ambush tries
And shows men’s valor; there the craven, there
The brave, is known; the coward’s color comes
And goes; his spirit is not calm within
His bosom, so that he can rest awhile
And tremble not; he shifts his place; he sits
On both his feet; his heart beats audibly
Within his breast; his teeth at thought of death
Chatter; the brave man’s color changes not,
Nor when with other warriors he sits down
In ambush is he troubled, but he longs
To rise and mingle in the desperate fray;⁠—
For thee, in such an ambush, none could blame
Thy courage or thy skill. If there the foe
Should wound thee from afar, or smite thee near,
The weapon would not strike thy neck behind,
Or pierce thy back, but enter at thy breast
Or stomach, as thou wert advancing fast
Among the foremost. But enough of this.
Come! Stand we here no longer, idiot-like,
Lest someone chide us sharply. Hasten thou,
And bring a sturdy javelin from the tent.”

He spake. Meriones, like Mars in port
And swiftness, hastened to the tent and brought
A brazen spear, and joined Idomeneus,
Eager for battle. As the god of war,
The man-destroyer, comes into the field,
With Terror, his strong-limbed and dauntless son,
Following and striking fear into the heart
Of the most resolute warrior, when from Thrace
They issue armed against the Ephyri,
Or else against the Phlegyans large of soul,
And hearken not to both the hosts, but give
To one the victory; so Meriones
Advanced to battle with Idomeneus,
Leaders of heroes both, and both equipped
In glittering helms. And first Meriones
Spake and addressed his fellow-warrior thus:⁠—

“Son of Deucalion, at which point wilt thou
Enter the throng? Upon the army’s right,
Its centre, or its left? The long haired Greeks
Seem most to need our aid upon the left.”

Then spoke Idomeneus, in turn, the prince
Of Cretans: “At the centre of the fleet
Are others who will guard it. Posted there
Are either Ajax and the most expert
Of Grecian archers, Teucer, not less skilled
In standing fight, and amply will they task
The arm of Hector, Priam’s son, though bent
On desperate conflict, and though passing fierce.
With all his fierceness, he will find it hard
To quell their prowess, never yet o’ercome,
And fire the ships, unless Saturnian Jove
Himself should cast on them the flaming torch.
Nor yet will Telamonian Ajax yield
To any man of mortal birth, or reared
Upon the grains of Ceres, or whom brass
Or ponderous stones can wound. He would not own
The warlike son of Peleus mightier
Than he in standing fight, although in speed
He vies not with him. Lead us then to join
The army’s left, that we may learn at once
Whether our fate in battle shall confer
Glory on other men, or theirs on us.”

So spake the chief. Meriones, the peer
Of Mars in swiftness, hastened till he joined
The army where his