The Iliad - Homer (best novels to read for beginners .txt) 📗

that rolls on golden sands; Xanthus his name with those of heavenly birth, But called Scamander by the sons of earth.

 

While thus the gods in various league engage, Achilles glow’d with more than mortal rage: Hector he sought; in search of Hector turn’d His eyes around, for Hector only burn’d; And burst like lightning through the ranks, and vow’d To glut the god of battles with his blood.

 

AEneas was the first who dared to stay; Apollo wedged him in the warrior’s way, But swell’d his bosom with undaunted might, Half-forced and half-persuaded to the fight.

Like young Lycaon, of the royal line,

In voice and aspect, seem’d the power divine; And bade the chief reflect, how late with scorn In distant threats he braved the goddess-born.

 

Then thus the hero of Anchises’ strain: “To meet Pelides you persuade in vain:

Already have I met, nor void of fear

Observed the fury of his flying spear;

From Ida’s woods he chased us to the field, Our force he scattered, and our herds he kill’d; Lyrnessus, Pedasus in ashes lay;

But (Jove assisting) I survived the day: Else had I sunk oppress’d in fatal fight By fierce Achilles and Minerva’s might.

Where’er he moved, the goddess shone before, And bathed his brazen lance in hostile gore.

What mortal man Achilles can sustain?

The immortals guard him through the dreadful plain, And suffer not his dart to fall in vain.

Were God my aid, this arm should check his power, Though strong in battle as a brazen tower.”

 

To whom the son of Jove: “That god implore, And be what great Achilles was before.

From heavenly Venus thou deriv’st thy strain, And he but from a sister of the main;

An aged sea-god father of his line;

But Jove himself the sacred source of thine.

Then lift thy weapon for a noble blow,

Nor fear the vaunting of a mortal foe.”

 

This said, and spirit breathed into his breast, Through the thick troops the embolden’d hero press’d: His venturous act the white-arm’d queen survey’d, And thus, assembling all the powers, she said: “Behold an action, gods! that claims your care, Lo great AEneas rushing to the war!

Against Pelides he directs his course,

Phoebus impels, and Phoebus gives him force.

Restrain his bold career; at least, to attend Our favour’d hero, let some power descend.

To guard his life, and add to his renown, We, the great armament of heaven, came down.

Hereafter let him fall, as Fates design, That spun so short his life’s illustrious line: [222]

But lest some adverse god now cross his way, Give him to know what powers assist this day: For how shall mortal stand the dire alarms, When heaven’s refulgent host appear in arms?” [223]

 

Thus she; and thus the god whose force can make The solid globe’s eternal basis shake:

“Against the might of man, so feeble known, Why should celestial powers exert their own?

Suffice from yonder mount to view the scene, And leave to war the fates of mortal men.

But if the armipotent, or god of light, Obstruct Achilles, or commence the fight.

Thence on the gods of Troy we swift descend: Full soon, I doubt not, shall the conflict end; And these, in ruin and confusion hurl’d, Yield to our conquering arms the lower world.”

 

Thus having said, the tyrant of the sea, Coerulean Neptune, rose, and led the way.

Advanced upon the field there stood a mound Of earth congested, wall’d, and trench’d around; In elder times to guard Alcides made,

(The work of Trojans, with Minerva’s aid,) What time a vengeful monster of the main Swept the wide shore, and drove him to the plain.

 

Here Neptune and the gods of Greece repair, With clouds encompass’d, and a veil of air: The adverse powers, around Apollo laid, Crown the fair hills that silver Simois shade.

In circle close each heavenly party sat, Intent to form the future scheme of fate; But mix not yet in fight, though Jove on high Gives the loud signal, and the heavens reply.

 

Meanwhile the rushing armies hide the ground; The trampled centre yields a hollow sound: Steeds cased in mail, and chiefs in armour bright, The gleaming champaign glows with brazen light.

Amid both hosts (a dreadful space) appear, There great Achilles; bold AEneas, here.

With towering strides Aeneas first advanced; The nodding plumage on his helmet danced: Spread o’er his breast the fencing shield he bore, And, so he moved, his javelin flamed before.

Not so Pelides; furious to engage,

He rush’d impetuous. Such the lion’s rage, Who viewing first his foes with scornful eyes, Though all in arms the peopled city rise, Stalks careless on, with unregarding pride; Till at the length, by some brave youth defied, To his bold spear the savage turns alone, He murmurs fury with a hollow groan;

He grins, he foams, he rolls his eyes around Lash’d by his tail his heaving sides resound; He calls up all his rage; he grinds his teeth, Resolved on vengeance, or resolved on death.

So fierce Achilles on AEneas flies;

So stands AEneas, and his force defies.

Ere yet the stern encounter join’d, begun The seed of Thetis thus to Venus’ son:

 

“Why comes AEneas through the ranks so far?

Seeks he to meet Achilles’ arm in war,

In hope the realms of Priam to enjoy,

And prove his merits to the throne of Troy?

Grant that beneath thy lance Achilles dies, The partial monarch may refuse the prize; Sons he has many; those thy pride may quell: And ‘tis his fault to love those sons too well, Or, in reward of thy victorious hand,

Has Troy proposed some spacious tract of land An ample forest, or a fair domain,

Of hills for vines, and arable for grain?

Even this, perhaps, will hardly prove thy lot.

But can Achilles be so soon forgot?

Once (as I think) you saw this brandish’d spear And then the great AEneas seem’d to fear: With hearty haste from Ida’s mount he fled, Nor, till he reach’d Lyrnessus, turn’d his head.

Her lofty walls not long our progress stay’d; Those, Pallas, Jove, and we, in ruins laid: In Grecian chains her captive race were cast; ‘Tis true, the great Aeneas fled too fast.

Defrauded of my conquest once before,

What then I lost, the gods this day restore.

Go; while thou may’st, avoid the threaten’d fate; Fools stay to feel it, and are wise too late.”

 

To this Anchises’ son: “Such words employ To one that fears thee, some unwarlike boy; Such we disdain; the best may be defied With mean reproaches, and unmanly pride; Unworthy the high race from which we came Proclaim’d so loudly by the voice of fame: Each from illustrious fathers draws his line; Each goddess-born; half human, half divine.

Thetis’ this day, or Venus’ offspring dies, And tears shall trickle from celestial eyes: For when two heroes, thus derived, contend, ‘Tis not in words the glorious strife can end.

If yet thou further seek to learn my birth (A tale resounded through the spacious earth) Hear how the glorious origin we prove

From ancient Dardanus, the first from Jove: Dardania’s walls he raised; for Ilion, then, (The city since of many-languaged men,) Was not. The natives were content to till The shady foot of Ida’s fountful hill. [224]

From Dardanus great Erichthonius springs, The richest, once, of Asia’s wealthy kings; Three thousand mares his spacious pastures bred, Three thousand foals beside their mothers fed.

Boreas, enamour’d of the sprightly train, Conceal’d his godhead in a flowing mane, With voice dissembled to his loves he neigh’d, And coursed the dappled beauties o’er the mead: Hence sprung twelve others of unrivall’d kind, Swift as their mother mares, and father wind.

These lightly skimming, when they swept the plain, Nor plied the grass, nor bent the tender grain; And when along the level seas they flew, [225]

Scarce on the surface curl’d the briny dew.

Such Erichthonius was: from him there came The sacred Tros, of whom the Trojan name.

Three sons renown’d adorn’d his nuptial bed, Ilus, Assaracus, and Ganymed:

The matchless Ganymed, divinely fair,

Whom heaven, enamour’d, snatch’d to upper air, To bear the cup of Jove (ethereal guest, The grace and glory of the ambrosial feast).

The two remaining sons the line divide: First rose Laomedon from Ilus’ side;

From him Tithonus, now in cares grown old, And Priam, bless’d with Hector, brave and bold; Clytius and Lampus, ever-honour’d pair; And Hicetaon, thunderbolt of war.

From great Assaracus sprang Capys, he

Begat Anchises, and Anchises me.

Such is our race: ‘tis fortune gives us birth, But Jove alone endues the soul with worth: He, source of power and might! with boundless sway, All human courage gives, or takes away.

Long in the field of words we may contend, Reproach is infinite, and knows no end, Arm’d or with truth or falsehood, right or wrong; So voluble a weapon is the tongue;

Wounded, we wound; and neither side can fail, For every man has equal strength to rail: Women alone, when in the streets they jar, Perhaps excel us in this wordy war;

Like us they stand, encompass’d with the crowd, And vent their anger impotent and loud.

Cease then—Our business in the field of fight Is not to question, but to prove our might.

To all those insults thou hast offer’d here, Receive this answer: ‘tis my flying spear.”

 

He spoke. With all his force the javelin flung, Fix’d deep, and loudly in the buckler rung.

Far on his outstretch’d arm, Pelides held (To meet the thundering lance) his dreadful shield, That trembled as it stuck; nor void of fear Saw, ere it fell, the immeasurable spear.

His fears were vain; impenetrable charms Secured the temper of the ethereal arms.

Through two strong plates the point its passage held, But stopp’d, and rested, by the third repell’d.

Five plates of various metal, various mould, Composed the shield; of brass each outward fold, Of tin each inward, and the middle gold: There stuck the lance. Then rising ere he threw, The forceful spear of great Achilles flew, And pierced the Dardan shield’s extremest bound, Where the shrill brass return’d a sharper sound: Through the thin verge the Pelean weapon glides, And the slight covering of expanded hides.

AEneas his contracted body bends,

And o’er him high the riven targe extends, Sees, through its parting plates, the upper air, And at his back perceives the quivering spear: A fate so near him, chills his soul with fright; And swims before his eyes the many-colour’d light.

Achilles, rushing in with dreadful cries, Draws his broad blade, and at AEneas flies: AEneas rousing as the foe came on,

With force collected, heaves a mighty stone: A mass enormous! which in modern days

No two of earth’s degenerate sons could raise.

But ocean’s god, whose earthquakes rock the ground.

Saw the distress, and moved the powers around: “Lo! on the brink of fate AEneas stands, An instant victim to Achilles’ hands;

By Phoebus urged; but Phoebus has bestow’d His aid in vain: the man o’erpowers the god.

And can ye see this righteous chief atone With guiltless blood for vices not his own?

To all the gods his constant vows were paid; Sure, though he wars for Troy, he claims our aid.

Fate wills not this; nor thus can Jove resign The future father of the Dardan line: [226]

The first great ancestor obtain’d his grace, And still his love descends on all the race: For Priam now, and Priam’s faithless kind, At length are odious to the all-seeing mind; On great AEneas shall devolve the reign, And sons succeeding sons the lasting line sustain.”

 

The great earth-shaker thus: to whom replies The imperial goddess with the radiant eyes: “Good as he is, to immolate or spare

The Dardan