Now nothing can be more at variance with the tenor of the second and following books than this supposition. The Trojans come forth readily and fight gallantly; neither Agamemnôn, nor Nestor, nor Odysseus consider them as enemies who cannot hold front; and the circuit of exhortation by Agamemnôn (Epipôlêsis), so strikingly described in the fourth book, proves that _he_ does not anticipate a very easy victory. Nor does Nestor, in proposing the construction of the wall, give the smallest hint that the power of the Trojans to resist in the open field was to the Greeks an unexpected discovery. The reason assigned by Müller, then, is a fancy of his own, proceeding from the same source of mistake as others among his remarks; because he tries to find, in the books between the first and eighth, a governing reference to Achilles (the point of view of the Achillêis), which those books distinctly refuse. The Achillêis was a poem of Grecian disasters up to the time when Achilles sent forth Patroclus; and during those disasters, it might suit the poet to refer by contrast to the past time when Achilles was active, and to say that _then_ the Trojans did not dare even to present themselves in battle-array in the field, whereas _now_ they were assailing the ships. But the author of books ii. to vii. has no wish to glorify Achilles: he gives us a picture of the Trojan war generally, and describes the Trojans, not only as brave and equal enemies, but well known by the Greeks themselves to be so. The building of the Grecian wall, as it now stands described, is an unexplained proceeding, which Müller’s ingenuity does not render consistent. The tenth book, or Doloneia, was considered by some of the ancient scholiasts,[297] and has been confidently set forth by the modern Wolfian critics, as originally a separate poem, inserted by Peisistratus into the Iliad. How it can ever have been a separate poem, I do not understand. It is framed with great specialty for the antecedent circumstances under which it occurs, and would suit for no other place; though capable of being separately recited, inasmuch as it has a definite beginning and end, like the story of Nisus and Euryalus in the Æneid. But while distinctly presupposing and resting upon the incidents in the eighth book, and in line 88 of the ninth, (probably, the appointment of sentinels on the part of the Greeks, as well of the Trojans, formed the close of the battle described in the eighth book,) it has not the slightest bearing upon the events of the eleventh or the following books: it goes to make up the general picture of the Trojan war, but lies quite apart from the Achillêis. And this is one mark of a portion subsequently inserted,—that, though fitted on to the parts which precede, it has no influence on those which follow. [297] Schol. ad Iliad. x. 1.