A distinguished classical authority has remarked that the description of Achilles’ shield occupies an anomalous position in Homer’s ‘Iliad.’ On the one hand, it is easy to show that the poem—for the description may be looked on as a complete poem—is out of place in the ‘Iliad;’ on the other, it is no less easy to show that Homer has carefully led up to the description of the shield by a series of introductory events. I propose to examine, briefly, the evidence on each of these points, and then to exhibit a theory respecting the shield which may appear _bizarre_ enough on a first view, but which seems to me to be supported by satisfactory evidence. An argument commonly urged against the genuineness of the ‘Shield of Achilles’ is founded on the length and laboured character of the description. Even Grote, whose theory is that Homer’s original poem was not an _Iliad_, but an _Achilleis_, has admitted the force of this argument. He finds clear evidence that from Book II. to Book XX. Homer has been husbanding his resources for the more effective description of the final conflict. He therefore concedes the possibility that the ‘Shield of Achilles’ may be an interpolation—perhaps the work of another hand. It appears to me, however, that the mere length of the description is no argument against the genuineness of the passage. Events have, indeed, been hastening to a crisis up to the end of Book XVII., and the action is checked in a marked manner by the ‘Oplopœia’ in Book XVIII. Yet it is quite in Homer’s manner to introduce, between two series of important events, an interval of comparative inaction, or at least of events wholly different in character from those of either series. We have a marked instance of this in Books IX. and X. Here the appeal to Achilles and the night-adventure of Diomed and Ulysses are interposed between the first victory of the Trojans and the great struggle in which Patroclus is slain, and Agamemnon, Ulysses, Diomed, Machaon, and Eurypylus wounded.[19] In fact, one cannot doubt that in such an arrangement Homer exhibits admirable taste and judgment. The contrast between action and inaction, or between the confused tumult of a heady conflict and the subtle advance of the two Greek heroes, is conceived in the true poetic spirit. The dignity and importance of the action, and the interest of the interposed events, are alike enhanced. Indeed, there is scarcely a noted author whose works do not afford instances of corresponding contrasts. How skilfully, for example, has Shakespeare interposed the ‘bald, disjointed chat’ of the sleepy porter between the conscience-wrought horror of Duncan’s murderers and the ‘horror, horror, horror’ which ‘tongue nor heart could not conceive nor name’ of his faithful followers. Nor will the reader need to be reminded of the frequent and effective use of the contrast between the humorous and the pathetic by others.