So spake Athene, tempting him; and he hearkened unto her in his folly, and began to take the cover from his bow. It was a powerful weapon, formed from the horns of a great ibex, which he himself had brought down by a skilful shot long ago. The horns, each sixteen palms in length, were set firmly in a solid bridge, and tipped at each end with gold. Resting the lower end of the bow against his foot, he leaned upon it, and strung it, and laying it down took off the lid of his quiver, and selected an arrow. Then he took up the bow again, and set the arrow on the string. His companions, who had been covering him with their shields while he was making his preparations, now stepped aside, and he, having made his vow to Apollo, lifted up his bow, drew the arrow to his ear, and shot. The bow twanged loud and clear, and the arrow leapt hissing towards the Grecian ranks. Then ill had it fared with thee, Menelaus, had not Athene been standing at thy side, to guard thee from fatal hurt. And as a mother brushes a fly from the face of her babe, lying in sweet slumber on her lap, so Athene suffered not the arrow to reach any vital part, but guided it to the place where the plates of his corslet met at his side. Through the girdle pierced the shaft, through the brazen corslet, and through the taslet which covered his loins; the point just grazed the surface of his flesh, and the red blood began to flow, staining his thighs, and trickling down to his ankles. When Agamemnon saw his brother wounded and bleeding, he ran to his side, and taking him by the hand began to deplore the evil issue of their treaty. "Must thy life pay the forfeit for the perjured men of Troy, who have trampled our covenant underfoot? I know indeed that vengeance will overtake them in the end from the hands of Zeus, whose name they have taken in vain; yea, well I know that the day shall come when holy Ilios shall fall, involved with all her people in one common doom. But what will that avail, if I lose thee, my brother? My army will desert me, for they cannot fight without a cause, and thou art the cause which brought them hither. Troy's doom will be wrought by other hands, and I shall go back to Argos, a beaten man, leaving thy bones to rot in a foreign grave." "Speak not so loud," said Menelaus, when Agamemnon paused at last; "thou wilt cause a panic in the army. There is no ground for alarm; the wound is not deep. Send for Machaon, the skilled leech, that he may draw out the arrow, and stanch the flow of blood."