The siege of Troy is an event not to be reckoned as history, although Herodotus, the "Father of History," speaks of it as such, and it would be quite impossible to understand the history and character of the Greek people without a study of the _Iliad_ and _Odyssey_ poems attributed to "a blind bard of Scio's isle"--immortal Homer. The campaign of the Greek heroes in Asia is to be referred to a hazy point in the past when Europe was just beginning to have an Eastern Question. A vast circle of tales and poems has gathered round this mythical event, and the _Iliad_--Song of Ilium, or Troy--is still a poem of unfailing interest and fascination. Ilium, or Troy, was a city of Asia Minor, a little south of the Hellespont. It was the centre of a powerful state, Grecian in race and language; and when Paris, son of King Priam, visited Sparta and carried off the beautiful wife of Menelaus, king of Sparta, all the heroes of Greece banded together and invaded Priam's dominions. The twelve hundred ships that sailed for Troy transported one hundred thousand warriors to the valley of Simois and Scamander. Among them was Agamemnon, "king of men," brother of Menelaus. He was the leader, and in his train were Achilles, "swift of foot"; "god-like, wise" Ulysses, King of Ithaca, the two Ajaxes, and the aged Nestor. The narrative of their adventures is told in the Homeric poems with a power of musical expression, a charm of language, and a vividness of imagery unsurpassed in poetry. For ten years the besiegers encircled the city of Priam. After many engagements and single combats on "the windy plain of Troy" the great hero of the Greeks, Achilles of Thessaly, is wronged by Agamemnon, who carries away Briseis, a fair captive girl allotted as the spoils of war to the "Swift-footed." The hero of Thessaly thenceforth refuses to join in the war, and sullenly shuts himself up in his tent. It is only when his dear friend Patroclus has been slain by the valiant Hector, eldest son of Priam, that he sallies forth, meets Hector in single combat, and finally slays him. Achilles then attaches the body of Hector to his chariot and insultingly trails it in the dust as he drives three times around the walls of Troy. The _Iliad_ closes with the funeral rites celebrated over the corpse of Hector. We now arrive at the capital and culminating point of the Grecian epic--the two sieges and captures of Troy, with the destinies of the dispersed heroes, Trojan as well as Grecian, after the second and most celebrated capture and destruction of the city.