Achilles (Mythological character); Classical literature; Epic poetry, Greek -- Translations into English; Trojan War
Thus did he hound them on, and in one body they rushed straight
at the wall as he had bidden them, and scaled the battlements
with sharp spears in their hands. Hector laid hold of a stone
that lay just outside the gates and was thick at one end but
pointed at the other; two of the best men in a town, as men now
are, could hardly raise it from the ground and put it on to a
waggon, but Hector lifted it quite easily by himself, for the son
of scheming Saturn made it light for him. As a shepherd picks up
a ram’s fleece with one hand and finds it no burden, so easily
did Hector lift the great stone and drive it right at the doors
that closed the gates so strong and so firmly set. These doors
were double and high, and were kept closed by two cross-bars to
which there was but one key. When he had got close up to them,
Hector strode towards them that his blow might gain in force and
struck them in the middle, leaning his whole weight against them.
He broke both hinges, and the stone fell inside by reason of its
great weight. The portals re-echoed with the sound, the bars held
no longer, and the doors flew open, one one way, and the other
the other, through the force of the blow. Then brave Hector
leaped inside with a face as dark as that of flying night. The
gleaming bronze flashed fiercely about his body and he had two
spears in his hand. None but a god could have withstood him as he
flung himself into the gateway, and his eyes glared like fire.
Then he turned round towards the Trojans and called on them to
scale the wall, and they did as he bade them—some of them at once
climbing over the wall, while others passed through the gates.
The Danaans then fled panic-stricken towards their ships, and all
was uproar and confusion.
BOOK XIII.
Neptune helps the Achaeans—The feats of Idomeneus—Hector at the
ships.
Now when Jove had thus brought Hector and the Trojans to the
ships, he left them to their never-ending toil, and turned his
keen eyes away, looking elsewhither towards the horse-breeders of
Thrace, the Mysians, fighters at close quarters, the noble
Hippemolgi, who live on milk, and the Abians, justest of mankind.
He no longer turned so much as a glance towards Troy, for he did
not think that any of the immortals would go and help either
Trojans or Danaans.
But King Neptune had kept no blind look-out; he had been looking
admiringly on the battle from his seat on the topmost crests of
wooded Samothrace, whence he could see all Ida, with the city of
Priam and the ships of the Achaeans. He had come from under the
sea and taken his place here, for he pitied the Achaeans who were
being overcome by the Trojans; and he was furiously angry with
Jove.
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