Quick palpitates his death-foreboding heart,345 And his teeth chatter; but the valiant man His posture shifts not; no excessive fears Feels he, but seated once in ambush, deems Time tedious till the bloody fight begin;) Even there, thy courage should no blame incur.[8]350 For should’st thou, toiling in the fight, by spear Or falchion bleed, not on thy neck behind Would fall the weapon, or thy back annoy, But it would meet thy bowels or thy chest While thou didst rush into the clamorous van.355 But haste—we may not longer loiter here As children prating, lest some sharp rebuke Reward us. Enter quick, and from within My tent provide thee with a noble spear. Then, swift as Mars, Meriones produced360 A brazen spear of those within the tent Reserved, and kindling with heroic fire Follow’d Idomeneus. As gory Mars By Terror follow’d, his own dauntless son Who quells the boldest heart, to battle moves;365 From Thrace against the Ephyri they arm, Or hardy Phlegyans, and by both invoked, Hear and grant victory to which they please; Such, bright in arms Meriones, and such Idomeneus advanced, when foremost thus370 Meriones his fellow-chief bespake. Son of Deucalion! where inclinest thou most To enter into battle? On the right Of all the host? or through the central ranks? Or on the left? for nowhere I account375 The Greeks so destitute of force as there. Then answer thus Idomeneus return’d Chief of the Cretans. Others stand to guard The middle fleet; there either Ajax wars, And Teucer, noblest archer of the Greeks,380 Nor less in stationary fight approved. Bent as he is on battle, they will task And urge to proof sufficiently the force Of Priameïan Hector; burn his rage How fierce soever, he shall find it hard,385 With all his thirst of victory, to quell Their firm resistance, and to fire the fleet, Let not Saturnian Jove cast down from heaven Himself a flaming brand into the ships. High towering Telamonian Ajax yields390 To no mere mortal by the common gift Sustain’d of Ceres, and whose flesh the spear Can penetrate, or rocky fragment bruise; In standing fight Ajax would not retire Even before that breaker of the ranks395 Achilles, although far less swift than he. But turn we to the left, that we may learn At once, if glorious death, or life be ours. Then, rapid as the God of war, his course Meriones toward the left began,400 As he enjoin’d. Soon as the Trojans saw Idomeneus advancing like a flame, And his compeer Meriones in arms All-radiant clad, encouraging aloud From rank to rank each other, on they came405 To the assault combined. Then soon arose Sharp contest on the left of all the fleet. As when shrill winds blow vehement, what time Dust deepest spreads the ways, by warring blasts Upborne a sable cloud stands in the air,410 Such was the sudden conflict; equal rage To stain with gore the lance ruled every breast. Horrent with quivering spears the fatal field Frown’d on all sides; the brazen flashes dread