"Give ear, ye Trojans and allies! I thought this day to destroy the hosts of the Greeks and their ships, and so to return to Troy; but night hath hindered me. Let us yield to night, and take our meal. Unharness your horses and feed them. Fetch also from the city kine, and sheep, and wine, and bread, and store of fuel also, that we may burn many fires, lest the Greeks escape across the sea in the night. Also let the heralds make proclamation in the city that the lads and the old men should guard the wall, and that every woman should light a great fire in her house, and that all should keep watch, lest an ambush should enter the city while the people are away. In the morning will we arm ourselves, and wake the war beside the ships, and bring ruin on the Greeks." So Hector spake, and all the Trojans shouted their assent. They loosed their horses, and fetched food from the city, and gathered fuel. All night long they sat in high hope. And as on some windless night the stars shine bright about the moon, and all the crags and dells are shown, and the tops of the hills also, and the depths of the sky are open, and all the stars appear, and the shepherd's heart is glad; so the Trojan fires glittered between the stream of Xanthus and the ships. A thousand fires were burning, and fifty sat in the glare of each; and the horses stood beside the chariots champing their grain, and waited for the morn. Xan'-thus (X is pronounced as Z). CHAPTER X THE EMBASSY TO ACHILLES While the Trojans watched with good hope, the Greeks were filled with fear. And King Agamemnon was troubled beyond all others. He bade the heralds call every man to the assembly. Gloomily they sat, and when the King rose up to speak, his tears dropped down, as the waters drop down a steep cliff-side from some spring which the sunshine toucheth not. Thus he spake: "O friends, lords and leaders of the Greeks, verily Zeus dealeth ill with me. Once he promised that I should take the city of Troy and so return home; but now he hath deceived me, bidding me go back dishonoured, having lost much people. Therefore let us flee with our ships to the land of our fathers, for Troy we may not take." Long time the chiefs kept silence, for they were out of heart; but at the last rose Diomed, and spake: "Be not wroth, O King, if I contend with this thy madness. Thou hast called me laggard and coward; whether I be so indeed the Greeks know well, both young and old. But to thee Zeus hath given lordship and the power of the sceptre above thy fellows; but courage he hath not given, and courage is best of all. Now if thine heart be bent upon return, go thou; the way is nigh, and thy ships are by the sea; but all the other Greeks will abide till they have taken Troy. Yea, and if these also will go, then we two, I and Sthenelus, will abide and fight till we make an end of the city, for it was the gods that sent us hither."