(and the theft that followed?(237) Or shall I pay my respects to your Thracian horses, whiter than snow and faster than the storm winds, and your Thracian chariots? For in your case also we can extol all these, and as for the palace of Alcinous and those halls that dazzled even the son of prudent Odysseus and moved him to such foolish expressions of wonder,(238) shall I think it worth while to compare them with yours, for fear that men should one day think that you were worse off than he in these respects, or shall I not rather reject such trifling? Nay, I must be on my guard lest someone accuse and convict me of using frivolous speech and ignoring what is really admirable. So I had better leave it to the Homerids to spend their energies on such themes, and proceed boldly to what is more closely allied to virtue, and things to which you yourself pay more attention, I mean bodily strength and experience in the use of arms.) Τίνι δήποτε οὖν τῶν ὑπὸ τῆς Ὁμηρικῆς ὑμνουμένων σειρῆνος εἴξομεν; [53] ἔστι μὲν γὰρ τοξότης παρ᾽ αὐτῷ Πάνδαρος, ἀνὴρ ἄπιστος καὶ χρημάτων ἥττων, ἀλλα καὶ ἀσθενὴς τὴν χεῖρα καὶ ὁπλίτης φαῦλος, Τεῦκρος τε ἐπ᾽ αὐτῷ καὶ Μηριόνης, ὁ μὲν ἐπὶ τῆς πελειάδος τῷ τόξῳ χρώμενος, ὁ δὲ ἠρίστευε μὲν ἐν τῇ μάχῃ ἐδεῖτο δὲ ὥσπερ ἐρύματος καὶ τειχίου. ταῦτά τοι καὶ προβάλλεται τὴν ἀσπίδα, οὔτι τὴν οἰκείαν, τἀδελφοῦ δέ, καὶ στοχάζεται καθ᾽ ἡσυχίαν τῶν πολεμίων, γελοῖος ἀναφανεὶς στρατιώτης, [B] ὅς γε ἐδεῖτο μείζονος φύλακος καὶ οὐκ ἐν τοῖς ὅπλοις ἐποιεῖτο τῆς σωτηρίας τὰς ἐλπίδας. σὲ δῆτα ἐθεασάμην, ὦ φίλε βασιλεῦ, ἄρκτους καὶ παρδάλεις καὶ λέοντας συχνοὺς καταβάλλοντα τοῖς ἀφιεμένοις βέλεσι, χρώμενον δὲ πρὸς θήραν καὶ παιδιὰν τόξῳ, ἐπὶ δὲ τῆς παρατάξεως ἀσπίς ἐστί σοι καὶ θώραξ καὶ κράνος· καὶ οὐκ ἂν καταδείσαιμι τὸν ἀχιλλέα τοῖς Ἡφαιστείοις λαμπρυνόμενον καὶ ἀποπειρώμενον αὑτοῦ καὶ τῶν ὅπλον, (And now which one of those heroes to whom Homer devotes his enchanting strains shall I admit to be superior to you? There is the archer Pandaros in Homer, but he is treacherous and yields to bribes(239); moreover his arm was weak and he was an inferior hoplite: then there are besides, Teucer and Meriones. The latter employs his bow against a pigeon(240) while Teucer, though he distinguished himself in battle, always needed a sort of bulwark or wall. Accordingly he keeps a shield in front of him,(241) and that not his own but his brother’s, and aims at the enemy at his ease, cutting an absurd figure as a soldier, seeing that he needed a protector taller than himself and that it was not in his weapons that he placed his hopes of safety. But I have seen you many a time, my beloved Emperor, bringing down bears and panthers and lions with the weapons hurled by your hand, and using your bow both for hunting and for pastime, and on the field of battle you have your own shield and cuirass and helmet. And I should not be afraid to match you with Achilles when he was exulting in the armour that Hephaistos made, and testing himself and that armour to see)