Shall, at the hollow ships, lift hand of oppression against thee, None out of all yon host—not and if thou said’st Agamemnon, Who now sits in his glory, the topmost flower of the armies.” Then did the blameless prophet at last wax valiant and answer: “Lo! He doth not reprove us of prayer or of oxen unoffered; But for his servant’s sake, the disdained of king Agamemnon, (In that he loosed not his daughter, inclined not his ear to a ransom,)— Therefore the Far-darter sendeth, and yet shall send on us, evil. Nor shall he stay from the slaughter the hand that is heavy upon you, Till to her own dear father the bright-eyed maiden is yielded, No price asked, no ransom; and ships bear hallowèd oxen Chryse-wards:—then, it may be, will he shew mercy and hear us.” These words said, sat he down. Then rose in his place and addressed them Atreus’ warrior son, Agamemnon king of the nations, Sore grieved. Fury was working in each dark cell of his bosom, And in his eye was a glare as a burning fiery furnace: First to the priest he addressed him, his whole mien boding a mischief. “Priest of ill luck! Never heard I of aught good from thee, but evil. Still doth the evil thing unto thee seem sweeter of utt’rance; Leaving the thing which is good all unspoke, all unaccomplished. Lo! this day to the people thou say’st, God-oracles opening, What, but that _I_ am the cause why the god’s hand worketh against them, For that in sooth I rejected a ransom, aye and a rich one, Brought for the girl Briseis. I did. For I chose to possess her, Rather, at home: less favour hath Clytemnestra before me, Clytemnestra my wife: unto her Briseis is equal, Equal in form and in stature, in mind and in womanly wisdom. Still, even thus, am I ready to yield her, so it be better: Better is saving alive, I hold, than slaying a nation. Meanwhile deck me a guerdon in her stead, lest of Achaians I should alone lack honour; an unmeet thing and a shameful. See all men, that my guerdon, I wot not whither it goeth.” Then unto him made answer the swift-foot chieftain Achilles: “O most vaunting of men, most gain-loving, off-spring of Atreus! How shall the lords of Achaia bestow fresh guerdon upon thee? Surely we know not yet of a treasure piled in abundance: That which the sacking of cities hath brought to us, all hath an owner, Yea it were all unfit that the host make redistribution. Yield thou the maid to the god. So threefold surely and fourfold All we Greeks will requite thee, should that day dawn, when the great Gods Grant that of yon proud walls not one stone rest on another.” * * * * * * THE END. * * * * * FOOTNOTES {15a} “The kites know well the long stern swell That bids the Romans close.”