It is significant that the character of Achilles is developed in conflict with the war-god, Ares; while Odysseus is whelmed in a ‘sea of troubles,’ literally heaped upon him by Poseidon. Struggling constantly against the rage of the elements, Odysseus becomes alert and cautious, patient and painstaking and resourceful: a great constructive energy, as contrasted with the destroying fury of Achilles. The poet’s epithet for Odysseus is ‘subtle’ as that for Achilles had been ‘swift’; and the emphasis is always laid upon his qualities of brain and nerve. He is not a very imposing figure, and has little physical beauty. When his friends would praise him, it is gifts of mind rather than of body to which they refer. He is ‘the just one’ who does no injury ‘as is the way of princes’; the kindly ruler, who is ‘like a father’ to help his people; the faithful husband who can flatter and cajole his goddess-gaoler, in desperate anxiety to be home with his dear wife; the loyal comrade who will risk the enchantments of Circe rather than forsake his men without an effort; the gracious master whose servants ‘mourn and pine’ because of his long absence. And all the way through the poem, in passages which are too numerous to quote, there is a running tribute to his wisdom. Zeus himself, with other gods and goddesses; kings and queens; nymphs, naiads and enchantresses; swineherds and domestic servants; soldiers and sailors; strangers and homefolk; friends and enemies, all add their word to the eulogium of his wit. Now Penelope, who is the perfect mate for such a man as this, is for that very reason contrasted with Helen as strongly as her husband is contrasted with the hero of the _Iliad_. It is not merely that her personality is totally unlike Helen’s, although that is true. The contrast is rooted in something deeper—in the whole conception of the poet, the manner of life out of which the poem came, the theme of which it treats. In the _Iliad_ we are quite literally moving amongst demi-gods. Helen, reputed daughter of Tyndareus, is really the child of Zeus; and Achilles has the nereid Thetis for his mother. Something of their divine origin clings to them, making them awful and magnificent. In all that they do and are they are greater than mere human folk. They move majestically, and they are not to be approached too nearly, or judged by the common standard, or compared with the ordinary race of men. Troy itself, to which their names cling, was a city built by gods.