Iliad by Homer - Join iZDOT

Homer’s Iliad
should do so. In the first place you attacked me before all the
Danaans and said that I was a coward and no soldier. The Argives
young and old know that you did so. But the son of scheming
Saturn endowed you by halves only. He gave you honour as the
chief ruler over us, but valour, which is the highest both right and
might he did not give you. Sir, think you that the sons of the
Achaeans are indeed as unwarlike and cowardly as you say they
are? If your own mind is set upon going home- go- the way is open
to you; the many ships that followed you from Mycene stand
ranged upon the seashore; but the rest of us stay here till we have
sacked Troy. Nay though these too should turn homeward with
their ships, Sthenelus and myself will still fight on till we reach the
goal of Ilius, for for heaven was with us when we came.”
The sons of the Achaeans shouted applause at the words of
Diomed, and presently Nestor rose to speak. “Son of Tydeus,” said
he, “in war your prowess is beyond question, and in council you
excel all who are of your own years; no one of the Achaeans can
make light of what you say nor gainsay it, but you have not yet
come to the end of the whole matter. You are still young- you
might be the youngest of my own children- still you have spoken
wisely and have counselled the chief of the Achaeans not without
discretion; nevertheless I am older than you and I will tell you
every” thing; therefore let no man, not even King Agamemnon,
disregard my saying, for he that foments civil discord is a clanless,
hearthless outlaw.
“Now, however, let us obey the behests of night and get our
suppers, but let the sentinels every man of them camp by the
trench that is without the wall. I am giving these instructions to the
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