Iliad by Homer - Join iZDOT

Homer’s Iliad
weapons after him; nor did he turn round and stay his flight till he
had reached his comrades.
The Trojans, fierce as lions, were still rushing on towards the ships
in fulfilment of the behests of Jove who kept spurring them on to
new deeds of daring, while he deadened the courage of the Argives
and defeated them by encouraging the Trojans. For he meant
giving glory to Hector son of Priam, and letting him throw fire
upon the ships, till he had fulfilled the unrighteous prayer that
Thetis had made him; Jove, therefore, bided his time till he should
see the glare of a blazing ship. From that hour he was about so to
order that the Trojans should be driven back from the ships and to
vouchsafe glory to the Achaeans. With this purpose he inspired
Hector son of Priam, who was cager enough already, to assail the
ships. His fury was as that of Mars, or as when a fire is raging in the
glades of some dense forest upon the mountains; he foamed at the
mouth, his eyes glared under his terrible eye-brows, and his
helmet quivered on his temples by reason of the fury with which
he fought. Jove from heaven was with him, and though he was but
one against many, vouchsafed him victory and glory; for he was
doomed to an early death, and already Pallas Minerva was
hurrying on the hour of his destruction at the hands of the son of
Peleus. Now, however, he kept trying to break the ranks of the
enemy wherever he could see them thickest, and in the goodliest
armour; but do what he might he could not break through them, for
they stood as a tower foursquare, or as some high cliff rising from
the grey sea that braves the anger of the gale, and of the waves that
thunder up against it. He fell upon them like flames of fire from
every quarter. As when a wave, raised mountain high by wind and
storm, breaks over a ship and covers it deep in foam, the fierce
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