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Iliad by Homer - Join iZDOT

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<strong>Homer</strong>’s <strong>Iliad</strong><br />

Achilles in his turn threw, and struck the round shield of Aeneas at<br />

the very edge, where the bronze was thinnest; the spear of Pelian<br />

ash went clean through, and the shield rang under the blow;<br />

Aeneas was afraid, and crouched backwards, holding the shield<br />

away from him; the spear, however, flew over his back, and stuck<br />

quivering in the ground, after having gone through both circles of<br />

the sheltering shield. Aeneas though he had avoided the spear,<br />

stood still, blinded with fear and grief because the weapon had<br />

gone so near him; then Achilles sprang furiously upon him, with a<br />

cry as of death and with his keen blade drawn, and Aeneas seized a<br />

great stone, so huge that two men, as men now are, would be<br />

unable to lift it, but Aeneas wielded it quite easily.<br />

Aeneas would then have struck Achilles as he was springing<br />

towards him, either on the helmet, or on the shield that covered<br />

him, and Achilles would have closed with him and despatched him<br />

with his sword, had not Neptune lord of the earthquake been quick<br />

to mark, and said forthwith to the immortals, “Alas, I am sorry for<br />

great Aeneas, who will now go down to the house of Hades,<br />

vanquished <strong>by</strong> the son of Peleus. Fool that he was to give ear to the<br />

counsel of Apollo. Apollo will never save him from destruction.<br />

Why should this man suffer when he is guiltless, to no purpose,<br />

and in another’s quarrel? Has he not at all times offered acceptable<br />

sacrifice to the gods that dwell in heaven? Let us then snatch him<br />

from death’s jaws, lest the son of Saturn be angry should Achilles<br />

slay him. It is fated, moreover, that he should escape, and that the<br />

race of Dardanus, whom Jove loved above all the sons born to him<br />

of mortal women, shall not perish utterly without seed or sign. For<br />

now indeed has Jove hated the blood of Priam, while Aeneas shall<br />

399

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