Iliad by Homer - Join iZDOT

Homer’s Iliad
much space between wheel and horse when the chariot is going;
Menelaus was no further than this behind Antilochus, though at
first he had been a full disc’s throw behind him. He had soon
caught him up again, for Agamemnon’s mare Aethe kept pulling
stronger and stronger, so that if the course had been longer he
would have passed him, and there would not even have been a
dead heat. Idomeneus’s brave squire Meriones was about a spear’s
cast behind Menelaus. His horses were slowest of all, and he was
the worst driver. Last of them all came the son of Admetus,
dragging his chariot and driving his horses on in front. When
Achilles saw him he was sorry, and stood up among the Argives
saying, “The best man is coming in last. Let us give him a prize for
it is reasonable. He shall have the second, but the first must go to
the son of Tydeus.”
Thus did he speak and the others all of them applauded his saying,
and were for doing as he had said, but Nestor’s son Antilochus
stood up and claimed his rights from the son of Peleus. “Achilles,”
said he, “I shall take it much amiss if you do this thing; you would
rob me of my prize, because you think Eumelus’s chariot and
horses were thrown out, and himself too, good man that he is. He
should have prayed duly to the immortals; he would not have
come in fast if he had done so. If you are sorry for him and so
choose, you have much gold in your tents, with bronze, sheep,
cattle and horses. Take something from this store if you would
have the Achaeans speak well of you, and give him a better prize
even than that which you have now offered; but I will not give up
the mare, and he that will fight me for her, let him come on.”
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