be thus slaughtered by the Achaeans?
Would you wait till they are at the walls of Troy? Aeneas the son of
Anchises has fallen, he whom we held in as high honour as Hector
himself. Help me, then, to rescue our brave comrade from the stress of
the fight."

With these words he put heart and soul into them all. Then Sarpedon
rebuked Hector very sternly. "Hector," said he, "where is your prowess
now? You used to say that though you had neither people nor allies you
could hold the town alone with your brothers and brothers-in-law. I see
not one of them here; they cower as hounds before a lion; it is we,
your allies, who bear the brunt of the battle. I have come from afar,
even from Lycia and the banks of the river Xanthus, where I have left
my wife, my infant son, and much wealth to tempt whoever is needy;
nevertheless, I head my Lycian soldiers and stand my ground against any
who would fight me though I have nothing here for the Achaeans to
plunder, while you look on, without even bidding your men stand firm in
defence of their wives. See that you fall not into the hands of your
foes as men caught in the meshes of a net, and they sack your fair city
forthwith. Keep this before your mind night and day, and beseech the
captains of your allies to hold on without flinching, and thus put away
their reproaches from you."

So spoke Sarpedon, and Hector smarted under his words. He sprang from
his chariot clad in his suit of armour, and went about among the host
brandishing his two spears, exhorting the men to fight and raising the
terrible cry of battle. Then they rallied and again faced the Achaeans,
but the Argives stood compact and firm, and were not driven back. As
the breezes sport with the chaff upon some goodly threshing-floor, when
men are winnowing--while yellow Ceres blows with the wind to sift the
chaff from the grain, and the chaff-heaps grow whiter and whiter--even
so did the Achaeans whiten in the dust which the horses' hoofs raised
to the firmament of heaven, as their drivers turned them back to
battle, and they bore down with might upon the foe. Fierce Mars, to
help the Trojans, covered them in a veil of darkness, and went about
everywhere among them, inasmuch as Phoebus Apollo had told him that
when he saw Pallas, Minerva leave the fray he was to put courage into
the hearts of the Trojans--for it was she who was helping the Danaans.
Then Apollo sent Aeneas forth from his rich sanctuary, and filled his
heart with v