ting
the priest and taking the ransom that he offered; but not so Agamemnon,
who spoke fiercely to him and sent him roughly away. So he went back in
anger, and Apollo, who loved him dearly, heard his prayer. Then the god
sent a deadly dart upon the Argives, and the people died thick on one
another, for the arrows went everywhither among the wide host of the
Achaeans. At last a seer in the fulness of his knowledge declared to us
the oracles of Apollo, and I was myself first to say that we should
appease him. Whereon the son of Atreus rose in anger, and threatened
that which he has since done. The Achaeans are now taking the girl in a
ship to Chryse, and sending gifts of sacrifice to the god; but the
heralds have just taken from my tent the daughter of Briseus, whom the
Achaeans had awarded to myself.

"Help your brave son, therefore, if you are able. Go to Olympus, and if
you have ever done him service in word or deed, implore the aid of
Jove. Ofttimes in my father's house have I heard you glory in that you
alone of the immortals saved the son of Saturn from ruin, when the
others, with Juno, Neptune, and Pallas Minerva would have put him in
bonds. It was you, goddess, who delivered him by calling to Olympus the
hundred-handed monster whom gods call Briareus, but men Aegaeon, for he
is stronger even than his father; when therefore he took his seat
all-glorious beside the son of Saturn, the other gods were afraid, and
did not bind him. Go, then, to him, remind him of all this, clasp his
knees, and bid him give succour to the Trojans. Let the Achaeans be
hemmed in at the sterns of their ships, and perish on the sea-shore,
that they may reap what joy they may of their king, and that Agamemnon
may rue his blindness in offering insult to the foremost of the
Achaeans."

Thetis wept and answered, "My son, woe is me that I should have borne
or suckled you. Would indeed that you had lived your span free from all
sorrow at your ships, for it is all too brief; alas, that you should be
at once short of life and long of sorrow above your peers: woe,
therefore, was the hour in which I bore you; nevertheless I will go to
the snowy heights of Olympus, and tell this tale to Jove, if he will
hear our prayer: meanwhile stay where you are with your ships, nurse
your anger against the Achaeans, and hold aloof from fight. For Jove
went yesterday to Oceanus, to a feast among the Ethiopians, and the
other gods went with him. He will return to