the fields, fresh risen into the
vault of heaven from the slow still currents of deep Oceanus, when the
two armies met. They could hardly recognise their dead, but they washed
the clotted gore from off them, shed tears over them, and lifted them
upon their waggons. Priam had forbidden the Trojans to wail aloud, so
they heaped their dead sadly and silently upon the pyre, and having
burned them went back to the city of Ilius. The Achaeans in like manner
heaped their dead sadly and silently on the pyre, and having burned
them went back to their ships.

Now in the twilight when it was not yet dawn, chosen bands of the
Achaeans were gathered round the pyre and built one barrow that was
raised in common for all, and hard by this they built a high wall to
shelter themselves and their ships; they gave it strong gates that
there might be a way through them for their chariots, and close outside
it they dug a trench deep and wide, and they planted it within with
stakes.

Thus did the Achaeans toil, and the gods, seated by the side of Jove
the lord of lightning, marvelled at their great work; but Neptune, lord
of the earthquake, spoke, saying, "Father Jove, what mortal in the
whole world will again take the gods into his counsel? See you not how
the Achaeans have built a wall about their ships and driven a trench
all round it, without offering hecatombs to the gods? The fame of this
wall will reach as far as dawn itself, and men will no longer think
anything of the one which Phoebus Apollo and myself built with so much
labour for Laomedon."

Jove was displeased and answered, "What, O shaker of the earth, are you
talking about? A god less powerful than yourself might be alarmed at
what they are doing, but your fame reaches as far as dawn itself.
Surely when the Achaeans have gone home with their ships, you can
shatter their wall and fling it into the sea; you can cover the beach
with sand again, and the great wall of the Achaeans will then be
utterly effaced."

Thus did they converse, and by sunset the work of the Achaeans was
completed; they then slaughtered oxen at their tents and got their
supper. Many ships had come with wine from Lemnos, sent by Euneus the
son of Jason, born to him by Hypsipyle. The son of Jason freighted them
with ten thousand measures of wine, which he sent specially to the sons
of Atreus, Agamemnon and Menelaus. From this supply the Achaeans bought
their wine, some with bronze, some with iron, some with