When they had thus armed, each amid his own people, they strode fierce
of aspect into the open space, and both Trojans and Achaeans were
struck with awe as they beheld them. They stood near one another on the
measured ground, brandishing their spears, and each furious against the
other. Alexandrus aimed first, and struck the round shield of the son
of Atreus, but the spear did not pierce it, for the shield turned its
point. Menelaus next took aim, praying to Father Jove as he did so.
"King Jove," he said, "grant me revenge on Alexandrus who has wronged
me; subdue him under my hand that in ages yet to come a man may shrink
from doing ill deeds in the house of his host."

He poised his spear as he spoke, and hurled it at the shield of
Alexandrus. Through shield and cuirass it went, and tore the shirt by
his flank, but Alexandrus swerved aside, and thus saved his life. Then
the son of Atreus drew his sword, and drove at the projecting part of
his helmet, but the sword fell shivered in three or four pieces from
his hand, and he cried, looking towards Heaven, "Father Jove, of all
gods thou art the most despiteful; I made sure of my revenge, but the
sword has broken in my hand, my spear has been hurled in vain, and I
have not killed him."

With this he flew at Alexandrus, caught him by the horsehair plume of
his helmet, and began dragging him towards the Achaeans. The strap of
the helmet that went under his chin was choking him, and Menelaus would
have dragged him off to his own great glory had not Jove's daughter
Venus been quick to mark and to break the strap of oxhide, so that the
empty helmet came away in his hand. This he flung to his comrades among
the Achaeans, and was again springing upon Alexandrus to run him
through with a spear, but Venus snatched him up in a moment (as a god
can do), hid him under a cloud of darkness, and conveyed him to his own
bedchamber.

Then she went to call Helen, and found her on a high tower with the
Trojan women crowding round her. She took the form of an old woman who
used to dress wool for her when she was still in Lacedaemon, and of
whom she was very fond. Thus disguised she plucked her by perfumed robe
and said, "Come hither; Alexandrus says you are to go to the house; he
is on his bed in his own room, radiant with beauty and dressed in
gorgeous apparel. No one would think he had just come from fighting,
but rather that he was going to a dance, or had done dancing and was
sitting