, and carried off
as slaves to the towns of the men who had killed their fathers and
husbands. Now at that time one lady was far the fairest in the world:
namely, Helen, daughter of King Tyndarus. Every young prince heard of
her and desired to marry her; so her father invited them all to his
palace, and entertained them, and found out what they would give. Among
the rest Ulysses went, but his father had a little kingdom, a rough
island, with others near it, and Ulysses had not a good chance. He was
not tall; though very strong and active, he was a short man with broad
shoulders, but his face was handsome, and, like all the princes, he wore
long yellow hair, clustering like a hyacinth flower. His manner was
rather hesitating, and he seemed to speak very slowly at first, though
afterwards his words came freely. He was good at everything a man can
do; he could plough, and build houses, and make ships, and he was the
best archer in Greece, except one, and could bend the great bow of a dead
king, Eurytus, which no other man could string. But he had no horses,
and had no great train of followers; and, in short, neither Helen nor her
father thought of choosing Ulysses for her husband out of so many tall,
handsome young princes, glittering with gold ornaments. Still, Helen was
very kind to Ulysses, and there was great friendship between them, which
was fortunate for her in the end.

Tyndarus first made all the princes take an oath that they would stand by
the prince whom he chose, and would fight for him in all his quarrels.
Then he named for her husband Menelaus, King of Lacedaemon. He was a
very brave man, but not one of the strongest; he was not such a fighter
as the gigantic Aias, the tallest and strongest of men; or as Diomede,
the friend of Ulysses; or as his own brother, Agamemnon, the King of the
rich city of Mycenae, who was chief over all other princes, and general
of the whole army in war. The great lions carved in stone that seemed to
guard his city are still standing above the gate through which Agamemnon
used to drive his chariot.

The man who proved to be the best fighter of all, Achilles, was not among
the lovers of Helen, for he was still a boy, and his mother, Thetis of
the silver feet, a goddess of the sea, had sent him to be brought up as a
girl, among the daughters of Lycomedes of Scyros, in an island far away.
Thetis did this because Achilles was her only child, and there was a
prophecy that, if