s strongly with
the silence of the Greeks. Plutarch remarks upon this distinction
as a credit to the military discipline of the latter, and Homer
would seem to have attached some importance to it, as he again
alludes to the same thing. Book iv. 510.

3. [Paris, frequently named Alexander in the original.--TR.]

4. Not from cowardice, but from a sense of guilt towards Menelaus. At
the head of an army he challenges the boldest of the enemy; and
Hector, at the end of the Sixth Book, confesses that no man could
reproach him as a coward. Homer has a fine moral;--A brave mind,
however blinded with passion, is sensible of remorse whenever he
meets the person whom he has injured; and Paris is never made to
appear cowardly, but when overcome by the consciousness of his
injustice.

5. [{Lainon esso chitona}.]

6. In allusion to the Oriental custom of stoning to death for the
crime of adultery.--FELTON.

7. The sling was a very efficacious and important instrument in
ancient warfare. Stones were also thrown with the hand. The Libyans
carried no other arms than the spear and a bag of stones.

8. The Trojans were required to sacrifice two lambs; one male of a
white color to the Sun, as the father of light, and one female and
black to the Earth, the mother and nurse of men. That these were
the powers to which they sacrificed appears from their being
attested by name in the oath. III. 330.

9. Helen's weaving the events of the Trojan war in a veil is an
agreeable fiction; and one might suppose that it was inherited by
Homer, and explained in his Iliad.--DACIER.

10. [Not the grasshopper, but an insect well known in hot countries,
and which in Italy is called Cicala. The grasshopper rests on the
ground, but the favorite abode of the Cicala is in the trees and
hedges.--TR.]

11. This episode is remarkable for its beauty. The effect of Helen's
appearance upon the aged counsellors is striking and poetical. It
must be borne in mind, that Helen was of divine parentage and
unfading beauty, and this will explain the enthusiasm which her
sight called forth from the old men. The poet's skill in taking
this method of describing the Grecian chieftains is obvious, and
the sketches themselves are living and characteristic to a high
degree. The reminiscences of the aged Priam, as their names are
announced, and the penitential sorrow of the erring