Page 218 - the-iliad
P. 218

him, with burning brands that scare him for all his fury,
       and when morning comes he slinks foiled and angry away—
       even  so  did  Ajax,  sorely  against  his  will,  retreat  angrily
       before the Trojans, fearing for the ships of the Achaeans. Or
       as some lazy ass that has had many a cudgel broken about
       his back, when he into a field begins eating the corn—boys
       beat him but he is too many for them, and though they lay
       about with their sticks they cannot hurt him; still when he
       has had his fill they at last drive him from the field—even
       so did the Trojans and their allies pursue great Ajax, ever
       smiting the middle of his shield with their darts. Now and
       again he would turn and show fight, keeping back the bat-
       talions of the Trojans, and then he would again retreat; but
       he prevented any of them from making his way to the ships.
       Single-handed he stood midway between the Trojans and
       Achaeans: the spears that sped from their hands stuck some
       of them in his mighty shield, while many, though thirsting
       for his blood, fell to the ground ere they could reach him to
       the wounding of his fair flesh.
          Now when Eurypylus the brave son of Euaemon saw that
       Ajax was being overpowered by the rain of arrows, he went
       up to him and hurled his spear. He struck Apisaon son of
       Phausius in the liver below the midriff, and laid him low.
       Eurypylus sprang upon him, and stripped the armour from
       his shoulders; but when Alexandrus saw him, he aimed an
       arrow at him which struck him in the right thigh; the arrow
       broke, but the point that was left in the wound dragged on
       the thigh; he drew back, therefore, under cover of his com-
       rades to save his life, shouting as he did so to the Danaans,

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