Page 258 - the-iliad

away groaning heavily to the ships. But Idomeneus ceased
not his fury. He kept on striving continually either to en-
shroud some Trojan in the darkness of death, or himself to
fall while warding off the evil day from the Achaeans. Then
fell Alcathous son of noble Aesyetes; he was son-in-law to
Anchises, having married his eldest daughter Hippodameia,
who was the darling of her father and mother, and excelled
all her generation in beauty, accomplishments, and under-
standing, wherefore the bravest man in all Troy had taken
her to wife—him did Neptune lay low by the hand of Idome-
neus, blinding his bright eyes and binding his strong limbs
in fetters so that he could neither go back nor to one side,
but stood stock still like pillar or lofty tree when Idome-
neus struck him with a spear in the middle of his chest. The
coat of mail that had hitherto protected his body was now
broken, and rang harshly as the spear tore through it. He
fell heavily to the ground, and the spear stuck in his heart,
which still beat, and made the butt-end of the spear quiver
till dread Mars put an end to his life. Idomeneus vaunted
over him and cried with a loud voice saying, ‘Deiphobus,
since you are in a mood to vaunt, shall we cry quits now
that we have killed three men to your one? Nay, sir, stand
in fight with me yourself, that you may learn what manner
of Jove-begotten man am I that have come hither. Jove first
begot Minos, chief ruler in Crete, and Minos in his turn be-
got a son, noble Deucalion. Deucalion begot me to be a ruler
over many men in Crete, and my ships have now brought
me hither, to be the bane of yourself, your father, and the
Trojans.’