Page 272 - the-iliad

BOOK XIV

ESTOR was sitting over his wine, but the cry of battle
Ndid not escape him, and he said to the son of Aescu-
lapius, ‘What, noble Machaon, is the meaning of all this?
The shouts of men fighting by our ships grow stronger and
stronger; stay here, therefore, and sit over your wine, while
fair Hecamede heats you a bath and washes the clotted
blood from off you. I will go at once to the look-out station
and see what it is all about.’
As he spoke he took up the shield of his son Thrasymedes
that was lying in his tent, all gleaming with bronze, for
Thrasymedes had taken his father’s shield; he grasped his
redoubtable bronze-shod spear, and as soon as he was out-
side saw the disastrous rout of the Achaeans who, now that
their wall was overthrown, were flying pell-mell before the
Trojans. As when there is a heavy swell upon the sea, but the
waves are dumb—they keep their eyes on the watch for the
quarter whence the fierce winds may spring upon them, but
they stay where they are and set neither this way nor that,
till some particular wind sweeps down from heaven to de-
termine them—even so did the old man ponder whether to
make for the crowd of Danaans, or go in search of Agamem-
non. In the end he deemed it best to go to the son of Atreus;
but meanwhile the hosts were fighting and killing one an-
other, and the hard bronze rattled on their bodies, as they

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