Page 398 - the-iliad

ed in full armour, resplendent as the sun-god Hyperion.
Then with a loud voice he chided with his father’s horses
saying, ‘Xanthus and Balius, famed offspring of Podarge—
this time when we have done fighting be sure and bring
your driver safely back to the host of the Achaeans, and do
not leave him dead on the plain as you did Patroclus.’
Then fleet Xanthus answered under the yoke—for white-
armed Juno had endowed him with human speech—and
he bowed his head till his mane touched the ground as it
hung down from under the yoke-band. ‘Dread Achilles,’
said he, ‘we will indeed save you now, but the day of your
death is near, and the blame will not be ours, for it will be
heaven and stern fate that will destroy you. Neither was it
through any sloth or slackness on our part that the Tro-
jans stripped Patroclus of his armour; it was the mighty god
whom lovely Leto bore that slew him as he fought among
the foremost, and vouchsafed a triumph to Hector. We two
can fly as swiftly as Zephyrus who they say is fleetest of all
winds; nevertheless it is your doom to fall by the hand of a
man and of a god.’
When he had thus said the Erinyes stayed his speech,
and Achilles answered him in great sadness, saying, ‘Why,
O Xanthus, do you thus foretell my death? You need not do
so, for I well know that I am to fall here, far from my dear
father and mother; none the more, however, shall I stay my
hand till I have given the Trojans their fill of fighting.’
So saying, with a loud cry he drove his horses to the
front.