Book XIV

BOOK XIV

NESTOR was sitting over his wine, but the cry of battle did not

escape him, and he said to the son of Aesculapius, "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 outside 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

determine them--even so did the old man ponder whether to make

for the crowd of Danaans, or go in search of Agamemnon. In the

end he deemed it best to go to the son of Atreus; but meanwhile

the hosts were fighting and killing one another, and the hard

bronze rattled on their bodies, as they thrust at one another

with their swords and spears.

The wounded kings, the son of Tydeus, Ulysses, and Agamemnon son

of Atreus, fell in Nestor as they were coming up from their

ships--for theirs were drawn up some way from where the fighting

was going on, being on the shore itself inasmuch as they had been

beached first, while the wall had been built behind the

hindermost. The stretch of the shore, wide though it was, did not

afford room for all the ships, and the host was cramped for

space, therefore they had placed the ships in rows one behind the

other, and had filled the whole opening of the bay between the

two points that formed it. The kings, leaning on their spears,

were coming out to survey the fight, being in great anxiety, and

when old Nestor met them they were filled with dismay. Then King

Agamemnon said to him, "Nestor son of Neleus, honour to the

Achaean name, why have you left the battle to come hither? I fear

that what dread Hector said will come true, when he vaunted among

the Trojans saying that he would not return to Ilius till he had

fired our ships and killed us; this is what he said, and now it

is all coming true. Alas! others of the