Wroth for Briseis' sake, that fair-haired maid
Whom from Lyrnessus in hard fight he won,
When fell Lyrnessus and the walls of Thebes ;
Epistrophus and Mynes, spearmen bold,
Smiting, Evenus' sons, of Sclepius' blood :—
For her sake lay he still-but not for long.

From Phylace and flowery Pyrasus, Demeter's own; from sheep-clad Iton some, And sea-washed Antron, and

came.

Protesilaus was their warrior chief

735

green Pteleus,

Once: but the dark soil was his lodging now.
In Phylacè his widow tore her cheeks,
Unfinished stood his home: for, first of Greeks

740

Leaping to land, a Dardan struck him down. 745 They mourned their chief, yet were not chiefless still:

Podarces led them, bred to warfare, son

Of rich Iphiclus, son of Phylacus";

Of proud Protesilaus brother born:

But younger, and less brave, than that great

chief

750

Protesilaus. Leader lacked they not;

Yet thought, regretful, on the brave man dead. Forty dark ships these manned.

And those who tilled

Pheras by Lake Bobeis, Glaphyræ,
Or Bobè or Iolcos, well-walled town:
Admetus' son led their eleven ships,

Eumelus, whom Alcestis, lady fair,

Of Pelias' daughters loveliest, bare to him.

755

Those whom Methonè, whom Thaumachia reared,

Or Meliboa, or Olizon's crags;

760

Them Philoctetes led, an archer trained,

Seven ships: in each sat fifty rowers, trained Archers, in fight right valiant. But he lay, Racked by strong pangs, in Lemnos' sacred isle, Abandoned of the children of the Greeks 765 To rue the fell bite of the deadly snake.

There he lay sorrowing. But the Greeks were soon. To think of Philoctetes once again.

Chiefless they were not, though they mourned their chief.

Medon arrayed them, Rhenè's bastard child, 770

By city-sacking Oileus.

Them who held

Echalia, where Echalian Eurytus

Was king, or Triccè, or Ithomè's rocks:
These Podaleirius and Machaon led,

Asclepius' two sons, of healing arts

775

Each master. Thirty chiselled ships ranged they.

Them from Ormenius, Hypereia's rill,

Asterius, and Titanus' white-faced cliffs;
Euæmon's glorious son, Eurypylus,

Led forth. And forty dark ships followed him. 780

Argissa's, Orthè's and Gyrtona's hosts,

White Olöessa's, and Elonè's; led

The sturdy Polypotes, son of him

Whom deathless Zeus begat, Peirithoüs.

Him to Peirithoüs famed Hippodamè

785

Bore, when those shaggy Beasts his vengeance felt,

From Pelion unto far-off Pindus driven.

Leonteus, bred to warfare, shared his toil,

Haughty Coronus' son, of Cæneus' blood.
And forty dark ships followed after these.

790

Gouneus from Cyphos twenty ships and two Led. Enienians thronged them, and the men Whose homes were round Dodona's storm-beat

crags,

Sturdy Peræbians, or who tilled the meads

Of Titaresius, that pleasant stream

That flows in beauty down to Penëus;

Yet with that silver-eddied river ne'er

795

Mingleth, but oil-like, on the surface swims:
For Peneus is an arm of that oath-witness, Styx.

Prothoüs, Tenthredon's son, led Magnè's hosts, 800 By Peneus reared, and Pelion's quivering woods. Forty dark ships of theirs swift Prothoüs led.

These were the chiefs and captains of the host. Now, tell me, Muse, who far surpassed their mates, Horsemen or steeds, in all that chivalry.

Of steeds the noblest far Eumelus drave,

Driv'n once by Pheres; swift in flight as birds,

805

In age, hue, depth of shoulder, fairly matched.

Those mares the Monarch of the Silver Bow
Bred in Pereia, couriers of dread war.

810

Of men far first was Aias, Telamon's son, While Peleus' son was wroth. For all unmatched Was great Achilles, all unmatched his steeds.

But in his beaked sea-vessels wroth he lay

At Agamemnon, shepherd of the host.

815

His army by the breakers on the beach

With spear and quoit and bow made holiday:
While, ranged beside their several cars, their steeds
On lotus browsed and parsley of the lake.
Tented, in canvass, stood the chieftains' cars. 820
Reft of their warrior prince, they roamed at will
Among the host, and went not forth to war.

On came they: so might fire o'errun the lands. Groaned earth beneath: as when Zeus smites in

wrath,