POETRY.

REPLY OF ACHILLES TO THE ENVOYS FROM'

AGAM FAIN ON.

THERETO responded the swiftly-careering Achilles :—

" Son of Laertes, Odysseus you lord of devices !

Need is I tell you forthright and off-handed my purpose, All that I think of and what will be done too for certain, So as to spare you the sitting there one and the other Trying to murmur me down by mere dint of complaining.

Hateful as Hell, to my mind, is the traitor with one thing Hid in his thoughts while his lips give vent to another ; I, when I speak, say what will be done, and for certain.

Hardly, I think, Agamemnon Atrides will move me, He or his other Achaians ; for thankless the task is, Still with a torrent of foes to be fighting for ever Laggard in tents you may be or lover of battle, One and the same is your fate ; for hero and coward Get a like measure of honour in life, and their death-day Levels the noblest doer with him who does nothing.

What have I gained by enduring peril and hardship,

Flinging my life away not to be out of a battle ?

No, as the bird brings food to her featherless young ones, All that she finds, though starving herself, so have I too Many a night watched weary and sleepless, and fought through.

Many a bloodiest day in the press of the warriors Slashing and slaying because of these wives of your chieftains Twelve are the populous cities I sacked with my galleys,

Took on foot in the deep-farrowed Troiad eleven— Treasures I bore off from all of them rich and abundant—

All which—I say—I took as I got them—and gave to This Agamemnon Atrides I he, too, abiding

Safe by his sea-flying ships meanwhile would receive them,—

Doled out a few, kept many, and gave other prizes Always to Kings and the highest in rank of the Princes.

Firmly they hold to them ; me, me alone of Achaians, Me he has robbed of a dear companion, and keeps her.

Let him keep her, embrace her, delight himself with her !

Where is the sense, then, of Argives warring on Trojans ?

Why did Atrides lead this multitude hither?

Why, but for Helen's sake ?—her and her beautiful tresses f Are the Atrides alone, then, of all men breathing Fond of their wives, when everyone, good, in his senses, Cares for and treasures his own, as did I from my soul too Love her,—captive and spoil of my spear though she might be ?

Since he has torn this prize from me—cheated me—let him Try it no more ; for I know him, he cannot cajole me

You and the rest of his Kings, he should talk with, Odysseus,--

Talk how to shelter his ships from the enemy's torches.

Has he not done great things without my assistance?

Built up a rampart and driven a ditch all along it, Grand—such a broad one—and fixed stake-fences before them, Strong, but not altogether enough so to baffle Hector and stop the assaults of the slayer-of-heroes!

True, at the time I was fighting among the Achaians Hector was not over-anxious to stir up a contest Far from the walls—to the Semen Gate and the beech-tree Came at the farthest—paused there as if to await me.

Once, and was put to it hard to escape from my onset.

Now I've no wish to be warring with glorious Hector :

Therefore—all rites due to Zeus and the deities rendered,

All my galleys run down and well-laden to morrow- You—if you please to, and care for such sights—you shall see them Cleaving the fish-fraught Hellespont bravely at daybreak, Galleys, and crews elate with the ardour of rowing !

Then, if the sounding Coast•shaker but prosper my voyage, Three days hence I shall land in the rich-furrowed Phthia ; There I have wealth of all kinds I left to come hither, Evil the day I but will take back gold and red copper,

Fair women daintily girdled and silverlike iron—

Mine, and awarded by lot ; for the prize that was given, Himself—King Agamemnon Atrides—who gave her

Robbed me again of insultingly Tell him, I charge you,

Publicly all that I say; that the other Achaians May be doubly enraged should he hope to deceive them, Clothed in his impudence cheat any Greek of them henceforth! Neither, in spite of his dog-like effrontery, let him Dare look me in the face evermore, for I will not Join him in anything—action or counsel—in future!

Once he has wronged me, deceived me ; let him not think to Cozen me now with his phrases ; enough of him ; he may Go his own way to perdition ! Zeus in his wisdom Seems to have shattered his senses. But hateful all gifts are Coming from him, and himself not a rush do I value!

No! if he offered me ten, aye, twenty times over All that he has or will ever have; treasures on treasures, All to Oichomenos taken or Thebes where in Egypt Palaces groan with wealth and the gates are a hundred, And through each of them warriors double a hundred Hurry with horses and chariots ; no ! if his gifts were Thick as the dust or the sands are, be never should move me Till this unbearable grievance be fully atoned for !

Not that I'd marry a daughter of his—Agamemnon's!

Match though she might Aphrodite the golden in beauty, Vie in skill with the diamond-eyed Athenaia, would not wed with her ; better he find some Achaian More to his fancy, with more of the monarch about him Marry !—if they, if the Gods let me reach home in safety, Peleus himself would give me a maiden in marriage ; Plenty of women there are in Hellas and Phthia, Noble,—the daughters of Chiefs and Rulers of Cities ; One will I choose of them, make her my loving companion !

Many a time has a vehement longing assailed me Thus with a virgin betrothed, true partner and consort Worthy and fitting, to go and enjoy the possessions

Peleus the aged is owner of. Not worth my life is,—

Not all the wealth they say Ilion when happy to dwell in Held in the old peace-time ere they came, the Achaiaus ; Not all the riches for arrowy Phcebus Apollo Heaped on his marble porch-way in Pytho the rocky !

Oxen and sheep may be taken as booty, and tripods Captured in war and the chestnut beauty of horses ; But man's life ! 'tis no thing to be won back as booty, No! nor recaptured when once through the lips it has vanished !

Thetis the silvery-footed, the goddess my mother, Says that the Fates have in store for me two ways of dying ; If I about Troy will linger here fighting,—for ever Lost is my home, but my glory will then be eternal ; Or if I leave this and go to the land of my fathers, Lost is my darling glory, but then will my life be Lasting, and death's dark extinction not swiftly o'ertake me.

And indeed, I would counsel the others to sail off Homeward again ; for the downfall of towering Ilion Will not be yours to behold, since Zeus the wide-viewing Stretches his hand out mightily now to protect her,

And her people recover their daring. But go ye— For to do this is the meed of the wise and the aged—

Bear back the message I send the Achaiau commanders ; 'Tis that they rack their invention to work some design out, Other and better, to rescue from danger their galleys, And in their smooth-chiselled galleys preserve the Achaians,

Since 'tis not feasible, that which they now are proposing—

Too indignant am I and disgusted. Let Phcenix Stay here, however, and sleep with us ; so that to-morrow To our dear native land he may follow our vessels, Should it so please him ; I wish to use no compulsion."

ALFRED DOSIETT.