Page:History of Greece Vol II.djvu/86

 70 HISTORY OF GREECE. to believe that the siege had become desperate, and that there was no choice except to go on shipboard and flee. Announcing to Nestor and Odysseus, in preliminary council, his intention to hold this strange language, he at the same time tells them that he relies upon them to oppose it and counterwork its effect upon the multitude. 1 The agora is presently assembled, and the king of men pours forth a speech full of dismay and despair, concluding by a distinct exhortation to all present to go aboard and return home at once. Immediately the whole army, chiefs as well as people, break up and proceed to execute his orders : every one rushes off to get his ship afloat, except Odysseus, who looks on in mournful silence and astonishment. The army would have been quickly on its voyage home, had not the goddesses Here and Athene stimulated Odysseus to an instantaneous interference. He hastens among the dispersing crowd and diverts them from their purpose of retreat : to the chiefs he addresses flattering words, trying to shame them by gentle expostulation : but the people he visits with harsh reprimand and blows from his scep- tre, 2 thus driving them back to their seats in the agora. Amidst the dissatisfied crowd thus unwillingly brought back, the voice of Thersites is heard the longest and the loudest, a man ugly, deformed, and unwarlike, but fluent in speech, and especially severe and unsparing in his censure of the chiefs, Agamemnon, Achilles, and Odysseus. Upon this occasion, he addresses to the people a speech denouncing Agamemnon for selfish and greedy exaction generally, but particularly for his recent ill-treatment of Achilles, and he endeavors, moreover, to induce them to persist in their scheme of departure. In reply, Odysseus not only rebukes Thersites sharply for his impudence in abusing the commander-in-chief, but threatens that, if ever such behavior is repeated, he will strip him naked, and thrash him out of the assembly with disgraceful blows ; as an earnest of which, he administers to him at once a smart stroke with tli 1 Iliad, ii. 74. IlptJra <5' tyiJv eireaiv neiprjaofiai, etc. Iliad, ii. 188-196. 'Ovnva [lev Paoihrja not e^o^ov uvdpa Kixeiy, T6v6' ayavols Eweeaaiv tprjTvaaaKt Ttapaaru; Ov 6' av 6fijj.ov T' uvdpa 1601, poouvru T' ttyevpoi, T<>v OKriKTfxf Ihaaaaitev, Spot&famU re ftbdy, etc.