Page:The Story of the Iliad.djvu/140

114 the gods of Olympus may not overbear me; and ye two tremble, or ever ye have looked on war."

He spake, and the two goddesses murmured where they sat side by side. Athené kept silence for all her wrath; but Hera spake, "Well do we know, son of Chronos, that thy might is beyond all bounds; nevertheless we pity the Greeks, lest they fill up the measure of their fate and die."

Then Zeus spake again, "To-morrow, Queen Hera, shalt thou see worse things than these; for great Hector will not cease from his slaying till the son of Peleus be roused by his ships, in the day when they shall fight about the dead Patroclus in the dark press of men."

And now the sun sank into the sea; wroth were the Trojans that the light should go, but to the Greeks welcome, much prayed for, came the night.

Then Hector called the men of Troy to an assembly. In his hand he held a spear eleven cubits long, with flaming point of bronze, and circled with gold; on it he leant and spake:―

"Give ear, ye Trojans, Dardans, and allies! I thought this day to destroy the hosts of the