Authors of Greece | Page 5

her robe. Knowing that she was but a weak goddess Diomedes attacked her, wounding her in the hand. Dropping her son, she fled to Ares who was watching the battle and besought him to lend her his chariot, wherein she fled back to Olympus. There her mother Dione comforted her with the story of the woes which other gods had suffered from mortals.
"But this man hath been set upon thee by Athena. Foolish one, he knoweth not in his heart that no man liveth long who fighteth with the gods; no children lisp 'father' at his knees when he returneth from war and dread conflict. Therefore, albeit he is so mighty, let him take heed lest a better than thou meet him, for one day his prudent wife shall wail in her sleep awaking all her house, bereft of her lord, the best man of the Achaeans."
But Athena in irony deemed that Aphrodite had been scratched by some Greek woman whom she caressed to tempt her to forsake her husband and follow one of the Trojans she loved.
Aeneas when dropped by his mother had been picked up by Apollo; when Diomedes attacked the god, he was warned that battle with an immortal was not like man's warfare. Stirred by Apollo, Ares himself came to the aid of the Trojans, inspiring Sarpedon the Lycian to hearten his comrades, who were shortly gladdened by the return of Aeneas whom Apollo had healed. At the sight of Ares and Apollo fighting for Troy Hera and Athena came down to battle for the Greeks; they found Diomedes on the skirts of the host, cooling the wound Pandarus had inflicted. Entering his chariot by his side, Athena fired him to meet Ares and drive him wounded back to Olympus, where he found but little compassion from Zeus. The two goddesses then left the mortals to fight it out.
At this moment Helenus, the prophetic brother of Hector, bade him go to Troy to try to appease the anger of Athena by an offering, in the hope that Diomedes' progress might be stayed. In his absence Diomedes met in the battle Glaucus, a Lycian prince.
"Who art thou?" he asked. "I have never seen thee before in battle, yet now thou hast gone far beyond all others in hardihood, for thou hast awaited my onset, and they are hapless whose sons meet my strength. If thou art a god, I will not fight with thee; but if thou art one of those who eat the fruit of the earth, come near, that thou mayest the quicker get thee to the gates of death."
In answer, Glaucus said:
"Why askest thou my lineage? As is the life of leaves, so is that of men. The leaves are scattered some of them to the earth by the wind, others the wood putteth forth when it is in bloom, and they come on in the season of spring. Even so of men one generation groweth, another ceaseth."
He then told how he was a family friend of Diomedes and made with him a compact that if they met in battle they should avoid each the other; this they sealed by the exchange of armour, wherein the Greek had the better, getting gold weapons for bronze, the worth of a hundred oxen for the value of nine.
Coming to Troy Hector bade his mother offer Athena the finest robe she had; yet all in vain, for the goddess rejected it. Passing to the house of Paris, he found him polishing his armour, Helen at his side. Again rebuking him, he had from him a promise that he would be ready to re-enter the fight when Hector had been to his own house to see his wife Andromache. Hector's heart foreboded that it was the last time he would speak with her. She had with her their little son Astyanax. Weeping she besought him to spare himself for her sake.
"For me there will be no other comfort if thou meetest thy doom, but sorrow. Father and mother have I none, for Achilles hath slain them and my seven brothers. Hector, thou art my father and my lady mother and my brother and thou art my wedded husband. Nay, come, pity me and abide on the wall, lest thou make thy son an orphan and thy wife a widow."
He answered, his heart heavy with a sense of coming death:
"The day will come when Troy shall fall, yet I grieve not for father or mother or brethren so much as for thee, when some Achaean leads thee captive, robbing thee of thy day of freedom. Thou shalt weave at the loom in Argos or perchance fetch water, for heavy necessity shall be laid upon thee. Then shall many a one say when he sees thee shedding tears: 'Lo, this