e is boasting that I
shall not see the light of the sun much longer."

Thus he prayed, and Pallas Minerva heard him; she made his limbs supple
and quickened his hands and his feet. Then she went up close to him and
said, "Fear not, Diomed, to do battle with the Trojans, for I have set
in your heart the spirit of your knightly father Tydeus. Moreover, I
have withdrawn the veil from your eyes, that you know gods and men
apart. If, then, any other god comes here and offers you battle, do not
fight him; but should Jove's daughter Venus come, strike her with your
spear and wound her."

When she had said this Minerva went away, and the son of Tydeus again
took his place among the foremost fighters, three times more fierce
even than he had been before. He was like a lion that some mountain
shepherd has wounded, but not killed, as he is springing over the wall
of a sheep-yard to attack the sheep. The shepherd has roused the brute
to fury but cannot defend his flock, so he takes shelter under cover of
the buildings, while the sheep, panic-stricken on being deserted, are
smothered in heaps one on top of the other, and the angry lion leaps
out over the sheep-yard wall. Even thus did Diomed go furiously about
among the Trojans.

He killed Astynous, and Hypeiron shepherd of his people, the one with a
thrust of his spear, which struck him above the nipple, the other with
a sword-cut on the collar-bone, that severed his shoulder from his neck
and back. He let both of them lie, and went in pursuit of Abas and
Polyidus, sons of the old reader of dreams Eurydamas: they never came
back for him to read them any more dreams, for mighty Diomed made an
end of them. He then gave chase to Xanthus and Thoon, the two sons of
Phaenops, both of them very dear to him, for he was now worn out with
age, and begat no more sons to inherit his possessions. But Diomed took
both their lives and left their father sorrowing bitterly, for he
nevermore saw them come home from battle alive, and his kinsmen divided
his wealth among themselves.

Then he came upon two sons of Priam, Echemmon and Chromius, as they
were both in one chariot. He sprang upon them as a lion fastens on the
neck of some cow or heifer when the herd is feeding in a coppice. For
all their vain struggles he flung them both from their chariot and
stripped the armour from their bodies. Then he gave their horses to his
comrades to take them back to the ships.

When Aeneas saw him thus maki