the brain, crashing in among
the white bones and smashing them up. His teeth were all of them
knocked out and the blood came gushing in a stream from both his eyes;
it also came gurgling up from his mouth and nostrils, and the darkness
of death enfolded him round about.

Thus did these chieftains of the Danaans each of them kill his man. As
ravening wolves seize on kids or lambs, fastening on them when they are
alone on the hillsides and have strayed from the main flock through the
carelessness of the shepherd--and when the wolves see this they pounce
upon them at once because they cannot defend themselves--even so did
the Danaans now fall on the Trojans, who fled with ill-omened cries in
their panic and had no more fight left in them.

Meanwhile great Ajax kept on trying to drive a spear into Hector, but
Hector was so skilful that he held his broad shoulders well under cover
of his ox-hide shield, ever on the look-out for the whizzing of the
arrows and the heavy thud of the spears. He well knew that the fortunes
of the day had changed, but still stood his ground and tried to protect
his comrades.

As when a cloud goes up into heaven from Olympus, rising out of a clear
sky when Jove is brewing a gale--even with such panic stricken rout did
the Trojans now fly, and there was no order in their going. Hector's
fleet horses bore him and his armour out of the fight, and he left the
Trojan host penned in by the deep trench against their will. Many a
yoke of horses snapped the pole of their chariots in the trench and
left their master's car behind them. Patroclus gave chase, calling
impetuously on the Danaans and full of fury against the Trojans, who,
being now no longer in a body, filled all the ways with their cries of
panic and rout; the air was darkened with the clouds of dust they
raised, and the horses strained every nerve in their flight from the
tents and ships towards the city.

Patroclus kept on heading his horses wherever he saw most men flying in
confusion, cheering on his men the while. Chariots were being smashed
in all directions, and many a man came tumbling down from his own car
to fall beneath the wheels of that of Patroclus, whose immortal steeds,
given by the gods to Peleus, sprang over the trench at a bound as they
sped onward. He was intent on trying to get near Hector, for he had set
his heart on spearing him, but Hector's horses were now hurrying him
away. As the whole dark earth bows before some t