ury; raise your wave
on high, and let snags and stones come thundering down you that we may
make an end of this savage creature who is now lording it as though he
were a god. Nothing shall serve him longer, not strength nor
comeliness, nor his fine armour, which forsooth shall soon be lying low
in the deep waters covered over with mud. I will wrap him in sand, and
pour tons of shingle round him, so that the Achaeans shall not know how
to gather his bones for the silt in which I shall have hidden him, and
when they celebrate his funeral they need build no barrow."

On this he upraised his tumultuous flood high against Achilles,
seething as it was with foam and blood and the bodies of the dead. The
dark waters of the river stood upright and would have overwhelmed the
son of Peleus, but Juno, trembling lest Achilles should be swept away
in the mighty torrent, lifted her voice on high and called out to
Vulcan her son. "Crook-foot," she cried, "my child, be up and doing,
for I deem it is with you that Xanthus is fain to fight; help us at
once, kindle a fierce fire; I will then bring up the west and the white
south wind in a mighty hurricane from the sea, that shall bear the
flames against the heads and armour of the Trojans and consume them,
while you go along the banks of Xanthus burning his trees and wrapping
him round with fire. Let him not turn you back neither by fair words
nor foul, and slacken not till I shout and tell you. Then you may stay
your flames."

On this Vulcan kindled a fierce fire, which broke out first upon the
plain and burned the many dead whom Achilles had killed and whose
bodies were lying about in great numbers; by this means the plain was
dried and the flood stayed. As the north wind, blowing on an orchard
that has been sodden with autumn rain, soon dries it, and the heart of
the owner is glad--even so the whole plain was dried and the dead
bodies were consumed. Then he turned tongues of fire on to the river.
He burned the elms the willows and the tamarisks, the lotus also, with
the rushes and marshy herbage that grew abundantly by the banks of the
river. The eels and fishes that go darting about everywhere in the
water, these, too, were sorely harassed by the flames that cunning
Vulcan had kindled, and the river himself was scalded, so that he spoke
saying, "Vulcan, there is no god can hold his own against you. I cannot
fight you when you flare out your flames in this way; strive with me no
longe