but at break of day, King
Agamemnon, bid your men bring wood, and provide all else that the dead
may duly take into the realm of darkness; the fire shall thus burn him
out of our sight the sooner, and the people shall turn again to their
own labours."

Thus did he speak, and they did even as he had said. They made haste to
prepare the meal, they ate, and every man had his full share so that
all were satisfied. As soon as they had had enough to eat and drink,
the others went to their rest each in his own tent, but the son of
Peleus lay grieving among his Myrmidons by the shore of the sounding
sea, in an open place where the waves came surging in one after
another. Here a very deep slumber took hold upon him and eased the
burden of his sorrows, for his limbs were weary with chasing Hector
round windy Ilius. Presently the sad spirit of Patroclus drew near him,
like what he had been in stature, voice, and the light of his beaming
eyes, clad, too, as he had been clad in life. The spirit hovered over
his head and said--

"You sleep, Achilles, and have forgotten me; you loved me living, but
now that I am dead you think for me no further. Bury me with all speed
that I may pass the gates of Hades; the ghosts, vain shadows of men
that can labour no more, drive me away from them; they will not yet
suffer me to join those that are beyond the river, and I wander all
desolate by the wide gates of the house of Hades. Give me now your hand
I pray you, for when you have once given me my dues of fire, never
shall I again come forth out of the house of Hades. Nevermore shall we
sit apart and take sweet counsel among the living; the cruel fate which
was my birth-right has yawned its wide jaws around me--nay, you too
Achilles, peer of gods, are doomed to die beneath the wall of the noble
Trojans.

"One prayer more will I make you, if you will grant it; let not my
bones be laid apart from yours, Achilles, but with them; even as we
were brought up together in your own home, what time Menoetius brought
me to you as a child from Opoeis because by a sad spite I had killed
the son of Amphidamas--not of set purpose, but in childish quarrel over
the dice. The knight Peleus took me into his house, entreated me
kindly, and named me to be your squire; therefore let our bones lie in
but a single urn, the two-handled golden vase given to you by your
mother."

And Achilles answered, "Why, true heart, are you come hither to lay
these charges upon m