with her
hand catching her by the fragrant mantle, she shook her: and likening
herself to an ancient dame, a spinner of wool, who used to comb fair
wool for her when dwelling at Lacedaemon, and she loved her much: to her
having likened herself, divine Venus accosted [Helen]:

"Come hither, Alexander calls thee to return home. He himself is in his
chamber and turned bed, shining both in beauty and attire; nor wouldst
thou say that he had returned after having fought with a hero, but that
he was going to the dance, or that just ceasing from the dance, he sat
down."

Thus she said, and agitated the heart in her breast: and when she beheld
the all-beauteous neck of the goddess, and her lovely bosom, and her
flashing eyes, she was awe-struck, and spoke a word, and said:

"Strange one! why dost thou desire to deceive me in these things? Wilt
thou lead me anywhere farther on to one of the well-inhabited cities,
either of Phrygia or pleasant Maeonia, if there be any of
articulately-speaking men dear to thee there? Is it because Menelaus,
having now conquered noble Alexander, wishes to bring hated me home,
that therefore with artful purpose thou now standest near me? Going,
sit with him thyself, and renounce the path of the gods. And mayest thou
no more return on thy feet to Olympus: but always grieve beside him, and
watch him, until he either make thee his consort, or he indeed [make
thee] his handmaid. But there I will not go to adorn his couch, for it
would be reprehensible: all the Trojan ladies henceforth will reproach
me. But I shall have woes without measure in my soul."

But her, divine Venus, incensed, thus addressed: "Wretch, provoke me
not, lest in my wrath I abandon thee, and detest thee as much as
heretofore I have wonderfully loved thee, and lest I scatter destructive
hate in the midst of the Trojans and Greeks, and thou perish by an evil
fate."

Thus she spoke: but Helen, sprung from Jove, dreaded, and she went
covered with a white transparent robe, in silence; and escaped the
notice of all the Trojan dames, for the goddess led the way.

But when they reached the very beautiful palace of Alexander, then the
maids, on their part, turned themselves speedily to their tasks; but
she, divine of women, ascended into her lofty-roofed chamber: and then
laughter-loving Venus, carrying, placed a seat for her opposite
Alexander: there Helen, daughter of the aegis-bearing Jove, sat, averting
her eyes, and reproached he