roic age, as
revealed in Homer's female characters:

"The most notable of them compare advantageously with
those commended to us in the Old Testament; while
Achaiian Jezebels are nowhere found. There is a certain
authority of the man over the woman; but it does not
destroy freedom, or imply the absence either of
respect, or of a close mental and moral fellowship. Not
only the relation of Odysseus to Penelope and of Hector
to Andromache, but those of Achilles to Briseis, and of
Menelaus to the returned Helen, are full of dignity and
attachment. Briseis was but a captive, yet Achilles
viewed her as in expectation a wife, called her so,
avowed his love for her, and laid it down that not he
only, but every man must love his wife if he had sense
and virtue. Among the Achaiian Greeks monogamy is
invariable; divorce unknown; incest abhorred.... The
sad institution which, in Saint Augustine's time, was
viewed by him as saving the world from yet worse evil
is unknown or unrecorded. Concubinage prevails in the
camp before Troy, but only simple concubinage. Some of
the women, attendants in the Ithacan palace, were
corrupted by the evil-minded Suitors; but some were
not. It should, perhaps, be noted as a token of the
respect paid to the position of the woman, that these
very bad men are not represented as ever having
included in their plans the idea of offering violence
to Penelope. The noblest note, however, of the Homeric
woman remains this, that she shared the thought and
heart of her husband: as in the fine utterance of
Penelope she prays that rather she may be borne away by
the Harpies than remain to 'glad the heart of a meaner
man' (_Od_. XX., 82) than her husband, still away from
her."

Only a careful student of Homer can quite realize the diplomatic
astuteness which inspired this sketch of Homeric morals. Its amazing
sophistry can, however, be made apparent even to one who has never
read the _Iliad_ and the _Odyssey_.

ACHILLES AS A LOVER

The Trojan War lasted ten years. Its object was to punish Paris, son
of the King of Troy, for eloping with Helen, the wife of Menelaus,
King of Sparta, and taking away a shipload of treasures to boot. The
subject of Homer's _Iliad_ is popularly supposed to be this Trojan
War; in reality, however, it covers less than two