,
and he wept, and called to his mother, the silver-footed lady of the
waters. Then she arose from the grey sea, like a mist, and sat down
beside her son, and stroked his hair with her hand, and he told her all
his sorrows. So she said that she would go up to the dwelling of the
Gods, and pray Zeus, the chief of them all, to make the Trojans win a
great battle, so that Agamemnon should feel his need of Achilles, and
make amends for his insolence, and do him honour.

Thetis kept her promise, and Zeus gave his word that the Trojans should
defeat the Greeks. That night Zeus sent a deceitful dream to Agamemnon.
The dream took the shape of old Nestor, and said that Zeus would give him
victory that day. While he was still asleep, Agamemnon was fun of hope
that he would instantly take Troy, but, when he woke, he seems not to
have been nearly so confident, for in place of putting on his armour, and
bidding the Greeks arm themselves, he merely dressed in his robe and
mantle, took his sceptre, and went and told the chiefs about his dream.
They did not feel much encouraged, so he said that he would try the
temper of the army. He would call them together, and propose to return
to Greece; but, if the soldiers took him at his word, the other chiefs
were to stop them. This was a foolish plan, for the soldiers were
wearying for beautiful Greece, and their homes, and wives and children.
Therefore, when Agamemnon did as he had said, the whole army rose, like
the sea under the west wind, and, with a shout, they rushed to the ships,
while the dust blew in clouds from under their feet. Then they began to
launch their ships, and it seems that the princes were carried away in
the rush, and were as eager as the rest to go home.

But Ulysses only stood in sorrow and anger beside his ship, and never put
hand to it, for he felt how disgraceful it was to run away. At last he
threw down his mantle, which his herald Eurybates of Ithaca, a
round-shouldered, brown, curly-haired man, picked up, and he ran to find
Agamemnon, and took his sceptre, a gold-studded staff, like a marshal's
baton, and he gently told the chiefs whom he met that they were doing a
shameful thing; but he drove the common soldiers back to the place of
meeting with the sceptre. They all returned, puzzled and chattering, but
one lame, bandy-legged, bald, round-shouldered, impudent fellow, named
Thersites, jumped up and made an insolent speech, insulting the princes,
and ad