, the prince whom Paris shot when he leaped ashore
on the day when the Greeks first landed; and Hector kept calling: "Bring
fire!" and even Aias, in this strange sea fight on land, left the decks
and went below, thrusting with his spear through the portholes. Twelve
men lay dead who had brought fire against the ship which Aias guarded.

THE SLAYING AND AVENGING OF PATROCLUS

At this moment, when torches were blazing round the ships, and all seemed
lost, Patroclus came out of the hut of Eurypylus, whose wound he had been
tending, and he saw that the Greeks were in great danger, and ran weeping
to Achilles. "Why do you weep," said Achilles, "like a little girl that
runs by her mother's side, and plucks at her gown and looks at her with
tears in her eyes, till her mother takes her up in her arms? Is there
bad news from home that your father is dead, or mine; or are you sorry
that the Greeks are getting what they deserve for their folly?" Then
Patroclus told Achilles how Ulysses and many other princes were wounded
and could not fight, and begged to be allowed to put on Achilles' armour
and lead his men, who were all fresh and unwearied, into the battle, for
a charge of two thousand fresh warriors might turn the fortune of the
day.

Then Achilles was sorry that he had sworn not to fight himself till
Hector brought fire to his own ships. He would lend Patroclus his
armour, and his horses, and his men; but Patroclus must only drive the
Trojans from the ships, and not pursue them. At this moment Aias was
weary, so many spears smote his armour, and he could hardly hold up his
great shield, and Hector cut off his spear-head with the sword; the
bronze head fell ringing on the ground, and Aias brandished only the
pointless shaft. So he shrank back and fire blazed all over his ship;
and Achilles saw it, and smote his thigh, and bade Patroclus make haste.
Patroclus armed himself in the shining armour of Achilles, which all
Trojans feared, and leaped into the chariot where Automedon, the squire,
had harnessed Xanthus and Balius, two horses that were the children, men
said, of the West Wind, and a led horse was harnessed beside them in the
side traces. Meanwhile the two thousand men of Achilles, who were called
Myrmidons, had met in armour, five companies of four hundred apiece,
under five chiefs of noble names. Forth they came, as eager as a pack of
wolves that have eaten a great red deer and run to slake their thirs