To whom the brave Gerenian thus replied.
Why feels Achilles for the wounded Greeks 790
Such deep concern? He little knows the height
To which our sorrows swell. Our noblest lie
By spear or arrow wounded in the fleet.
Diomede, warlike son of Tydeus, bleeds,
Gall'd by a shaft; Ulysses, glorious Chief, 795
And Agamemnon[23] suffer by the spear;
Eurypylus is shot into the thigh,
And here lies still another newly brought
By me from fight, pierced also by a shaft.
What then? How strong soe'er to give them aid, 800
Achilles feels no pity of the Greeks.
Waits he till every vessel on the shore
Fired, in despite of the whole Argive host,
Be sunk in its own ashes, and ourselves
All perish, heaps on heaps? For in my limbs 805
No longer lives the agility of my youth.
Oh, for the vigor of those days again,
When Elis, for her cattle which we took,
Strove with us and Itymoneus I slew,
Brave offspring of Hypirochus; he dwelt 810
In Elis, and while I the pledges drove,
Stood for his herd, but fell among the first
By a spear hurl'd from my victorious arm.
Then fled the rustic multitude, and we
Drove off abundant booty from the plain, 815
Herds fifty of fat beeves, large flocks of goats
As many, with as many sheep and swine,
And full thrice fifty mares of brightest hue,
All breeders, many with their foals beneath.
All these, by night returning safe, we drove 820
Into Neleian Pylus, and the heart
Rejoiced of Neleus, in a son so young
A warrior, yet enrich'd with such a prize.
At early dawn the heralds summon'd loud
The citizens, to prove their just demands 825
On fruitful Elis, and the assembled Chiefs
Division made (for numerous were the debts
Which the Epeans, in the weak estate
Of the unpeopled Pylus, had incurr'd;
For Hercules, few years before, had sack'd[24] 830
Our city, and our mightiest slain. Ourselves
The gallant sons of Neleus, were in all
Twelve youths, of whom myself alone survived;
The rest all perish'd; whence, presumptuous grown,
The brazen-mail'd Epeans wrong'd us oft). 835
A herd of beeves my father for himself
Selected, and a numerous flock beside,
Three hundred sheep, with shepherds for them all.
For he a claiman