azure-haired Earth-shaker, shall I really thus bear back from thee to Jove this relentless and violent reply? Or wilt thou change it at all? The minds of the prudent indeed are flexible. Thou knowest that the Furies are ever attendant on the elders."[1]
But her again earth-shaking Neptune in turn addressed: "Goddess Iris, very rightly hast thou delivered this opinion; moreover, it is good when a messenger knows fitting things. But on this account severe indignation comes upon my heart and soul, because he wishes to chide with angry words me, equal to him by lot, and doomed to an equal destiny. Nevertheless, at present, although being indignant, I will give way. But another thing will I tell thee, and I will threaten this from my soul; if indeed, without me and prey-hunting Minerva, Juno, Mercury, and king Vulcan, he shall spare lofty Ilium, nor shall wish to destroy it, and give great glory to the Greeks; let him know this, that endless animosity shall arise between us."
So saying, the Earth-shaker quitted the Grecian army, and proceeding, he plunged into the deep; but the Grecian heroes longed for him. And then cloud-compelling Jove addressed Apollo:
"Go now, dear Phœbus, to brazen-helmed Hector; for already hath earth-encircling Neptune departed to the vast sea, avoiding our dreadful anger; for otherwise the rest, who are infernal gods, being around Saturn, would surely have heard our quarrel. This, however, is much better for me as well as for himself, that he hath first yielded to my hands accounting himself worthy of blame, because the matter would not have been accomplished without sweat. But do thou take the fringed ægis in thy hands, with which, by violently shaking it, do thou greatly terrify the Grecian heroes. To thyself, however, O far-darting [Apollo], let illustrious Hector be a care. So long then arouse his great might unto him, until the Greeks in flight reach the ships
- ↑ The Furies are said to wait on men in a double sense; either for evil, as upon Orestes after he had slain his mother; or else for good, as upon elders when they are injured, to protect them and avenge their wrongs. This is an instance that the pagans looked upon birthright as a right divine. Eustath. quoted in ed. Dubl. cf. ix. 507.
the intemperate language which Antigonus would fain have addressed to Ptolemy Philadelphus. See Sextus Emp. adv. Gramm. i. 13, p. 276.
