around his kidneys. But he (Achilles) hastened to go against the Pæonian equestrian warriors, who were already turned to flight beside the eddying river, when they saw the bravest in the violent conflict bravely subdued by the hands and sword of the son of Peleus. Then he slew Thersilochus, Mydon, Astypylus, Mnesus, Thrasius, Ænius, and Ophelestes. And now had swift Achilles slain even more Pæonians, had not the deep-eddying River, enraged, addressed him, likening itself to a man, and uttered a voice from its deep vortex:
"O Achilles, thou excellest, it is true, in strength, but thou doest unworthy acts above [others], for the gods themselves always aid thee. If indeed the son of Saturn has granted to thee to destroy all the Trojans, at least having driven them from me, perform these arduous enterprises along the plain. For now are my agreeable streams full of dead bodies, nor can I any longer pour my tide into the vast sea, choked up by the dead; while thou slayest unsparingly. But come, even cease—a stupor seizes me—O chieftain of the people."
But him swift-footed Achilles, answering, addressed:
"These things shall be as thou desirest, O Jove-nurtured Scamander. But I will not cease slaughtering the treaty-breaking[1] Trojans, before that I inclose them in the city, and make trial of Hector, face to face, whether he shall slay me, or I him."
Thus speaking, he rushed upon the Trojans like unto a god; and the deep-eddying River then addressed Apollo:
"Alas! O god of the silver bow, child of Jove, thou has not observed the counsels of Jove, who very much enjoined thee to stand by and aid the Trojans, till the late setting evening[2] sun should come, and overshadow the fruitful earth."
- ↑ Although this meaning of ὑπερφίαλος is well suited to this passage, yet Buttmann, Lexil. p. 616, § 6, is against any such particular explanation of the word. See his whole dissertation.
- ↑ Δείελος has been shown by Buttmann to be really the afternoon; but he observes, p. 223, that in the present passage, "it is not the Attic δείλη ὀψία, with which it has been compared, but by the force of δύων, the actual sunset of evening. The ὀψέ is, therefore, strictly speaking, redundant, and appears to be used with reference only to the time past, something in this way: 'Thou shouldst assist the Trojans until the sun sinks late in the west.'"
