Minerva, leave the combat. Then the god Brought from the sanctuary’s inner shrine Aeneas⁠—filling with recovered strength That shepherd of the people. He beside His comrades placed himself, and they rejoiced To see him living and unharmed and strong As ever; yet they questioned not; their task Was different, set them by the god who bears The silver bow, and Mars the slayer of men, And raging Strife that never is appeased.

The Ajaces and Ulysses and the son Of Tydeus roused the Achaians to the fight. For of the strength and clamor of the foe They felt no fear, but calmly stood, to bide The assault; as stand in air the quiet clouds Which Saturn’s son upon the mountaintops Piles in still volumes when the north wind sleeps, And every ruder breath of blustering air That drives the gathered vapors through the sky. Thus calmly waited they the Trojan host, Nor thought of flight. And now Atrides passed In haste along their ranks, and gave command:⁠—