“Hear me, ye mighty throng of our allies, Dwellers of nations round us! Not to make Our army vast in numbers did I send To summon you, each from his native town, But that your willing valor might defend The wives and children of the sons of Troy From the assailing Greeks. I therefore give Most freely of our substance in large gifts And banquets, that ye all may be content; And now let some of you move boldly on To do or die, which is the chance of war. To him who from the field will drag and bring The slain Patroclus to the Trojan knights, Compelling Ajax to give way⁠—to him I yield up half the spoil; the other half I keep, and let his glory equal mine.”

He spake, and all that mighty multitude With lifted lances threw themselves against The Grecian ranks. They hoped to bear away The dead from Ajax, son of Telamon. Ah, idle hope! that hero o’er the dead Took many a Trojan’s life. Then Ajax thus To Menelaus, great in battle, spake:⁠—