THE TAKING OF ILIOS 



him in the horse ; and Peneleus and Meges and 

 valiaut Antiphates, and Iphidaraas and Eundamas, 

 offspring of Pelias, and Amphidanias amied with a 

 bow. Last Epeius of glorious craft set foot in the 

 thing he had himself contrived. 



Then they prayed unto the grey-eyed daughter 

 of Zeus and hasted into their vessel of the horse. 

 And Athena mixed ambrosia and brought them the 

 food of the gods to eat, that in their ambush all 

 day long they might not be afflicted and their knees 

 weighed down by unpleasant hunger. And as when 

 with the frosts of the storm-footed clouds the snow 

 freezes the air and besprinkles the fields and melting 

 sends forth a great stream ; and the wild beasts, 

 cowering from the din of the mountain-cradled river, 

 as it leaps swiftly down from a rock in headlong 

 tumult, withdraw beneath the shelter of their 

 hollow lair and abide there silently with shivering 

 flanks, and, bitterly anhungered, by grievous con- 

 straint patiently await the ceasing of the rain : even 

 so the unwearied Achaeans leapt through the carven 

 wood and supported travail beyond enduring. And 

 for them Odysseus, the faithful warder of the 

 unguessed snare, closed the door of the pregnant 

 horse, and sat himself in the head as scout ; and 

 both his yearning eyes escaped the notice of those 

 without. And the son of Atreus bade the Achaean 

 servants undo with well-bent mattocks the fence 

 of stone wherewith the horse was hidden. He 

 wished to let it be uncovered that, shining afar, it 

 might send the message of its beauty unto all men. 

 And at the bidding of their king they dug it up. 



But when the sun, drawing on shadowy night 

 for men, turned far-shooting dawn to the dusky- 



S95 



