them to think that the war would be more than one year's work. For in the first encounter they lost Protesilaus, whom Hector slew, and many other, without any great harm done to the Trojans; save only that by their numbers of men they won ground enough to encamp themselves in, as appeareth in Thucydides. The principal impediment which the Greeks found was want of victuals, which grew upon them by reason of their multitude, and the smallness of their vessels, wherein they could not carry necessaries for such an army. Hereupon they were compelled to send some part of their men to labour the ground in Cherronesse, others to rob upon the sea, for the relief of the camp. Thus was the war protracted nine whole years, and either nothing done, or if any skirmishes were, yet could the town receive little loss by them, having equal numbers to maintain the field against such Greeks as continued the siege, and a more safe retreat if the enemy got the better.

Wherefore Ovid saith, that from the first year till the tenth there was no fighting at all; and Heraclides commends as very credible the report of Herodotus, that the Greeks did not lie before Troy the first nine years; but only did beat up and down the seas, exercising their men, and enriching themselves, and so by wasting the enemy's country, did block up the town, unto which they returned not, until the fatal time drew near when it should be subverted.

This is confirmed by the inquiry which Priamus made, when the Greek princes came into the field, the tenth year, for he knew none of them, and therefore sitting upon an high tower, (as Homer, Iliad. 3. tells,) he learned their names of Helen; which, though it is like to be a fiction, yet could it not at all have been supposed that he should be ignorant of them, if they had shewed themselves before the town so many years together. Between these relations. of Thucydides and Herodotus, the difference is not much, the one saying that a few of the Greeks remained in the camp before Troy, whilst the rest made purveyance by land and sea; the other, that the whole army did spend the time

in wasting the sea-coasts. Neither do the poets greatly disfrom these authors; for they make report of many agree towns and islands wasted, and the people carried into captivity; in which actions Achilles was employed, whom the army could not well, nor would have spared, if any service of importance had been to be performed before the city. Howsoever it was, this is agreed by general consent, that in the beginning of that summer, in which Troy was taken, great booties were brought into the camp, and a great pestilence arose among the Greeks; which Homer saith, that Apollo sent in revenge of his priest's daughter, whom Agamemnon had refused to let go for any ransom: but Heraclides, interpreting the place, saith, that by Apollo was meant the sun; who raised pestilent fogs, by which the army was infected, being lodged in a moorish piece of ground. And it might well be that the camp was overpestered with those who had been abroad, and now were lodged all close together: having also grounded their ships within the fortifications.

About the same time arose much contention between Agamemnon and Achilles about the booty, whereof Agamemnon, as general, having first chosen for his part a captive woman, and Achilles, in the second place, chosen for himself another, then Ajax, Ulysses, and so the rest of the chieftains in order. When the soothsayer Calchas had willed that Agamemnon's woman should be restored to her father, Apollo's priest, that so the pestilence might cease, then did Agamemnon greatly rage, and say, that he alone would not lose his part of the spoil, but would either take that which had been given to Achilles, or that which had fallen to Ajax or to Ulysses. Hereupon Achilles defied him, but was fain to suffer all patiently, as not able to hold his concubine by strong hand, nor to revenge her loss, otherwise than by refusing to fight, or to send forth his companies. But the Greeks, encouraged by their captains, presented themselves before the city without him and his troops.

The Trojans were now relieved with great succours, all the neighbour countries having sent them aid; partly drawn

to that war by their commanders, who assisted Priamus for money, wherewith he abounded when the war began, (as appears by his words in Homer,) or for love of himself and his sons, or hope of marriage with some of his many and fair daughters; partly also (as we may well guess) incited by the wrongs received of the Greeks, when they wasted the countries adjoining unto Troy: so that when Hector issued out of the town, he was little inferior to his enemies in numbers of men, or quality of their leaders. The principal captains in the Trojan army were Hector, Paris, Deiphobus, Helenus, and the other sons of Priamus; Æneas, Antenor and his sons, Polydamas, Sarpedon, Glaucus, Asius, and the sons of Panthus, besides Rhesus, who was slain the first night of his arrival; Memnon, queen Penthesilea, and others who came toward the end of the war. Between these and the Greeks were many battles fought; the greatest of which were, that at the tomb of king Ilus, upon the plain; and another, at the very trenches of the camp, wherein Hector brake through the fortifications of the Greeks, and began to fire their ships; at which time Ajax, the son of Telamon, with his brother Teucer, were in a manner the only men of note that, remaining unwounded, made head against Hector, when the state of the Greeks was almost desperate.

Another battle, (for so antiquity calls it,) or rather the same renewed, was fought by Patroclus, who, having obtained leave, drew forth Achilles's troops, relieving the weary Greeks with a fresh supply. Agamemnon, Diomedes, Ulysses, and the rest of the princes, though sore wounded, yet were driven to put on armour, and with help of Patroclus, repelled the Trojans very hardly. For in that fight Patroclus was lost, and his body, with much contention recovered by his friends, was brought back into the camp; the armour of Achilles which he had put on, being torn from him by Hector. It was the manner of those wars, having slain a man, to strip him, and hale away his body, not restoring it without ransom, if he were one of mark. Of the vulgar, little reckoning was made; for they

fought all on foot, slightly armed, and commonly followed the success of their captains, who rode, not upon horses, but in chariots, drawn by two or three horses, which were guided by some trusty followers of theirs, which drave up and down the field, as they were directed by the captains, who by the swiftness of their horses presenting themselves where need required, threw first their javelins, and then alighting fought on foot with swords and battle-axes, retiring into the ranks of the footmen, or else returning to their chariots when they found cause, and so began again with a new dart as they could get it, if their old were lost or broken. Their arms defensive were helmets, breastplates, boots of brass or other metal, and shields commonly of leather, plated over. The offensive were swords and battle-axes at hand; and stones, arrows, or darts, when they fought at any distance. The use of their chariots (besides the swiftness) was to keep them from weariness, whereto the leaders were much subject, because of their armour, which the strongest and stoutest ware heaviest : also that from them they might throw their javelins downwards with the more violence. Of which weapon I find not that any carried more than one or two into the field: wherefore they were often driven to return to their tents for a new one, when the old was gone. Likewise of armours they had little change or none; every man (speaking of the chief) carried his own complete, of which if any piece were lost or broken, he was driven to repair it with the like, if he had any fitting, taken from some captain whom he had slain and stripped; or else to borrow of them that had by such means gotten some to spare. Whereas therefore Achilles had lost his armour, which Hector (as is said before) had taken from the body of Patroclus, he was fain to await the making of new, ere he could enter the fight; whereof he became very desirous, that he might revenge the death of Patroclus, his dear friend.

At this time Agamemnon reconciled himself unto Achilles, not only restoring his concubine Briseis, but giving him very great gifts, and excusing former matters as well as he might.

In the next battle Achilles did so behave himself, that he did not only put the Trojans to the worst, but also slew the valiant Hector, whom (if Homer may herein be believed) he chased three times about the walls of Troy. But great question may be made of Homer's truth in this narration. For it is not likely that Hector would stay alone without the city (as Homer doth report of him) when all the Trojans were fled into it; nor that he could leap over the rivers of Xanthus and Simois, as he must have done in that flight: nor that the Trojans, perceiving Hector in such an extremity, would have forborne to open some of their gates and let him in. But this is reported only to grace Achilles, who having (by what means soever) slain the noble Hector, did not only carry away his dead body, as the custom then was, but boring holes in his feet, and thrusting leathern thongs into them, tied him to his chariot, and dragged him shamefully about the field, selling the dead body to his father Priamus for a very great ransom. But his cruelty and covetousness were not long unrevenged; for he was shortly after slain with an arrow by Paris, as Homer says, in the Scæan gate, or as others, in the temple of Apollo, whither he came to have married Polyxena, the daughter of Priamus, with whom he was too far in love, having slain so many of her brethren, and his body was ransomed (as Lycophron saith) at the self-same rate that Hector's was by him sold for. Not long after this, Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons, arrived at Troy; who, after some proof given of her valour, was slain by Pyrrhus, the son of Achilles.

SECT. V.

Of the taking of Troy, the wooden horse, the book of Dares and Dictys, the colonies of the relics of Troy.

FINALLY, after the death of many worthy persons on each side, the city was taken by night, as all writers agree; but whether by the treason of Æneas and Antenor, or by a wooden horse, as the poets and common fame (which followed the poets) have delivered, it is uncertain. Some write, that upon one of the gates of Troy called Scæa, was