Not yet divided. And on these he falls,
And wrought fell slaughter of the hornèd kine,
Smiting all round; and now it seemed to him
That he did slay the Atreidæ with his hand,
Now this, now that, of other generals.
And I still urged the wild and moon-struck man
With fresh access of madness, and I cast
An evil net around him. After this,
When he had ceased that slaughter, binding fast
The oxen that still lived, and all the flocks,
He leads them to his dwelling, counting them
No troop of hornèd cattle, but of men;
And now within he flouts his prisoners."—(P.)
Minerva is not even satisfied with having blinded the eyes and deluded the senses of the rash man who had insulted her. She wishes to humiliate her victim before her favourite hero, and loudly summons Ajax to come forth from the tent. At the second summons he appears, his eyes still glaring with a ferocious joy, carrying the scourge of cords with which he has been lashing his prisoners. No translation can express the bitter mockery with which the goddess humours his fancied triumph, "first gazing on her victim, while the depths of his mental ruin are lighted up by her irony, then turning in more benignant majesty to point the moral for her favourite."[1]
Ajax warmly thanks Minerva for her aid. His revenge has been glorious. Not only has he reddened his sword with the blood of the Atreidæ, but he has Ulysses, his bitterest foe (it is a ram which to his mad fancy represents him), bound to a pillar within, and
