shall choose a wife. Many maidens, daughters of princes, are there in Hellas and in Phthia. Of these I will wed whomsoever I will. Often, indeed, in time past was I moved to take for me a wife, to be my helpmeet, that I might have joy with her of the possessions of Peleus, my father. For all the wealth that was stored in the city of Troy, in the days of peace, before the Greeks came thither, and all the treasure that is laid up in the temple of Apollo the Archer that is in the city of Delphi―all this I count as nothing in comparison of life. For a man may take cattle and sheep for spoil, and he may buy tripods and horses; but the life of a man, when it hath once passed from out his lips, he may not win back by spoiling or by buying. And to me my mother, even Thetis, the goddess of the silver foot, hath unfolded my doom. A double doom it is. If I abide in this land and fight against the city of Troy, then shall I return no more to my native country, but my name shall live forever; but if I go back to my home, then my fame shall be taken from me, but I shall live long and see not the grave. Therefore I go, and verily I
