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dispenser of war, weighed the Balance^a of destruction for the Trojans, and hardly and at last rallied the Achaeans. Phoebus Apollo withdrew from Ilios to his rich shrine in Lycia, grieving over his mighty walls. And straightway beside the tomb of Achilles Sinon^a showed his message to the Argives with his shining brand. And all night long fair Helen herself also displayed from her chamber to her friends her golden torch. And even as when the moon, full with grey fire, gilds with her face the gleaming heaven: not when, sharpening her pointed horns, she first shines, rising in the shadowless^a dusk of the month, but when, orbing the rounded radiance of her eye, she draws to herself the reflected rays of the sun: even so did the lady of Therapne on that night in her radiance lift up her wine-hued arm, directing the friendly fire. And when they beheld the gleam of the beacon on high, the Argives speedily set back their ships on the path of return, and every mariner made haste, seeking to find an end of the long war. They were at once sailors and stout warriors and called each on the other to row. So the ships, swifter than the speedy winds, with obedient rush sailed unto Ilios by the help of

NOTES

^a For the Balance of Zeus cf. Hom. Il. viii. 69, xxii. 209, Milton, Paradise Lost, iv. ad fin.

The Eternal, to prevent such horrid fray,
Hung forth in Heaven his golden scales, etc.

^b Here (1) both Sinon and Helen give the beacon, (2) Sinon gives it from the grave of Achilles. In Apollodor. epitom. v. 19 only Sinon gives it and from the grave of Achilles, i.e. from outside the city. Arctinus, in the Iliupersis (Procl. p. 244, Myth. Gr. i. Wagner) says Sinon gave the signal (Susan note Grk), i.e. apparently inside the city. In Vergil, A. vi. 517 ff. the signal is given by Helen. No signal is given by Sinon, but ib. 256 a signal is sent by the Greeks to Sinon who then opens the door of the horse. In Quint. Smyrn. xiii. 23 ff. Sinon gives the signal and ib. 30 ff. he also opens the door of the horse.

^c Aratus says (736) that the moon first casts a shadow when she ãis going to the fourth day.ä Fest. Avien. Progn. v. ff.

namquŽ facem quarti sibimet profitebitur ignis,
corpora cum primo perfundens lumine nostra
in subiecta soli tenuem porrexerit umbram.

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