LIFE IN THE HEROIC AGE 23

they launched their * ashen spears' till one or other was wounded.
The issue of the battle was usually decided by such single
combats. The common folk were only lightly armed and could
make no stand against the prowess of the champions, before

FIG. 6. An ancient ship taken from an early ivory-carving and similar
to ships described in Homer. In the centre two men haul at the mainsail
which is furled to a yard-arm. The rowers sit each behind his shield. In
prow and stern are short decks; from one a man is fishing; from the other
the captain says good-bye to his wife. The steersman, seated astern, wields
two paddles.
whom they were as chaff before the wind. Here is Homer's
picture of Achilles' passage through the melee:
As down the hollow of the glen
Fierce fire its havoc plays,
When drought is on the mountain
And the deep woods are ablaze,
And a wind blows which catcheth up
And hunts the flame all ways;
So all ways ravening with his spear,
As he had been a god's own peer,
He hunted and he slew them there,
Till earth ran black where the blood was.
And, as when broad-browed bulls are yoked