Book II

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For many days the Greek chiefs at Aulis waited for favoring breezes, but none came.

"The troops Collected and embodied, here we sit Inactive, and from Aulis wish to sail In vain."

EURIPIDES (Potter's tr.).

At last the soothsayer Calchas told them that the easterly winds which prevented them from sailing were caused by the anger of Di-anʹa. Diana was the goddess of hunting, and there was one of her sacred groves in the neighborhood of Aulis. In this grove King Agamemnon went hunting during the time the ships were being repaired after the storm, and he killed one of Diana's favorite deer. He even boasted that he was a greater hunter than Diana herself. This enraged the goddess, and Calchas said that her anger could be appeased only by the offering up of Agamemnon's daughter, Iph-i-ge-niʹa, as a sacrifice.

[Illustration: DIANA HUNTING.

_Painting by Makart._ (_Fragment_.)]

The feelings of the father may be easily imagined. He heard the announcement of the soothsayer with the utmost horror, and he declared that he would withdraw from the expedition rather than permit his child to be put to death. But Ulysses and the other princes begged him to remember that the honor of their country was at stake. They said that if he should withdraw, the great cause for which they had labored for ten years would be lost, and the Trojan insult to his own family and to all Greece would remain unpunished.

At last Agamemnon consented, and messengers were sent to Mycenæ to bring Iphigenia to Aulis. The king was even persuaded to deceive his wife, Clyt-em-nesʹtra. Knowing that she would not allow her daughter to be taken away for such a purpose, he wrote a letter to the queen, saying that Iphigenia had been chosen to be the wife of Achilles, and that he wished the marriage ceremony to be performed before the departure of the young prince for Troy.

"I wrote, I seal'd A letter to my wife, that she should send Her daughter to Achilles as a bride Affianc'd."

EURIPIDES (Potter's tr.).

Clytemnestra agreed to the proposal, happy at the thought of her daughter being married to so great a prince as Achilles. Iphigenia accordingly accompanied the messengers to the Greek camp at Aulis. When she learned of the terrible fate to which she had been doomed, she threw herself at her father's feet and piteously implored his protection. But her tears and entreaties were in vain. The agonized father had now no power to save her, for the whole army demanded that the will of the goddess should be obeyed. Preparations for the awful sacrifice were therefore made, and when everything was ready, the beautiful young princess was led to the altar. Tennyson, in his "Dream of Fair Women," has these lines about Iphigenia at Aulis:

"I was cut off from hope in that sad place, Which men called Aulis in those iron years: My father held his hand upon his face; I, blinded with my tears,

Still strove to speak: my voice was thick with sighs As in a dream. Dimly I could descry The stern, black-bearded kings with wolfish eyes, Waiting to see me die."

But Iphigenia was not sacrificed after all. Her innocence excited the pity even of Diana, and at the last moment the goddess snatched the weeping maiden away in a cloud, and left in her place a beautiful deer to be offered up as a sacrifice. She carried the princess off to Tauʹri-ca, a country bordering the Black Sea, and there Iphigenia remained for many years, serving as a priestess in Diana's temple.

The anger of Diana being appeased, favorable winds now began to blow, and the Greeks again set sail. This time they had a more fortunate voyage. Piloted by Telephus, the fleet crossed the Ægean Sea, and safely reached the coast of Troas. But here Calchas made another discouraging prophecy. He declared that the first Greek who stepped on Trojan soil would be killed in the first fight with the enemy. This the oracle at Delphi had also foretold. There was some hesitation, therefore, about landing, for the army of King Priam was ranged along the beach prepared for battle with the invaders.

This was the occasion of an heroic act by Pro-tes-i-laʹus, king of Phylʹa-ce in Thessaly, who boldly leaped ashore as soon as the vessels touched the land. The prediction of Calchas was soon fulfilled. Protesilaus was struck dead in the first fight by a spear launched by the hands of the Trojan leader, Hector. The bravery of the Thessalian king, and the grief of his queen, La-od-a-miʹa, when she heard of his death, have been much celebrated in song and story.

Protesilaus the brave, Who now lay silent in the gloomy grave: The first who boldly touch'd the Trojan shore, And dyed a Phrygian lance with Grecian gore; There lies, far distant from his native plain; And his sad consort beats her breast in vain.

POPE, _Iliad_,