于是他们就像熊熊的火焰一样战斗。与此同时，作为信使的舰队舵手安提洛克斯来到阿喀琉斯身边，发现他正坐在高大的战船旁，预示着一个千真万确的事实。“唉，”他心情沉重地自言自语道，“亚该亚人为什么又在平原上扫荡，成群结队地向船只涌来呢?但愿诸神现在不要把我母亲忒提斯说过的那种悲伤带给我，她说在我还活着的时候，弥尔米顿人中最勇敢的人会在特洛伊人面前倒下，再也见不到太阳的光芒。我担心米诺埃提斯的勇敢的儿子是由于自己的胆大而失败的，但我命令他在击退那些向他们开火的人后立即回到船上，不要与赫克托耳作战。”正当他这样想着的时候，内斯特的儿子走到他面前，一边哭一边讲述了他的悲惨经历。“唉，”他喊道，“高贵的珀琉斯的儿子，我给你带来了坏消息，真希望这不是真的。普特洛克勒斯倒下了，围绕着他赤裸的身体展开了一场激烈的战斗——因为赫克托耳拿着他的盔甲。”阿喀琉斯听着，一阵悲伤的乌云落在他的头上。他双手捧满地上的灰尘，倒在头上，弄脏了他那张秀美的脸，还让灰尘落在他那件洁白的新衬衫上。 He flung himself down all huge and hugely at full length, and tore his hair with his hands. The bondswomen whom Achilles and Patroclus had taken captive screamed aloud for grief, beating their breasts, and with their limbs failing them for sorrow. Antilochus bent over him the while, weeping and holding both his hands as he lay groaning for he feared that he might plunge a knife into his own throat. Then Achilles gave a loud cry and his mother heard him as she was sitting in the depths of the sea by the old man her father, whereon she screamed, and all the goddesses daughters of Nereus that dwelt at the bottom of the sea, came gathering round her. There were Glauce, Thalia and Cymodoce, Nesaia, Speo, thoe and dark-eyed Halie, Cymothoe, Actaea and Limnorea, Melite, Iaera, Amphithoe and Agave, Doto and Proto, Pherusa and Dynamene, Dexamene, Amphinome and Callianeira, Doris, Panope, and the famous sea-nymph Galatea, Nemertes, Apseudes and Callianassa. There were also Clymene, Ianeira and Ianassa, Maera, Oreithuia and Amatheia of the lovely locks, with other Nereids who dwell in the depths of the sea. The crystal cave was filled with their multitude and they all beat their breasts while Thetis led them in their lament. "Listen," she cried, "sisters, daughters of Nereus, that you may hear the burden of my sorrows. Alas, woe is me, woe in that I have borne the most glorious of offspring. I bore him fair and strong, hero among heroes, and he shot up as a sapling; I tended him as a plant in a goodly garden, and sent him with his ships to Ilius to fight the Trojans, but never shall I welcome him back to the house of Peleus. So long as he lives to look upon the light of the sun he is in heaviness, and though I go to him I cannot help him. Nevertheless I will go, that I may see my dear son and learn what sorrow has befallen him though he is still holding aloof from battle." She left the cave as she spoke, while the others followed weeping after, and the waves opened a path before them. When they reached the rich plain of Troy, they came up out of the sea in a long line on to the sands, at the place where the ships of the Myrmidons were drawn up in close order round the tents of Achilles. His mother went up to him as he lay groaning; she laid her hand upon his head and spoke piteously, saying, "My son, why are you thus weeping? What sorrow has now befallen you? Tell me; hide it not from me. Surely Jove has granted you the prayer you made him, when you lifted up your hands and besought him that the Achaeans might all of them be pent up at their ships, and rue it bitterly in that you were no longer with them." Achilles groaned and answered, "Mother, Olympian Jove has indeed vouchsafed me the fulfilment of my prayer, but what boots it to me, seeing that my dear comrade Patroclus has fallen- he whom I valued more than all others, and loved as dearly as my own life? I have lost him; aye, and Hector when he had killed him stripped the wondrous armour, so glorious to behold, which the gods gave to Peleus when they laid you in the couch of a mortal man. Would that you were still dwelling among the immortal sea-nymphs, and that Peleus had taken to himself some mortal bride. For now you shall have grief infinite by reason of the death of that son whom you can never welcome home- nay, I will not live nor go about among mankind unless Hector fall by my spear, and thus pay me for having sl