[Iliad, B. I. V. 149] <br /> <br />'Heigh me! brazen of front, thou glutton for plunder, how can one, <br />Servant here to thy mandates, heed thee among our Achaians, <br />Either the mission hie on or stoutly do fight with the foemen? <br />I, not hither I fared on account of the spear-armed Trojans, <br />Pledged to the combat; they unto me have in nowise a harm done; <br />Never have they, of a truth, come lifting my horses or oxen; <br />Never in deep-soiled Phthia, the nurser of heroes, my harvests <br />Ravaged, they; for between us is numbered full many a darksome <br />Mountain, ay, therewith too the stretch of the windy sea-waters. <br />O hugely shameless! thee did we follow to hearten thee, justice <br />Pluck from the Dardans for him, Menelaos, thee too, thou dog-eyed! <br />Whereof little thy thought is, nought whatever thou reckest. <br />Worse, it is thou whose threat 'tis to ravish my prize from me, portion <br />Won with much labour, the which my gift from the sons of Achaia. <br />Never, in sooth, have I known my prize equal thine when Achaians <br />Gave some flourishing populous Trojan town up to pillage. <br />Nay, sure, mine were the hands did most in the storm of the combat, <br />Yet when came peradventure share of the booty amongst us, <br />Bigger to thee went the prize, while I some small blessed thing bore <br />Off to the ships, my share of reward for my toil in the bloodshed! <br />So now go I to Phthia, for better by much it beseems me <br />Homeward go with my beaked ships now, and I hold not in prospect, <br />I being outraged, thou mayst gather here plunder and wealth-store.'<br /><br />George Meredith<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-invective-of-achilles/
