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At first sight he was of the size which I have mentioned, but he grew bigger, till he was twice as large and even more than that; at any rate he appeared to me to be twelve cubits high just at that moment when he reached his complete stature, and his beauty grew apace with his length. He told me then that he had never at any time shorn off his hair, but preserved it inviolate in honour of Spercheios, for this was the river of his first intimacy; but on his cheeks you saw the first down.
And he addressed me and said: 'I am pleased to have met you, since I have long wanted a man like yourself. For the Thessalians for a long time past have failed to present their offerings to my tomb, and I do not yet wish to show my wrath against them; for if I did so, they would perish more thoroughly than ever the Hellenes did on this spot; accordingly I resort to gentle advice, and would warn them not to violate ancient custom, nor to prove themselves worse men than the Trojans here, who though they were robbed of so many of their heroes by myself, yet sacrifice publicly to me, and also give me the tithes of their fruits of season, and olive branch in hand ask for a truce from my hostility. But this I will not grant, for the perjuries which they committed against me will not suffer Ilium ever to resume its pristine beauty, nor to regain the prosperity which yet has favoured many a city that was destroyed of old; nay, if they rebuild it, things shall go as hard with them as if their city had been captured only yesterday. In order then to save me from reducing the Thessalians to the same condition, you must go as my envoy to their council on behalf of the object I have mentioned.'
'I will be your envoy,' I replied, 'for the object of my embassy was to save them from ruin. But, O Achilles, I would ask something of you.'
'I understand,' said he, 'for it is plain you are going to ask about the Trojan war. So ask me five questions about whatever you like, and that the Fates approve of.'
I accordingly asked him firstly, if he had obtained burial in accordance with the story of the poets. 'I lie here,' he answered, 'as was most delightful to myself and Patroclus; for you know we met in mere youth, and a single golden jar holds the remains of both of us, as if we were one. But as for the dirges of the Muses and Nereids, which they say are sung over me, the Muses, I may tell you, never once came here at all, though the Nereids still resort to the spot.'
Next I asked him, if Polyxena was really slaughtered over his tomb; and he replied that this was true, but that she was not slain by the Achaeans, but that she came of her own free will to the sepulchre, and that so high was the value she set on her passion for him and he for her, that she threw herself upon an upright sword.
The third questions was this: 'Did Helen, O Achilles, really come to Troy or was it Homer that was pleased to make up the story?'
'For a long time,' he replied, 'we were deceived and tricked into sending envoys to the Trojans and fighting battles on her behalf, in the belief that she was in Ilium, whereas she really was living in Egypt and in the house of Proteus, whither she had been snatched away by Paris. But when we became convinced thereof, we continued to fight to win Troy itself, so as not to disgrace ourselves by retreat.'
The fourth question which I ventured upon was this: 'I wonder,' I said, 'that Greece ever produced at any one time so many and such distinguished heroes as Homer says were gathered against Troy.'
But Achilles answered: 'Why even the barbarians did not fall far short of us, so abundantly then did excellence flourish all over the earth.'
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