Book 29

Agamemnon: If you went mad and wrought your own destruction, Ajax, in default of that you designed for us all, why put the blame on Odysseus? Why would you not vouchsafe him a look or a word, when he came to consult Tiresias that day? you stalked past your old comrade in arms as if he was beneath your notice.

Ajax: Had I not good reason? My madness lies at the door of my solitary rival for the arms.

Agamemnon: Did you expect to be unopposed, and carry it over us all without a contest?

Ajax: Surely, in such a matter. The armour was mine by natural right, seeing I was Achilles’s cousin. The rest of you, his undoubted superiors, refused to compete, recognizing my claim. It was the son of Laertes, he that I had rescued scores of times when he would have been cut to pieces by the Phrygians, who set up for a better man and a stronger claimant than I.

Agamemnon: Blame Thetis, then, my good sir; it was she who, instead of delivering the inheritance to the next of kin, brought the arms and left the ownership an open question.

Ajax: No, no; the guilt was in claiming them—alone, I mean.

Agamemnon: Surely, Ajax, a mere man may be forgiven the sin of coveting honour—that sweetest bait for which each one of us adventured; nay, and he outdid you there, if a Trojan verdict counts.

Ajax: Who inspired that verdict? I know, but about the Gods we may not speak. Let that pass; but cease to hate Odysseus?’tis not in my power, Agamemnon, though Athene’s self should require it of me.

Henry Watson Fowler