Читать книгу The Story of Greece: Told to Boys and Girls онлайн

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Often she would stand upon the walls of Troy

When Chryses the priest found that his daughter had been carried away by the Greeks, he hastened to the tent of Agamemnon, taking with him a ransom great ‘beyond telling.’ In his hands he bore a golden staff on which he had placed the holy garland, that the Greeks, seeing it, might treat him with reverence.

‘Now may the gods that dwell in the mansions of Olympus grant you to lay waste the city of Priam and to fare happily homeward,’ said the priest to the assembled chiefs, ‘only set ye my dear child free and accept the ransom in reverence to Apollo.’

All save Agamemnon wished to accept the ransom and set Chryseis free, but he was wroth with the priest and roughly bade him begone.

‘Let me not find thee, old man,’ he cried, ‘amid the ships, whether tarrying now or returning again hereafter, lest the sacred staff of the god avail thee naught. And thy daughter will I not set free. But depart, provoke me not, that thou mayest the rather go in peace.’

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