ThereTell all about thy lucky lambs.—Now go.SHEPHERD.Dull wits, we shepherds! Aye, ’twas alway so.Yet still, there is some good news to be told.HECTOR.A truce there to thy gossip of the fold!Our dealings are of war, of sword and spear.He turns to go.SHEPHERD.Aye; so were mine. That is what brought me here.HECTOR’S manner changes.A chief comes yonder, leading a great bandOf spears, with help to thee and all the land.HECTOR.From whence? How do his name and lineage run?SHEPHERD.He comes from Thrace, the River Strymon’s son.HECTOR.Rhesus! Not Rhesus, here on Trojan soil?SHEPHERD.Thou hast guessed. That eases me of half my toil.HECTOR.What makes he there towards Ida? All astrayThus from the plain and the broad waggon-way!SHEPHERD.I know not rightly, though one well may guess.P. 17, l. 284 ff. The description of the march of the mountaineers, the vast crowd, the noise, the mixture of all arms, suggests personal observation. A great many fifth-century Athenians had probably served some time or other in Thrace.’Tis hard to land at night, with such a pressOf spears, on a strange coast, where rumours tellOf foes through all the plain-land. We that dwellOn Ida, in the rock, Troy’s ancient root