Provided by The Internet Classics Archive. See bottom for copyright ...

spears stream from the ships. The sheen pierced the sky, the whole
land was radiant with their flashing armour, and the sound of the
tramp of their treading rose from under their feet. In the midst of
them all Achilles put on his armour; he gnashed his teeth, his eyes
gleamed like fire, for his grief was greater than he could bear. Thus,
then, full of fury against the Trojans, did he don the gift of the
god, the armour that Vulcan had made him.
First he put on the goodly greaves fitted with ancle-­‐clasps, and next
he did on the breastplate about his chest. He slung the silver-­‐studded
sword of bronze about his shoulders, and then took up the shield so
great and strong that shone afar with a splendour as of the moon.
As the light seen by sailors from out at sea, when men have lit a
fire in their homestead high up among the mountains, but the sailors
are carried out to sea by wind and storm far from the haven where
they would be-­‐ even so did the gleam of Achilles' wondrous shield
strike up into the heavens. He lifted the redoubtable helmet, and
set it upon his head, from whence it shone like a star, and the golden
plumes which Vulcan had set thick about the ridge of the helmet, waved
all around it. Then Achilles made trial of himself in his armour to
see whether it fitted him, so that his limbs could play freely under
it, and it seemed to buoy him up as though it had been wings.
He also drew his father's spear out of the spear-­‐stand, a spear so
great and heavy and strong that none of the Achaeans save only Achilles
had strength to wield it; this was the spear of Pelian ash from the
topmost ridges of Mt. Pelion, which Chiron had once given to Peleus,
fraught with the death of heroes. Automedon and Alcimus busied themselves