at once among the host, and speak fairly to them, man by man,
that they draw not their ships into the sea."

Minerva was not slack to do her bidding. Down she darted from the
topmost summits of Olympus, and in a moment she was at the ships
of the Achaeans. There she found Ulysses, peer of Jove in
counsel, standing alone. He had not as yet laid a hand upon his
ship, for he was grieved and sorry; so she went close up to him
and said, "Ulysses, noble son of Laertes, are you going to fling
yourselves into your ships and be off home to your own land in
this way? Will you leave Priam and the Trojans the glory of still
keeping Helen, for whose sake so many of the Achaeans have died
at Troy, far from their homes? Go about at once among the host,
and speak fairly to them, man by man, that they draw not their
ships into the sea."

Ulysses knew the voice as that of the goddess: he flung his cloak
from him and set off to run. His servant Eurybates, a man of
Ithaca, who waited on him, took charge of the cloak, whereon
Ulysses went straight up to Agamemnon and received from him his
ancestral, imperishable staff. With this he went about among the
ships of the Achaeans.

Whenever he met a king or chieftain, he stood by him and spoke
him fairly. "Sir," said he, "this flight is cowardly and
unworthy. Stand to your post, and bid your people also keep their
places. You do not yet know the full mind of Agamemnon; he was
sounding us, and ere long will visit the Achaeans with his
displeasure. We were not all of us at the council to hear what he
then said; see to it lest he be angry and do us a mischief; for