is not mentioned by Homer, among the daughters of Agamemnon. 204 "Agamemnon, when he offers to transfer to Achilles seven towns inhabited by wealthy husbandmen, who would enrich their lord by presents and tribute, seems likewise to assume rather a property in them, than an authority over them. And the same thing may be intimated when it is said that Peleus bestowed a great people, the Dolopes of Phthia, on Phoenix."--Thirlwall's Greece, vol. i Section 6, p. 162, note. 205 --_Pray in deep silence._ Rather: "use well-omened words;" or, as Kennedy has explained it, "Abstain from expressions unsuitable to the solemnity of the occasion, which, by offending the god, might defeat the object of their supplications." 206 --_Purest hands._ This is one of the most ancient superstitions respecting prayer, and one founded as much in nature as in tradition. 207 It must be recollected, that the war at Troy was not a settled siege, and that many of the chieftains busied themselves in piratical expeditions about its neighborhood. Such a one was that of which Achilles now speaks. From the following verses, it is evident that fruits of these maraudings went to the common support of the expedition, and not to the successful plunderer. 208 --_Pthia,_ the capital of Achilles' Thessalian domains. 209 --_Orchomenian town._ The topography of Orchomenus, in Boeotia, "situated," as it was, "on the northern bank of the lake Ćpais, which receives not only the river Cephisus from the valleys of Phocis, but also other rivers from Parnassus and Helicon" (Grote, vol. p. 181), was a sufficient reason for its prosperity and decay. "As long as the channels of these waters were diligently watched and kept clear, a large portion of the lake was in the condition of alluvial land, pre-eminently rich and fertile. But when the channels came