Men-œ'-ti-us.
So they washed the body of Patroclus and anointed it, putting ointment nine years old into the wounds, and laid it on a bed, and covered it with a linen cloth from the head to the feet, and laid a white robe over it. All night the Myrmidons mourned for Patroclus dead.
But Thetis went to the house of Hephæstus. She found him busy at his work, making twenty cauldrons with three feet, that were to stand about the house of the gods. Golden wheels had they beneath, that they might go of their own motion into the chambers of the gods, and of their own motion return. But Grace, the wife of Hephæstus, espied Thetis, and caught her by the hands, and led her in, and set her on a silver-studded chair, and put a chair beneath her feet. Then she called to her husband, saying:—
"Come quick. Thetis would have somewhat of thee."
And he said: "Verily, she was my saviour in the day of trouble; for my mother cast me out because I was lame, but Thetis and her sister received me in the sea. Nine years I dwelt with them, and hammered many a trinket in a hollow cave. Verily, I would pay the price of my life for Thetis."
Then he put away his tools, and washed himself, and took a staff in his hand, and came into the house, and sat upon a chair, and said: "Speak all thy mind. I will do thy pleasure, if it can be done."
Then did Thetis tell him of her son Achilles, and of the wrong that had been done to him, and of his wrath, and of how Patroclus was dead, and that the arms that he had had were lost.
"Make me now," she said, "for him a shield and a helmet, and greaves, and a corselet."
greaves, armour for the legs.
And Hephæstus answered: "Be of good cheer. Would that I could keep from him the doom of death as easily as I can make him such arms that a man will wonder when he looks upon them."