Menelaus accepted the challenge, and the conditions were sworn to, Agamemnon dictating thus:—

If Paris valiant Menelaus kills,
Let him have Helen, and the goods possess;
If youthful Menelaus Paris kills,
The woman and the goods shall all be his.
(See "Iliad," iii. 68, 88, 255, and 281.)

Now since Menelaus only overcame but did not kill Paris, each party hath somewhat to say for itself, and against the other. The one may demand restitution, because Paris was overcome; the other deny it, because he was not killed. Now how to determine this case and clear the seeming repugnancies doth not belong to philosophers or grammarians, but to rhetoricians, that are well skilled both in grammar and philosophy.

Then Sospis said: The challenger's word decides; for the challenger proposed the conditions, and when they were accepted, the opposite party had no power to make additions. Now the condition proposed in this challenge was not killing, but overcoming; and there was reason that it should be so, for Helen ought to be the wife of the bravest. Now the bravest is he that overcomes; for it often happens that an excellent soldier might be killed by a coward, as is evident in what happened afterward, when Achilles was shot by Paris. For I do not believe that you will affirm, that Achilles was not so brave a man as Paris because he was killed by him, and that it should be called the victory, and not rather the unjust good fortune, of him that shot him. But Hector was overcome before he was killed by Achilles, because he would not stand, but trembled and fled at his approach. For he that refuseth the combat or flies cannot palliate his defeat, and plainly grants that his adversary is the better man. And therefore Iris tells Helen beforehand,

In single combat they shall fight for you,
And you shall be the glorious victor's wife.
(2 Ibid. iii. 137.)

And Jupiter afterwards adjudges the victory to Menelaus in these words:

The conquest leans to Menelaus's side.
(3 Ibid. iv. 13.)

For it would be ridiculous to call Menelaus a conqueror when he shot Podes, a man at a great distance, before he thought of or could provide against his danger, and yet not allow him the reward of conquest over him whom he made fly and sneak into the embraces of his wife, and whom he spoiled of his arms whilst he was yet alive, and who had himself offered the challenge, by the articles of which Menelaus now appeared to be the conqueror.

Glaucias subjoined: in all laws, decrees, contracts, and promises, those latest made are always accounted more valid than the former. Now the later contract was Agamemnon's, the condition of which was killing, and not only overcoming. Besides the former was mere words, the latter confirmed by oath; and, by the consent of all, those were cursed that broke them; so that this latter was properly the contract, and the other a bare challenge. And this Priam at his going away, after he had sworn to the conditions, confirms by these words:—

But Jove and other gods alone do know,
Which is designed to see the shades below;
("Iliad," iii. 308.)