For verily all they that aforetime were bravest, lie among the ships smitten by darts or wounded with spear-thrusts at the hands of the Trojans, whose strength ever waxeth. But me do thou succour, and lead me to my black ship, and cut the arrow from my thigh, and wash the black blood from it with warm water, and sprinkle thereon kindly simples of healing power, whereof men say that thou hast learned from Achilles, whom Cheiron taught, the most righteous of the Centaurs. For the leeches, Podaleirius and Machaon, the one methinks lieth wounded amid the huts, having need himself of a goodly leech, and the other in the plain abideth the sharp battle of the Trojans.
οὐκέτι διογενὲς Πατρόκλεες ἄλκαρ Ἀχαιῶν
ἔσσεται, ἀλλʼ ἐν νηυσὶ μελαίνῃσιν πεσέονται.
οἳ μὲν γὰρ δὴ πάντες, ὅσοι πάρος ἦσαν ἄριστοι,
ἐν νηυσὶν κέαται βεβλημένοι οὐτάμενοί τε
χερσὶν ὕπο Τρώων· τῶν δὲ σθένος ὄρνυται αἰέν.
ἀλλʼ ἐμὲ μὲν σὺ σάωσον ἄγων ἐπὶ νῆα μέλαιναν,
μηροῦ δʼ ἔκταμʼ ὀϊστόν, ἀπʼ αὐτοῦ δʼ αἷμα κελαινὸν
νίζʼ ὕδατι λιαρῷ, ἐπὶ δʼ ἤπια φάρμακα πάσσε
ἐσθλά, τά σε προτί φασιν Ἀχιλλῆος δεδιδάχθαι,
ὃν Χείρων ἐδίδαξε δικαιότατος Κενταύρων.
ἰητροὶ μὲν γὰρ Ποδαλείριος ἠδὲ Μαχάων
τὸν μὲν ἐνὶ κλισίῃσιν ὀΐομαι ἕλκος ἔχοντα
χρηΐζοντα καὶ αὐτὸν ἀμύμονος ἰητῆρος
κεῖσθαι· ὃ δʼ ἐν πεδίῳ Τρώων μένει ὀξὺν Ἄρηα.
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