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One of these allies was Memnon, the Aethiopian prince, whose story we have already told. Another was Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons, who came with a band of female warriors. All the authorities attest their valor and the fearful effect of their war cry. Penthesilea slew many of the bravest warriors, but was at last slain by Achilles.
Priam held a great feast, and gave to Penthesilea many beautiful gifts: cups of gold, and embroideries, and a sword with a hilt of silver, and she vowed that she would slay Achilles. But when Andromache, the wife of Hector, heard her she said within herself, "Ah, unhappy girl, what is this boast of thine!
But Clonie fell beneath the spear of Podarkes, whose hand Penthesilea cut off with the sword, while Idomeneus speared the Amazon Bremousa, and Meriones of Crete slew Evadre, and Diomede killed Alcibie and Derimacheia in close fight with the sword, so the company of the Twelve were thinned, the bodyguard of Penthesilea.
The famous publisher Cotta did print Penthesilea, but was so displeased with it that he made no effort to sell the edition, and Kitty of Heilbronn, declined by Cotta, fell flat when it was printed in Berlin. Two volumes of tales, including some masterpieces in this form, hardly fared better; the new numbers in this collection were The Duel, The Beggar Woman of Locarno, and Saint Cecilia.
"Penthesilea," with a climactic passion and a sheer contrast of tempest and tenderness, uttered with all the mastery of modern devices, has a pervading thrall of pure musical beauty. We are tempted to hail in Wolff a true poet in an age of pedants and false prophets.
In her rage she banishes her favorite Prothoe from her presence, but in a quick revulsion takes her back. In the next scene the high priestess and the little Amazon maids prepare the Feast, which Penthesilea had ordered in her confident attack upon the fleeing Greeks. One of the Rose-maidens recounts the passing scene of the Queen's amazing action.
On turning to the lower shelf, the visitor will at once be struck with the sarcophagi. Here are three Etruscan sarcophagi, two of alabaster, and one in peperino. On all three are recumbent female figures, and in front of the first the hunt of the Calydonian boar; of the second, Scylla; and of the third, a bas-relief representing Achilles dragging Penthesilea from her chariot.
Henceforth I shall know little rest until I find her. Pray when did she leave you and how?" "She fled yesterday morning stole from Wyvelstoke before daybreak she was seen by one of the keepers stealing away in the dawn. She fled away to hide her grief leaving behind all her jewels and a very solitary, very old man. She was all I had my comrade, my Penthesilea my loved daughter "
The battle begins, Achilles in fullest confidence in Penthesilea's love, unfrightened by the wild army of dogs and elephants. The scene, told by the present on-lookers, is heightened by the cries of horror and dismay of the Amazons themselves. Achilles falls; Penthesilea, a living Fury, dashes upon him with her dogs in an insane orgy of blood.
The Trojans and Greeks kept slaying each other, but Penthesilea avenged her maidens, driving the ranks of Greece as a lioness drives the cattle on the hills, for they could not stand before her. Then she shouted, "Dogs! to-day shall you pay for the sorrows of Priam! Where is Diomede, where is Achilles, where is Aias, that, men say, are your bravest? Will none of them stand before my spear?"
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