Book ix., "shall not persuade me" (by gifts richer than he offers),

"_till he have paid me back all the bitter despite_."[14] A payment in gold and lands and women Achilles disdains: he will not take it till he has a payment in revenge. This he has insisted on in Book i., this Zeus has promised in Book viii., and this inexorableness is the sin and stumbling-block of Achilles. Customary law and public opinion acknowledged his right to apology and atonement, but condemned his insistence, after these had been duly offered, on a bloody revenge. All the world recognised the facts before Grote went hunting for discrepancies, and bagged the greatest of all,--which is no discrepancy!

The whole story, including Book ix., is absolutely consistent. Grote argued that Agamemnon, by his offers, had done all that was necessary. He _had_, according to customary law; but Achilles had set his heart, in Book i. as in Book ix., on much more, on "a contented revenge." In