braced like a mother cow lowing over a calf, her first-born, first labor-pangs she'd felt. So the red-haired captain bestrode Patroclus now, shielding his corpse with spear and round buckler.

crested now in his gleaming bronze gear Atrides
plowed through the front to stand astride the body,
braced like a mother cow lowing over a calf,
her first-born, first labor-pangs she’d felt.
So the red-haired captain bestrode Patroclus now,
shielding his corpse with spear and round buckler.

– Homer

The Iliad, Book 17, lines 3-8. Menelaus stands protectively over the body of Patroclus, like a mother cow lowing over her first-born calf, we are told in one of Homer’s wonderful epic similes.

Homer Quotes