This translation comprises about half the Iliad, and includes all the main story and nearly all the most cele brated passages. The abridgment was not merely to save work. The omitted parts with few exceptions are inferior in literary skill and interest, are irrelevant to the plot and unduly delay its action, and in the opinion of the translator are mostly interpolations or later addi tions. Apart from these considerations the Iliad is much too long to suit modern taste; and its inordinate length, even in ancient times, became a proverb both in the Greek and Latin tongues. The scholar who cares little for the story as a whole, and likes to pick up the original for single passages, and the student and antiquarian who read it for special purposes, find the Iliad none too long, but with the ordinary reader it is otherwise.