{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_7768/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_7768","id":"gutenberg_7768","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/7768","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Adventure","Category: Children & Young Adult Reading","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Homer. Odyssey -- Adaptations","Odysseus, King of Ithaca (Mythological character) -- Juvenile literature"],"text":"Produced by Anne Soulard, Juliet Sutherland, Charles\nBidwell, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES\n\nBY\n\nCHARLES LAMB\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nThis work is designed as a supplement to the Adventures of Telemachus. It\ntreats of the conduct and sufferings of Ulysses, the father of Telemachus.\nThe picture which it exhibits is that of a brave man struggling with\nadversity; by a wise use of events, and with an inimitable presence of\nmind under difficulties, forcing out a way for himself through the\nseverest trials to which human life can be exposed; with enemies natural\nand preternatural surrounding him on all sides. The agents in this tale,\nbesides men and women, are giants, enchanters, sirens: things which denote\nexternal force or internal temptations, the twofold danger which a wise\nfortitude must expect to encounter in its course through this world. The\nfictions contained in it will be found to comprehend some of the most\nadmired inventions of Grecian mythology.\n\nThe groundwork of the story is as old as the Odyssey, but the moral and\nthe coloring are comparatively modern. By avoiding the prolixity which\nmarks the speeches and the descriptions in Homer, I have gained a rapidity\nto the narration which I hope will make it more attractive and give it\nmore the air of a romance to young readers, though I am sensible that by\nthe curtailment I have sacrificed in many places the manners to the\npassion, the subordinate characteristics to the essential interest of the\nstory. The attempt is not to be considered as seeking a comparison with\nany of the direct translations of the Odyssey, either in prose or verse,\nthough if I were to state the obligations which I have had to one obsolete\nversion, [Footnote: The translation of Homer by Chapman in the reign of\nJames I.] I should run the hazard of depriving myself of the very slender\ndegree of reputation which I could hope to acquire from a trifle like the\npresent undertaking.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nCHAPTER ONE\n\nThe Cicons.--The Fruit of the Lotus-tree.--Polyphemus and the Cyclops.--\nThe Kingdom of the Winds, and God Aeolus's Fatal Present.--The\nLaestrygonian Man-eaters.\n\nCHAPTER TWO\n\nThe House of Circe.--Men changed into Beasts.--The Voyage to Hell.--The\nBanquet of the Dead.\n\nCHAPTER THREE\n\nThe Song of the Sirens.--Scylla and Charybdis.--The Oxen of the Sun.--The\nJudgment.--The Crew Killed by Lightning.\n\nCHAPTER FOUR\n\nThe Island of Calypso.--Immortality Refused.\n\nCHAPTER FIVE\n\nThe Tempest.--The Sea-bird's Gift.--The Escape by Swimming.--The Sleep in\nthe Woods.\n\nCHAPTER SIX\n\nThe Princess Nausicaa.--The Washing.--The Game with the Ball.--The Court\nof Phaeacia and King Alcinous.\n\nCHAPTER SEVEN\n\nThe Songs of Demodocus--The Convoy Home.--The Manners--Transformed to\nStone--The Young Shepherd.\n\nCHAPTER EIGHT\n\nThe Change from a King to a Beggar.--Eumaeus and the Herdsmen--Telemachus.\n\nCHAPTER NINE\n\nThe Queen's Suitors--The Battle of the Beggars.--The Armour Taken Down.--\nThe Meeting with Penelope.\n\nCHAPTER TEN\n\nThe Madness from Above--The Bow of Ulysses.--The Slaughter.--The\nConclusion.\n\n\n\n\nILLUSTRATIONS\n\n\"'Cyclop,' he said, 'take a bowl of wine from the hand of your guest'\"\n\n\"Out rushed with mighty noise all the winds\"\n\n\"And straight they were transformed into swine\"\n\n\"'Who or what manner of man art thou?'\"\n\n\"And the dead came to his banquet\"\n\n\"He would have broken his bonds to rush after them\"\n\n\"Nine days was he floating about with all the motions of the sea\"\n\n\"Took a last leave of her and of her nymphs\"\n\n\"And Nausicaa joined them in a game with the ball\"\n\n\"He gave them a brief relation of all the adventures that had befallen\nhim\"\n\n\"Consulting how they might with safety bring about his restoration\"\n\n\"'But such as your fare is, eat it, and be welcome'\"\n\n\"'I am no more but thy father: I am even he'\"\n\n\"But the greater part reviled him and bade him begone\"\n\n\"When the maids were lighting the queen through a stately gallery\"\n\n\"Rose in a mass to overwhelm and crush those two\"\n\n\n\n\nTHE ADVENTURES OF ULYSSES\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER ONE\n\nThe Cicons.--The Fruit of the Lotos-tree.--Polyphemus and the Cyclops.--\nThe Kingdom of the Winds, and God Aeolus's Fatal Present.--The\nLaestrygonian Man-eaters.\n\n\nThis history tells of the wanderings of Ulysses and his followers in their\nreturn from Troy, after the destruction of that famous city of Asia by the\nGrecians. He was inflamed with a desire of seeing again, after a ten\nyears' absence, his wife and native country, Ithaca. He was king of a\nbarren spot, and a poor country in comparison of the fruitful plains of\nAsia, which he was leaving, or the wealthy kingdoms which he touched upon\nin his return; yet, wherever he came, he could never see a soil which\nappeared in his eyes half so sweet or desirable as his country earth. This\nmade him refuse the offers of the goddess Calypso to stay with her, and\npartake of her immortality in the delightful island; and this gave him\nstrength to break from the enchantments of Circe, the daughter of the Sun.\n\nFrom Troy, ill winds cast Ulysses and his fleet upon the coast of the\nCicons, a people hostile to the Grecians. Landing his forces, he laid\nsiege to their chief city, Ismarus, which he took, and with it much spoil,\nand slew many people. But success proved fatal to him; for his soldiers,\nelated with the spoil, and the good store of provisions which they found\nin that place, fell to eating and drinking, forgetful of their safety,\ntill the Cicons, who inhabited the coast, had time to assemble their\nfriends and allies from the interior; who, mustering in prodigious force,\nset upon the Grecians, while they negligently revelled and feasted, and\nslew many of them, and recovered the spoil. They, dispirited and thinned\nin their numbers, with difficulty made their retreat good to the ships.\n\nThence they set sail, sad at heart, yet something cheered that with such\nfearful odds against them they had not all been utterly destroyed. A\ndreadful tempest ensued, which for two nights and two days tossed them\nabout, but the third day the weather cleared, and they had hopes of a\nfavourable gale to carry them to Ithaca; but, as they doubled the Cape of\nMalea, suddenly a north wind arising drove them back as far as Cythera.\nAfter that, for the space of nine days, contrary winds continued to drive\nthem in an opposite direction to the point to which they were bound, and\nthe tenth day they put in at a shore where a race of men dwell that are\nsustained by the fruit of the lotos-tree. Here Ulysses sent some of his\nmen to land for fresh water, who were met by certain of the inhabitants,\nthat gave them some of their country food to eat--not with any ill\nintention towards them, though in the event it proved pernicious; for,\nhaving eaten of this fruit, so pleasant it proved to their appetite that\nthey in a minute quite forgot all thoughts of home, or of their\ncountrymen, or of ever returning back to the ships to give an account of\nwhat sort of inhabitants dwelt there, but they would needs stay and live\nthere among them, and eat of that precious food forever; and when Ulysses\nsent other of his men to look for them, and to bring them back by force,\nthey strove, and wept, and would not leave their food for heaven itself,\nso much the pleasure of that enchanting fruit had bewitched them. But\nUlysses caused them to be bound hand and foot, and cast under the hatches;\nand set sail with all possible speed from that baneful coast, lest others\nafter them might taste the lotos, which had such strange qualities to make\nmen forget their native country and the thoughts of home.\n\nCoasting on all that night by unknown and out-of-the-way shores, they came\nby daybreak to the land where the Cyclops dwell, a sort of giant shepherds\nthat neither sow nor plough, but the earth untilled produces for them rich\nwheat and barley and grapes, yet they have neither bread nor wine, nor\nknow the arts of cultivation, nor care to know them; for they live each\nman to himself, without law or government, or anything like a state or\nkingdom; but their dwellings are in caves, on the steep heads of\nmountains; every man's household governed by his own caprice, or not\ngoverned at all; their wives and children as lawless as themselves, none\ncaring for others, but each doing as he or she thinks good. Ships or boats\nthey have none, nor artificers to make them, no trade or commerce, or wish\nto visit other shores; yet they have convenient places for harbours and\nfor shipping. Here Ulysses with a chosen party of twelve followers landed,\nto explore what sort of men dwelt there, whether hospitable and friendly\nto strangers, or altogether wild and savage, for as yet no dwellers\nappeared in sight.\n\nThe first sign of habitation which they came to was a giant's cave rudely\nfashioned, but of a size which betokened the vast proportions of its\nowner; the pillars which supported it being the bodies of huge oaks or\npines, in the natural state of the tree, and all about showed more marks\nof strength than skill in whoever built it. Ulysses, entering it, admired\nthe savage contrivances and artless structure of the place, and longed to\nsee the tenant of so outlandish a mansion; but well conjecturing that\ngifts would have more avail in extracting courtesy than strength would\nsucceed in forcing it, from such a one as he expected to find the\ninhabitant, he resolved to flatter his hospitality with a present of Greek\nwine, of which he had store in twelve great vessels, so strong that no one\never drank it without an infusion of twenty parts of water to one of wine,\nyet the fragrance of it even then so delicious that it would have vexed a\nman who smelled it to abstain from tasting it; but whoever tasted it, it\nwas able to raise his courage to the height of heroic deeds. Taking with\nthem a goat-skin flagon full of this precious liquor, they ventured into\nthe recesses of the cave. Here they pleased themselves a whole day with\nbeholding the giant's kitchen, where the flesh of sheep and goats lay\nstrewed; his dairy, where goat-milk stood ranged in troughs and pails; his\npens, where he kept his live animals; but those he had driven forth to\npasture with him when he went out in the morning. While they were feasting\ntheir eyes with a sight of these curiosities, their ears were suddenly\ndeafened with a noise like the falling of a house. It was the owner of the\ncave, who had been abroad all day feeding his flock, as his custom was, in\nthe mountains, and now drove them home in the evening from pasture. He\nthrew down a pile of fire-wood, which he had been gathering against\nsupper-time, before the mouth of the cave, which occasioned the crash they\nheard. The Grecians hid themselves in the remote parts of the cave at\nsight of the uncouth monster. It was Polyphemus, the largest and savagest\nof the Cyclops, who boasted himself to be the son of Neptune. He looked\nmore like a mountain crag than a man, and to his brutal body he had a\nbrutish mind answerable. He drove his flock, all that gave milk, to the\ninterior of the cave, but left the rams and the he-goats without. Then\ntaking up a stone so massy that twenty oxen could not have drawn it, he\nplaced it at the mouth of the cave, to defend the entrance, and sat him\ndown to milk his ewes and his goats; which done, he lastly kindled a fire,\nand throwing his great eye round the cave (for the Cyclops have no more\nthan one eye, and that placed in the midst of their forehead), by the\nglimmering light he discerned some of Ulysses's men.\n\n\"Ho! guests, what are you? Merchants or wandering thieves?\" he bellowed\nout in a voice which took from them all power of reply, it was so\nastounding.\n\nOnly Ulysses summoned resolution to answer, that they came neither for\nplunder nor traffic, but were Grecians who had lost their way, returning\nfrom Troy; which famous city, under the conduct of Agamemnon, the renowned\nson of Atreus, they had sacked, and laid level with the ground. Yet now\nthey prostrated themselves humbly before his feet, whom they acknowledged\nto be mightier than they, and besought him that he would bestow the rites\nof hospitality upon them, for that Jove was the avenger of wrongs done to\nstrangers, and would fiercely resent any injury which they might suffer.\n\n\"Fool!\" said the Cyclop, \"to come so far to preach to me the fear of the\ngods. We Cyclops care not for your Jove, whom you fable to be nursed by a\ngoat, nor any of your blessed ones. We are stronger than they, and dare\nbid open battle to Jove himself, though you and all your fellows of the\nearth join with him.\" And he bade them tell him where their ship was in\nwhich they came, and whether they had any companions. But Ulysses, with a\nwise caution, made answer that they had no ship or companions, but were\nunfortunate men, whom the sea, splitting their ship in pieces, had dashed\nupon his coast, and they alone had escaped. He replied nothing, but\ngripping two of the nearest of them, as if they had been no more than\nchildren, he dashed their brains out against the earth, and, shocking to\nrelate, tore in pieces their limbs, and devoured them yet warm and\ntrembling, making a lion's meal of them, lapping the blood; for the\nCyclops are _man-eaters_, and esteem human flesh to be a delicacy far\nabove goat's or kid's; though by reason of their abhorred customs few men\napproach their coast, except some stragglers, or now and then a\nshipwrecked mariner. At a sight so horrid, Ulysses and his men were like\ndistracted people. He, when he had made an end of his wicked supper,\ndrained a draught of goat's milk down his prodigious throat, and lay down\nand slept among his goats. Then Ulysses drew his sword, and half resolved\nto thrust it with all his might in at the bosom of the sleeping monster;\nbut wiser thoughts restrained him, else they had there without help all\nperished, for none but Polyphemus himself could have removed that mass of\nstone which he had placed to guard the entrance. So they were constrained\nto abide all that night in fear.\n\nWhen day came the Cyclop awoke, and kindling a fire, made his breakfast of\ntwo other of his unfortunate prisoners, then milked his goats as he was\naccustomed, and pushing aside the vast stone, and shutting it again when\nhe had done upon the prisoners, with as much ease as a man opens and shuts\na quiver's lid, he let out his flock, and drove them before him with\nwhistlings (as sharp as winds in storms) to the mountains.\n\nThen Ulysses, of whose strength or cunning the Cyclop seems to have had as\nlittle heed as of an infant's, being left alone, with the remnant of his\nmen which the Cyclop had not devoured, gave manifest proof how far manly\nwisdom excels brutish force. He chose a stake from among the wood which\nthe Cyclop had piled up for firing, in length and thickness like a mast,\nwhich he sharpened and hardened in the fire, and selected four men, and\ninstructed them what they should do with this stake, and made them perfect\nin their parts.\n\nWhen the evening was come, the Cyclop drove home his sheep; and as fortune\ndirected it, either of purpose, or that his memory was overruled by the\ngods to his hurt (as in the issue it proved), he drove the males of his\nflock, contrary to his custom, along with the dams into the pens. Then\nshutting-to the stone of the cave, he fell to his horrible supper. When he\nhad despatched two more of the Grecians, Ulysses waxed bold with the\ncontemplation of his project, and took a bowl of Greek wine, and merrily\ndared the Cyclop to drink.\n\n[Illustration: _'Cyclop,' he said, 'take a bowl of wine from the hand of\nyour guest.'_]\n\n\"Cyclop,\" he said, \"take a bowl of wine from the hand of your guest: it\nmay serve to digest the man's flesh that you have eaten, and show what\ndrink our ship held before it went down. All I ask in recompense, if you\nfind it good, is to be dismissed in a whole skin. Truly you must look to\nhave few visitors, if you observe this new custom of eating your guests.\"\n\nThe brute took and drank, and vehemently enjoyed the taste of wine, which\nwas new to him, and swilled again at the flagon, and entreated for more,\nand prayed Ulysses to tell him his name, that he might bestow a gift upon\nthe man who had given him such brave liquor. The Cyclops, he said, had\ngrapes, but this rich juice, he swore, was simply divine. Again Ulysses\nplied him with the wine, and the fool drank it as fast as he poured out,\nand again he asked the name of his benefactor, which Ulysses, cunningly\ndissembling, said, \"My name is Noman: my kindred and friends in my own\ncountry call me Noman.\"\n\n\"Then,\" said the Cyclop, \"this is the kindness I will show thee, Noman: I\nwill eat thee last of all thy friends.\" He had scarce expressed his savage\nkindness, when the fumes of the strong wine overcame him, and he reeled\ndown upon the floor and sank into a dead sleep.\n\nUlysses watched his time, while the monster lay insensible, and,\nheartening up his men, they placed the sharp end of the stake in the fire\ntill it was heated red-hot, and some god gave them a courage beyond that\nwhich they were used to have, and the four men with difficulty bored the\nsharp end of the huge stake, which they had heated red-hot, right into the\neye of the drunken cannibal, and Ulysses helped to thrust it in with all\nhis might, still farther and farther, with effort, as men bore with an\nauger, till the scalded blood gushed out, and the eye-ball smoked, and the\nstrings of the eye cracked, as the burning rafter broke in it, and the eye\nhissed, as hot iron hisses when it is plunged into water.\n\nHe, waking, roared with the pain so loud that all the cavern broke into\nclaps like thunder. They fled, and dispersed into corners. He plucked the\nburning stake from his eye, and hurled the wood madly about the cave. Then\nhe cried out with a mighty voice for his brethren the Cyclops, that dwelt\nhard by in caverns upon hills; they, hearing the terrible shout, came\nflocking from all parts to inquire, What ailed Polyphemus? and what cause\nhe had for making such horrid clamours in the night-time to break their\nsleeps? if his fright proceeded from any mortal? if strength or craft had\ngiven him his death's blow? He made answer from within that Noman had hurt\nhim, Noman had killed him, Noman was with him in the cave. They replied,\n\"If no man has hurt thee, and no man is with thee, then thou art alone,\nand the evil that afflicts thee is from the hand of Heaven, which none can\nresist or help.\" So they left him and went their way, thinking that some\ndisease troubled him. He, blind and ready to split with the anguish of the\npain, went groaning up and down in the dark, to find the doorway, which\nwhen he found, he removed the stone, and sat in the threshold, feeling if\nhe could lay hold on any man going out with the sheep, which (the day now\nbreaking) were beginning to issue forth to their accustomed pastures. But\nUlysses, whose first artifice in giving himself that ambiguous name had\nsucceeded so well with the Cyclop, was not of a wit so gross to be caught\nby that palpable device. But casting about in his mind all the ways which\nhe could contrive for escape (no less than all their lives depending on\nthe success), at last he thought of this expedient. He made knots of the\nosier twigs upon which the Cyclop commonly slept; with which he tied the\nfattest and fleeciest of the rams together, three in a rank, and under the\nbelly of the middle ram he tied a man, and himself last, wrapping himself\nfast with both his hands in the rich wool of one, the fairest of the\nflock.\n\nAnd now the sheep began to issue forth very fast; the males went first,\nthe females, unmilked, stood by, bleating and requiring the hand of their\nshepherd in vain to milk them, their full bags sore with being unemptied,\nbut he much sorer with the loss of sight. Still, as the males passed, he\nfelt the backs of those fleecy fools, never dreaming that they carried his\nenemies under their bellies; so they passed on till the last ram came\nloaded with his wool and Ulysses together. He stopped that ram and felt\nhim, and had his hand once in the hair of Ulysses, yet knew it not, and he\nchid the ram for being last, and spoke to it as if it understood him, and\nasked it whether it did not wish that its master had his eye again, which\nthat abominable Noman with his execrable rout had put out, when they had\ngot him down with wine; and he willed the ram to tell him whereabouts in\nthe cave his enemy lurked, that he might dash his brains and strew them\nabout, to ease his heart of that tormenting revenge which rankled in it.\nAfter a deal of such foolish talk to the beast, he let it go.\n\nWhen Ulysses found himself free, he let go his hold, and assisted in\ndisengaging his friends. The rams which had befriended them they carried\noff with them to the ships, where their companions with tears in their\neyes received them, as men escaped from death. They plied their oars, and\nset their sails, and when they were got as far off from shore as a voice\ncould reach, Ulysses cried out to the Cyclop: \"Cyclop, thou shouldst not\nhave so much abused thy monstrous strength, as to devour thy guests. Jove\nby my hand sends thee requital to pay thy savage inhumanity.\" The Cyclop\nheard, and came forth enraged, and in his anger he plucked a fragment of a\nrock, and threw it with blind fury at the ships. It narrowly escaped\nlighting upon the bark in which Ulysses sat, but with the fall it raised\nso fierce an ebb as bore back the ship till it almost touched the shore.\n\"Cyclop,\" said Ulysses, \"if any ask thee who imposed on thee that\nunsightly blemish in thine eye, say it was Ulysses, son of Laertes: the\nking of Ithaca am I called, the waster of cities.\" Then they crowded sail,\nand beat the old sea, and forth they went with a forward gale; sad for\nfore-past losses, yet glad to have escaped at any rate; till they came to\nthe isle where Aeolus reigned, who is god of the winds.\n\nHere Ulysses and his men were courteously received by the monarch, who\nshowed him his twelve children which have rule over the twelve winds. A\nmonth they stayed and feasted with him, and at the end of the month he\ndismissed them with many presents, and gave to Ulysses at parting an ox's\nhide, in which were enclosed _all the winds_: only he left abroad the\nwestern wind, to play upon their sails and waft them gently home to\nIthaca. This bag, bound in a glittering silver band so close that no\nbreath could escape, Ulysses hung up at the mast. His companions did not\nknow its contents, but guessed that the monarch had given to him some\ntreasures of gold or silver.\n\nNine days they sailed smoothly, favoured by the western wind, and by the\ntenth they approached so nigh as to discern lights kindled on the shores\nof their country earth: when, by ill-fortune, Ulysses, overcome with\nfatigue of watching the helm, fell asleep. The mariners seized the\nopportunity, and one of them said to the rest, \"A fine time has this\nleader of ours; wherever he goes he is sure of presents, when we come away\nempty-handed; and see what King Aeolus has given him, store no doubt of\ngold and silver.\" A word was enough to those covetous wretches, who quick\nas thought untied the bag, and, instead of gold, out rushed with mighty\nnoise _all the winds_.\n\n[Illustration: _Out rushed with mighty noise all the winds_.]\n\nUlysses with the noise awoke, and saw their mistake, but too late, for the\nship was driving with all the winds back far from Ithaca, far as to the\nisland of Aeolus from which they had parted, in one hour measuring back\nwhat in nine days they had scarcely tracked, and in sight of home too! Up\nhe flew amazed, and, raving, doubted whether he should not fling himself\ninto the sea for grief of his bitter disappointment. At last he hid\nhimself under the hatches for shame. And scarce could he be prevailed\nupon, when he was told he was arrived again in the harbour of King Aeolus,\nto go himself or send to that monarch for a second succour; so much the\ndisgrace of having misused his royal bounty (though it was the crime of\nhis followers, and not his own) weighed upon him; and when at last he\nwent, and took a herald with him, and came where the god sat on his\nthrone, feasting with his children, he would not thrust in among them at\ntheir meat, but set himself down like one unworthy in the threshold.\n\nIndignation seized Aeolus to behold him in that manner returned; and he\nsaid, \"Ulysses, what has brought you back? Are you so soon tired of your\ncountry; or did not our present please you? We thought we had given you a\nkingly passport.\"  Ulysses made answer: \"My men have done this ill\nmischief to me; they did it while I slept.\" \"Wretch!\" said Aeolus,\n\"avaunt, and quit our shores: it fits not us to convoy men whom the gods\nhate, and will have perish.\"\n\nForth they sailed, but with far different hopes than when they left the\nsame harbour the first time with all the winds confined, only the west\nwind suffered to play upon their sails to waft them in gentle murmurs to\nIthaca. They were now the sport of every gale that blew, and despaired of\never seeing home more. Now those covetous mariners were cured of their\nsurfeit for gold, and would not have touched it if it had lain in untold\nheaps before them.\n\nSix days and nights they drove along, and on the seventh day they put into\nLamos, a port of the Laestrygonians. So spacious this harbour was that it\nheld with ease all their fleet, which rode at anchor, safe from any\nstorms, all but the ship in which Ulysses was embarked. He, as if\nprophetic of the mischance which followed, kept still without the harbour,\nmaking fast his bark to a rock at the land's point, which he climbed with\npurpose to survey the country. He saw a city with smoke ascending from the\nroofs, but neither ploughs going, nor oxen yoked, nor any sign of\nagricultural works. Making choice of two men, he sent them to the city to\nexplore what sort of inhabitants dwelt there. His messengers had not gone\nfar before they met a damsel, of stature surpassing human, who was coming\nto draw water from a spring. They asked her who dwelt in that land. She\nmade no reply, but led them in silence to her father's palace. He was a\nmonarch, and named Antiphas. He and all his people were giants. When they\nentered the palace, a woman, the mother of the damsel, but far taller than\nshe, rushed abroad and called for Antiphas. He came, and snatching up one\nof the two men, made as if he would devour him. The other fled. Antiphas\nraised a mighty shout, and instantly, this way and that, multitudes of\ngigantic people issued out at the gates, and, making for the harbour, tore\nup huge pieces of the rocks and flung them at the ships which lay there,\nall which they utterly overwhelmed and sank; and the unfortunate bodies of\nmen which floated, and which the sea did not devour, these cannibals\nthrust through with harpoons, like fishes, and bore them off to their dire\nfeast. Ulysses with his single bark, that had never entered the harbour,\nescaped; that bark which was now the only vessel left of all the gallant\nnavy that had set sail with him from Troy. He pushed off from the shore,\ncheering the sad remnant of his men, whom horror at the sight of their\ncountrymen's fate had almost turned to marble.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER TWO\n\nThe House of Circe.--Men changed into Beasts.--The Voyage to Hell.--The\nBanquet of the Dead.\n\n\nOn went the single ship till it came to the island of Aeaea, where Circe,\nthe dreadful daughter of the Sun, dwelt. She was deeply skilled in magic,\na haughty beauty, and had hair like the Sun. The Sun was her parent, and\nbegot her and her brother Aeaetes (such another as herself) upon Perse,\ndaughter to Oceanus.\n\nHere a dispute arose among Ulysses's men, which of them should go ashore\nand explore the country; for there was a necessity that some should go to\nprocure water and provisions, their stock of both being nigh spent; but\ntheir hearts failed them when they called to mind the shocking fate of\ntheir fellows whom the Laestrygonians had eaten, and those which the foul\nCyclop Polyphemus had crushed between his jaws; which moved them so\ntenderly in the recollection that they wept. But tears never yet supplied\nany man's wants; this Ulysses knew full well, and dividing his men (all\nthat were left) into two companies, at the head of one of which was\nhimself, and at the head of the other Eurylochus, a man of tried courage,\nhe cast lots which of them should go up into the country, and the lot fell\nupon Eurylochus and his company, two-and-twenty in number, who took their\nleave, with tears, of Ulysses and his men that stayed, whose eyes wore the\nsame wet badges of weak humanity, for they surely thought never to see\nthese their companions again, but that on every coast where they should\ncome they should find nothing but savages and cannibals.\n\nEurylochus and his party proceeded up the country, till in a dale they\ndescried the house of Circe, built of bright stone, by the roadside.\nBefore her gate lay many beasts, as wolves, lions, leopards, which, by her\nart, of wild, she had rendered tame. These arose when they saw strangers,\nand ramped upon their hinder paws, and fawned upon Eurylochus and his men,\nwho dreaded the effects of such monstrous kindness; and staying at the\ngate they heard the enchantress within, sitting at her loom, singing such\nstrains as suspended all mortal faculties, while she wove a web, subtile\nand glorious, and of texture inimitable on earth, as all the housewiferies\nof the deities are. Strains so ravishingly sweet provoked even the sagest\nand prudentest heads among the party to knock and call at the gate. The\nshining gate the enchantress opened, and bade them come in and feast. They\nunwise followed, all but Eurylochus, who stayed without the gate,\nsuspicious that some train was laid for them. Being entered, she placed\nthem in chairs of state, and set before them meal and honey, and Smyrna\nwine, but mixed with baneful drugs of powerful enchantment. When they had\neaten of these, and drunk of her cup, she touched them with her\ncharming-rod, and straight they were transformed into swine, having the\nbodies of swine, the bristles, and snout, and grunting noise of that\nanimal; only they still retained the minds of men, which made them the\nmore to lament their brutish transformation. Having changed them, she\nshut them up in her sty with many more whom her wicked sorceries had\nformerly changed, and gave them swine's food--mast, and acorns, and\nchestnuts--to eat.\n\n[Illustration: _And straight they were transformed into swine_.]\n\nEurylochus, who beheld nothing of these sad changes from where he was\nstationed without the gate, only instead of his companions that entered\n(who he thought had all vanished by witchcraft) beheld a herd of swine,\nhurried back to the ship, to give an account of what he had seen; but so\nfrighted and perplexed, that he could give no distinct report of anything,\nonly he remembered a palace, and a woman singing at her work, and gates\nguarded by lions. But his companions, he said, were all vanished.\n\nThen Ulysses, suspecting some foul witchcraft, snatched his sword and his\nbow, and commanded Eurylochus instantly to lead him to the place. But\nEurylochus fell down, and, embracing his knees, besought him by the name\nof a man whom the gods had in their protection, not to expose his safety,\nand the safety of them all, to certain destruction.\n\n\"Do thou then stay, Eurylochus,\" answered Ulysses: \"eat thou and drink in\nthe ship in safety; while I go alone upon this adventure: necessity, from\nwhose law is no appeal, compels me.\"\n\nSo saying, he quitted the ship and went on shore, accompanied by none;\nnone had the hardihood to offer to partake that perilous adventure with\nhim, so much they dreaded the enchantments of the witch. Singly he pursued\nhis journey till he came to the shining gates which stood before her\nmansion; but when he essayed to put his foot over her threshold, he was\nsuddenly stopped by the apparition of a young man, bearing a golden rod in\nhis hand, who was the god Mercury. He held Ulysses by the wrist, to stay\nhis entrance; and \"Whither wouldest thou go?\" he said, \"O thou most erring\nof the sons of men! knowest thou not that this is the house of great\nCirce, where she keeps thy friends in a loathsome sty, changed from the\nfair forms of men into the detestable and ugly shapes of swine? art thou\nprepared to share their fate, from which nothing can ransom thee?\" But\nneither his words nor his coming from heaven could stop the daring foot of\nUlysses, whom compassion for the misfortune of his friends had rendered\ncareless of danger: which when the god perceived, he had pity to see\nvalour so misplaced, and gave him the flower of the herb _moly_, which is\nsovereign against enchantments. The moly is a small unsightly root, its\nvirtues but little known and in low estimation; the dull shepherd treads\non it every day with his clouted shoes; but it bears a small white flower,\nwhich is medicinal against charms, blights, mildews, and damps. \"Take this\nin thy hand,\" said Mercury, \"and with it boldly enter her gates; when she\nshall strike thee with her rod, thinking to change thee, as she has\nchanged thy friends, boldly rush in upon her with thy sword, and extort\nfrom her the dreadful oath of the gods, that she will use no enchantments\nagainst thee; then force her to restore thy abused companions.\" He gave\nUlysses the little white flower, and, instructing him how to use it,\nvanished.\n\nWhen the god was departed, Ulysses with loud knockings beat at the gate of\nthe palace. The shining gates were opened, as before, and great Circe with\nhospitable cheer invited in her guest. She placed him on a throne with\nmore distinction than she had used to his fellows; she mingled wine in a\ncostly bowl, and he drank of it, mixed with those poisonous drugs. When he\nhad drunk, she struck him with her charming-rod, and \"To your sty!\" she\ncried; \"out, swine! mingle with your companions!\" But those powerful words\nwere not proof against the preservative which Mercury had given to\nUlysses; he remained unchanged, and, as the god had directed him, boldly\ncharged the witch with his sword, as if he meant to take her life; which\nwhen she saw, and perceived that her charms were weak against the antidote\nwhich Ulysses bore about him, she cried out and bent her knees beneath his\nsword, embracing his, and said, \"Who or what manner of man art thou? Never\ndrank any man before thee of this cup but he repented it in some brute's\nform. Thy shape remains unaltered as thy mind. Thou canst be none other\nthan Ulysses, renowned above all the world for wisdom, whom the Fates have\nlong since decreed that I must love. This haughty bosom bends to thee. O\nIthacan, a goddess wooes thee to her bed.\"\n\n[Illustration: '_Who or what manner of man art thou?_']\n\n\"O Circe,\" he replied, \"how canst thou treat of love or marriage with one\nwhose friends thou hast turned into beasts? and now offerest him thy hand\nin wedlock, only that thou mightest have him in thy power, to live the\nlife of a beast with thee, naked, effeminate, subject to thy will, perhaps\nto be advanced in time to the honour of a place in thy sty. What pleasure\ncanst thou promise which may tempt the soul of a reasonable man? Thy\nmeats, spiced with poison; or thy wines, drugged with death? Thou must\nswear to me that thou wilt never attempt against me the treasons which\nthou hast practised upon my friends.\" The enchantress, won by the terror\nof his threats, or by the violence of that new love which she felt\nkindling in her veins for him, swore by Styx, the great oath of the gods,\nthat she meditated no injury to him. Then Ulysses made show of gentler\ntreatment, which gave her hopes of inspiring him with a passion equal to\nthat which she felt. She called her handmaids, four that served her in\nchief, who were daughters to her silver fountains, to her sacred rivers,\nand to her consecrated woods, to deck her apartments, to spread rich\ncarpets, and set out her silver tables with dishes of the purest gold, and\nmeat as precious as that which the gods eat, to entertain her guest. One\nbrought water to wash his feet, and one brought wine to chase away, with a\nrefreshing sweetness, the sorrows that had come of late so thick upon him,\nand hurt his noble mind. They strewed perfumes on his head, and, after he\nhad bathed in a bath of the choicest aromatics, they brought him rich and\ncostly apparel to put on. Then he was conducted to a throne of massy\nsilver, and a regale, fit for Jove when he banquets, was placed before\nhim. But the feast which Ulysses desired was to see his friends (the\npartners of his voyage) once more in the shapes of men; and the food which\ncould give him nourishment must be taken in at his eyes. Because he missed\nthis sight, he sat melancholy and thoughtful, and would taste of none of\nthe rich delicacies placed before him. Which when Circe noted, she easily\ndivined the cause of his sadness, and leaving the seat in which she sat\nthroned, went to her sty, and let abroad his men, who came in like swine,\nand filled the ample hall, where Ulysses sat, with gruntings. Hardly had\nhe time to let his sad eye run over their altered forms and brutal\nmetamorphosis, when, with an ointment which she smeared over them,\nsuddenly their bristles fell off, and they started up in their own shapes,\nmen as before. They knew their leader again, and clung about him, with joy\nof their late restoration, and some shame for their late change; and wept\nso loud, blubbering out their joy in broken accents, that the palace was\nfilled with a sound of pleasing mourning, and the witch herself, great\nCirce, was not unmoved at the sight. To make her atonement complete, she\nsent for the remnant of Ulysses's men who stayed behind at the ship,\ngiving up their great commander for lost; who when they came, and saw him\nagain alive, circled with their fellows, no expression can tell what joy\nthey felt; they even cried out with rapture, and to have seen their\nfrantic expressions of mirth a man might have supposed that they were just\nin sight of their country earth, the cliffs of rocky Ithaca. Only\nEurylochus would hardly be persuaded to enter that palace of wonders, for\nhe remembered with a kind of horror how his companions had vanished from\nhis sight.\n\nThen great Circe spake, and gave order that there should be no more\nsadness among them, nor remembering of past sufferings. For as yet they\nfared like men that are exiles from their country, and if a gleam of mirth\nshot among them, it was suddenly quenched with the thought of their\nhelpless and homeless condition. Her kind persuasions wrought upon Ulysses\nand the rest, and they spent twelve months in all manner of delight with\nher in her palace. For Circe was a powerful magician, and could command\nthe moon from her sphere, or unroot the solid oak from its place to make\nit dance for their diversion, and by the help of her illusions she could\nvary the taste of pleasures, and contrive delights, recreations, and jolly\npastimes, to \"fetch the day about from sun to sun, and rock the tedious\nyear as in a delightful dream.\"\n\nAt length Ulysses awoke from the trance of the faculties into which her\ncharms had thrown him, and the thought of home returned with tenfold\nvigour to goad and sting him; that home where he had left his virtuous\nwife Penelope, and his young son Telemachus. One day when Circe had been\nlavish of her caresses, and was in her kindest humour, he moved her\nsubtly, and as it were afar off, the question of his home-return; to which\nshe answered firmly, \"O Ulysses, it is not in my power to detain one whom\nthe gods have destined to further trials. But leaving me, before you\npursue your journey home, you must visit the house of Ades, or Death, to\nconsult the shade of Tiresias the Theban prophet; to whom alone, of all\nthe dead, Proserpine, queen of hell, has committed the secret of future\nevents: it is he that must inform you whether you shall ever see again\nyour wife and country.\" \"O Circe,\" he cried, \"that is impossible: who\nshall steer my course to Pluto's kingdom? Never ship had strength to make\nthat voyage.\" \"Seek no guide,\" she replied; \"but raise you your mast, and\nhoist your white sails, and sit in your ship in peace: the north wind\nshall waft you through the seas, till you shall cross the expanse of the\nocean and come to where grow the poplar groves and willows pale of\nProserpine: where Pyriphlegethon and Cocytus and Acheron mingle their\nwaves. Cocytus is an arm of Styx, the forgetful river. Here dig a pit, and\nmake it a cubit broad and a cubit long, and pour in milk, and honey, and\nwine, and the blood of a ram, and the blood of a black ewe, and turn away\nthy face while thou pourest in, and the dead shall come flocking to taste\nthe milk and the blood; but suffer none to approach thy offering till thou\nhast inquired of Tiresias all which thou wishest to know.\"\n\nHe did as great Circe had appointed. He raised his mast, and hoisted his\nwhite sails, and sat in his ship in peace. The north wind wafted him\nthrough the seas, till he crossed the ocean, and came to the sacred woods\nof Proserpine. He stood at the confluence of the three floods, and digged\na pit, as she had given directions, and poured in his offering--the blood\nof a ram, and the blood of a black ewe, milk, and honey, and wine; and the\ndead came to his banquet; aged men, and women, and youths, and children\nwho died in infancy. But none of them would he suffer to approach, and dip\ntheir thin lips in the offering, till Tiresias was served, not though his\nown mother was among the number, whom now for the first time he knew to be\ndead, for he had left her living when he went to Troy, and she had died\nsince his departure, and the tidings never reached him; though it irked\nhis soul to use constraint upon her, yet in compliance with the injunction\nof great Circe he forced her to retire along with the other ghosts. Then\nTiresias, who bore a golden sceptre, came and lapped of the offering, and\nimmediately he knew Ulysses, and began to prophesy: _he denounced woe to\nUlysses--woe, woe, and many sufferings--through the anger of Neptune for\nthe putting out of the eye of the sea-god's son. Yet there was safety\nafter suffering, if they could abstain from slaughtering the oxen of the\nSun after they landed in the Triangular island. For Ulysses, the gods had\ndestined him from a king to become a beggar, and to perish by his own\nguests, unless he slew those who knew him not_.\n\n[Illustration: _And the dead came to his banquet_.]\n\nThis prophecy, ambiguously delivered, was all that Tiresias was empowered\nto unfold, or else there was no longer place for him; for now the souls of\nthe other dead came flocking in such numbers, tumultuously demanding the\nblood, that freezing horror seized the limbs of the living Ulysses, to see\nso many, and all dead, and he the only one alive in that region. Now his\nmother came and lapped the blood, without restraint from her son, and now\nshe knew him to be her son, and inquired of him why he had come alive to\ntheir comfortless habitations. And she said that affliction for Ulysses's\nlong absence had preyed upon her spirits, and brought her to the grave.\n\nUlysses's soul melted at her moving narration, and forgetting the state of\nthe dead, and that the airy texture of disembodied spirits does not admit\nof the embraces of flesh and blood, he threw his arms about her to clasp\nher: the poor ghost melted from his embrace, and, looking mournfully upon\nhim, vanished away.\n\nThen saw he other females: Tyro, who when she lived was the paramour of\nNeptune, and by him had Pelias and Neleus. Antiope, who bore two like sons\nto Jove, Amphion and Zethus, founders of Thebes. Alcmena, the mother of\nHercules, with her fair daughter, afterwards her daughter-in-law, Megara.\nThere also Ulysses saw Jocasta, the unfortunate mother and wife of\nOedipus; who, ignorant of kin, wedded with her son, and when she had\ndiscovered the unnatural alliance, for shame and grief hanged herself. He\ncontinued to drag a wretched life above the earth, haunted by the dreadful\nFuries. There was Leda, the wife of Tyndarus, the mother of the beautiful\nHelen, and of the two brave brothers Castor and Pollux, who obtained this\ngrace from Jove, that, being dead, they should enjoy life alternately,\nliving in pleasant places under the earth. For Pollux had prayed that his\nbrother Castor, who was subject to death, as the son of Tyndarus, should\npartake of his own immortality, which he derived from an immortal sire.\nThis the Fates denied; therefore Pollux was permitted to divide his\nimmortality with his brother Castor, dying and living alternately.\nThere was Iphimedia, who bore two sons to Neptune that were giants, Otus\nand Ephialtes: Earth in her prodigality never nourished bodies to such\nportentous size and beauty as these two children were of, except Orion. At\nnine years old they had imaginations of climbing to heaven to see what the\ngods were doing; they thought to make stairs of mountains, and were for\npiling Ossa upon Olympus, and setting Pelion upon that, and had perhaps\nperformed it, if they had lived till they were striplings; but they were\ncut off by death in the infancy of their ambitious project. Phaedra was\nthere, and Procris, and Ariadne, mournful for Theseus's desertion, and\nMaera, and Clymene, and Eryphile, who preferred gold before wedlock faith.\n\nBut now came a mournful ghost, that late was Agamemnon, son of Atreus, the\nmighty leader of all the host of Greece and their confederate kings that\nwarred against Troy. He came with the rest to sip a little of the blood at\nthat uncomfortable banquet. Ulysses was moved with compassion to see him\namong them, and asked him what untimely fate had brought him there, if\nstorms had overwhelmed him coming from Troy, or if he had perished in some\nmutiny by his own soldiers at a division of the prey.\n\n\"By none of these,\" he replied, \"did I come to my death; but slain at a\nbanquet to which I was invited by Aegisthus after my return home. He\nconspiring with my adulterous wife, they laid a scheme for my destruction,\ntraining me forth to a banquet as an ox goes to the slaughter, and, there\nsurrounding me, they slew me with all my friends about me.\n\n\"Clytemnestra, my wicked wife, forgetting the vows which she swore to me\nin wedlock, would not lend a hand to close my eyes in death. But nothing\nis so heaped with impieties as such a woman, who would kill her spouse\nthat married her a maid. When I brought her home to my house a bride, I\nhoped in my heart that she would be loving to me and to my children. Now,\nher black treacheries have cast a foul aspersion on her whole sex. Blessed\nhusbands will have their loving wives in suspicion for her bad deeds.\"\n\n\"Alas!\" said Ulysses, \"there seems to be a fatality in your royal house of\nAtreus, and that they are hated of Jove for their wives. For Helen's sake,\nyour brother Menelaus's wife, what multitudes fell in the wars of Troy!\"\n\nAgamemnon replied, \"For this cause be not thou more kind than wise to any\nwoman. Let not thy words express to her at any time all that is in thy\nmind, keep still some secrets to thyself. But thou by any bloody\ncontrivances of thy wife never needst fear to fall. Exceeding wise she is,\nand to her wisdom she has a goodness as eminent; Icarius's daughter,\nPenelope the chaste: we left her a young bride when we parted from our\nwives to go to the wars, her first child sucking at her breast, the young\nTelemachus, whom you shall see grown up to manhood on your return, and he\nshall greet his father with befitting welcomes. My Orestes, my dear son, I\nshall never see again. His mother has deprived his father of the sight of\nhim, and perhaps will slay him as she slew his sire. It is now no world to\ntrust a woman in. But what says fame? is my son yet alive? lives he in\nOrchomen, or in Pylus, or is he resident in Sparta, in his uncle's court?\nAs yet, I see, divine Orestes is not here with me.\"\n\nTo this Ulysses replied that he had received no certain tidings where\nOrestes abode, only some uncertain rumours which he could not report for\ntruth.\n\nWhile they held this sad conference, with kind tears striving to render\nunkind fortunes more palatable, the soul of great Achilles joined them.\n\"What desperate adventure has brought Ulysses to these regions,\" said\nAchilles; \"to see the end of dead men, and their foolish shades?\"\n\nUlysses answered him that he had come to consult Tiresias respecting his\nvoyage home. \"But thou, O son of Thetis,\" said he, \"why dost thou\ndisparage the state of the dead? Seeing that as alive thou didst surpass\nall men in glory, thou must needs retain thy pre-eminence here below: so\ngreat Achilles triumphs over death.\"\n\nBut Achilles made reply that he had much rather be a peasant slave upon\nthe earth than reign over all the dead. So much did the inactivity and\nslothful condition of that state displease his unquenchable and restless\nspirit. Only he inquired of Ulysses if his father Peleus were living, and\nhow his son Neoptolemus conducted himself.\n\nOf Peleus Ulysses could tell him nothing; but of Neoptolemus he thus bore\nwitness: \"From Scyros I convoyed your son by sea to the Greeks: where I\ncan speak of him, for I knew him. He was chief in council, and in the\nfield. When any question was proposed, so quick was his conceit in the\nforward apprehension of any case, that he ever spoke first, and was heard\nwith more attention than the older heads. Only myself and aged Nestor\ncould compare with him in giving advice. In battle I cannot speak his\npraise, unless I could count all that fell by his sword. I will only\nmention one instance of his manhood. When we sat hid in the belly of the\nwooden horse, in the ambush which deceived the Trojans to their\ndestruction, I, who had the management of that stratagem, still shifted my\nplace from side to side to note the behaviour of our men. In some I marked\ntheir hearts trembling, through all the pains which they took to appear\nvaliant, and in others tears, that in spite of manly courage would gush\nforth. And to say truth, it was an adventure of high enterprise, and as\nperilous a stake as was ever played in war's game. But in him I could not\nobserve the least sign of weakness, no tears nor tremblings, but his hand\nstill on his good sword, and ever urging me to set open the machine and\nlet us out before the time was come for doing it; and when we sallied out\nhe was still first in that fierce destruction and bloody midnight\ndesolation of king Priam's city.\"\n\nThis made the soul of Achilles to tread a swifter pace, with high-raised\nfeet, as he vanished away, for the joy which he took in his son being\napplauded by Ulysses.\n\nA sad shade stalked by, which Ulysses knew to be the ghost of Ajax, his\nopponent, when living, in that famous dispute about the right of\nsucceeding to the arms of the deceased Achilles. They being adjudged by\nthe Greeks to Ulysses, as the prize of wisdom above bodily strength, the\nnoble Ajax in despite went mad, and slew himself. The sight of his rival\nturned to a shade by his dispute so subdued the passion of emulation in\nUlysses that for his sake he wished that judgment in that controversy had\nbeen given against himself, rather than so illustrious a chief should have\nperished for the desire of those arms which his prowess (second only to\nAchilles in fight) so eminently had deserved. \"Ajax,\" he cried, \"all the\nGreeks mourn for thee as much as they lamented for Achilles. Let not thy\nwrath burn forever, great son of Telamon. Ulysses seeks peace with thee,\nand will make any atonement to thee that can appease thy hurt spirit.\" But\nthe shade stalked on, and would not exchange a word with Ulysses, though\nhe prayed it with many tears and many earnest entreaties. \"He might have\nspoke to me,\" said Ulysses, \"since I spoke to him; but I see the\nresentments of the dead are eternal.\"\n\nThen Ulysses saw a throne on which was placed a judge distributing\nsentence. He that sat on the throne was Minos, and he was dealing out just\njudgments to the dead. He it is that assigns them their place in bliss or\nwoe.\n\nThen came by a thundering ghost, the large-limbed Orion, the mighty\nhunter, who was hunting there the ghosts of the beasts which he had\nslaughtered in desert hills upon the earth. For the dead delight in the\noccupations which pleased them in the time of their living upon the earth.\n\nThere was Tityus suffering eternal pains because he had sought to violate\nthe honour of Latona, as she passed from Pytho into Panopeus. Two vultures\nsat perpetually preying upon his liver with their crooked beaks; which as\nfast as they devoured, is forever renewed; nor can he fray them away with\nhis great hands.\n\nThere was Tantalus, plagued for his great sins, standing up to his chin in\nwater, which he can never taste, but still as he bows his head, thinking\nto quench his burning thirst, instead of water he licks up unsavory dust.\nAll fruits pleasant to the sight, and of delicious flavor, hang in ripe\nclusters about his head, seeming as though they offered themselves to be\nplucked by him; but when he reaches out his hand, some wind carries them\nfar out of his sight into the clouds; so he is starved in the midst of\nplenty by the righteous doom of Jove, in memory of that inhuman banquet at\nwhich the sun turned pale, when the unnatural father served up the limbs\nof his little son in a dish, as meat for his divine guests.\n\nThere was Sisyphus, that sees no end to his labours. His punishment is, to\nbe forever rolling up a vast stone to the top of a mountain, which, when\nit gets to the top, falls down with a crushing weight, and all his work is\nto be begun again. He was bathed all over in sweat, that reeked out a\nsmoke which covered his head like a mist. His crime had been the revealing\nof state secrets.\n\nThere Ulysses saw Hercules--not that Hercules who enjoys immortal life in\nheaven among the gods, and is married to Hebe or Youth; but his shadow,\nwhich remains below. About him the dead flocked as thick as bats, hovering\naround, and cuffing at his head: he stands with his dreadful bow, ever in\nthe act to shoot.\n\nThere also might Ulysses have seen and spoken with the shades of Theseus,\nand Pirithous, and the old heroes; but he had conversed enough with\nhorrors; therefore, covering his face with his hands, that he might see no\nmore spectres, he resumed his seat in his ship, and pushed off. The bark\nmoved of itself without the help of any oar, and soon brought him out of\nthe regions of death into the cheerful quarters of the living, and to the\nisland of Aeaea, whence he had set forth.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER THREE\n\nThe Song of the Sirens.--Scylla and Charybdis.--The Oxen of the Sun.--The\nJudgment.--The Crew Killed by Lightning.\n\n\n\"Unhappy man, who at thy birth wast appointed twice to die! others shall\ndie once; but thou, besides that death that remains for thee, common to\nall men, hast in thy lifetime visited the shades of death. Thee Scylla,\nthee Charybdis, expect. Thee the deathful Sirens lie in wait for, that\ntaint the minds of whoever listen to them with their sweet singing.\nWhosoever shall but hear the call of any Siren, he will so despise both\nwife and children through their sorceries that the stream of his affection\nnever again shall set homewards, nor shall he take joy in wife or children\nthereafter, or they in him.\"\n\nWith these prophetic greetings great Circe met Ulysses on his return. He\nbesought her to instruct him in the nature of the Sirens, and by what\nmethod their baneful allurements were to be resisted.\n\n\"They are sisters three,\" she replied, \"that sit in a mead (by which your\nship must needs pass) circled with dead men's bones. These are the bones\nof men whom they have slain, after with fawning invitements they have\nenticed them into their fen. Yet such is the celestial harmony of their\nvoice accompanying the persuasive magic of their words, that, knowing\nthis, you shall not be able to withstand their enticements. Therefore,\nwhen you are to sail by them, you shall stop the ears of your companions\nwith wax, that they may hear no note of that dangerous music; but for\nyourself, that you may hear, and yet live, give them strict command to\nbind you hand and foot to the mast, and in no case to set you free, till\nyou are out of the danger of the temptation, though you should entreat it,\nand implore it ever so much, but to bind you rather the more for your\nrequesting to be loosed. So shall you escape that snare.\"\n\nUlysses then prayed her that she would inform him what Scylla and\nCharybdis were, which she had taught him by name to fear. She replied:\n\"Sailing from Aeaea to Trinacria, you must pass at an equal distance\nbetween two fatal rocks. Incline never so little either to the one side or\nthe other, and your ship must meet with certain destruction. No vessel\never yet tried that pass without being lost but the Argo, which owed her\nsafety to the sacred freight she bore, the fleece of the golden-backed\nram, which could not perish. The biggest of these rocks which you shall\ncome to, Scylla hath in charge. There in a deep whirlpool at the foot of\nthe rock the abhorred monster shrouds her face; who if she were to show\nher full form, no eye of man or god could endure the sight: thence she\nstretches out all her six long necks, peering and diving to suck up fish,\ndolphins, dog-fish, and whales, whole ships, and their men, whatever comes\nwithin her raging gulf. The other rock is lesser, and of less ominous\naspect; but there dreadful Charybdis sits, supping the black deeps. Thrice\na day she drinks her pits dry, and thrice a day again she belches them all\nup; but when she is drinking, come not nigh, for, being once caught, the\nforce of Neptune cannot redeem you from her swallow. Better trust to\nScylla, for she will but have for her six necks six men: Charybdis in her\ninsatiate draught will ask all.\"\n\nThen Ulysses inquired, in case he should escape Charybdis, whether he\nmight not assail that other monster with his sword; to which she replied\nthat he must not think that he had an enemy subject to death, or wounds,\nto contend with, for Scylla could never die. Therefore, his best safety\nwas in flight, and to invoke none of the gods but Gratis, who is Scylla's\nmother, and might perhaps forbid her daughter to devour them. For his\nconduct after he arrived at Trinacria she referred him to the admonitions\nwhich had been given him by Tiresias.\n\nUlysses having communicated her instructions, as far as related to the\nSirens, to his companions, who had not been present at that interview--but\nconcealing from them the rest, as he had done the terrible predictions of\nTiresias, that they might not be deterred by fear from pursuing their\nvoyage--the time for departure being come, they set their sails, and took\na final leave of great Circe; who by her art calmed the heavens, and gave\nthem smooth seas, and a right forewind (the seaman's friend) to bear them\non their way to Ithaca.\n\nThey had not sailed past a hundred leagues before the breeze which Circe\nhad lent them suddenly stopped. It was stricken dead. All the sea lay in\nprostrate slumber. Not a gasp of air could be felt. The ship stood still.\nUlysses guessed that the island of the Sirens was not far off, and that\nthey had charmed the air so with their devilish singing. Therefore he made\nhim cakes of wax, as Circe had instructed him, and stopped the ears of his\nmen with them; then causing himself to be bound hand and foot, he\ncommanded the rowers to ply their oars and row as fast as speed could\ncarry them past that fatal shore. They soon came within sight of the\nSirens, who sang in Ulysses's hearing:\n\n  Come here, thou, worthy of a world of praise,\n  That dost so high the Grecian glory raise,\n  Ulysses' stay thy ship, and that song hear\n  That none pass'd ever, but it bent his ear,\n  But left him ravish'd, and instructed more\n  By us than any ever heard before.\n  For we know all things, whatsoever were\n  In wide Troy labor'd, whatsoever there\n  The Grecians and the Trojans both sustain'd,\n  By those high issues that the gods ordain'd;\n  And whatsoever all the earth can show\n  To inform a knowledge of desert, we know.\n\nThese were the words, but the celestial harmony of the voices which sang\nthem no tongue can describe: it took the ear of Ulysses with ravishment.\nHe would have broken his bonds to rush after them; and threatened, wept,\nsued, entreated, commanded, crying out with tears and passionate\nimprecations, conjuring his men by all the ties of perils past which they\nhad endured in common, by fellowship and love, and the authority which he\nretained among them, to let him loose; but at no rate would they obey him.\nAnd still the Sirens sang. Ulysses made signs, motions, gestures,\npromising mountains of gold if they would set him free; but their oars\nonly moved faster. And still the Sirens sang. And still the more he\nadjured them to set him free, the faster with cords and ropes they bound\nhim; till they were quite out of hearing of the Sirens' notes, whose\neffect great Circe had so truly predicted. And well she might speak of\nthem, for often she has joined her own enchanting voice to theirs, while\nshe has sat in the flowery meads, mingled with the Sirens and the Water\nNymphs, gathering their potent herbs and drugs of magic quality: their\nsinging altogether has made the gods stoop, and \"heaven drowsy with the\nharmony.\"\n\n[Illustration: _He would have broken his bonds to rush after them_.]\n\nEscaped that peril, they had not sailed yet a hundred leagues farther,\nwhen they heard a roar afar off, which Ulysses knew to be the barking of\nScylla's dogs, which surround her waist, and bark incessantly. Coming\nnearer they beheld a smoke ascend, with a horrid murmur, which arose from\nthat other whirlpool, to which they made nigher approaches than to Scylla.\nThrough the furious eddy, which is in that place, the ship stood still as\na stone, for there was no man to lend his hand to an oar, the dismal roar\nof Scylla's dogs at a distance, and the nearer clamours of Charybdis,\nwhere everything made an echo, quite taking from them the power of\nexertion. Ulysses went up and down encouraging his men, one by one, giving\nthem good words, telling them that they were in greater perils when they\nwere blocked up in the Cyclop's cave, yet, Heaven assisting his counsels,\nhe had delivered them out of that extremity. That he could not believe but\nthey remembered it; and wished them to give the same trust to the same\ncare which he had now for their welfare. That they must exert all the\nstrength and wit which they had, and try if Jove would not grant them an\nescape even out of this peril. In particular, he cheered up the pilot who\nsat at the helm, and told him that he must show more firmness than other\nmen, as he had more trust committed to him, and had the sole management by\nhis skill of the vessel in which all their safeties were embarked. That a\nrock lay hid within those boiling whirlpools which he saw, on the outside\nof which he must steer, if he would avoid his own destruction and the\ndestruction of them all.\n\nThey heard him, and like men took to the oars; but little knew what\nopposite danger, in shunning that rock, they must be thrown upon. For\nUlysses had concealed from them the wounds, never to be healed, which\nScylla was to open: their terror would else have robbed them all of all\ncare to steer or move an oar, and have made them hide under the hatches,\nfor fear of seeing her, where he and they must have died an idle death.\nBut even then he forgot the precautions which Circe had given him to\nprevent harm to his person, who had willed him not to arm, or show himself\nonce to Scylla; but disdaining not to venture life for his brave\ncompanions, he could not contain, but armed in all points, and taking a\nlance in either hand, he went up to the fore-deck, and looked when Scylla\nwould appear.\n\nShe did not show herself as yet, and still the vessel steered closer by\nher rock, as it sought to shun that other more dreaded; for they saw how\nhorribly Charybdis' black throat drew into her all the whirling deep,\nwhich she disgorged again, that all about her boiled like a kettle, and\nthe rock roared with troubled waters; which when she supped in again, all\nthe bottom turned up, and disclosed far under shore the swart sands naked,\nwhose whole stern sight frayed the startled blood from their faces, and\nmade Ulysses turn to view the wonder of whirlpools. Which when Scylla saw,\nfrom out her black den she darted out her six long necks, and swooped up\nas many of his friends: whose cries Ulysses heard, and saw them too late,\nwith their heels turned up, and their hands thrown to him for succour, who\nhad been their help in all extremities, but could not deliver them now;\nand he heard them shriek out, as she tore them, and to the last they\ncontinued to throw their hands out to him for sweet life. In all his\nsufferings he never had beheld a sight so full of miseries.\n\nEscaped from Scylla and Charybdis, but with a diminished crew, Ulysses and\nthe sad remains of his followers reached the Trinacrian shore. Here\nlanding, he beheld oxen grazing of such surpassing size and beauty that,\nboth from them and from the shape of the Island (having three promontories\njutting into the sea), he judged rightly that he was come to the\nTriangular island and the oxen of the Sun, of which Tiresias had\nforewarned him.\n\nSo great was his terror lest through his own fault, or that of his men,\nany violence or profanation should be offered to the holy oxen, that even\nthen, tired as they were with the perils and fatigues of the day past, and\nunable to stir an oar, or use any exertion, and though night was fast\ncoming on, he would have had them re-embark immediately, and make the best\nof their way from that dangerous station; but his men with one voice\nresolutely opposed it, and even the too cautious Eurylochus himself\nwithstood the proposal; so much did the temptation of a little ease and\nrefreshment (ease tenfold sweet after such labours) prevail over the\nsagest counsels, and the apprehension of certain evil outweigh the\nprospect of contingent danger. They expostulated that the nerves of\nUlysses seemed to be made of steel, and his limbs not liable to lassitude\nlike other men's; that waking or sleeping seemed indifferent to him; but\nthat they were men, not gods, and felt the common appetites for food and\nsleep. That in the night-time all the winds most destructive to ships are\ngenerated. That black night still required to be served with meat, and\nsleep, and quiet havens, and ease. That the best sacrifice to the sea was\nin the morning. With such sailor-like sayings and mutinous arguments,\nwhich the majority have always ready to justify disobedience to their\nbetters, they forced Ulysses to comply with their requisition, and against\nhis will to take up his night-quarters on shore. But he first exacted from\nthem an oath that they would neither maim nor kill any of the cattle which\nthey saw grazing, but content themselves with such food as Circe had\nstowed their vessel with when they parted from Aeaea. This they man by man\nseverally promised, imprecating the heaviest curses on whoever should\nbreak it; and mooring their bark within a creek, they went to supper,\ncontenting themselves that night with such food as Circe had given them,\nnot without many sad thoughts of their friends whom Scylla had devoured,\nthe grief of which kept them great part of the night waking.\n\nIn the morning Ulysses urged them again to a religious observance of the\noath that they had sworn, not in any case to attempt the blood of those\nfair herds which they saw grazing, but to content themselves with the\nship's food; for the god who owned those cattle sees and hears all.\n\nThey faithfully obeyed, and remained in that good mind for a month, during\nwhich they were confined to that station by contrary winds, till all the\nwine and the bread were gone which they had brought with them. When their\nvictuals were gone, necessity compelled them to stray in quest of whatever\nfish or fowl they could snare, which that coast did not yield in any great\nabundance. Then Ulysses prayed to all the gods that dwelt in bountiful\nheaven, that they would be pleased to yield them some means to stay their\nhunger without having recourse to profane and forbidden violations; but\nthe ears of heaven seemed to be shut, or some god incensed plotted his\nruin; for at midday, when he should chiefly have been vigilant and\nwatchful to prevent mischief, a deep sleep fell upon the eyes of Ulysses,\nduring which he lay totally insensible of all that passed in the world,\nand what his friends or what his enemies might do for his welfare or\ndestruction. Then Eurylochus took his advantage. He was the man of most\nauthority with them after Ulysses. He represented to them all the misery\nof their condition; how that every death is hateful and grievous to\nmortality, but that of all deaths famine is attended with the most\npainful, loathsome, and humiliating circumstances; that the subsistence\nwhich they could hope to draw from fowling or fishing was too precarious\nto be depended upon; that there did not seem to be any chance of the winds\nchanging to favour their escape, but that they must inevitably stay there\nand perish, if they let an irrational superstition deter them from the\nmeans which nature offered to their hands; that Ulysses might be deceived\nin his belief that these oxen had any sacred qualities above other oxen;\nand even admitting that they were the property of the god of the Sun, as\nhe said they were, the Sun did neither eat nor drink, and the gods were\nbest served not by a scrupulous conscience, but by a thankful heart, which\ntook freely what they as freely offered: with these and such like\npersuasions he prevailed on his half-famished and half-mutinous companions\nto begin the impious violation of their oath by the slaughter of seven of\nthe fairest of these oxen which were grazing. Part they roasted and eat,\nand part they offered in sacrifice to the gods, particularly to Apollo,\ngod of the Sun, vowing to build a temple to his godhead when they should\narrive in Ithaca, and deck it with magnificent and numerous gifts. Vain\nmen! and superstition worse than that which they so lately derided! to\nimagine that prospective penitence can excuse a present violation of duty,\nand that the pure natures of the heavenly powers will admit of compromise\nor dispensation for sin.\n\nBut to their feast they fell, dividing the roasted portions of the flesh,\nsavoury and pleasant meat to them, but a sad sight to the eyes, and a\nsavour of death in the nostrils, of the waking Ulysses, who just woke in\ntime to witness, but not soon enough to prevent, their rash and\nsacrilegious banquet. He had scarce time to ask what great mischief was\nthis which they had done unto him; when behold, a prodigy! the ox-hides\nwhich they had stripped began to creep as if they had life; and the\nroasted flesh bellowed as the ox used to do when he was living. The hair\nof Ulysses stood up on end with affright at these omens; but his\ncompanions, like men whom the gods had infatuated to their destruction,\npersisted in their horrible banquet.\n\nThe Sun from his burning chariot saw how Ulysses's men had slain his oxen,\nand he cried to his father Jove, \"Revenge me upon these impious men who\nhave slain my oxen, which it did me good to look upon when I walked my\nheavenly round. In all my daily course I never saw such bright and\nbeautiful creatures as those my oxen were.\" The father promised that ample\nretribution should be taken of those accursed men: which was fulfilled\nshortly after, when they took their leaves of the fatal island.\n\nSix days they feasted in spite of the signs of heaven, and on the seventh,\nthe wind changing, they set their sails and left the island; and their\nhearts were cheerful with the banquets they had held; all but the heart of\nUlysses, which sank within him, as with wet eyes he beheld his friends,\nand gave them for lost, as men devoted to divine vengeance. Which soon\novertook them; for they had not gone many leagues before a dreadful\ntempest arose, which burst their cables; down came their mast, crushing\nthe skull of the pilot in its fall; off he fell from the stern into the\nwater, and the bark wanting his management drove along at the wind's\nmercy; thunders roared, and terrible lightnings of Jove came down; first a\nbolt struck Eurylochus, then another, and then another, till all the crew\nwere killed, and their bodies swam about like sea-mews; and the ship was\nsplit in pieces. Only Ulysses survived; and he had no hope of safety but\nin tying himself to the mast, where he sat riding upon the waves, like one\nthat in no extremity would yield to fortune. Nine days was he floating\nabout with all the motions of the sea, with no other support than the\nslender mast under him, till the tenth night cast him, all spent and weary\nwith toil, upon the friendly shores of the island Ogygia.\n\n[Illustration: _Nine days was he floating about with all the motions of\nthe sea_.]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER FOUR\n\nThe Island of Calypso.--Immortality Refused.\n\n\nHenceforth the adventures of the single Ulysses must be pursued. Of all\nthose faithful partakers of his toil, who with him left Asia, laden with\nthe spoils of Troy, now not one remains, but all a prey to the remorseless\nwaves, and food for some great fish; their gallant navy reduced to one\nship, and that finally swallowed up and lost. Where now are all their\nanxious thoughts of home? that perseverance with which they went through\nthe severest sufferings and the hardest labours to which poor seafarers\nwere ever exposed, that their toils at last might be crowned with the\nsight of their native shores and wives at Ithaca! Ulysses is now in the\nisle Ogygia, called the Delightful Island. The poor shipwrecked chief, the\nslave of all the elements, is once again raised by the caprice of fortune\ninto a shadow of prosperity. He that was cast naked upon the shore, bereft\nof all his companions, has now a goddess to attend upon him, and his\ncompanions are the nymphs which never die. Who has not heard of Calypso?\nher grove crowned with alders and poplars; her grotto, against which the\nluxuriant vine laid forth his purple grapes; her ever new delights,\ncrystal fountains, running brooks, meadows flowering with sweet\nbalm--gentle and with violet; blue violets which like veins enamelled the\nsmooth breasts of each fragrant mead! It were useless to describe over\nagain what has been so well told already; or to relate those soft arts\nof courtship which the goddess used to detain Ulysses; the same in kind\nwhich she afterwards practised upon his less wary son, whom Minerva, in\nthe shape of Mentor, hardly preserved from her snares, when they came to\nthe Delightful Island together in search of the scarce departed Ulysses.\n\nA memorable example of married love, and a worthy instance how dear to\nevery good man his country is, was exhibited by Ulysses. If Circe loved\nhim sincerely, Calypso loves him with tenfold more warmth and passion: she\ncan deny him nothing, but his departure; she offers him everything, even\nto a participation of her immortality--if he will stay and share in her\npleasures, he shall never die. But death with glory has greater charms for\na mind heroic than a life that shall never die with shame; and when he\npledged his vows to his Penelope, he reserved no stipulation that he would\nforsake her whenever a goddess should think him worthy of her bed, but\nthey had sworn to live and grow old together; and he would not survive her\nif he could, no meanly share in immortality itself, from which she was\nexcluded.\n\nThese thoughts kept him pensive and melancholy in the midst of pleasure.\nHis heart was on the seas, making voyages to Ithaca. Twelve months had\nworn away, when Minerva from heaven saw her favourite, how he sat still\npining on the seashores (his daily custom), wishing for a ship to carry\nhim home. She (who is wisdom herself) was indignant that so wise and brave\na man as Ulysses should be held in effeminate bondage by an unworthy\ngoddess; and at her request her father Jove ordered Mercury to go down to\nthe earth to command Calypso to dismiss her guest. The divine messenger\ntied fast to his feet his winged shoes, which bear him over land and seas,\nand took in his hand his golden rod, the ensign of his authority. Then\nwheeling in many an airy round, he stayed not till he alighted on the firm\ntop of the mountain Pieria; thence he fetched a second circuit over the\nseas, kissing the waves in his flight with his feet, as light as any\nsea-mew fishing dips her wings, till he touched the isle Ogygia, and\nsoared up from the blue sea to the grotto of the goddess to whom his\nerrand was ordained.\n\nHis message struck a horror, checked by love, through all the faculties of\nCalypso. She replied to it, incensed: \"You gods are insatiate, past all\nthat live, in all things which you affect; which makes you so envious and\ngrudging. It afflicts you to the heart when any goddess seeks the love of\na mortal man in marriage, though you yourselves without scruple link\nyourselves to women of the earth. So it fared with you, when the\ndelicious-fingered Morning shared Orion's bed; you could never satisfy\nyour hate and your jealousy till you had incensed the chastity-loving\ndame, Diana, who leads the precise life, to come upon him by stealth in\nOrtygia, and pierce him through with her arrows. And when rich-haired\nCeres gave the reins to her affections, and took Iasion (well worthy) to\nher arms, the secret was not so cunningly kept but Jove had soon notice of\nit, and the poor mortal paid for his felicity with death, struck through\nwith lightnings. And now you envy me the possession of a wretched man whom\ntempests have cast upon my shores, making him lawfully mine; whose ship\nJove rent in pieces with his hot thunderbolts, killing all his friends.\nHim I have preserved, loved, nourished; made him mine by protection, my\ncreature; by every tie of gratitude, mine; have vowed to make him\ndeathless like myself; him you will take from me. But I know your power,\nand that it is vain for me to resist. Tell your king that I obey his\nmandates.\"\n\nWith an ill grace Calypso promised to fulfil the commands of Jove; and,\nMercury departing, she went to find Ulysses, where he sat outside the\ngrotto, not knowing of the heavenly message, drowned in discontent, not\nseeing any human probability of his ever returning home.\n\nShe said to him: \"Unhappy man, no longer afflict yourself with pining\nafter your country, but build you a ship, with which you may return home,\nsince it is the will of the gods; who, doubtless, as they are greater in\npower than I, are greater in skill, and best can tell what is fittest for\nman. But I call the gods and my inward conscience to witness that I have\nno thought but what stood with thy safety, nor would have done or\ncounselled anything against thy good. I persuaded thee to nothing which\nI should not have followed myself in thy extremity; for my mind is\ninnocent and simple. O, if thou knewest what dreadful sufferings thou must\nyet endure before ever thou reachest thy native land, thou wouldest not\nesteem so hardly of a goddess's offer to share her immortality with thee;\nnor, for a few years' enjoyment of a perishing Penelope, refuse an\nimperishable and never-dying life with Calypso.\"\n\nHe replied: \"Ever-honoured, great Calypso, let it not displease thee, that\nI a mortal man desire to see and converse again with a wife that is\nmortal: human objects are best fitted to human infirmities. I well know\nhow far in wisdom, in feature, in stature, proportion, beauty, in all the\ngifts of the mind, thou exceedest my Penelope: she is a mortal, and\nsubject to decay; thou immortal, ever growing, yet never old; yet in her\nsight all my desires terminate, all my wishes--in the sight of her, and of\nmy country earth. If any god, envious of my return, shall lay his dreadful\nhand upon me as I pass the seas, I submit; for the same powers have given\nme a mind not to sink under oppression. In wars and waves my sufferings\nhave not been small.\"\n\nShe heard his pleaded reasons, and of force she must assent; so to her\nnymphs she gave in charge from her sacred woods to cut down timber, to\nmake Ulysses a ship. They obeyed, though in a work unsuitable to their\nsoft fingers, yet to obedience no sacrifice is hard; and Ulysses busily\nbestirred himself, labouring far more hard than they, as was fitting, till\ntwenty tall trees, driest and fittest for timber, were felled. Then, like\na skilful shipwright, he fell to joining the planks, using the plane, the\naxe, and the auger with such expedition that in four days' time a ship was\nmade, complete with all her decks, hatches, sideboards, yards. Calypso\nadded linen for the sails, and tackling; and when she was finished, she\nwas a goodly vessel for a man to sail in, alone or in company, over the\nwide seas. By the fifth morning she was launched; and Ulysses, furnished\nwith store of provisions, rich garments, and gold and silver, given him by\nCalypso, took a last leave of her and of her nymphs, and of the isle\nOgygia which had so befriended him.\n\n[Illustration: _Took a last leave of her and of her nymphs_.]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER FIVE\n\nThe Tempest.--The Sea-bird's Gift.--The Escape by Swimming.--The Sleep in\nthe Woods.\n\n\nAt the stern of his solitary ship Ulysses sat, and steered right artfully.\nNo sleep could seize his eyelids. He beheld the Pleiads, the Bear, which\nis by some called the Wain, that moves round about Orion, and keeps still\nabove the ocean, and the slow-setting sign Bootes, which some name the\nWagoner. Seventeen days he held his course, and on the eighteenth the\ncoast of Phaeacia was in sight. The figure of the land, as seen from the\nsea, was pretty and circular, and looked something like a shield.\n\nNeptune, returning from visiting his favourite Aethiopians, from the\nmountains of the Solymi, descried Ulysses ploughing the waves, his domain.\nThe sight of the man he so much hated for Polyphemus's sake, his son,\nwhose eye Ulysses had put out, set the god's heart on fire; and snatching\ninto his hand his horrid sea-sceptre, the trident of his power, he smote\nthe air and the sea, and conjured up all his black storms, calling down\nnight from the cope of heaven, and taking the earth into the sea, as it\nseemed, with clouds, through the darkness and indistinctness which\nprevailed; the billows rolling up before the fury of all the winds, that\ncontended together in their mighty sport.\n\nThen the knees of Ulysses bent with fear, and then all his spirit was\nspent, and he wished that he had been among the number of his countrymen\nwho fell before Troy, and had their funerals celebrated by all the Greeks,\nrather than to perish thus, where no man could mourn him or know him.\n\nAs he thought these melancholy thoughts, a huge wave took him and washed\nhim overboard, ship and all upset amidst the billows, he struggling afar\noff, clinging to her stern broken off which he yet held, her mast cracking\nin two with the fury of that gust of mixed winds that struck it, sails and\nsailyards fell into the deep, and he himself was long drowned under water,\nnor could get his head above, wave so met with wave, as if they strove\nwhich should depress him most; and the gorgeous garments given him by\nCalypso clung about him, and hindered his swimming; yet neither for this,\nnor for the overthrow of his ship, nor his own perilous condition, would\nhe give up his drenched vessel; but, wrestling with Neptune, got at length\nhold of her again, and then sat in her hull, insulting over death, which\nhe had escaped, and the salt waves which he gave the seas again to give to\nother men; his ship, striving to live, floated at random, cuffed from wave\nto wave, hurled to and fro by all the winds: now Boreas tossed it to\nNotus, Notus passed it to Eurus, and Eurus to the West Wind, who kept up\nthe horrid tennis.\n\nThem in their mad sport Ino Leucothea beheld--Ino Leucothea, now a\nsea-goddess, but once a mortal and the daughter of Cadmus; she with pity\nbeheld Ulysses the mark of their fierce contention, and rising from the\nwaves alighted on the ship, in shape like to the sea-bird which is called\na cormorant; and in her beak she held a wonderful girdle made of\nsea-weeds, which grow at the bottom of the ocean, which she dropped at his\nfeet; and the bird spake to Ulysses, and counselled him not to trust any\nmore to that fatal vessel against which god Neptune had levelled his\nfurious wrath, nor to those ill-befriending garments which Calypso had\ngiven him, but to quit both it and them, and trust for his safety to\nswimming. \"And here,\" said the seeming bird, \"take this girdle and tie\nabout your middle, which has virtue to protect the wearer at sea, and you\nshall safely reach the shore; but when you have landed, cast it far from\nyou back into the sea.\" He did as the sea-bird instructed him; he stripped\nhimself naked, and, fastening the wondrous girdle about his middle, cast\nhimself into the seas to swim. The bird dived past his sight into the\nfathomless abyss of the ocean.\n\nTwo days and two nights he spent in struggling with the waves, though sore\nbuffeted, and almost spent, never giving up himself for lost, such\nconfidence he had in that charm which he wore about his middle, and in the\nwords of that divine bird. But the third morning the winds grew calm and\nall the heavens were clear. Then he saw himself nigh land, which he knew\nto be the coast of the Phaeacians, a people good to strangers and\nabounding in ships, by whose favour he doubted not that he should soon\nobtain a passage to his own country. And such joy he conceived in his\nheart as good sons have that esteem their father's life dear, when long\nsickness has held him down to his bed and wasted his body, and they see at\nlength health return to the old man, with restored strength and spirits,\nin reward of their many prayers to the gods for his safety: so precious\nwas the prospect of home-return to Ulysses, that he might restore health\nto his country (his better parent), that had long languished as full of\ndistempers in his absence. And then for his own safety's sake he had joy\nto see the shores, the woods, so nigh and within his grasp as they seemed,\nand he laboured with all the might of hands and feet to reach with\nswimming that nigh-seeming land.\n\nBut when he approached near, a horrid sound of a huge sea beating against\nrocks informed him that here was no place for landing, nor any harbour for\nman's resort, but through the weeds and the foam which the sea belched up\nagainst the land he could dimly discover the rugged shore all bristled\nwith flints, and all that part of the coast one impending rock that seemed\nimpossible to climb, and the water all about so deep that not a sand was\nthere for any tired foot to rest upon, and every moment he feared lest\nsome wave more cruel than the rest should crush him against a cliff,\nrendering worse than vain all his landing; and should he swim to seek a\nmore commodious haven farther on, he was fearful lest, weak and spent as\nhe was, the winds would force him back a long way off into the main, where\nthe terrible god Neptune, for wrath that he had so nearly escaped his\npower, having gotten him again into his domain, would send out some great\nwhale (of which those seas breed a horrid number) to swallow him up alive;\nwith such malignity he still pursued him.\n\nWhile these thoughts distracted him with diversity of dangers, one bigger\nwave drove against a sharp rock his naked body, which it gashed and tore,\nand wanted little of breaking all his bones, so rude was the shock. But in\nthis extremity she prompted him that never failed him at need. Minerva\n(who is wisdom itself) put it into his thoughts no longer to keep swimming\noff and on, as one dallying with danger, but boldly to force the shore\nthat threatened him, and to hug the rock that had torn him so rudely;\nwhich with both hands he clasped, wrestling with extremity, till the rage\nof that billow which had driven him upon it was passed; but then again the\nrock drove back that wave so furiously that it reft him of his hold,\nsucking him with it in its return; and the sharp rock, his cruel friend,\nto which he clung for succour, rent the flesh so sore from his hands in\nparting that he fell off, and could sustain no longer; quite under water\nhe fell, and, past the help of fate, there had the hapless Ulysses lost\nall portion that he had in this life, if Minerva had not prompted his\nwisdom in that peril to essay another course, and to explore some other\nshelter, ceasing to attempt that landing-place.\n\nShe guided his wearied and nigh-exhausted limbs to the mouth of the fair\nriver Callicoe, which not far from thence disbursed its watery tribute to\nthe ocean. Here the shores were easy and accessible, and the rocks, which\nrather adorned than defended its banks, so smooth that they seemed\npolished of purpose to invite the landing of our sea-wanderer, and to\natone for the uncourteous treatment which those less hospitable cliffs had\nafforded him. And the god of the river, as if in pity, stayed his current,\nand smoothed his waters, to make his landing more easy; for sacred to the\never-living deities of the fresh waters, be they mountain-stream, river,\nor lake, is the cry of erring mortals that seek their aid, by reason that,\nbeing inland-bred, they partake more of the gentle humanities of our\nnature than those marine deities whom Neptune trains up in tempests in the\nunpitying recesses of his salt abyss.\n\nSo by the favour of the river's god Ulysses crept to land half-drowned;\nboth his knees faltering, his strong hands falling down through weakness\nfrom the excessive toils he had endured, his cheeks and nostrils flowing\nwith froth of the sea-brine, much of which he had swallowed in that\nconflict, voice and breath spent, down he sank as in death. Dead weary he\nwas. It seemed that the sea had soaked through his heart, and the pains he\nfelt in all his veins were little less than those which one feels that has\nendured the torture of the rack. But when his spirits came a little to\nthemselves, and his recollection by degrees began to return, he rose up,\nand unloosing from his waist the girdle or charm which that divine bird\nhad given him, and remembering the charge which he had received with it,\nhe flung it far from him into the river. Back it swam with the course of\nthe ebbing stream till it reached the sea, where the fair hands of Ino\nLeucothea received it to keep it as a pledge of safety to any future\nshipwrecked mariner that, like Ulysses, should wander in those perilous\nwaves.\n\nThen he kissed the humble earth in token of safety, and on he went by the\nside of that pleasant river, till he came where a thicker shade of rushes\nthat grew on its banks seemed to point out the place where he might rest\nhis sea-wearied limbs. And here a fresh perplexity divided his mind,\nwhether he should pass the night, which was coming on, in that place,\nwhere, though he feared no other enemies, the damps and frosts of the\nchill sea-air in that exposed situation might be death to him in his weak\nstate; or whether he had better climb the next hill, and pierce the depth\nof some shady wood, in which he might find a warm and sheltered though\ninsecure repose, subject to the approach of any wild beast that roamed\nthat way. Best did this last course appear to him, though with some\ndanger, as that which was more honourable and savoured more of strife and\nself-exertion than to perish without a struggle the passive victim of cold\nand the elements.\n\nSo he bent his course to the nearest woods, where, entering in, he found a\nthicket, mostly of wild olives and such low trees, yet growing so\nintertwined and knit together that the moist wind had not leave to play\nthrough their branches, nor the sun's scorching beams to pierce their\nrecesses, nor any shower to beat through, they grew so thick, and as it\nwere folded each in the other; here creeping in, he made his bed of the\nleaves which were beginning to fall, of which was such abundance that two\nor three men might have spread them ample coverings, such as might shield\nthem from the winter's rage, though the air breathed steel and blew as it\nwould burst. Here creeping in, he heaped up store of leaves all about him,\nas a man would billets upon a winter fire, and lay down in the midst. Rich\nseed of virtue lying hid in poor leaves! Here Minerva soon gave him sound\nsleep; and here all his long toils past seemed to be concluded and shut up\nwithin the little sphere of his refreshed and closed eyelids.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER SIX\n\nThe Princess Nausicaa.--The Washing.--The Game with the Ball.--The Court\nof Phaeacia and King Alcinous.\n\n\nMeantime Minerva, designing an interview between the king's daughter of\nthat country and Ulysses when he should awake, went by night to the palace\nof king Alcinous, and stood at the bedside of the princess Nausicaa in the\nshape of one of her favourite attendants, and thus addressed the sleeping\nprincess:\n\n\"Nausicaa, why do you lie sleeping here, and never bestow a thought upon\nyour bridal ornaments, of which you have many and beautiful, laid up in\nyour wardrobe against the day of your marriage, which cannot be far\ndistant; when you shall have need of all, not only to deck your own\nperson, but to give away in presents to the virgins that honouring you\nshall attend you to the temple? Your reputation stands much upon the\ntimely care of these things; these things are they which fill father and\nreverend mother with delight. Let us arise betimes to wash your fair\nvestments of linen and silks in the river; and request your sire to lend\nyou mules and a coach, for your wardrobe is heavy, and the place where we\nmust wash is distant, and besides it fits not a great princess like you to\ngo so far on foot.\"\n\nSo saying, she went away, and Nausicaa awoke, full of pleasing thoughts of\nher marriage, which the dream had told her was not far distant; and as\nsoon as it was dawn she arose and dressed herself, and went to find her\nparents.\n\nThe queen her mother was already up, and seated among her maids, spinning\nat her wheel, as the fashion was in those primitive times, when great\nladies did not disdain housewifery: and the king her father was preparing\nto go abroad at that early hour to council with his grave senate.\n\n\"My father,\" she said, \"will you not order mules and a coach to be got\nready, that I may go and wash, I and my maids, at the cisterns that stand\nwithout the city?\"\n\n\"What washing does my daughter speak of?\" said Alcinous.\n\n\"Mine and my brothers' garments,\" she replied, \"that have contracted soil\nby this time with lying by so long in the wardrobe. Five sons have you\nthat are my brothers; two of them are married, and three are bachelors;\nthese last it concerns to have their garments neat and unsoiled; it may\nadvance their fortunes in marriage: and who but I their sister should have\na care of these things? You yourself, my father, have need of the whitest\napparel when you go, as now, to the council.\"\n\nShe used this plea, modestly dissembling her care of her own nuptials to\nher father; who was not displeased at this instance of his daughter's\ndiscretion; for a seasonable care about marriage may be permitted to a\nyoung maiden, provided it be accompanied with modesty and dutiful\nsubmission to her parents in the choice of her future husband; and there\nwas no fear of Nausicaa choosing wrongly or improperly, for she was as\nwise as she was beautiful, and the best in all Phaeacia were suitors to\nher for her love. So Alcinous readily gave consent that she should go,\nordering mules and a coach to be prepared. And Nausicaa brought from her\nchamber all her vestments, and laid them up in the coach, and her mother\nplaced bread and wine in the coach, and oil in a golden cruse, to soften\nthe bright skins of Nausicaa and her maids when they came out of the\nriver.\n\nNausicaa, making her maids get up into the coach with her, lashed the\nmules, till they brought her to the cisterns which stood a little on the\noutside of the town, and were supplied with water from the river Callicoe.\n\nThere her attendants unyoked the mules, took out the clothes, and steeped\nthem in the cisterns, washing them in several waters, and afterwards\ntreading them clean with their feet, venturing wagers who should have done\nsoonest and cleanest, and using many pretty pastimes to beguile their\nlabours as young maids use, while the princess looked on. When they had\nlaid their clothes to dry, they fell to playing again, and Nausicaa joined\nthem in a game with the ball, which is used in that country, which is\nperformed by tossing the ball from hand to hand with great expedition, she\nwho begins the pastime singing a song. It chanced that the princess, whose\nturn it became to toss the ball, sent it so far from its mark that it fell\nbeyond into one of the cisterns of the river; at which the whole company,\nin merry consternation, set up a shriek so loud as waked the sleeping\nUlysses, who was taking his rest after his long toils in the woods not far\ndistant from the place where these young maids had come to wash.\n\n[Illustration: _And Nausicaa joined them in a game with the ball_.]\n\nAt the sound of female voices Ulysses crept forth from his retirement,\nmaking himself a covering with boughs and leaves as well as he could to\nshroud his nakedness. The sudden appearance of his weather-beaten and\nalmost naked form so frighted the maidens that they scudded away into the\nwoods and all about to hide themselves, only Minerva (who had brought\nabout this interview to admirable purposes, by seemingly accidental means)\nput courage into the breast of Nausicaa, and she stayed where she was, and\nresolved to know what manner of man he was, and what was the occasion of\nhis strange coming to them.\n\nHe not venturing (for delicacy) to approach and clasp her knees, as\nsuppliants should, but standing far off, addressed this speech to the\nyoung princess:\n\n\"Before I presume rudely to press my petitions, I should first ask whether\nI am addressing a mortal woman, or one of the goddesses. If a goddess, you\nseem to me to be likest to Diana, the chaste huntress, the daughter of\nJove. Like hers are your lineaments, your stature, your features, and air\ndivine.\"\n\nShe making answer that she was no goddess, but a mortal maid, he\ncontinued:\n\n\"If a woman, thrice blessed are both the authors of your birth, thrice\nblessed are your brothers, who even to rapture must have joy in your\nperfections, to see you grown so like a young tree, and so graceful. But\nmost blessed of all that breathe is he that has the gift to engage your\nyoung neck in the yoke of marriage. I never saw that man that was worthy\nof you. I never saw man or woman that at all parts equalled you. Lately at\nDelos (where I touched) I saw a young palm which grew beside Apollo's\ntemple; it exceeded all the trees which ever I beheld for straightness and\nbeauty: I can compare you only to that. A stupor past admiration strikes\nme, joined with fear, which keeps me back from approaching you, to embrace\nyour knees. Nor is it strange; for one of freshest and firmest spirit\nwould falter, approaching near to so bright an object: but I am one whom a\ncruel habit of calamity has prepared to receive strong impressions. Twenty\ndays the unrelenting seas have tossed me up and down coming from Ogygia,\nand at length cast me shipwrecked last night upon your coast. I have seen\nno man or woman since I landed but yourself. All that I crave is clothes,\nwhich you may spare me, and to be shown the way to some neighbouring town.\nThe gods, who have care of strangers, will requite you for these\ncourtesies.\"\n\nShe, admiring to hear such complimentary words proceed out of the mouth of\none whose outside looked so rough and unpromising, made answer: \"Stranger,\nI discern neither sloth nor folly in you, and yet I see that you are poor\nand wretched: from which I gather that neither wisdom nor industry can\nsecure felicity; only Jove bestows it upon whomsoever he pleases. He\nperhaps has reduced you to this plight. However, since your wanderings\nhave brought you so near to our city, it lies in our duty to supply your\nwants. Clothes and what else a human hand should give to one so suppliant,\nand so tamed with calamity, you shall not want. We will show you our city\nand tell you the name of our people. This is the land of the Phaeacians,\nof which my father, Alcinous, is king.\"\n\nThen calling her attendants, who had dispersed on the first sight of\nUlysses, she rebuked them for their fear, and said: \"This man is no\nCyclop, nor monster of sea or land, that you should fear him; but he seems\nmanly, staid, and discreet, and though decayed in his outward appearance,\nyet he has the mind's riches, wit and fortitude, in abundance. Show him\nthe cisterns, where he may wash him from the sea-weeds and foam that hang\nabout him, and let him have garments that fit him out of those which we\nhave brought with us to the cisterns.\"\n\nUlysses, retiring a little out of sight, cleansed him in the cisterns from\nthe soil and impurities with which the rocks and waves had covered all his\nbody, and clothing himself with befitting raiment, which the princess's\nattendants had given him, he presented himself in more worthy shape to\nNausicaa. She admired to see what a comely personage he was, now he was\ndressed in all parts; she thought him some king or hero: and secretly\nwished that the gods would be pleased to give her such a husband.\n\nThen causing her attendants to yoke her mules, and lay up the vestments,\nwhich the sun's heat had sufficiently dried, in the coach, she ascended\nwith her maids and drove off to the palace, bidding Ulysses, as she\ndeparted, keep an eye upon the coach, and to follow it on foot at some\ndistance: which she did, because if she had suffered him to have rode in\nthe coach with her, it might have subjected her to some misconstructions\nof the common people, who are always ready to vilify and censure their\nbetters, and to suspect that charity is not always pure charity, but that\nlove or some sinister intention lies hid under its disguise. So discreet\nand attentive to appearance in all her actions was this admirable\nprincess.\n\nUlysses as he entered the city wondered to see its magnificence, its\nmarkets, buildings, temples; its walls and rampires; its trade, and resort\nof men; its harbours for shipping, which is the strength of the Phaeacian\nstate. But when he approached the palace, and beheld its riches, the\nproportion of its architecture, its avenues, gardens, statues, fountains,\nhe stood rapt in admiration, and almost forgot his own condition in\nsurveying the flourishing estate of others; but recollecting himself, he\npassed on boldly into the inner apartment, where the king and queen were\nsitting at dinner with their peers, Nausicaa having prepared them for his\napproach.\n\nTo them humbly kneeling, he made it his request that, since fortune had\ncast him naked upon their shores, they would take him into their\nprotection, and grant him a conveyance by one of the ships of which their\ngreat Phaeacian state had such good store, to carry him to his own\ncountry. Having delivered his request, to grace it with more humility he\nwent and sat himself down upon the hearth among the ashes, as the custom\nwas in those days when any would make a petition to the throne.\n\nHe seemed a petitioner of so great state and of so superior a deportment\nthat Alcinous himself arose to do him honour, and causing him to leave\nthat abject station which he had assumed, placed him next to his throne,\nupon a chair of state, and thus he spake to his peers:\n\n\"Lords and councillors of Phaeacia, ye see this man, who he is we know\nnot, that is come to us in the guise of a petitioner: he seems no mean\none; but whoever he is, it is fit, since the gods have cast him upon our\nprotection, that we grant him the rites of hospitality while he stays with\nus, and at his departure a ship well manned to convey so worthy a\npersonage as he seems to be, in a manner suitable to his rank, to his own\ncountry.\"\n\nThis counsel the peers with one consent approved; and wine and meat being\nset before Ulysses, he ate and drank, and gave the gods thanks who had\nstirred up the royal bounty of Alcinous to aid him in that extremity. But\nnot as yet did he reveal to the king and queen who he was, or whence he\nhad come; only in brief terms he related his being cast upon their shores,\nhis sleep in the woods, and his meeting with the princess Nausicaa, whose\ngenerosity, mingled with discretion, filled her parents with delight, as\nUlysses in eloquent phrases adorned and commended her virtues. But\nAlcinous, humanely considering that the troubles which his guest had\nundergone required rest, as well as refreshment by food, dismissed him\nearly in the evening to his chamber; where in a magnificent apartment\nUlysses found a smoother bed, but not a sounder repose, than he had\nenjoyed the night before, sleeping upon leaves which he had scraped\ntogether in his necessity.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER SEVEN\n\nThe Songs of Demodocus.--The Convoy Home.--The Mariners Transformed to\nStone.--The Young Shepherd.\n\n\nWhen it was daylight, Alcinous caused it to be proclaimed by the heralds\nabout the town that there was come to the palace a stranger, shipwrecked\non their coast, that in mien and person resembled a god; and inviting all\nthe chief people of the city to come and do honour to the stranger.\n\nThe palace was quickly filled with guests, old and young, for whose cheer,\nand to grace Ulysses more, Alcinous made a kingly feast with banquetings\nand music. Then, Ulysses being seated at a table next the king and queen,\nin all men's view, after they had feasted Alcinous ordered Demodocus, the\ncourt-singer, to be called to sing some song of the deeds of heroes, to\ncharm the ear of his guest. Demodocus came and reached his harp, where it\nhung between two pillars of silver; and then the blind singer, to whom, in\nrecompense of his lost sight, the muses had given an inward discernment, a\nsoul and a voice to excite the hearts of men and gods to delight, began in\ngrave and solemn strains to sing the glories of men highliest famed. He\nchose a poem whose subject was The Stern Strife stirred up between Ulysses\nand Great Achilles, as at a banquet sacred to the gods, in dreadful\nlanguage, they expressed their difference; while Agamemnon sat rejoiced in\nsoul to hear those Grecians jar; for the oracle in Pytho had told him that\nthe period of their wars in Troy should then be, when the kings of Greece,\nanxious to arrive at the wished conclusion, should fall to strife, and\ncontend which must end the war, force or stratagem.\n\nThis brave contention he expressed so to the life, in the very words which\nthey both used in the quarrel, as brought tears into the eyes of Ulysses\nat the remembrance of past passages of his life, and he held his large\npurple weed before his face to conceal it. Then craving a cup of wine, he\npoured it out in secret libation to the gods, who had put into the mind of\nDemodocus unknowingly to do him so much honour. But when the moving poet\nbegan to tell of other occurrences where Ulysses had been present, the\nmemory of his brave followers who had been with him in all difficulties,\nnow swallowed up and lost in the ocean, and of those kings that had fought\nwith him at Troy, some of whom were dead, some exiles like himself, forced\nitself so strongly upon his mind that forgetful where he was he sobbed\noutright with passion: which yet he restrained, but not so cunningly but\nAlcinous perceived it and without taking notice of it to Ulysses,\nprivately gave signs that Demodocus should cease from his singing.\n\nNext followed dancing in the Phaeacian fashion, when they would show\nrespect to their guests; which was succeeded by trials of skill, games of\nstrength, running, racing, hurling of the quoit, mock fights, hurling of\nthe javelin, shooting with the bow: in some of which Ulysses modestly\nchallenging his entertainers, performed such feats of strength and prowess\nas gave the admiring Phaeacians fresh reason to imagine that he was either\nsome god, or hero of the race of the gods.\n\nThese solemn shows and pageants in honour of his guest king Alcinous\ncontinued for the space of many days, as if he could never be weary of\nshowing courtesies to so worthy a stranger. In all this time he never\nasked him his name, nor sought to know more of him than he of his own\naccord disclosed; till on a day as they were seated feasting, after the\nfeast was ended, Demodocus being called, as was the custom, to sing some\ngrave matter, sang how Ulysses, on that night when Troy was fired, made\ndreadful proof of his valour, maintaining singly a combat against the\nwhole household of Deiphobus, to which the divine expresser gave both act\nand passion, and breathed such a fire into Ulysses's deeds that it\ninspired old death with life in the lively expressing of slaughters, and\nrendered life so sweet and passionate in the hearers that all who heard\nfelt it fleet from them in the narration: which made Ulysses even pity his\nown slaughterous deeds, and feel touches of remorse, to see how song can\nrevive a dead man from the grave, yet no way can it defend a living man\nfrom death; and in imagination he underwent some part of death's horrors,\nand felt in his living body a taste of those dying pangs which he had\ndealt to others; that with the strong conceit, tears (the true\ninterpreters of unutterable emotion) stood in his eyes.\n\nWhich king Alcinous noting, and that this was now the second time that he\nhad perceived him to be moved at the mention of events touching the Trojan\nwars, he took occasion to ask whether his guest had lost any friend or\nkinsman at Troy, that Demodocus's singing had brought into his mind. Then\nUlysses, drying the tears with his cloak, and observing that the eyes of\nall the company were upon him, desirous to give them satisfaction in what\nhe could, and thinking this a fit time to reveal his true name and\ndestination, spake as follows:\n\n\"The courtesies which ye all have shown me, and in particular yourself and\nprincely daughter, O king Alcinous, demand from me that I should no longer\nkeep you in ignorance of what or who I am; for to reserve any secret from\nyou, who have with such openness of friendship embraced my love, would\nargue either a pusillanimous or an ungrateful mind in me. Know, then, that\nI am that Ulysses, of whom I perceive ye have heard something; who\nheretofore have filled the world with the renown of my policies. I am he\nby whose counsels, if Fame is to be believed at all, more than by the\nunited valour of all the Grecians, Troy fell. I am that unhappy man whom\nthe heavens and angry gods have conspired to keep an exile on the seas,\nwandering to seek my home, which still flies from me. The land which I am\nin quest of is Ithaca; in whose ports some ship belonging to your\nnavigation-famed Phaeacian state may haply at some time have found a\nrefuge from tempests. If ever you have experienced such kindness, requite\nit now, by granting to me, who am the king of that land, a passport to\nthat land.\"\n\nAdmiration seized all the court of Alcinous, to behold in their presence\none of the number of those heroes who fought at Troy, whose divine story\nhad been made known to them by songs and poems, but of the truth they had\nlittle known, or rather they had hitherto accounted those heroic exploits\nas fictions and exaggerations of poets; but having seen and made proof of\nthe real Ulysses, they began to take those supposed inventions to be real\nverities, and the tale of Troy to be as true as it was delightful.\n\nThen king Alcinous made answer: \"Thrice fortunate ought we to esteem our\nlot, in having seen and conversed with a man of whom report hath spoken so\nloudly, but, as it seems, nothing beyond the truth. Though we could desire\nno felicity greater than to have you always among us, renowned Ulysses,\nyet your desire having been expressed so often and so deeply to return\nhome, we can deny you nothing, though to our own loss. Our kingdom of\nPhaeacia, as you know, is chiefly rich in shipping. In all parts of the\nworld, where there are navigable seas, or ships can pass, our vessels will\nbe found. You cannot name a coast to which they do not resort. Every rock\nand every quicksand is known to them that lurks in the vast deep. They\npass a bird in flight; and with such unerring certainty they make to their\ndestination that some have said that they have no need of pilot or rudder,\nbut that they move instinctively, self-directed, and know the minds of\ntheir voyagers. Thus much, that you may not fear to trust yourself in one\nof our Phaeacian ships. Tomorrow, if you please, you shall launch forth.\nTo-day spend with us in feasting, who never can do enough when the gods\nsend such visitors.\"\n\nUlysses acknowledged king Alcinous's bounty; and while these two royal\npersonages stood interchanging courteous expressions, the heart of the\nprincess Nausicaa was overcome: she had been gazing attentively upon her\nfather's guest as he delivered his speech; but when he came to that part\nwhere he declared himself to be Ulysses, she blessed herself and her\nfortune that in relieving a poor shipwrecked mariner, as he seemed no\nbetter, she had conferred a kindness on so divine a hero as he proved; and\nscarce waiting till her father had done speaking, with a cheerful\ncountenance she addressed Ulysses, bidding him be cheerful, and when he\nreturned home, as by her father's means she trusted he would shortly,\nsometimes to remember to whom he owed his life, and who met him in the\nwoods by the river Callicoe.\n\n\"Fair flower of Phaeacia,\" he replied, \"so may all the gods bless me with\nthe strife of joys in that desired day, whenever I shall see it, as I\nshall always acknowledge to be indebted to your fair hand for the gift of\nlife which I enjoy, and all the blessings which shall follow upon my\nhome-return. The gods give thee, Nausicaa, a princely husband; and from\nyou two spring blessings to this state.\" So prayed Ulysses, his heart\noverflowing with admiration and grateful recollections of king Alcinous's\ndaughter.\n\nThen at the king's request he gave them a brief relation of all the\nadventures that had befallen him since he launched forth from Troy; during\nwhich the princess Nausicaa took great delight (as ladies are commonly\ntaken with these kind of travellers' stories) to hear of the monster\nPolyphemus, of the men that devour each other in Laestrygonia, of the\nenchantress Circe, of Scylla, and the rest; to which she listened with a\nbreathless attention, letting fall a shower of tears from her fair eyes\nevery now and then, when Ulysses told of some more than usual distressful\npassage in his travels; and all the rest of his auditors, if they had\nbefore entertained a high respect for their guest, now felt their\nveneration increased tenfold, when they learned from his own mouth what\nperils, what sufferance, what endurance, of evils beyond man's strength to\nsupport, this much-sustaining, almost heavenly man, by the greatness of\nhis mind, and by his invincible courage, had struggled through.\n\n[Illustration: _He gave them a brief relation of all the adventures that\nhad befallen him_.]\n\nThe night was far spent before Ulysses had ended his narrative, and with\nwishful glances he cast his eyes towards the eastern parts, which the sun\nhad begun to flecker with his first red; for on the morrow Alcinous had\npromised that a bark should be in readiness to convoy him to Ithaca.\n\nIn the morning a vessel well manned and appointed was waiting for him;\ninto which the king and queen heaped presents of gold and silver, massy\nplate, apparel, armour, and whatsoever things of cost or rarity they\njudged would be most acceptable to their guest; and the sails being set,\nUlysses, embarking with expressions of regret, took his leave of his royal\nentertainers, of the fair princess (who had been his first friend), and of\nthe peers of Phaeacia; who crowding down to the beach to have the last\nsight of their illustrious visitant, beheld the gallant ship with all her\ncanvas spread, bounding and curveting over the waves, like a horse proud\nof his rider, or as if she knew that in her capacious womb's rich\nfreightage she bore Ulysses.\n\nHe whose life past had been a series of disquiets, in seas among rude\nwaves, in battles amongst ruder foes, now slept securely, forgetting all;\nhis eye-lids bound in such deep sleep as only yielded to death; and when\nthey reached the nearest Ithacan port by the next morning, he was still\nasleep. The mariners, not willing to awake him, landed him softly, and\nlaid him in a cave at the foot of an olive-tree, which made a shady recess\nin that narrow harbour, the haunt of almost none but the sea-nymphs, which\nare called Naiads; few ships before this Phaeacian vessel having put into\nthat haven, by reason of the difficulty and narrowness of the entrance.\nHere leaving him asleep, and disposing in safe places near him the\npresents with which king Alcinous had dismissed him, they departed for\nPhaeacia; where these wretched mariners never again set foot; but just as\nthey arrived, and thought to salute their country earth, in sight of their\ncity's turrets, and in open view of their friends who from the harbour\nwith shouts greeted their return, their vessel and all the mariners which\nwere in her were turned to stone, and stood transformed and fixed in sight\nof the whole Phaeacian city, where it yet stands, by Neptune's vindictive\nwrath; who resented thus highly the contempt which those Phaeacians had\nshown in convoying home a man whom the god had destined to destruction.\nWhence it comes to pass that the Phaeacians at this day will at no price\nbe induced to lend their ships to strangers, or to become the carriers for\nother nations, so highly do they still dread the displeasure of their\nsea-god, while they see that terrible monument ever in sight.\n\nWhen Ulysses awoke, which was not till some time after the mariners had\ndeparted, he did not at first know his country again, either that long\nabsence had made it strange, or that Minerva (which was more likely) had\ncast a cloud about his eyes, that he should have greater pleasure\nhereafter in discovering his mistake; but like a man suddenly awaking in\nsome desert isle, to which his sea-mates have transported him in his\nsleep, he looked around, and discerning no known objects, he cast his\nhands to heaven for pity, and complained on those ruthless men who had\nbeguiled him with a promise of conveying him home to this country, and\nperfidiously left him to perish in an unknown land. But then the rich\npresents of gold and silver given him by Alcinous, which he saw carefully\nlaid up in secure places near him, staggered him: which seemed not like\nthe act of wrongful or unjust men, such as turn pirates for gain, or land\nhelpless passengers in remote coasts to possess themselves of their goods.\n\nWhile he remained in this suspense, there came up to him a young shepherd,\nclad in the finer sort of apparel, such as kings' sons wore in those days\nwhen princes did not disdain to tend sheep, who, accosting him, was\nsaluted again by Ulysses, who asked him what country that was on which he\nhad been just landed, and whether it were part of a continent, or an\nisland. The young shepherd made show of wonder, to hear any one ask the\nname of that land; as country people are apt to esteem those for mainly\nignorant and barbarous who do not know the names of places which are\nfamiliar to _them_, though perhaps they who ask have had no opportunities\nof knowing, and may have come from far countries.\n\n\"I had thought,\" said he, \"that all people knew our land. It is rocky and\nbarren, to be sure; but well enough: it feeds a goat or an ox well; it is\nnot wanting either in wine or in wheat; it has good springs of water, some\nfair rivers; and wood enough, as you may see: it is called Ithaca.\"\n\nUlysses was joyed enough to find himself in his own country; but so\nprudently he carried his joy, that, dissembling his true name and quality,\nhe pretended to the shepherd that he was only some foreigner who by stress\nof weather had put into that port; and framed on the sudden a story to\nmake it plausible, how he had come from Crete in a ship of Phaeacia; when\nthe young shepherd, laughing, and taking Ulysses's hand in both his, said\nto him: \"He must be cunning, I find, who thinks to overreach you. What,\ncannot you quit your wiles and your subtleties, now that you are in a\nstate of security? must the first word with which you salute your native\nearth be an untruth? and think you that you are unknown?\"\n\nUlysses looked again; and he saw, not a shepherd, but a beautiful woman,\nwhom he immediately knew to be the goddess Minerva, that in the wars of\nTroy had frequently vouchsafed her sight to him; and had been with him\nsince in perils, saving him unseen.\n\n\"Let not my ignorance offend thee, great Minerva,\" he cried, \"or move thy\ndispleasure, that in that shape I knew thee not; since the skill of\ndiscerning of deities is not attainable by wit or study, but hard to be\nhit by the wisest of mortals. To know thee truly through all thy changes\nis only given to those whom thou art pleased to grace. To all men thou\ntakest all likenesses. All men in their wits think that they know thee,\nand that they have thee. Thou art wisdom itself. But a semblance of thee,\nwhich is false wisdom, often is taken for thee, so thy counterfeit view\nappears to many, but thy true presence to few: those are they which,\nloving thee above all, are inspired with light from thee to know thee. But\nthis I surely know, that all the time the sons of Greece waged war against\nTroy, I was sundry times graced with thy appearance; but since, I have\nnever been able to set eyes upon thee till now; but have wandered at my\nown discretion, to myself a blind guide, erring up and down the world,\nwanting thee.\"\n\nThen Minerva cleared his eyes, and he knew the ground on which he stood to\nbe Ithaca, and that cave to be the same which the people of Ithaca had in\nformer times made sacred to the sea-nymphs, and where he himself had done\nsacrifices to them a thousand times; and full in his view stood Mount\nNerytus with all his woods: so that now he knew for a certainty that he\nwas arrived in his own country, and with the delight which he felt he\ncould not forbear stooping down and kissing the soil.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER EIGHT\n\nThe Change from a King to a Beggar.--Eumaeus and the Herdsmen.--\nTelemachus.\n\n\nNot long did Minerva suffer him to indulge vain transports; but briefly\nrecounting to him the events which had taken place in Ithaca during his\nabsence, she showed him that his way to his wife and throne did not lie so\nopen, but that before he were reinstated in the secure possession of them\nhe must encounter many difficulties. His palace, wanting its king, was\nbecome the resort of insolent and imperious men, the chief nobility of\nIthaca and of the neighboring isles, who, in the confidence of Ulysses\nbeing dead, came as suitors to Penelope. The queen (it was true) continued\nsingle, but was little better than a state-prisoner in the power of these\nmen, who, under a pretence of waiting her decision, occupied the king's\nhouse rather as owners than guests, lording and domineering at their\npleasure, profaning the palace and wasting the royal substance with their\nfeasts and mad riots. Moreover, the goddess told him how, fearing the\nattempts of these lawless men upon the person of his young son Telemachus,\nshe herself had put it into the heart of the prince to go and seek his\nfather in far countries; how in the shape of Mentor she had borne him\ncompany in his long search; which, though failing, as she meant it should\nfail, in its first object, had yet had this effect, that through hardships\nhe had learned endurance, through experience he had gathered wisdom, and\nwherever his footsteps had been he had left such memorials of his worth as\nthe fame of Ulysses's son was already blown throughout the world. That it\nwas now not many days since Telemachus had arrived in the island, to the\ngreat joy of the queen his mother, who had thought him dead, by reason of\nhis long absence, and had begun to mourn for him with a grief equal to\nthat which she endured for Ulysses: the goddess herself having so ordered\nthe course of his adventures that the time of his return should correspond\nwith the return of Ulysses, that they might together concert measures how\nto repress the power and insolence of those wicked suitors. This the\ngoddess told him; but of the particulars of his son's adventures, of his\nhaving been detained in the Delightful Island, which his father had so\nlately left, of Calypso and her nymphs, and the many strange occurrences\nwhich may be read with profit and delight in the history of the prince's\nadventures, she forbore to tell him as yet, as judging that he would hear\nthem with greater pleasure from the lips of his son, when he should have\nhim in an hour of stillness and safety, when their work should be done,\nand none of their enemies left alive to trouble them.\n\n[Illustration: _Consulting how they might with safety bring about his\nrestoration_.]\n\nThen they sat down, the goddess and Ulysses, at the foot of a wild\nolive-tree, consulting how they might with safety bring about his\nrestoration. And when Ulysses revolved in his mind how that his enemies\nwere a multitude, and he single, he began to despond, and he said, \"I shall\ndie an ill death like Agamemnon; in the threshold of my own house I shall\nperish, like that unfortunate monarch, slain by some one of my wife's\nsuitors.\" But then again calling to mind his ancient courage, he secretly\nwished that Minerva would but breathe such a spirit into his bosom as she\ninflamed him with in the hour of Troy's destruction, that he might\nencounter with three hundred of those impudent suitors at once, and strew\nthe pavements of his beautiful palace with their bloods and brains.\n\nAnd Minerva knew his thoughts, and she said, \"I will be strongly with\nthee, if thou fail not to do thy part. And for a sign between us that I\nwill perform my promise and for a token on thy part of obedience, I must\nchange thee, that thy person may not be known of men.\"\n\nThen Ulysses bowed his head to receive the divine impression, and Minerva\nby her great power changed his person so that it might not be known. She\nchanged him to appearance into a very old man, yet such a one as by his\nlimbs and gait seemed to have been some considerable person in his time,\nand to retain yet some remains of his once prodigious strength. Also,\ninstead of those rich robes in which king Alcinous had clothed him, she\nthrew over his limbs such old and tattered rags as wandering beggars\nusually wear. A staff supported his steps, and a scrip hung to his back,\nsuch as travelling mendicants used to hold the scraps which are given to\nthem at rich men's doors. So from a king he became a beggar, as wise\nTiresias had predicted to him in the shades.\n\nTo complete his humiliation, and to prove his obedience by suffering, she\nnext directed him in his beggarly attire to go and present himself to his\nold herdsman Eumaeus, who had the care of his swine and his cattle, and\nhad been a faithful steward to him all the time of his absence. Then\nstrictly charging Ulysses that he should reveal himself to no man, but to\nhis own son, whom she would send to him when she saw occasion, the goddess\nwent her way.\n\nThe transformed Ulysses bent his course to the cottage of the herdsman,\nand, entering in at the front court, the dogs, of which Eumaeus kept many\nfierce ones for the protection of the cattle, flew with open mouths upon\nhim, as those ignoble animals have oftentimes an antipathy to the sight of\nanything like a beggar, and would have rent him in pieces with their\nteeth, if Ulysses had not had the prudence to let fall his staff, which\nhad chiefly provoked their fury, and sat himself down in a careless\nfashion upon the ground; but for all that some serious hurt had certainly\nbeen done to him, so raging the dogs were, had not the herdsman, whom the\nbarking of the dogs had fetched out of the house, with shouting and with\nthrowing of stones repressed them.\n\nHe said, when he saw Ulysses, \"Old father, how near you were to being torn\nin pieces by these rude dogs! I should never have forgiven myself, if\nthrough neglect of mine any hurt had happened to you. But Heaven has given\nme so many cares to my portion that I might well be excused for not\nattending to everything: while here I lie grieving and mourning for the\nabsence of that majesty which once ruled here, and am forced to fatten his\nswine and his cattle for food to evil men, who hate him and who wish his\ndeath; when he perhaps strays up and down the world, and has not wherewith\nto appease hunger, if indeed he yet lives (which is a question) and enjoys\nthe cheerful light of the sun.\" This he said, little thinking that he of\nwhom he spoke now stood before him, and that in that uncouth disguise and\nbeggarly obscurity was present the hidden majesty of Ulysses.\n\nThen he had his guest into the house, and sat meat and drink before him;\nand Ulysses said, \"May Jove and all the other gods requite you for the\nkind speeches and hospitable usage which you have shown me!\"\n\nEumaeus made answer, \"My poor guest, if one in much worse plight than\nyourself had arrived here, it were a shame to such scanty means as I have\nif I had let him depart without entertaining him to the best of my\nability. Poor men, and such as have no houses of their own, are by Jove\nhimself recommended to our care. But the cheer which we that are servants\nto other men have to bestow is but sorry at most, yet freely and lovingly\nI give it you. Indeed, there once ruled here a man, whose return the gods\nhave set their faces against, who, if he had been suffered to reign in\npeace and grow old among us, would have been kind to me and mine. But he\nis gone; and for his sake would to God that the whole posterity of Helen\nmight perish with her, since in her quarrel so many worthies have\nperished! But such as your fare is, eat it, and be welcome--such lean\nbeasts as are food for poor herdsmen. The fattest go to feed the voracious\nstomachs of the queen's suitors. Shame on their unworthiness! there is no\nday in which two or three of the noblest of the herd are not slain to\nsupport their feasts and their surfeits.\"\n\n[Illustration: '_But such as your fare is, eat it, and be welcome_.']\n\nUlysses gave good ear to his words; and as he ate his meat, he even tore\nit and rent it with his teeth, for mere vexation that his fat cattle\nshould be slain to glut the appetites of those godless suitors. And he\nsaid, \"What chief or what ruler is this, that thou commendest so highly,\nand sayest that he perished at Troy? I am but a stranger in these parts.\nIt may be I have heard of some such in my long travels.\"\n\nEumaeus answered, \"Old father, never any one of all the strangers that\nhave come to our coast with news of Ulysses being alive could gain credit\nwith the queen or her son yet. These travellers, to get raiment or a meal,\nwill not stick to invent any lie. Truth is not the commodity they deal in.\nNever did the queen get anything of them but lies. She receives all that\ncome graciously, hears their stories, inquires all she can, but all ends\nin tears and dissatisfaction. But in God's name, old father, if you have\ngot a tale, make the most on't, it may gain you a cloak or a coat from\nsomebody to keep you warm; but for him who is the subject of it, dogs and\nvultures long since have torn him limb from limb, or some great fish at\nsea has devoured him, or he lieth with no better monument upon his bones\nthan the sea-sand. But for me past all the race of men were tears created;\nfor I never shall find so kind a royal master more; not if my father or my\nmother could come again and visit me from the tomb, would my eyes be so\nblessed, as they should be with the sight of him again, coming as from the\ndead. In his last rest my soul shall love him. He is not here, nor do I\nname him as a flatterer, but because I am thankful for his love and care\nwhich he had to me a poor man; and if I knew surely that he were past all\nshores that the sun shines upon, I would invoke him as a deified thing.\"\n\nFor this saying of Eumaeus the waters stood in Ulysses's eyes, and he\nsaid, \"My friend, to say and to affirm positively that he cannot be alive\nis to give too much license to incredulity. For, not to speak at random,\nbut with as much solemnity as an oath comes to, I say to you that Ulysses\nshall return; and whenever that day shall be, then shall you give to me a\ncloak and a coat; but till then, I will not receive so much as a thread of\na garment, but rather go naked; for no less than the gates of hell do I\nhate that man whom poverty can force to tell an untruth. Be Jove then\nwitness to my words, that this very year, nay, ere this month be fully\nended, your eyes shall behold Ulysses, dealing vengeance in his own palace\nupon the wrongers of his wife and his son.\"\n\nTo give the better credence to his words, he amused Eumaeus with a forged\nstory of his life; feigning of himself that he was a Cretan born, and one\nthat went with Idomeneus to the wars of Troy. Also he said that he knew\nUlysses, and related various passages which he alleged to have happened\nbetwixt Ulysses and himself, which were either true in the main, as having\nreally happened between Ulysses and some other person, or were so like to\ntruth, as corresponding with the known character and actions of Ulysses,\nthat Eumaeus's incredulity was not a little shaken. Among other things he\nasserted that he had lately been entertained in the court of Thesprotia,\nwhere the king's son of the country had told him that Ulysses had been\nthere but just before him, and was gone upon a voyage to the oracle of\nJove in Dodona, whence he should shortly return, and a ship would be ready\nby the bounty of the Thesprotians to convoy him straight to Ithaca. \"And\nin token that what I tell you is true,\" said Ulysses, \"if your king come\nnot within the period which I have named, you shall have leave to give\nyour servants commandment to take my old carcass, and throw it headlong\nfrom some steep rock into the sea, that poor men, taking example by me,\nmay fear to lie.\" But Eumaeus made answer that that should be small\nsatisfaction or pleasure to him.\n\nSo while they sat discoursing in this manner, supper was served in, and\nthe servants of the herdsman, who had been out all day in the fields, came\nin to supper, and took their seats at the fire, for the night was bitter\nand frosty. After supper, Ulysses, who had well eaten and drunken, and was\nrefreshed with the herdsman's good cheer, was resolved to try whether his\nhost's hospitality would extend to the lending him a good warm mantle or\nrug to cover him in the night season; and framing an artful tale for the\npurpose, in a merry mood, filling a cup of Greek wine, he thus began:\n\n\"I will tell you a story of your king Ulysses and myself. If there is ever\na time when a man may have leave to tell his own stories, it is when he\nhas drunken a little too much. Strong liquor driveth the fool, and moves\neven the heart of the wise, moves and impels him to sing and to dance, and\nbreak forth in pleasant laughters, and perchance to prefer a speech too\nwhich were better kept in. When the heart is open, the tongue will be\nstirring. But you shall hear. We led our powers to ambush once under the\nwalls of Troy.\"\n\nThe herdsmen crowded about him eager to hear anything which related to\ntheir king Ulysses and the wars of Troy, and thus he went on:\n\n\"I remember, Ulysses and Menelaus had the direction of that enterprise,\nand they were pleased to join me with them in the command. I was at that\ntime in some repute among men, though fortune has played me a trick since,\nas you may perceive. But I was somebody in those times, and could do\nsomething. Be that as it may, a bitter freezing night it was, such a night\nas this, the air cut like steel, and the sleet gathered on our shields\nlike crystal. There was some twenty of us, that lay close crouched down\namong the reeds and bulrushes that grew in the moat that goes round the\ncity. The rest of us made tolerable shift, for every man had been careful\nto bring with him a good cloak or mantle to wrap over his armour and keep\nhimself warm; but I, as it chanced, had left my cloak behind me, as not\nexpecting that the night would prove so cold, or rather I believe because\nI had at that time a brave suit of new armour on, which, being a soldier,\nand having some of the soldier's vice about me--_vanity_--I was not\nwilling should be hidden under a cloak; but I paid for my indiscretion\nwith my sufferings, for with the inclement night, and the wet of the ditch\nin which we lay, I was well-nigh frozen to death; and when I could endure\nno longer, I jogged Ulysses who was next to me, and had a nimble ear, and\nmade known my case to him, assuring him that I must inevitably perish. He\nanswered in a low whisper, 'Hush, lest any Greek should hear you, and take\nnotice of your softness.' Not a word more he said, but showed as if he had\nno pity for the plight I was in. But he was as considerate as he was\nbrave; and even then, as he lay with his head reposing upon his hand, he\nwas meditating how to relieve me, without exposing my weakness to the\nsoldiers. At last, raising up his head, he made as if he had been asleep,\nand said, 'Friends, I have been warned in a dream to send to the fleet to\nking Agamemnon for a supply, to recruit our numbers, for we are not\nsufficient for this enterprise; and they believing him, one Thoas was\ndespatched on that errand, who departing, for more speed, as Ulysses had\nforeseen, left his upper garment behind him, a good warm mantle, to which\nI succeeded, and by the help of it got through the night with credit. This\nshift Ulysses made for one in need, and would to heaven that I had now\nthat strength in my limbs which made me in those days to be accounted fit\nto be a leader under Ulysses! I should not then want the loan of a cloak\nor a mantle, to wrap about me and shield my old limbs from the night air.\"\n\nThe tale pleased the herdsmen; and Eumaeus, who more than all the rest was\ngratified to hear tales of Ulysses, true or false, said that for his story\nhe deserved a mantle, and a night's lodging, which he should have; and he\nspread for him a bed of goat and sheep skins by the fire; and the seeming\nbeggar, who was indeed the true Ulysses, lay down and slept under that\npoor roof, in that abject disguise to which the will of Minerva had\nsubjected him.\n\nWhen morning was come, Ulysses made offer to depart, as if he were not\nwilling to burden his host's hospitality any longer, but said that he\nwould go and try the humanity of the townsfolk, if any there would bestow\nupon him a bit of bread or a cup of drink. Perhaps the queen's suitors (he\nsaid), out of their full feasts, would bestow a scrap on him; for he could\nwait at table, if need were, and play the nimble serving-man; he could\nfetch wood (he said) or build a fire, prepare roast meat or boiled, mix\nthe wine with water, or do any of those offices which recommended poor men\nlike him to services in great men's houses.\n\n\"Alas! poor guest,\" said Eumaeus, \"you know not what you speak. What\nshould so poor and old a man as you do at the suitors' tables? Their light\nminds are not given to such grave servitors. They must have youths, richly\ntricked out in flowing vests, with curled hair, like so many of Jove's\ncupbearers, to fill out the wine to them as they sit at table, and to\nshift their trenchers. Their gorged insolence would but despise and make a\nmock at thy age. Stay here. Perhaps the queen, or Telemachus, hearing of\nthy arrival, may send to thee of their bounty.\"\n\nAs he spake these words, the steps of one crossing the front court were\nheard, and a noise of the dogs fawning and leaping about as for joy; by\nwhich token Eumaeus guessed that it was the prince, who, hearing of a\ntraveller being arrived at Eumaeus's cottage that brought tidings of his\nfather, was come to search the truth; and Eumaeus said, \"It is the tread\nof Telemachus, the son of king Ulysses.\" Before he could well speak the\nwords, the prince was at the door, whom Ulysses rising to receive,\nTelemachus would not suffer that so aged a man, as he appeared, should\nrise to do respect to him, but he courteously and reverently took him by\nthe hand, and inclined his head to him, as if he had surely known that it\nwas his father indeed; but Ulysses covered his eyes with his hands, that\nhe might not show the waters which stood in them. And Telemachus said, \"Is\nthis the man who can tell us tidings of the king my father?\"\n\n\"He brags himself to be a Cretan born,\" said Eumaeus, \"and that he has\nbeen a soldier and a traveller, but whether he speak the truth or not he\nalone can tell. But whatsoever he has been, what he is now is apparent.\nSuch as he appears, I give him to you; do what you will with him; his\nboast at present is that he is at the very best a supplicant.\"\n\n\"Be he what he may,\" said Telemachus, \"I accept him at your hands. But\nwhere I should bestow him I know not, seeing that in the palace his age\nwould not exempt him from the scorn and contempt which my mother's suitors\nin their light minds would be sure to fling upon him: a mercy if he\nescaped without blows; for they are a company of evil men, whose\nprofession is wrongs and violence.\"\n\nUlysses answered: \"Since it is free for any man to speak in presence of\nyour greatness, I must say that my heart puts on a wolfish inclination to\ntear and to devour, hearing your speech, that these suitors should with\nsuch injustice rage, where you should have the rule solely. What should\nthe cause be? do you wilfully give way to their ill manners? or has your\ngovernment been such as has procured ill-will towards you from your\npeople? or do you mistrust your kinsfolk and friends in such sort as\nwithout trial to decline their aid? A man's kindred are they that he might\ntrust to when extremities run high.\"\n\nTelemachus replied: \"The kindred of Ulysses are few. I have no brothers to\nassist me in the strife. But the suitors are powerful in kindred and\nfriends. The house of old Arcesius has had this fate from the heavens,\nthat from old it still has been supplied with single heirs. To Arcesius,\nLaertes only was born, from Laertes descended only Ulysses, from Ulysses I\nalone have sprung, whom he left so young that from me never comfort arose\nto him. But the end of all rests in the hands of the gods.\"\n\nThen Eumaeus departing to see to some necessary business of his herds,\nMinerva took a woman's shape, and stood in the entry of the door, and was\nseen to Ulysses, but by his son she was not seen, for the presences of the\ngods are invisible save to those to whom they will to reveal themselves.\nNevertheless, the dogs which were about the door saw the goddess, and\ndurst not bark, but went crouching and licking of the dust for fear. And\ngiving signs to Ulysses that the time was now come in which he should make\nhimself known to his son, by her great power she changed back his shape\ninto the same which it was before she transformed him; and Telemachus, who\nsaw the change, but nothing of the manner by which it was effected, only\nhe saw the appearance of a king in the vigour of his age where but just\nnow he had seen a worn and decrepit beggar, was struck with fear, and\nsaid, \"Some god has done this house this honour,\" and he turned away his\neyes, and would have worshipped. But his father permitted not, but said,\n\"Look better at me; I am no deity; why put you upon me the reputation of\ngodhead? I am no more but thy father: I am even he; I am that Ulysses by\nreason of whose absence thy youth has been exposed to such wrongs from\ninjurious men.\" Then kissed he his son, nor could any longer refrain those\ntears which he had held under such mighty restraint before, though they\nwould ever be forcing themselves out in spite of him; but now, as if their\nsluices had burst, they came out like rivers, pouring upon the warm cheeks\nof his son. Nor yet by all these violent arguments could Telemachus be\npersuaded to believe that it was his father, but he said some deity had\ntaken that shape to mock him; for he affirmed that it was not in the power\nof any man, who is sustained by mortal food, to change his shape so in a\nmoment from age to youth: for, \"but now,\" said he, \"you were all wrinkles,\nand were old, and now you look as the gods are pictured.\"\n\n[Illustration: \"_I am no more but thy father: I am even he._\"]\n\nHis father replied: \"Admire, but fear not, and know me to be at all parts\nsubstantially thy father, who in the inner powers of his mind, and the\nunseen workings of a father's love to thee, answers to his outward shape\nand pretence! There shall no more Ulysseses come here. I am he that after\ntwenty years' absence, and suffering a world of ill, have recovered at\nlast the sight of my country earth. It was the will of Minerva that I\nshould be changed as you saw me. She put me thus together; she puts\ntogether or takes to pieces whom she pleases. It is in the law of her free\npower to do it: sometimes to show her favourites under a cloud, and poor,\nand again to restore to them their ornaments. The gods raise and throw\ndown men with ease.\"\n\nThen Telemachus could hold out no longer, but he gave way now to a full\nbelief and persuasion, of that which for joy at first he could not credit,\nthat it was indeed his true and very father that stood before him; and\nthey embraced, and mingled their tears.\n\nThen said Ulysses, \"Tell me who these suitors are, what are their numbers,\nand how stands the queen thy mother affected to them?\"\n\n\"She bears them still in expectation,\" said Telemachus, \"which she never\nmeans to fulfil, that she will accept the hand of some one of them in\nsecond nuptials. For she fears to displease them by an absolute refusal.\nSo from day to day she lingers them on with hope, which they are content\nto bear the deferring of, while they have entertainment at free cost in\nour palace.\"\n\nThen said Ulysses, \"Reckon up their numbers that we may know their\nstrength and ours, if we having none but ourselves may hope to prevail\nagainst them.\"\n\n\"O father,\" he replied, \"I have ofttimes heard of your fame for wisdom,\nand of the great strength of your arm, but the venturous mind which your\nspeeches now indicate moves me even to amazement: for in nowise can it\nconsist with wisdom or a sound mind that two should try their strengths\nagainst a host. Nor five, or ten, or twice ten strong are these suitors,\nbut many more by much: from Dulichium came there fifty and two, they and\ntheir servants; twice twelve crossed the seas hither from Samos; from\nZacynthus twice ten; of our native Ithacans, men of chief note, are twelve\nwho aspire to the bed and crown of Penelope; and all these under one\nstrong roof--a fearful odds against two! My father, there is need of\ncaution, lest the cup which your great mind so thirsts to taste of\nvengeance prove bitter to yourself in the drinking. And therefore it were\nwell that we should bethink us of some one who might assist us in this\nundertaking.\"\n\n\"Thinkest thou,\" said his father, \"if we had Minerva and the king of skies\nto be our friends, would their sufficiencies make strong our part; or must\nwe look out for some further aid yet?\"\n\n\"They you speak of are above the clouds,\" said Telemachus, \"and are sound\naids indeed; as powers that not only exceed human, but bear the chiefest\nsway among the gods themselves.\"\n\nThen Ulysses gave directions to his son to go and mingle with the suitors,\nand in nowise to impart his secret to any, not even to the queen his\nmother, but to hold himself in readiness, and to have his weapons and his\ngood armour in preparation. And he charged him that when he himself should\ncome to the palace, as he meant to follow shortly after, and present\nhimself in his beggar's likeness to the suitors, that whatever he should\nsee which might grieve his heart, with what foul usage and contumelious\nlanguage soever the suitors should receive his father, coming in that\nshape, though they should strike and drag him by the heels along the\nfloors, that he should not stir nor make offer to oppose them, further\nthan by mild words to expostulate with them, until Minerva from heaven\nshould give the sign which should be the prelude to their destruction.\nAnd Telemachus, promising to obey his instructions, departed; and the\nshape of Ulysses fell to what it had been before, and he became to all\noutward appearance a beggar, in base and beggarly attire.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER NINE\n\nThe Queen's Suitors.--The Battle of the Beggars.--The Armour Taken Down.--\nThe Meeting with Penelope.\n\n\nFrom the house of Eumaeus the seeming beggar took his way, leaning on his\nstaff, till he reached the palace, entering in at the hall where the\nsuitors sat at meat. They in the pride of their feasting began to break\ntheir jests in mirthful manner, when they saw one looking so poor and so\naged approach. He, who expected no better entertainment, was nothing moved\nat their behaviour, but, as became the character which he had assumed, in\na suppliant posture crept by turns to every suitor, and held out his hands\nfor some charity, with such a natural and beggar-resembling grace that he\nmight seem to have practised begging all his life; yet there was a sort of\ndignity in his most abject stoopings, that whoever had seen him would have\nsaid, If it had pleased Heaven that this poor man had been born a king, he\nwould gracefully have filled a throne. And some pitied him, and some gave\nhim alms, as their present humours inclined them, but the greater part\nreviled him, and bade him begone, as one that spoiled their feast; for the\npresence of misery has this power with it, that, while it stays, it can\nash and overturn the mirth even of those who feel no pity or wish to\nrelieve it: nature bearing this witness of herself in the hearts of the\nmost obdurate.\n\n[Illustration: _But the greater part reviled him and bade him begone_.]\n\nNow Telemachus sat at meat with the suitors, and knew that it was the king\nhis father who in that shape begged an alms; and when his father came and\npresented himself before him in turn, as he had done to the suitors one by\none, he gave him of his own meat which he had in his dish, and of his own\ncup to drink. And the suitors were past measure offended to see a pitiful\nbeggar, as they esteemed him, to be so choicely regarded by the prince.\n\nThen Antinous, who was a great lord, and of chief note among the suitors,\nsaid, \"Prince Telemachus does ill to encourage these wandering beggars,\nwho go from place to place, affirming that they have been some\nconsiderable persons in their time, filling the ears of such as hearken to\nthem with lies, and pressing with their bold feet into kings' palaces.\nThis is some saucy vagabond, some travelling Egyptian.\"\n\n\"I see,\" said Ulysses, \"that a poor man should get but little at your\nboard; scarce should he get salt from your hands, if he brought his own\nmeat.\"\n\nLord Antinous, indignant to be answered with such sharpness by a supposed\nbeggar, snatched up a stool, with which he smote Ulysses where the neck\nand shoulders join. This usage moved not Ulysses; but in his great heart\nhe meditated deep evils to come upon them all, which for a time must be\nkept close, and he went and sat himself down in the door-way to eat of\nthat which was given him; and he said, \"For life or possessions a man will\nfight, but for his belly this man smites. If a poor man has any god to\ntake his part, my lord Antinous shall not live to be the queen's husband.\"\n\nThen Antinous raged highly, and threatened to drag him by the heels, and\nto rend his rags about his ears, if he spoke another word.\n\nBut the other suitors did in nowise approve of the harsh language, nor of\nthe blow which Antinous had dealt; and some of them said, \"Who knows but\none of the deities goes about hid under that poor disguise? for in the\nlikeness of poor pilgrims the gods have many times descended to try the\ndispositions of men, whether they be humane or impious.\" While these\nthings passed, Telemachus sat and observed all, but held his peace,\nremembering the instructions of his father. But secretly he waited for the\nsign which Minerva was to send from heaven.\n\nThat day there followed Ulysses to the court one of the common sort of\nbeggars, Irus by name, one that had received alms beforetime of the\nsuitors, and was their ordinary sport, when they were inclined (as that\nday) to give way to mirth, to see him eat and drink; for he had the\nappetite of six men, and was of huge stature and proportions of body; yet\nhad in him no spirit nor courage of a man. This man, thinking to curry\nfavour with the suitors, and recommend himself especially to such a great\nlord as Antinous was, began to revile and scorn Ulysses, putting foul\nlanguage upon him, and fairly challenging him to fight with the fist. But\nUlysses, deeming his railings to be nothing more than jealousy and that\nenvious disposition which beggars commonly manifest to brothers in their\ntrade, mildly besought him not to trouble him, but to enjoy that portion\nwhich the liberality of their entertainers gave him, as he did quietly;\nseeing that, of their bounty, there was sufficient for all.\n\nBut Irus, thinking that this forbearance in Ulysses was nothing more than\na sign of fear, so much the more highly stormed, and bellowed, and\nprovoked him to fight; and by this time the quarrel had attracted the\nnotice of the suitors, who with loud laughters and shouting egged on the\ndispute, and lord Antinous swore by all the gods it should be a battle,\nand that in that hall the strife should be determined. To this the rest of\nthe suitors with violent clamours acceded, and a circle was made for the\ncombatants, and a fat goat was proposed as the victor's prize, as at the\nOlympic or the Pythian games. Then Ulysses, seeing no remedy, or being not\nunwilling that the suitors should behold some proof of that strength which\nere long in their own persons they were to taste of, stripped himself, and\nprepared for the combat. But first he demanded that he should have fair\nplay shown him, that none in that assembly should aid his opponent, or\ntake part against him, for, being an old man, they might easily crush him\nwith their strengths. And Telemachus passed his word that no foul play\nshould be shown him, but that each party should be left to their own\nunassisted strengths, and to this he made Antinous and the rest of the\nsuitors swear.\n\nBut when Ulysses had laid aside his garments, and was bare to the waist,\nall the beholders admired at the goodly sight of his large shoulders,\nbeing of such exquisite shape and whiteness, and at his great and brawny\nbosom, and the youthful strength which seemed to remain in a man thought\nso old; and they said, What limbs and what sinews he has! and coward fear\nseized on the mind of that great vast beggar, and he dropped his threats,\nand his big words, and would have fled, but lord Antinous stayed him, and\nthreatened him that if he declined the combat, he would put him in a ship,\nand land him on the shores where king Echetus reigned, the roughest tyrant\nwhich at that time the world contained, and who had that antipathy to\nrascal beggars, such as he, that when any landed on his coast he would\ncrop their ears and noses and give them to the dogs to tear. So Irus, in\nwhom fear of king Echetus prevailed above the fear of Ulysses, addressed\nhimself to fight. But Ulysses, provoked to be engaged in so odious a\nstrife with a fellow of his base conditions, and loathing longer to be\nmade a spectacle to entertain the eyes of his foes, with one blow, which\nhe struck him beneath the ear, so shattered the teeth and jawbone of this\nsoon baffled coward that he laid him sprawling in the dust, with small\nstomach or ability to renew the contest. Then raising him on his feet, he\nled him bleeding and sputtering to the door, and put his staff into his\nhand, and bade him go use his command upon dogs and swine, but not presume\nhimself to be lord of the guests another time, nor of the beggary!\n\nThe suitors applauded in their vain minds the issue of the contest, and\nrioted in mirth at the expense of poor Irus, who they vowed should be\nforthwith embarked, and sent to king Echetus; and they bestowed thanks on\nUlysses for ridding the court of that unsavoury morsel, as they called\nhim; but in their inward souls they would not have cared if Irus had been\nvictor, and Ulysses had taken the foil, but it was mirth to them to see\nthe beggars fight. In such pastimes and light entertainments the day wore\naway.\n\nWhen evening was come, the suitors betook themselves to music and dancing.\nAnd Ulysses leaned his back against a pillar from which certain lamps hung\nwhich gave light to the dancers, and he made show of watching the dancers,\nbut very different thoughts were in his head. And as he stood near the\nlamps, the light fell upon his head, which was thin of hair and bald, as\nan old man's. And Eurymachus, a suitor, taking occasion from some words\nwhich were spoken before, scoffed, and said, \"Now I know for a certainty\nthat some god lurks under the poor and beggarly appearance of this man,\nfor, as he stands by the lamps, his sleek head throws beams around it,\nlike as it were a glory.\" And another said, \"He passes his time, too, not\nmuch unlike the gods, lazily living exempt from labour, taking offerings\nof men.\" \"I warrant,\" said Eurymachus again, \"he could not raise a fence\nor dig a ditch for his livelihood, if a man would hire him to work in a\ngarden.\"\n\n\"I wish,\" said Ulysses, \"that you who speak this and myself were to be\ntried at any taskwork: that I had a good crooked scythe put in my hand,\nthat was sharp and strong, and you such another, where the grass grew\nlongest, to be up by daybreak, mowing the meadows till the sun went down,\nnot tasting of food till we had finished; or that we were set to plough\nfour acres in one day of good glebe land, to see whose furrows were\nevenest and cleanest; or that we might have one wrestling-bout together;\nor that in our right hands a good steel-headed lance were placed, to try\nwhose blows fell heaviest and thickest upon the adversary's head-piece. I\nwould cause you such work as you should have small reason to reproach me\nwith being slack at work. But you would do well to spare me this reproach,\nand to save your strength till the owner of this house shall return, till\nthe day when Ulysses shall return, when returning he shall enter upon his\nbirthright.\"\n\nThis was a galling speech to those suitors, to whom Ulysses's return was\nindeed the thing which they most dreaded; and a sudden fear fell upon\ntheir souls, as if they were sensible of the real presence of that man who\ndid indeed stand amongst them, but not in that form as they might know\nhim; and Eurymachus, incensed, snatched a massy cup which stood on a table\nnear and hurled it at the head of the supposed beggar, and but narrowly\nmissed the hitting of him; and all the suitors rose, as at once, to thrust\nhim out of the hall, which they said his beggarly presence and his rude\nspeeches had profaned. But Telemachus cried to them to forbear, and not to\npresume to lay hands upon a wretched man to whom he had promised\nprotection. He asked if they were mad, to mix such abhorred uproar with\nhis feasts. He bade them take their food and their wine, to sit up or to\ngo to bed at their free pleasures, so long as he should give license to\nthat freedom; but why should they abuse his banquet, or let the words\nwhich a poor beggar spake have power to move their spleens so fiercely'\n\nThey bit their lips and frowned for anger to be checked so by a youth;\nnevertheless for that time they had the grace to abstain, either for\nshame, or that Minerva had infused into them a terror of Ulysses's son.\n\nSo that day's feast was concluded without bloodshed, and the suitors,\ntired with their sports, departed severally each man to his apartment.\nOnly Ulysses and Telemachus remained. And now Telemachus, by his father's\ndirection, went and brought down into the hall armour and lances from the\narmoury; for Ulysses said, \"On the morrow we shall have need of them.\" And\nmoreover he said, \"If any one shall ask why you have taken them down, say\nit is to clean them and scour them from the rust which they have gathered\nsince the owner of this house went for Troy.\" And as Telemachus stood by\nthe armour, the lights were all gone out, and it was pitch dark, and the\narmour gave out glistering beams as of fire, and he said to his father,\n\"The pillars of the house are on fire.\" And his father said, \"It is the\ngods who sit above the stars, and have power to make the night as light as\nthe day.\" And he took it for a good omen. And Telemachus fell to cleaning\nand sharpening of the lances.\n\nNow Ulysses had not seen his wife Penelope in all the time since his\nreturn; for the queen did not care to mingle with the suitors at their\nbanquets, but, as became one that had been Ulysses's wife, kept much in\nprivate, spinning and doing her excellent housewiferies among her maids in\nthe remote apartments of the palace. Only upon solemn days she would come\ndown and show herself to the suitors. And Ulysses was filled with a\nlonging desire to see his wife again, whom for twenty years he had not\nbeheld, and he softly stole through the known passages of his beautiful\nhouse, till he came where the maids were lighting the queen through a\nstately gallery that led to the chamber where she slept. And when the\nmaids saw Ulysses, they said, \"It is the beggar who came to the court\nto-day, about whom all that uproar was stirred up in the hall: what does he\nhere?\" But Penelope gave commandment that he should be brought before her,\nfor she said, \"It may be that he has travelled, and has heard something\nconcerning Ulysses.\"\n\n[Illustration: _Where the maids were lighting the queen through a stately\ngallery_.]\n\nThen was Ulysses right glad to hear himself named by his queen, to find\nhimself in nowise forgotten, nor her great love towards him decayed in all\nthat time that he had been away And he stood before his queen, and she\nknew him not to be Ulysses, but supposed that he had been some poor\ntraveller. And she asked him of what country he was.\n\nHe told her (as he had before told Eumaeus) that he was a Cretan born,\nand, however poor and cast down he now seemed, no less a man than brother\nto Idomeneus, who was grandson to king Minos; and though he now wanted\nbread, he had once had it in his power to feast Ulysses. Then he feigned\nhow Ulysses, sailing for Troy, was forced by stress of weather to put his\nfleet in at a port of Crete, where for twelve days he was his guest, and\nentertained by him with all befitting guest-rites. And he described the\nvery garments which Ulysses had on, by which Penelope knew he had seen her\nlord.\n\nIn this manner Ulysses told his wife many tales of himself, at most but\npainting, but painting so near to the life that the feeling of that which\nshe took in at her ears became so strong that the kindly tears ran down\nher fair cheeks, while she thought upon her lord, dead as she thought him,\nand heavily mourned the loss of him whom she missed, whom she could not\nfind, though in very deed he stood so near her.\n\nUlysses was moved to see her weep, but he kept his own eyes dry as iron or\nhorn in their lids, putting a bridle upon his strong passion, that it\nshould not issue to sight.\n\nThen told he how he had lately been at the court of Thesprotia, and what\nhe had learned concerning Ulysses there, in order as he had delivered to\nEumaeus; and Penelope was wont to believe that there might be a\npossibility of Ulysses being alive, and she said, \"I dreamed a dream this\nmorning. Methought I had twenty household fowl which did eat wheat steeped\nin water from my hand, and there came suddenly from the clouds a\ncrooked-beaked  hawk, who soused on them and killed them all, trussing\ntheir necks; then took his flight back up to the clouds. And in my dream\nmethought that I wept and made great moan for my fowls, and for the\ndestruction which the hawk had made; and my maids came about me to comfort\nme. And in the height of my griefs the hawk came back, and lighting upon\nthe beam of my chamber, he said to me in a man's voice, which sounded\nstrangely even in my dream, to hear a hawk to speak: 'Be of good cheer,'\nhe said, 'O daughter of Icarius for this is no dream which thou hast seen,\nbut that which shall happen to thee indeed. Those household fowl, which\nthou lamentest so without reason, are the suitors who devour thy\nsubstance, even as thou sawest the fowl eat from thy hand; and the hawk\nis thy husband, who is coming to give death to the suitors.' And I awoke,\nand went to see to my fowls if they were alive, whom I found eating wheat\nfrom their troughs, all well and safe as before my dream.\"\n\nThen said Ulysses, \"This dream can endure no other interpretation than\nthat which the hawk gave to it, who is your lord, and who is coming\nquickly to effect all that his words told you.\"\n\n\"Your words,\" she said, \"my old guest, are so sweet that would you sit and\nplease me with your speech, my ears would never let my eyes close their\nspheres for very joy of your discourse; but none that is merely mortal can\nlive without the death of sleep, so the gods who are without death\nthemselves have ordained it, to keep the memory of our mortality in our\nminds, while we experience that as much as we live we die every day; in\nwhich consideration I will ascend my bed, which I have nightly watered\nwith my tears since he that was the joy of it departed for that bad\ncity\"--she so speaking because she could not bring her lips to name the\nname of Troy so much hated. So for that night they parted, Penelope to\nher bed and Ulysses to his son, and to the armour and the lances in the\nhall, where they sat up all night cleaning and watching by the armour.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER TEN\n\nThe Madness from Above.--The Bow of Ulysses.--The Slaughter.--The\nConclusion.\n\n\nWhen daylight appeared, a tumultuous concourse of the suitors again filled\nthe hall; and some wondered, and some inquired what meant that glittering\nstore of armour and lances which lay in heaps by the entry of the door;\nand to all that asked Telemachus made reply that he had caused them to be\ntaken down to cleanse them of the rust and of the stain which they had\ncontracted by lying so long unused, even ever since his father went for\nTroy; and with that answer their minds were easily satisfied. So to their\nfeasting and vain rioting again they fell. Ulysses, by Telemachus's order,\nhad a seat and a mess assigned him in the doorway, and he had his eye ever\non the lances. And it moved gall in some of the great ones there present\nto have their feast still dulled with the society of that wretched beggar\nas they deemed him, and they reviled and spurned at him with their feet.\nOnly there was one Philaetius, who had something a better nature than the\nrest, that spake kindly to him, and had his age in respect. He, coming up\nto Ulysses, took him by the hand with a kind of fear, as if touched\nexceedingly with imagination of his great worth, and said thus to him,\n\"Hail father stranger! my brows have sweat to see the injuries which you\nhave received, and my eyes have broke forth in tears, when I have only\nthought that, such being oftentimes the lot of worthiest men, to this\nplight Ulysses may be reduced, and that he now may wander from place to\nplace as you do; for such who are compelled by need to range here and\nthere, and have no firm home to fix their feet upon, God keeps them in\nthis earth as under water; so are they kept down and depressed. And a dark\nthread is sometimes spun in the fates of kings.\"\n\nAt this bare likening of the beggar to Ulysses, Minerva from heaven made\nthe suitors for foolish joy to go mad, and roused them to such a laughter\nas would never stop--they laughed without power of ceasing, their eyes\nstood full of tears for violent joys; but fears and horrible misgivings\nsucceeded; and one among them stood up and prophesied: \"Ah, wretches!\" he\nsaid, \"what madness from heaven has seized you, that you can laugh? see\nyou not that your meat drops blood? a night, like the night of death,\nwraps you about; you shriek without knowing it; your eyes thrust forth\ntears; the fixed walls, and the beam that bears the whole house up, fall\nblood; ghosts choke up the entry; full is the hall with apparitions of\nmurdered men; under your feet is hell; the sun falls from heaven, and it\nis midnight at noon.\" But like men whom the gods had infatuated to their\ndestruction, they mocked at his fears, and Eurymachus said, \"This man is\nsurely mad; conduct him forth into the market-place, set him in the light,\nfor he dreams that 'tis night within the house.\"\n\nBut Theoclymenus (for that was the prophet's name), whom Minerva had\ngraced with a prophetic spirit, that he foreseeing might avoid the\ndestruction which awaited them, answered and said: \"Eurymachus, I will not\nrequire a guide of thee, for I have eyes and ears, the use of both my\nfeet, and a sane mind within me, and with these I will go forth of the\ndoors, because I know the imminent evils which await all you that stay, by\nreason of this poor guest who is a favourite with all the gods.\" So\nsaying, he turned his back upon those inhospitable men, and went away\nhome, and never returned to the palace.\n\nThese words which he spoke were not unheard by Telemachus, who kept still\nhis eye upon his father, expecting fervently when he would give the sign\nwhich was to precede the slaughter of the suitors.\n\nThey, dreaming of no such thing, fell sweetly to their dinner, as joying\nin the great store of banquet which was heaped in full tables about them;\nbut there reigned not a bitterer banquet planet in all heaven than that\nwhich hung over them this day by secret destination of Minerva.\n\nThere was a bow which Ulysses left when he went for Troy. It had lain by\nsince that time, out of use and unstrung, for no man had strength to draw\nthat bow, save Ulysses. So it had remained, as a monument of the great\nstrength of its master. This bow, with the quiver of arrows belonging\nthereto, Telemachus had brought down from the armoury on the last night\nalong with the lances; and now Minerva, intending to do Ulysses an honour,\nput it into the mind of Telemachus to propose to the suitors to try who\nwas strongest to draw that bow; and he promised that to the man who should\nbe able to draw that bow his mother should be given in marriage--Ulysses's\nwife the prize to him who should bend the bow of Ulysses.\n\nThere was great strife and emulation stirred up among the suitors at those\nwords of the prince Telemachus. And to grace her son's words, and to\nconfirm the promise which he had made, Penelope came and showed herself\nthat day to the suitors; and Minerva made her that she appeared never so\ncomely in their sight as that day, and they were inflamed with the\nbeholding of so much beauty, proposed as the price of so great manhood;\nand they cried out that if all those heroes who sailed to Colchis for the\nrich purchase of the golden-fleeced ram had seen earth's richer prize,\nPenelope, they would not have made their voyage, but would have vowed\ntheir valours and their lives to her, for she was at all parts faultless.\n\nAnd she said, \"The gods have taken my beauty from me, since my lord went\nfor Troy.\" But Telemachus willed his mother to depart and not be present\nat that contest; for he said, \"It may be, some rougher strife shall chance\nof this than may be expedient for a woman to witness.\" And she retired,\nshe and her maids, and left the hall.\n\nThen the bow was brought into the midst, and a mark was set up by prince\nTelemachus; and lord Antinous, as the chief among the suitors, had the\nfirst offer; and he took the bow, and, fitting an arrow to the string, he\nstrove to bend it, but not with all his might and main could he once draw\ntogether the ends of that tough bow; and when he found how vain a thing it\nwas to endeavour to draw Ulysses's bow, he desisted, blushing for shame\nand for mere anger. Then Eurymachus adventured, but with no better\nsuccess; but as it had torn the hands of Antinous, so did the bow tear and\nstrain his hands, and marred his delicate fingers, yet could he not once\nstir the string. Then called he to the attendants to bring fat and\nunctuous matter, which melting at the fire, he dipped the bow therein,\nthinking to supple it and make it more pliable; but not with all the helps\nof art could he succeed in making it to move. After him Liodes, and\nAmphinomus, and Polybus, and Eurynomus, and Polyctorides essayed their\nstrength, but not any one of them, or of the rest of those aspiring\nsuitors, had any better luck; yet not the meanest of them there but\nthought himself well worthy of Ulysses's wife, though to shoot with\nUlysses's bow the completest champion among them was by proof found too\nfeeble.\n\nThen Ulysses prayed that he might have leave to try; and immediately a\nclamour was raised among the suitors, because of his petition, and they\nscorned and swelled with rage at his presumption, and that a beggar should\nseek to contend in a game of such noble mastery. But Telemachus ordered\nthat the bow should be given him, and that he should have leave to try,\nsince they had failed; \"for,\" he said, \"the bow is mine, to give or to\nwithhold;\" and none durst gainsay the prince.\n\nThen Ulysses gave a sign to his son, and he commanded the doors of the\nhall to be made fast, and all wondered at his words, but none could divine\nthe cause. And Ulysses took the bow into his hands, and before he essayed\nto bend it, he surveyed it at all parts, to see whether, by long lying by,\nit had contracted any stiffness which hindered the drawing; and as he was\nbusied in the curious surveying of his bow, some of the suitors mocked\nhim, and said, \"Past doubt this man is a right cunning archer, and knows\nhis craft well. See how he turns it over and over, and looks into it, as\nif he could see through the wood.\" And others said, \"We wish some one\nwould tell out gold into our laps but for so long a time as he shall be in\ndrawing of that string.\" But when he had spent some little time in making\nproof of the bow, and had found it to be in good plight, like as a harper\nin tuning of his harp draws out a string, with such ease or much more did\nUlysses draw to the head the string of his own tough bow, and in letting\nof it go, it twanged with such a shrill noise as a swallow makes when it\nsings through the air; which so much amazed the suitors that their colours\ncame and went, and the skies gave out a noise of thunder, which at heart\ncheered Ulysses, for he knew that now his long labours by the disposal of\nthe Fates drew to an end. Then fitted he an arrow to the bow, and drawing\nit to the head, he sent it right to the mark which the prince had set up.\nWhich done, he said to Telemachus, \"You have got no disgrace yet by your\nguest, for I have struck the mark I shot at, and gave myself no such\ntrouble in teasing the bow with fat and fire as these men did, but have\nmade proof that my strength is not impaired, nor my age so weak and\ncontemptible as these were pleased to think it. But come, the day going\ndown calls us to supper, after which succeed poem and harp, and all\ndelights which use to crown princely banquetings.\"\n\nSo saying, he beckoned to his son, who straight girt his sword to his\nside, and took one of the lances (of which there lay great store from the\narmoury) in his hand, and armed at all points advanced towards his father.\n\nThe upper rags which Ulysses wore fell from his shoulder, and his own\nkingly likeness returned, when he rushed to the great hall door with bow\nand quiver full of shafts, which down at his feet he poured, and in bitter\nwords presignified his deadly intent to the suitors. \"Thus far,\" he said,\n\"this contest has been decided harmless: now for us there rests another\nmark, harder to hit, but which my hands shall essay notwithstanding, if\nPhoebus, god of archers, be pleased to give me the mastery.\" With that he\nlet fly a deadly arrow at Antinous, which pierced him in the throat, as he\nwas in the act of lifting a cup of wine to his mouth. Amazement seized the\nsuitors, as their great champion fell dead, and they raged highly against\nUlysses, and said that it should prove the dearest shaft which he ever let\nfly, for he had slain a man whose like breathed not in any part of the\nkingdom; and they flew to their arms, and would have seized the lances,\nbut Minerva struck them with dimness of sight that they went erring up and\ndown the hall, not knowing where to find them. Yet so infatuated were they\nby the displeasure of Heaven that they did not see the imminent peril\nwhich impended over them, but every man believed that this accident had\nhappened beside the intention of the doer. Fools! to think by shutting\ntheir eyes to evade destiny, or that any other cup remained for them but\nthat which their great Antinous had tasted!\n\nThen Ulysses revealed himself to all in that presence, and that he was the\nman whom they held to be dead at Troy, whose palace they had usurped,\nwhose wife in his lifetime they had sought in impious marriage, and that\nfor this reason destruction was come upon them. And he dealt his deadly\narrows among them, and there was no avoiding him, nor escaping from his\nhorrid person; and Telemachus by his side plied them thick with those\nmurderous lances from which there was no retreat, till fear itself made\nthem valiant, and danger gave them eyes to understand the peril; then they\nwhich had swords drew them, and some with shields, that could find them,\nand some with tables and benches snatched up in haste, rose in a mass to\noverwhelm and crush those two; yet they singly bestirred themselves like\nmen, and defended themselves against that great host, and through tables,\nshields, and all, right through the arrows of Ulysses clove, and the\nirresistible lances of Telemachus; and many lay dead, and all had wounds,\nand Minerva in the likeness of a bird sat upon the beam which went across\nthe hall, clapping her wings with a fearful noise; and sometimes the great\nbird would fly among them, cuffing at the swords and at the lances, and up\nand down the hall would go, beating her wings, and troubling everything,\nthat it was frightful to behold, and it frayed the blood from the cheeks\nof those heaven-hated suitors; but to Ulysses and his son she appeared in\nher own divine similitude, with her snake-fringed shield, a goddess armed,\nfighting their battles. Nor did that dreadful pair desist till they had\nlaid all their foes at their feet. At their feet they lay in shoals: like\nfishes, when the fishermen break up their nets, so they lay gasping and\nsprawling at the feet of Ulysses and his son. And Ulysses remembered the\nprediction of Tiresias, which said that he was to perish by his own\nguests, unless he slew those who knew him not.\n\n[Illustration: _Rose in a mass to overwhelm and crush those two_.]\n\nThen certain of the queen's household went up and told Penelope what had\nhappened, and how her lord Ulysses was come home, and had slain the\nsuitors. But she gave no heed to their words, but thought that some frenzy\npossessed them, or that they mocked her; for it is the property of such\nextremes of sorrow as she had felt not to believe when any great joy\ncometh. And she rated and chid them exceedingly for troubling her. But\nthey the more persisted in their asseverations of the truth of what they\nhad affirmed; and some of them had seen the slaughtered bodies of the\nsuitors dragged forth of the hall. And they said, \"That poor guest whom\nyou talked with last night was Ulysses.\" Then she was yet more fully\npersuaded that they mocked her, and she wept. But they said, \"This thing\nis true which we have told. We sat within, in an inner room in the palace,\nand the doors of the hall were shut on us, but we heard the cries and the\ngroans of the men that were killed, but saw nothing, till at length your\nson called to us to come in, and entering we saw Ulysses standing in the\nmidst of the slaughtered.\" But she, persisting in her unbelief, said that\nit was some god which had deceived them to think it was the person of\nUlysses.\n\nBy this time Telemachus and his father had cleansed their hands from the\nslaughter, and were come to where the queen was talking with those of her\nhousehold; and when she saw Ulysses, she stood motionless, and had no\npower to speak, sudden surprise and joy and fear and many passions so\nstrove within her. Sometimes she was clear that it was her husband that\nshe saw, and sometimes the alteration which twenty years had made in his\nperson (yet that was not much) perplexed her that she knew not what to\nthink, and for joy she could not believe, and yet for joy she would not\nbut believe; and, above all, that sudden change from a beggar to a king\ntroubled her, and wrought uneasy scruples in her mind. But Telemachus,\nseeing her strangeness, blamed her, and called her an ungentle and\ntyrannous mother; and said that she showed a too great curiousness of\nmodesty, to abstain from embracing his father, and to have doubts of his\nperson, when to all present it was evident that he was the very real and\ntrue Ulysses.\n\nThen she mistrusted no longer, but ran and fell upon Ulysses's neck, and\nsaid, \"Let not my husband be angry, that I held off so long with strange\ndelays; it is the gods, who severing us for so long time, have caused this\nunseemly distance in me. If Menelaus's wife had used half my caution, she\nwould never have taken so freely to a stranger's bed; and she might have\nspared us all these plagues which have come upon us through her shameless\ndeed.\"\n\nThese words with which Penelope excused herself wrought more affection in\nUlysses than if upon a first sight she had given up herself implicitly to\nhis embraces; and he wept for joy to possess a wife so discreet, so\nanswering to his own staid mind, that had a depth of wit proportioned to\nhis own, and one that held chaste virtue at so high a price; and he\nthought the possession of such a one cheaply purchased with the loss of\nall Circe's delights and Calypso's immortality of joys; and his long\nlabours and his severe sufferings past seemed as nothing, now they were\ncrowned with the enjoyment of his virtuous and true wife Penelope. And as\nsad men at sea whose ship has gone to pieces nigh shore, swimming for\ntheir lives, all drenched in foam and brine, crawl up to some poor patch\nof land, which they take possession of with as great a joy as if they had\nthe world given them in fee, with such delight did this chaste wife cling\nto her lord restored, till the dark night fast coming on reminded her of\nthat more intimate and happy union when in her long-widowed bed she should\nonce again clasp a living Ulysses.\n\nSo from that time the land had rest from the suitors. And the happy\nIthacans with songs and solemn sacrifices of praise to the gods celebrated\nthe return of Ulysses; for he that had been so long absent was returned to\nwreak the evil upon the heads of the doers; in the place where they had\ndone the evil, there wreaked he his vengeance upon them.","title":"The Adventures of Ulysses","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":33478}