The Odyssey
Book I
THE GODS IN COUNCIL--MIVERVA'S VISIT TO ITHACA--THE CHALLENGE
FROM TELEMACHUS TO THE SUITORS.
Tell me, O Muse, of that ingenious hero who travelled far and
wide after he had sacked the famous town of Troy. Many cities
did he visit, and many were the nations with whose manners and
customs he was acquainted; moreover he suffered much by sea
while trying to save his own life and bring his men safely home;
but do what he might he could not save his men, for they
perished through their own sheer folly in eating the cattle of
the Sun-god Hyperion; so the god prevented them from ever
reaching home. Tell me, too, about all these things, oh daughter
of Jove, from whatsoever source you may know them.
So now all who escaped death in battle or by shipwreck had got
safely home except Ulysses, and he, though he was longing to
return to his wife and country, was detained by the goddess
Calypso, who had got him into a large cave and wanted to marry
him. But as years went by, there came a time when the gods
settled that he should go back to Ithaca; even then, however,
when he was among his own people, his troubles were not yet
over; nevertheless all the gods had now begun to pity him except
Neptune, who still persecuted him without ceasing and would not
let him get home.
Now Neptune had gone off to the Ethiopians, who are at the
world's end, and lie in two halves, the one looking West and the
other East. {1} He had gone there to accept a hecatomb of sheep
and oxen, and was enjoying himself at his festival; but the
other gods met in the house of Olympian Jove, and the sire of
gods and men spoke first. At that moment he was thinking of
Aegisthus, who had been killed by Agamemnon's son Orestes; so he
said to the other gods:
"See now, how men lay blame upon us gods for what is after all
nothing but their own folly. Look at Aegisthus; he must needs
make love to Agamemnon's wife unrighteously and then kill
Agamemnon, though he knew it would be the death of him; for I
sent Mercury to warn him not to do either of these things,
inasmuch as Orestes would be sure to take his revenge when he
grew up and wanted to return home. Mercury told him this in all
good will but he would not listen, and now he has paid for
everything in full."
Then Minerva said, "Father, son of Saturn, King of kings, it
served Aegisthus right, and so it would any one else who does as
he did; but Aegisthus is neither here nor there; it is for
Ulysses that my heart bleeds, when I think of his sufferings in
that lonely sea-girt island, far away, poor man, from all his
friends. It is an island covered with forest, in the very middle
of the sea, and a goddess lives there, daughter of the magician
Atlas, who looks after the bottom of the ocean, and carries the
great columns that keep heaven and earth asunder. This daughter
of Atlas has got hold of poor unhappy Ulysses, and keeps trying
by every kind of blandishment to make him forget his home, so
that he is tired of life, and thinks of nothing but how he may
once more see the smoke of his own chimneys. You, sir, take no
heed of this, and yet when Ulysses was before Troy did he not
propitiate you with many a burnt sacrifice? Why then should you
keep on being so angry with him?"
And Jove said, "My child, what are you talking about? How can I
forget Ulysses than whom there is no more capable man on earth,
nor more liberal in his offerings to the immortal gods that live
in heaven? Bear in mind, however, that Neptune is still furious
with Ulysses for having blinded an eye of Polyphemus king of the
Cyclopes. Polyphemus is son to Neptune by the nymph Thoosa,
daughter to the sea-king Phorcys; therefore though he will not
kill Ulysses outright, he torments him by preventing him from
getting home. Still, let us lay our heads together and see how
we can help him to return; Neptune will then be pacified, for if
we are all of a mind he can hardly stand out against us."
And Minerva said, "Father, son of Saturn, King of kings, if,
then, the gods now mean that Ulysses should get home, we should
first send Mercury to the Ogygian island to tell Calypso that we
have made up our minds and that he is to return. In the meantime
I will go to Ithaca, to put heart into Ulysses' son Telemachus;
I will embolden him to call the Achaeans in assembly, and speak
out to the suitors of his mother Penelope, who persist in eating
up any number of his sheep and oxen; I will also conduct him to
Sparta and to Pylos, to see if he can hear anything about the
return of his dear father--for this will make people speak well
of him."
So saying she bound on her glittering golden sandals,
imperishable, with which she can fly like the wind over land or
sea; she grasped the redoubtable bronze-shod spear, so stout and
sturdy and strong, wherewith she quells the ranks of heroes who
have displeased her, and down she darted from the topmost
summits of Olympus, whereon forthwith she was in Ithaca, at the
gateway of Ulysses' house, disguised as a visitor, Mentes, chief
of the Taphians, and she held a bronze spear in her hand. There
she found the lordly suitors seated on hides of the oxen which
they had killed and eaten, and playing draughts in front of the
house. Men-servants and pages were bustling about to wait upon
them, some mixing wine with water in the mixing-bowls, some
cleaning down the tables with wet sponges and laying them out
again, and some cutting up great quantities of meat.
Telemachus saw her long before any one else did. He was sitting
moodily among the suitors thinking about his brave father, and
how he would send them flying out of the house, if he were to
come to his own again and be honoured as in days gone by. Thus
brooding as he sat among them, he caught sight of Minerva and
went straight to the gate, for he was vexed that a stranger
should be kept waiting for admittance. He took her right hand
in his own, and bade her give him her spear. "Welcome," said
he, "to our house, and when you have partaken of food you shall
tell us what you have come for."
He led the way as he spoke, and Minerva followed him. When they
were within he took her spear and set it in the spear-stand
against a strong bearing-post along with the many other spears
of his unhappy father, and he conducted her to a richly
decorated seat under which he threw a cloth of damask. There was
a footstool also for her feet,{2} and he set another seat near
her for himself, away from the suitors, that she might not be
annoyed while eating by their noise and insolence, and that he
might ask her more freely about his father.
A maid servant then brought them water in a beautiful golden
ewer and poured it into a silver basin for them to wash their
hands, and she drew a clean table beside them. An upper servant
brought them bread, and offered them many good things of what
there was in the house, the carver fetched them plates of all
manner of meats and set cups of gold by their side, and a
manservant brought them wine and poured it out for them.
Then the suitors came in and took their places on the benches
and seats. {3} Forthwith men servants poured water over their
hands, maids went round with the bread-baskets, pages filled the
mixing-bowls with wine and water, and they laid their hands upon
the good things that were before them. As soon as they had had
enough to eat and drink they wanted music and dancing, which are
the crowning embellishments of a banquet, so a servant brought a
lyre to Phemius, whom they compelled perforce to sing to them.
As soon as he touched his lyre and began to sing Telemachus
spoke low to Minerva, with his head close to hers that no man
might hear.
"I hope, sir," said he, "that you will not be offended with what
I am going to say. Singing comes cheap to those who do not pay
for it, and all this is done at the cost of one whose bones lie
rotting in some wilderness or grinding to powder in the surf. If
these men were to see my father come back to Ithaca they would
pray for longer legs rather than a longer purse, for money would
not serve them; but he, alas, has fallen on an ill fate, and
even when people do sometimes say that he is coming, we no
longer heed them; we shall never see him again. And now, sir,
tell me and tell me true, who you are and where you come from.
Tell me of your town and parents, what manner of ship you came
in, how your crew brought you to Ithaca, and of what nation they
declared themselves to be--for you cannot have come by land.
Tell me also truly, for I want to know, are you a stranger to
this house, or have you been here in my father's time? In the
old days we had many visitors for my father went about much
himself."
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