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History Online - Odyssee
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Homer's Odyssee
Book II
Now when the child of morning, rosy-fingered Dawn, appeared, Telemachus
rose and dressed himself. He bound his sandals on to his comely feet,
girded his sword about his shoulder, and left his room looking like
an immortal god. He at once sent the criers round to call the people
in assembly, so they called them and the people gathered thereon;
then, when they were got together, he went to the place of assembly
spear in hand- not alone, for his two hounds went with him. Minerva
endowed him with a presence of such divine comeliness that all marvelled
at him as he went by, and when he took his place' in his father's
seat even the oldest councillors made way for him.
Aegyptius, a man bent double with age, and of infinite experience,
the first to speak His son Antiphus had gone with Ulysses to Ilius,
land of noble steeds, but the savage Cyclops had killed him when they
were all shut up in the cave, and had cooked his last dinner for him,
He had three sons left, of whom two still worked on their father's
land, while the third, Eurynomus, was one of the suitors; nevertheless
their father could not get over the loss of Antiphus, and was still
weeping for him when he began his speech.
"Men of Ithaca," he said, "hear my words. From the day Ulysses left
us there has been no meeting of our councillors until now; who then
can it be, whether old or young, that finds it so necessary to convene
us? Has he got wind of some host approaching, and does he wish to
warn us, or would he speak upon some other matter of public moment?
I am sure he is an excellent person, and I hope Jove will grant him
his heart's desire."
Telemachus took this speech as of good omen and rose at once, for
he was bursting with what he had to say. He stood in the middle of
the assembly and the good herald Pisenor brought him his staff. Then,
turning to Aegyptius, "Sir," said he, "it is I, as you will shortly
learn, who have convened you, for it is I who am the most aggrieved.
I have not got wind of any host approaching about which I would warn
you, nor is there any matter of public moment on which I would speak.
My grieveance is purely personal, and turns on two great misfortunes
which have fallen upon my house. The first of these is the loss of
my excellent father, who was chief among all you here present, and
was like a father to every one of you; the second is much more serious,
and ere long will be the utter ruin of my estate. The sons of all
the chief men among you are pestering my mother to marry them against
her will. They are afraid to go to her father Icarius, asking him
to choose the one he likes best, and to provide marriage gifts for
his daughter, but day by day they keep hanging about my father's house,
sacrificing our oxen, sheep, and fat goats for their banquets, and
never giving so much as a thought to the quantity of wine they drink.
No estate can stand such recklessness; we have now no Ulysses to ward
off harm from our doors, and I cannot hold my own against them. I
shall never all my days be as good a man as he was, still I would
indeed defend myself if I had power to do so, for I cannot stand such
treatment any longer; my house is being disgraced and ruined. Have
respect, therefore, to your own consciences and to public opinion.
Fear, too, the wrath of heaven, lest the gods should be displeased
and turn upon you. I pray you by Jove and Themis, who is the beginning
and the end of councils, [do not] hold back, my friends, and leave
me singlehanded- unless it be that my brave father Ulysses did some
wrong to the Achaeans which you would now avenge on me, by aiding
and abetting these suitors. Moreover, if I am to be eaten out of house
and home at all, I had rather you did the eating yourselves, for I
could then take action against you to some purpose, and serve you
with notices from house to house till I got paid in full, whereas
now I have no remedy."
With this Telemachus dashed his staff to the ground and burst into
tears. Every one was very sorry for him, but they all sat still and
no one ventured to make him an angry answer, save only Antinous, who
spoke thus:
"Telemachus, insolent braggart that you are, how dare you try to throw
the blame upon us suitors? It is your mother's fault not ours, for
she is a very artful woman. This three years past, and close on four,
she has been driving us out of our minds, by encouraging each one
of us, and sending him messages without meaning one word of what she
says. And then there was that other trick she played us. She set up
a great tambour frame in her room, and began to work on an enormous
piece of fine needlework. 'Sweet hearts,' said she, 'Ulysses is indeed
dead, still do not press me to marry again immediately, wait- for
I would not have skill in needlework perish unrecorded- till I have
completed a pall for the hero Laertes, to be in readiness against
the time when death shall take him. He is very rich, and the women
of the place will talk if he is laid out without a pall.'
"This was what she said, and we assented; whereon we could see her
working on her great web all day long, but at night she would unpick
the stitches again by torchlight. She fooled us in this way for three
years and we never found her out, but as time wore on and she was
now in her fourth year, one of her maids who knew what she was doing
told us, and we caught her in the act of undoing her work, so she
had to finish it whether she would or no. The suitors, therefore,
make you this answer, that both you and the Achaeans may understand-'Send
your mother away, and bid her marry the man of her own and of her
father's choice'; for I do not know what will happen if she goes on
plaguing us much longer with the airs she gives herself on the score
of the accomplishments Minerva has taught her, and because she is
so clever. We never yet heard of such a woman; we know all about Tyro,
Alcmena, Mycene, and the famous women of old, but they were nothing
to your mother, any one of them. It was not fair of her to treat us
in that way, and as long as she continues in the mind with which heaven
has now endowed her, so long shall we go on eating up your estate;
and I do not see why she should change, for she gets all the honour
and glory, and it is you who pay for it, not she. Understand, then,
that we will not go back to our lands, neither here nor elsewhere,
till she has made her choice and married some one or other of us."
Telemachus answered, "Antinous, how can I drive the mother who bore
me from my father's house? My father is abroad and we do not know
whether he is alive or dead. It will be hard on me if I have to pay
Icarius the large sum which I must give him if I insist on sending
his daughter back to him. Not only will he deal rigorously with me,
but heaven will also punish me; for my mother when she leaves the
house will calf on the Erinyes to avenge her; besides, it would not
be a creditable thing to do, and I will have nothing to say to it.
If you choose to take offence at this, leave the house and feast elsewhere
at one another's houses at your own cost turn and turn about. If,
on the other hand, you elect to persist in spunging upon one man,
heaven help me, but Jove shall reckon with you in full, and when you
fall in my father's house there shall be no man to avenge you."
As he spoke Jove sent two eagles from the top of the mountain, and
they flew on and on with the wind, sailing side by side in their own
lordly flight. When they were right over the middle of the assembly
they wheeled and circled about, beating the air with their wings and
glaring death into the eyes of them that were below; then, fighting
fiercely and tearing at one another, they flew off towards the right
over the town. The people wondered as they saw them, and asked each
other what an this might be; whereon Halitherses, who was the best
prophet and reader of omens among them, spoke to them plainly and
in all honesty, saying:
"Hear me, men of Ithaca, and I speak more particularly to the suitors,
for I see mischief brewing for them. Ulysses is not going to be away
much longer; indeed he is close at hand to deal out death and destruction,
not on them alone, but on many another of us who live in Ithaca. Let
us then be wise in time, and put a stop to this wickedness before
he comes. Let the suitors do so of their own accord; it will be better
for them, for I am not prophesying without due knowledge; everything
has happened to Ulysses as I foretold when the Argives set out for
Troy, and he with them. I said that after going through much hardship
and losing all his men he should come home again in the twentieth
year and that no one would know him; and now all this is coming true."
Eurymachus son of Polybus then said, "Go home, old man, and prophesy
to your own children, or it may be worse for them. I can read these
omens myself much better than you can; birds are always flying about
in the sunshine somewhere or other, but they seldom mean anything.
Ulysses has died in a far country, and it is a pity you are not dead
along with him, instead of prating here about omens and adding fuel
to the anger of Telemachus which is fierce enough as it is. I suppose
you think he will give you something for your family, but I tell you-
and it shall surely be- when an old man like you, who should know
better, talks a young one over till he becomes troublesome, in the
first place his young friend will only fare so much the worse- he
will take nothing by it, for the suitors will prevent this- and in
the next, we will lay a heavier fine, sir, upon yourself than you
will at all like paying, for it will bear hardly upon you. As for
Telemachus, I warn him in the presence of you all to send his mother
back to her father, who will find her a husband and provide her with
all the marriage gifts so dear a daughter may expect. Till we shall
go on harassing him with our suit; for we fear no man, and care neither
for him, with all his fine speeches, nor for any fortune-telling of
yours. You may preach as much as you please, but we shall only hate
you the more. We shall go back and continue to eat up Telemachus's
estate without paying him, till such time as his mother leaves off
tormenting us by keeping us day after day on the tiptoe of expectation,
each vying with the other in his suit for a prize of such rare perfection.
Besides we cannot go after the other women whom we should marry in
due course, but for the way in which she treats us."
Then Telemachus said, "Eurymachus, and you other suitors, I shall
say no more, and entreat you no further, for the gods and the people
of Ithaca now know my story. Give me, then, a ship and a crew of twenty
men to take me hither and thither, and I will go to Sparta and to
Pylos in quest of my father who has so long been missing. Some one
may tell me something, or (and people often hear things in this way)
some heaven-sent message may direct me. If I can hear of him as alive
and on his way home I will put up with the waste you suitors will
make for yet another twelve months. If on the other hand I hear of
his death, I will return at once, celebrate his funeral rites with
all due pomp, build a barrow to his memory, and make my mother marry
again."
With these words he sat down, and Mentor who had been a friend of
Ulysses, and had been left in charge of everything with full authority
over the servants, rose to speak. He, then, plainly and in all honesty
addressed them thus:
"Hear me, men of Ithaca, I hope that you may never have a kind and
well-disposed ruler any more, nor one who will govern you equitably;
I hope that all your chiefs henceforward may be cruel and unjust,
for there is not one of you but has forgotten Ulysses, who ruled you
as though he were your father. I am not half so angry with the suitors,
for if they choose to do violence in the naughtiness of their hearts,
and wager their heads that Ulysses will not return, they can take
the high hand and eat up his estate, but as for you others I am shocked
at the way in which you all sit still without even trying to stop
such scandalous goings on-which you could do if you chose, for you
are many and they are few."
Leiocritus, son of Evenor, answered him saying, "Mentor, what folly
is all this, that you should set the people to stay us? It is a hard
thing for one man to fight with many about his victuals. Even though
Ulysses himself were to set upon us while we are feasting in his house,
and do his best to oust us, his wife, who wants him back so very badly,
would have small cause for rejoicing, and his blood would be upon
his own head if he fought against such great odds. There is no sense
in what you have been saying. Now, therefore, do you people go about
your business, and let his father's old friends, Mentor and Halitherses,
speed this boy on his journey, if he goes at all- which I do not think
he will, for he is more likely to stay where he is till some one comes
and tells him something."
On this he broke up the assembly, and every man went back to his own
abode, while the suitors returned to the house of Ulysses.
Then Telemachus went all alone by the sea side, washed his hands in
the grey waves, and prayed to Minerva.
"Hear me," he cried, "you god who visited me yesterday, and bade me
sail the seas in search of my father who has so long been missing.
I would obey you, but the Achaeans, and more particularly the wicked
suitors, are hindering me that I cannot do so."
As he thus prayed, Minerva came close up to him in the likeness and
with the voice of Mentor. "Telemachus," said she, "if you are made
of the same stuff as your father you will be neither fool nor coward
henceforward, for Ulysses never broke his word nor left his work half
done. If, then, you take after him, your voyage will not be fruitless,
but unless you have the blood of Ulysses and of Penelope in your veins
I see no likelihood of your succeeding. Sons are seldom as good men
as their fathers; they are generally worse, not better; still, as
you are not going to be either fool or coward henceforward, and are
not entirely without some share of your father's wise discernment,
I look with hope upon your undertaking. But mind you never make common
cause with any of those foolish suitors, for they have neither sense
nor virtue, and give no thought to death and to the doom that will
shortly fall on one and all of them, so that they shall perish on
the same day. As for your voyage, it shall not be long delayed; your
father was such an old friend of mine that I will find you a ship,
and will come with you myself. Now, however, return home, and go about
among the suitors; begin getting provisions ready for your voyage;
see everything well stowed, the wine in jars, and the barley meal,
which is the staff of life, in leathern bags, while I go round the
town and beat up volunteers at once. There are many ships in Ithaca
both old and new; I will run my eye over them for you and will choose
the best; we will get her ready and will put out to sea without delay."
Thus spoke Minerva daughter of Jove, and Telemachus lost no time in
doing as the goddess told him. He went moodily and found the suitors
flaying goats and singeing pigs in the outer court. Antinous came
up to him at once and laughed as he took his hand in his own, saying,
"Telemachus, my fine fire-eater, bear no more ill blood neither in
word nor deed, but eat and drink with us as you used to do. The Achaeans
will find you in everything- a ship and a picked crew to boot- so
that you can set sail for Pylos at once and get news of your noble
father."
"Antinous," answered Telemachus, "I cannot eat in peace, nor take
pleasure of any kind with such men as you are. Was it not enough that
you should waste so much good property of mine while I was yet a boy?
Now that I am older and know more about it, I am also stronger, and
whether here among this people, or by going to Pylos, I will do you
all the harm I can. I shall go, and my going will not be in vain though,
thanks to you suitors, I have neither ship nor crew of my own, and
must be passenger not captain."
As he spoke he snatched his hand from that of Antinous. Meanwhile
the others went on getting dinner ready about the buildings, jeering
at him tauntingly as they did so.
"Telemachus," said one youngster, "means to be the death of us; I
suppose he thinks he can bring friends to help him from Pylos, or
again from Sparta, where he seems bent on going. Or will he go to
Ephyra as well, for poison to put in our wine and kill us?"
Another said, "Perhaps if Telemachus goes on board ship, he will be
like his father and perish far from his friends. In this case we should
have plenty to do, for we could then divide up his property amongst
us: as for the house we can let his mother and the man who marries
her have that."
This was how they talked. But Telemachus went down into the lofty
and spacious store-room where his father's treasure of gold and bronze
lay heaped up upon the floor, and where the linen and spare clothes
were kept in open chests. Here, too, there was a store of fragrant
olive oil, while casks of old, well-ripened wine, unblended and fit
for a god to drink, were ranged against the wall in case Ulysses should
come home again after all. The room was closed with well-made doors
opening in the middle; moreover the faithful old house-keeper Euryclea,
daughter of Ops the son of Pisenor, was in charge of everything both
night and day. Telemachus called her to the store-room and said:
"Nurse, draw me off some of the best wine you have, after what you
are keeping for my father's own drinking, in case, poor man, he should
escape death, and find his way home again after all. Let me have twelve
jars, and see that they all have lids; also fill me some well-sewn
leathern bags with barley meal- about twenty measures in all. Get
these things put together at once, and say nothing about it. I will
take everything away this evening as soon as my mother has gone upstairs
for the night. I am going to Sparta and to Pylos to see if I can hear
anything about the return of my dear father.
When Euryclea heard this she began to cry, and spoke fondly to him,
saying, "My dear child, what ever can have put such notion as that
into your head? Where in the world do you want to go to- you, who
are the one hope of the house? Your poor father is dead and gone in
some foreign country nobody knows where, and as soon as your back
is turned these wicked ones here will be scheming to get you put out
of the way, and will share all your possessions among themselves;
stay where you are among your own people, and do not go wandering
and worrying your life out on the barren ocean."
"Fear not, nurse," answered Telemachus, "my scheme is not without
heaven's sanction; but swear that you will say nothing about all this
to my mother, till I have been away some ten or twelve days, unless
she hears of my having gone, and asks you; for I do not want her to
spoil her beauty by crying."
The old woman swore most solemnly that she would not, and when she
had completed her oath, she began drawing off the wine into jars,
and getting the barley meal into the bags, while Telemachus went back
to the suitors.
Then Minerva bethought her of another matter. She took his shape,
and went round the town to each one of the crew, telling them to meet
at the ship by sundown. She went also to Noemon son of Phronius, and
asked him to let her have a ship- which he was very ready to do. When
the sun had set and darkness was over all the land, she got the ship
into the water, put all the tackle on board her that ships generally
carry, and stationed her at the end of the harbour. Presently the
crew came up, and the goddess spoke encouragingly to each of them.
Furthermore she went to the house of Ulysses, and threw the suitors
into a deep slumber. She caused their drink to fuddle them, and made
them drop their cups from their hands, so that instead of sitting
over their wine, they went back into the town to sleep, with their
eyes heavy and full of drowsiness. Then she took the form and voice
of Mentor, and called Telemachus to come outside.
"Telemachus," said she, "the men are on board and at their oars, waiting
for you to give your orders, so make haste and let us be off."
On this she led the way, while Telemachus followed in her steps. When
they got to the ship they found the crew waiting by the water side,
and Telemachus said, "Now my men, help me to get the stores on board;
they are all put together in the cloister, and my mother does not
know anything about it, nor any of the maid servants except one."
With these words he led the way and the others followed after. When
they had brought the things as he told them, Telemachus went on board,
Minerva going before him and taking her seat in the stern of the vessel,
while Telemachus sat beside her. Then the men loosed the hawsers and
took their places on the benches. Minerva sent them a fair wind from
the West, that whistled over the deep blue waves whereon Telemachus
told them to catch hold of the ropes and hoist sail, and they did
as he told them. They set the mast in its socket in the cross plank,
raised it, and made it fast with the forestays; then they hoisted
their white sails aloft with ropes of twisted ox hide. As the sail
bellied out with the wind, the ship flew through the deep blue water,
and the foam hissed against her bows as she sped onward. Then they
made all fast throughout the ship, filled the mixing-bowls to the
brim, and made drink offerings to the immortal gods that are from
everlasting, but more particularly to the grey-eyed daughter of Jove.
Thus, then, the ship sped on her way through the watches of the night
from dark till dawn.
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