The Odyssey
Thus did he speak, and his saying pleased them well, so Mulius of
Dulichium, servant to Amphinomus, mixed them a bowl of wine and water
and handed it round to each of them man by man, whereon they made their
drink-offerings to the blessed gods: Then, when they had made their
drink-offerings and had drunk each one as he was minded, they took
their several ways each of them to his own abode.
BOOK XIX
TELEMACHUS AND ULYSSES REMOVE THE ARMOUR—ULYSSES INTERVIEWS
PENELOPE—EURYCLEA WASHES HIS FEET AND RECOGNISES THE SCAR ON HIS
LEG—PENELOPE TELLS HER DREAM TO ULYSSES.
Ulysses was left in the cloister, pondering on the means whereby with
Minerva’s help he might be able to kill the suitors. Presently he said
to Telemachus, “Telemachus, we must get the armour together and take it
down inside. Make some excuse when the suitors ask you why you have
removed it. Say that you have taken it to be out of the way of the
smoke, inasmuch as it is no longer what it was when Ulysses went away,
but has become soiled and begrimed with soot. Add to this more
particularly that you are afraid Jove may set them on to quarrel over
their wine, and that they may do each other some harm which may
disgrace both banquet and wooing, for the sight of arms sometimes
tempts people to use them.”
Telemachus approved of what his father had said, so he called nurse
Euryclea and said, “Nurse, shut the women up in their room, while I
take the armour that my father left behind him down into the store
room. No one looks after it now my father is gone, and it has got all
smirched with soot during my own boyhood. I want to take it down where
the smoke cannot reach it.”
“I wish, child,” answered Euryclea, “that you would take the management
of the house into your own hands altogether, and look after all the
property yourself. But who is to go with you and light you to the
store-room? The maids would have done so, but you would not let them.”
“The stranger,” said Telemachus, “shall show me a light; when people
eat my bread they must earn it, no matter where they come from.”
Euryclea did as she was told, and bolted the women inside their room.
Then Ulysses and his son made all haste to take the helmets, shields,
and spears inside; and Minerva went before them with a gold lamp in her
hand that shed a soft and brilliant radiance, whereon Telemachus said,
“Father, my eyes behold a great marvel: the walls, with the rafters,
crossbeams, and the supports on which they rest are all aglow as with a
flaming fire. Surely there is some god here who has come down from
heaven.”
“Hush,” answered Ulysses, “hold your peace and ask no questions, for
this is the manner of the gods. Get you to your bed, and leave me here
to talk with your mother and the maids. Your mother in her grief will
ask me all sorts of questions.”
On this Telemachus went by torch-light to the other side of the inner
court, to the room in which he always slept. There he lay in his bed
till morning, while Ulysses was left in the cloister pondering on the
means whereby with Minerva’s help he might be able to kill the suitors.
Then Penelope came down from her room looking like Venus or Diana, and
they set her a seat inlaid with scrolls of silver and ivory near the
fire in her accustomed place. It had been made by Icmalius and had a
footstool all in one piece with the seat itself; and it was covered
with a thick fleece: on this she now sat, and the maids came from the
women’s room to join her. They set about removing the tables at which
the wicked suitors had been dining, and took away the bread that was
left, with the cups from which they had drunk. They emptied the embers
out of the braziers, and heaped much wood upon them to give both light
and heat; but Melantho began to rail at Ulysses a second time and said,
“Stranger, do you mean to plague us by hanging about the house all
night and spying upon the women? Be off, you wretch, outside, and eat
your supper there, or you shall be driven out with a firebrand.”
Ulysses scowled at her and answered, “My good woman, why should you be
so angry with me? Is it because I am not clean, and my clothes are all
in rags, and because I am obliged to go begging about after the manner
of tramps and beggars generally? I too was a rich man once, and had a
fine house of my own; in those days I gave to many a tramp such as I
now am, no matter who he might be nor what he wanted. I had any number
of servants, and all the other things which people have who live well
and are accounted wealthy, but it pleased Jove to take all away from
me; therefore, woman, beware lest you too come to lose that pride and
place in which you now wanton above your fellows; have a care lest you
get out of favour with your mistress, and lest Ulysses should come
home, for there is still a chance that he may do so. Moreover, though
he be dead as you think he is, yet by Apollo’s will he has left a son
behind him, Telemachus, who will note anything done amiss by the maids
in the house, for he is now no longer in his boyhood.”
Penelope heard what he was saying and scolded the maid, “Impudent
baggage,” said she, “I see how abominably you are behaving, and you
shall smart for it. You knew perfectly well, for I told you myself,
that I was going to see the stranger and ask him about my husband, for
whose sake I am in such continual sorrow.”
Then she said to her head waiting woman Eurynome, “Bring a seat with a
fleece upon it, for the stranger to sit upon while he tells his story,
and listens to what I have to say. I wish to ask him some questions.”
Eurynome brought the seat at once and set a fleece upon it, and as soon
as Ulysses had sat down Penelope began by saying, “Stranger, I shall
first ask you who and whence are you? Tell me of your town and
parents.”
“Madam,” answered Ulysses, “who on the face of the whole earth can dare
to chide with you? Your fame reaches the firmament of heaven itself;
you are like some blameless king, who upholds righteousness, as the
monarch over a great and valiant nation: the earth yields its wheat and
barley, the trees are loaded with fruit, the ewes bring forth lambs,
and the sea abounds with fish by reason of his virtues, and his people
do good deeds under him. Nevertheless, as I sit here in your house, ask
me some other question and do not seek to know my race and family, or
you will recall memories that will yet more increase my sorrow. I am
full of heaviness, but I ought not to sit weeping and wailing in
another person’s house, nor is it well to be thus grieving continually.
I shall have one of the servants or even yourself complaining of me,
and saying that my eyes swim with tears because I am heavy with wine.”
Then Penelope answered, “Stranger, heaven robbed me of all beauty,
whether of face or figure, when the Argives set sail for Troy and my
dear husband with them. If he were to return and look after my affairs
I should be both more respected and should show a better presence to
the world. As it is, I am oppressed with care, and with the afflictions
which heaven has seen fit to heap upon me. The chiefs from all our
islands—Dulichium, Same, and Zacynthus, as also from Ithaca itself, are
wooing me against my will and are wasting my estate. I can therefore
show no attention to strangers, nor suppliants, nor to people who say
that they are skilled artisans, but am all the time broken-hearted
about Ulysses. They want me to marry again at once, and I have to
invent stratagems in order to deceive them. In the first place heaven
put it in my mind to set up a great tambour-frame in my room, and to
begin working upon an enormous piece of fine needlework. Then I said to
them, ‘Sweethearts, Ulysses is indeed dead, still, do not press me to
marry again immediately; wait—for I would not have my skill in
needlework perish unrecorded—till I have finished making a pall for the
hero Laertes, to be ready 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 I said, and they assented; whereon I
used to keep working at my great web all day long, but at night I would
unpick the stitches again by torch light. I fooled them in this way for
three years without their finding it out, but as time wore on and I was
now in my fourth year, in the waning of moons, and many days had been
accomplished, those good for nothing hussies my maids betrayed me to
the suitors, who broke in upon me and caught me; they were very angry
with me, so I was forced to finish my work whether I would or no. And
now I do not see how I can find any further shift for getting out of
this marriage. My parents are putting great pressure upon me, and my
son chafes at the ravages the suitors are making upon his estate, for
he is now old enough to understand all about it and is perfectly able
to look after his own affairs, for heaven has blessed him with an
excellent disposition. Still, notwithstanding all this, tell me who you
are and where you come from—for you must have had father and mother of
some sort; you cannot be the son of an oak or of a rock.”
Then Ulysses answered, “Madam, wife of Ulysses, since you persist in
asking me about my family, I will answer, no matter what it costs me:
people must expect to be pained when they have been exiles as long as I
have, and suffered as much among as many peoples. Nevertheless, as
regards your question I will tell you all you ask. There is a fair and
fruitful island in mid-ocean called Crete; it is thickly peopled and
there are ninety cities in it: the people speak many different
languages which overlap one another, for there are Achaeans, brave
Eteocretans, Dorians of three-fold race, and noble Pelasgi. There is a
great town there, Cnossus, where Minos reigned who every nine years had
a conference with Jove himself.152 Minos was father to Deucalion, whose
son I am, for Deucalion had two sons Idomeneus and myself. Idomeneus
sailed for Troy, and I, who am the younger, am called Aethon; my
brother, however, was at once the older and the more valiant of the
two; hence it was in Crete that I saw Ulysses and showed him
hospitality, for the winds took him there as he was on his way to Troy,
carrying him out of his course from cape Malea and leaving him in
Amnisus off the cave of Ilithuia, where the harbours are difficult to
enter and he could hardly find shelter from the winds that were then
raging. As soon as he got there he went into the town and asked for
Idomeneus, claiming to be his old and valued friend, but Idomeneus had
already set sail for Troy some ten or twelve days earlier, so I took
him to my own house and showed him every kind of hospitality, for I had
abundance of everything. Moreover, I fed the men who were with him with
barley meal from the public store, and got subscriptions of wine and
oxen for them to sacrifice to their heart’s content. They stayed with
me twelve days, for there was a gale blowing from the North so strong
that one could hardly keep one’s feet on land. I suppose some
unfriendly god had raised it for them, but on the thirteenth day the
wind dropped, and they got away.”
Many a plausible tale did Ulysses further tell her, and Penelope wept
as she listened, for her heart was melted. As the snow wastes upon the
mountain tops when the winds from South East and West have breathed
upon it and thawed it till the rivers run bank full with water, even so
did her cheeks overflow with tears for the husband who was all the time
sitting by her side. Ulysses felt for her and was sorry for her, but he
kept his eyes as hard as horn or iron without letting them so much as
quiver, so cunningly did he restrain his tears. Then, when she had
relieved herself by weeping, she turned to him again and said: “Now,