Scroll 2
Now when the child of morning,
rosy-fingered Dawn, appeared, Telemakhos 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. Athena endowed him with a presence
of such divine comeliness [kharis] that all marveled
at him as he went by, and when he took his place in his
father's seat even the oldest councilors made way for
him.
Aigyptios, a man bent double with
age, and of infinite experience, was the first to speak His son
Antiphos had gone with Odysseus to
Ilion, 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, Eurynomos, was one of the suitors; nevertheless their father
could not get over the loss of Antiphos, and was still weeping for
him when he began his speech.
"Men of
Ithaca," he said, "hear my
words. From the day Odysseus left us there has been no meeting of our
councilors 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 Zeus will grant him his heart's desire."
Telemakhos 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 Aigyptios, "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 grievance 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 Ikarios, 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 Odysseus 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 [mênis] of the gods, lest they should
be displeased and turn upon you. I pray you by Zeus 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 Odysseus 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 Telemakhos 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 Antinoos, who spoke thus:
"Telemakhos, insolent braggart
that you are, how dare you try to throw the blame upon us suitors? We
are not the ones who are responsible [aitioi] but your
mother is, for she knows many kinds of kerdos. 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 that
say one thing but her noos means other things. 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 fabric.
‘Sweet hearts,’ said she, ‘Odysseus is indeed dead,
still do not press me to marry again immediately, wait - for I would
not have skill in weaving perish unrecorded - till I have completed a
shroud 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
dêmos will talk if he is laid out without a
shroud.’
"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 [hôra] 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 Athena has taught her,
and because she knows so many kinds of kerdos. We never yet
heard of such a woman; we know all about Tyro, Alkmene, 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 [noos] 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
honor and glory [kleos], 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."
Telemakhos answered, "Antinoos,
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 Ikarios 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 some daimôn
will also punish me; for my mother when she leaves the house will
call on the Erinyes to avenge her; besides, it will result in
nemesis for me among men, and I will have nothing to say to
it. If you choose to take offense 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 sponging upon
one man, heaven help me, but Zeus 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 Zeus 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 seer 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. Odysseus 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
Odysseus 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."
Eurymakhos son of Polybos 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. Odysseus 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 Telemakhos
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 Telemakhos, 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 then 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 Telemakhos' 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
[aretê]. 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 Telemakhos said,
"Eurymakhos, 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 to inquire
about the nostos of my father who has so long been missing.
Some one may tell me something, or (and people often hear
kleos in this way) some heaven-sent message may direct me. If
I can hear of him as alive and achieving his homecoming
[nostos] 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 grave marker [sêma] to his
memory, and make my mother marry again."
With these words he sat down, and
Mentor who had been a friend of Odysseus, 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 Odysseus, 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 minds [noos], and
wager their heads that Odysseus 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 the rest of the population
[dêmos] 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."
Leiokritos, son of Euenor,
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 Odysseus 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 Odysseus.
Then Telemakhos went all alone by
the sea side, washed his hands in the gray waves, and prayed to
Athena.
"Hear me," he cried, "you god who
visited me yesterday, and bade me sail the seas in search of the
nostos 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, Athena came
close up to him in the likeness and with the voice of Mentor.
"Telemakhos," said she, "if you are made of the same stuff as your
father you will be neither fool nor coward henceforward, for Odysseus
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 Odysseus 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
[noos] with any of those foolish suitors, for they are
neither sensible nor just [dikaioi], 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 dêmos and
round 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 Athena daughter of
Zeus, and Telemakhos 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. Antinoos came up to him at once and laughed as he
took his hand in his own, saying, "Telemakhos, 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."
"Antinoos," answered Telemakhos,
"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
[dêmos], 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 leader."
As he spoke he snatched his hand
from that of Antinoos. Meanwhile the others went on getting dinner
ready about the buildings, jeering at him tauntingly as they did
so.
"Telemakhos," 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
Telemakhos 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
Telemakhos 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 Odysseus should come home
again after all. The room was closed with well-made doors opening in
the middle; moreover the faithful old house-keeper Eurykleia,
daughter of Ops the son of Pisenor, was in charge of everything both
night and day. Telemakhos 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
nostos of my dear father.
When Eurykleia 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
[dêmos] 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
Telemakhos, "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 Telemakhos went back to the suitors.
Then Athena 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 Phronios, 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 harbor. Presently the crew came up, and the
goddess spoke encouragingly to each of them.
Furthermore she went to the house
of Odysseus, 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 Telemakhos to
come outside.
"Telemakhos," 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
Telemakhos followed in her steps. When they got to the ship they
found the crew waiting by the water side, and Telemakhos said, "Now
my men, help me to get the stores on board; they are all put together
in the room, 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, Telemakhos went on board, Athena going before him and
taking her seat in the stern of the vessel, while Telemakhos sat
beside her. Then the men loosed the hawsers and took their places on
the benches. Athena sent them a fair wind from the West, that
whistled over the seething deep waves whereon Telemakhos 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 seething deep 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 gray-eyed daughter of Zeus.
Thus, then, the ship sped on her
way through the watches of the night from dark till dawn.
