<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=410325" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>The Odyssey: Book 2</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">Now when the child of morning, rosy-fingered Dawn, appeared,<br>Telemachus rose and dressed himself. He bound his sandals on to his<br>comely feet, girded his sword about his shoulder, and left his room<br>looking like an immortal god. He at once sent the criers round to call<br>the people in assembly, so they called them and the people gathered<br>thereon; then, when they were got together, he went to the place of<br>assembly spear in hand- not alone, for his two hounds went with him.<br>Minerva endowed him with a presence of such divine comeliness that all<br>marvelled at him as he went by, and when he took his place' in his<br>father's seat even the oldest councillors made way for him.<br>Aegyptius, a man bent double with age, and of infinite experience,<br>the first to speak His son Antiphus had gone with Ulysses to Ilius,<br>land of noble steeds, but the savage Cyclops had killed him when<br>they were all shut up in the cave, and had cooked his last dinner<br>for him, He had three sons left, of whom two still worked on their<br>father's land, while the third, Eurynomus, was one of the suitors;<br>nevertheless their father could not get over the loss of Antiphus, and<br>was still weeping for him when he began his speech.<br>"Men of Ithaca," he said, "hear my words. From the day Ulysses<br>left us there has been no meeting of our councillors until now; who<br>then can it be, whether old or young, that finds it so necessary to<br>convene us? Has he got wind of some host approaching, and does he wish<br>to warn us, or would he speak upon some other matter of public moment?<br>I am sure he is an excellent person, and I hope Jove will grant him<br>his heart's desire."<br>Telemachus took this speech as of good omen and rose at once, for he<br>was bursting with what he had to say. He stood in the middle of the<br>assembly and the good herald Pisenor brought him his staff. Then,<br>turning to Aegyptius, "Sir," said he, "it is I, as you will shortly<br>learn, who have convened you, for it is I who am the most aggrieved. I<br>have not got wind of any host approaching about which I would warn<br>you, nor is there any matter of public moment on which I would<br>speak. My grieveance is purely personal, and turns on two great<br>misfortunes which have fallen upon my house. The first of these is the<br>loss of my excellent father, who was chief among all you here present,<br>and was like a father to every one of you; the second is much more<br>serious, and ere long will be the utter ruin of my estate. The sons of<br>all the chief men among you are pestering my mother to marry them<br>against her will. They are afraid to go to her father Icarius,<br>asking him to choose the one he likes best, and to provide marriage<br>gifts for his daughter, but day by day they keep hanging about my<br>father's house, sacrificing our oxen, sheep, and fat goats for their<br>banquets, and never giving so much as a thought to the quantity of<br>wine they drink. No estate can stand such recklessness; we have now no<br>Ulysses to ward off harm from our doors, and I cannot hold my own<br>against them. I shall never all my days be as good a man as he was,<br>still I would indeed defend myself if I had power to do so, for I<br>cannot stand such treatment any longer; my house is being disgraced<br>and ruined. Have respect, therefore, to your own consciences and to<br>public opinion. Fear, too, the wrath of heaven, lest the gods should<br>be displeased and turn upon you. I pray you by Jove and Themis, who is<br>the beginning and the end of councils, [do not] hold back, my friends,<br>and leave me singlehanded- unless it be that my brave father Ulysses<br>did some wrong to the Achaeans which you would now avenge on me, by<br>aiding and abetting these suitors. Moreover, if I am to be eaten out<br>of house and home at all, I had rather you did the eating<br>yourselves, for I could then take action against you to some<br>purpose, and serve you with notices from house to house till I got<br>paid in full, whereas now I have no remedy."<br>With this Telemachus dashed his staff to the ground and burst into<br>tears. Every one was very sorry for him, but they all sat still and no<br>one ventured to make him an angry answer, save only Antinous, who<br>spoke thus:<br>"Telemachus, insolent braggart that you are, how dare you try to<br>throw the blame upon us suitors? It is your mother's fault not ours,<br>for she is a very artful woman. This three years past, and close on<br>four, she has been driving us out of our minds, by encouraging each<br>one of us, and sending him messages without meaning one word of what<br>she says. And then there was that other trick she played us. She set<br>up a great tambour frame in her room, and began to work on an enormous<br>piece of fine needlework. 'Sweet hearts,' said she, 'Ulysses is indeed<br>dead, still do not press me to marry again immediately, wait- for I<br>would not have skill in needlework perish unrecorded- till I have<br>completed a pall for the hero Laertes, to be in readiness against<br>the time when death shall take him. He is very rich, and the women<br>of the place will talk if he is laid out without a pall.'<br>"This was what she said, and we assented; whereon we could see her<br>working on her great web all day long, but at night she would unpick<br>the stitches again by torchlight. She fooled us in this way for<br>three years and we never found her out, but as time wore on and she<br>was now in her fourth year, one of her maids who knew what she was<br>doing told us, and we caught her in the act of undoing her work, so<br>she had to finish it whether she would or no. The suitors,<br>therefore, make you this answer, that both you and the Achaeans may<br>understand-'Send your mother away, and bid her marry the man of her<br>own and of her father's choice'; for I do not know what will happen if<br>she goes on plaguing us much longer with the airs she gives herself on<br>the score of the accomplishments Minerva has taught her, and because<br>she is so clever. We never yet heard of such a woman; we know all<br>about Tyro, Alcmena, Mycene, and the famous women of old, but they<br>were nothing to your mother, any one of them. It was not fair of her<br>to treat us in that way, and as long as she continues in the mind with<br>which heaven has now endowed her, so long shall we go on eating up<br>your estate; and I do not see why she should change, for she gets<br>all the honour and glory, and it is you who pay for it, not she.<br>Understand, then, that we will not go back to our lands, neither<br>here nor elsewhere, till she has made her choice and married some<br>one or other of us."<br>Telemachus answered, "Antinous, how can I drive the mother who<br>bore me from my father's house? My father is abroad and we do not know<br>whether he is alive or dead. It will be hard on me if I have to pay<br>Icarius the large sum which I must give him if I insist on sending his<br>daughter back to him. Not only will he deal rigorously with me, but<br>heaven will also punish me; for my mother when she leaves the house<br>will calf on the Erinyes to avenge her; besides, it would not be a<br>creditable thing to do, and I will have nothing to say to it. If you<br>choose to take offence at this, leave the house and feast elsewhere at<br>one another's houses at your own cost turn and turn about. If, on<br>the other hand, you elect to persist in spunging upon one man,<br>heaven help me, but Jove shall reckon with you in full, and when you<br>fall in my father's house there shall be no man to avenge you."<br>As he spoke Jove sent two eagles from the top of the mountain, and<br>they flew on and on with the wind, sailing side by side in their own<br>lordly flight. When they were right over the middle of the assembly<br>they wheeled and circled about, beating the air with their wings and<br>glaring death into the eyes of them that were below; then, fighting<br>fiercely and tearing at one another, they flew off towards the right<br>over the town. The people wondered as they saw them, and asked each<br>other what an this might be; whereon Halitherses, who was the best<br>prophet and reader of omens among them, spoke to them plainly and in<br>all honesty, saying:<br>"Hear me, men of Ithaca, and I speak more particularly to the<br>suitors, for I see mischief brewing for them. Ulysses is not going<br>to be away much longer; indeed he is close at hand to deal out death<br>and destruction, not on them alone, but on many another of us who live<br>in Ithaca. Let us then be wise in time, and put a stop to this<br>wickedness before he comes. Let the suitors do so of their own accord;<br>it will be better for them, for I am not prophesying without due<br>knowledge; everything has happened to Ulysses as I foretold when the<br>Argives set out for Troy, and he with them. I said that after going<br>through much hardship and losing all his men he should come home again<br>in the twentieth year and that no one would know him; and now all this<br>is coming true."<br>Eurymachus son of Polybus then said, "Go home, old man, and prophesy<br>to your own children, or it may be worse for them. I can read these<br>omens myself much better than you can; birds are always flying about<br>in the sunshine somewhere or other, but they seldom mean anything.<br>Ulysses has died in a far country, and it is a pity you are not dead<br>along with him, instead of prating here about omens and adding fuel to<br>the anger of Telemachus which is fierce enough as it is. I suppose you<br>think he will give you something for your family, but I tell you-<br>and it shall surely be- when an old man like you, who should know<br>better, talks a young one over till he becomes troublesome, in the<br>first place his young friend will only fare so much the worse- he will<br>take nothing by it, for the suitors will prevent this- and in the<br>next, we will lay a heavier fine, sir, upon yourself than you will<br>at all like paying, for it will bear hardly upon you. As for<br>Telemachus, I warn him in the presence of you all to send his mother<br>back to her father, who will find her a husband and provide her with<br>all the marriage gifts so dear a daughter may expect. Till we shall go<br>on harassing him with our suit; for we fear no man, and care neither<br>for him, with all his fine speeches, nor for any fortune-telling of<br>yours. You may preach as much as you please, but we shall only hate<br>you the more. We shall go back and continue to eat up Telemachus's<br>estate without paying him, till such time as his mother leaves off<br>tormenting us by keeping us day after day on the tiptoe of<br>expectation, each vying with the other in his suit for a prize of such<br>rare perfection. Besides we cannot go after the other women whom we<br>should marry in due course, but for the way in which she treats us."<br>Then Telemachus said, "Eurymachus, and you other suitors, I shall<br>say no more, and entreat you no further, for the gods and the people<br>of Ithaca now know my story. Give me, then, a ship and a crew of<br>twenty men to take me hither and thither, and I will go to Sparta<br>and to Pylos in quest of my father who has so long been missing.<br>Some one may tell me something, or (and people often hear things in<br>this way) some heaven-sent message may direct me. If I can hear of him<br>as alive and on his way home I will put up with the waste you<br>suitors will make for yet another twelve months. If on the other<br>hand I hear of his death, I will return at once, celebrate his funeral<br>rites with all due pomp, build a barrow to his memory, and make my<br>mother marry again."<br>With these words he sat down, and Mentor who had been a friend of<br>Ulysses, and had been left in charge of everything with full authority<br>over the servants, rose to speak. He, then, plainly and in all honesty<br>addressed them thus:<br>"Hear me, men of Ithaca, I hope that you may never have a kind and<br>well-disposed ruler any more, nor one who will govern you equitably; I<br>hope that all your chiefs henceforward may be cruel and unjust, for<br>there is not one of you but has forgotten Ulysses, who ruled you as<br>though he were your father. I am not half so angry with the suitors,<br>for if they choose to do violence in the naughtiness of their<br>hearts, and wager their heads that Ulysses will not return, they can<br>take the high hand and eat up his estate, but as for you others I am<br>shocked at the way in which you all sit still without even trying to<br>stop such scandalous goings on-which you could do if you chose, for<br>you are many and they are few."<br>Leiocritus, son of Evenor, answered him saying, "Mentor, what<br>folly is all this, that you should set the people to stay us? It is<br>a hard thing for one man to fight with many about his victuals. Even<br>though Ulysses himself were to set upon us while we are feasting in<br>his house, and do his best to oust us, his wife, who wants him back so<br>very badly, would have small cause for rejoicing, and his blood<br>would be upon his own head if he fought against such great odds. There<br>is no sense in what you have been saying. Now, therefore, do you<br>people go about your business, and let his father's old friends,<br>Mentor and Halitherses, speed this boy on his journey, if he goes at<br>all- which I do not think he will, for he is more likely to stay where<br>he is till some one comes and tells him something."<br>On this he broke up the assembly, and every man went back to his own<br>abode, while the suitors returned to the house of Ulysses.<br>Then Telemachus went all alone by the sea side, washed his hands<br>in the grey waves, and prayed to Minerva.<br>"Hear me," he cried, "you god who visited me yesterday, and bade<br>me sail the seas in search of my father who has so long been<br>missing. I would obey you, but the Achaeans, and more particularly the<br>wicked suitors, are hindering me that I cannot do so."<br>As he thus prayed, Minerva came close up to him in the likeness<br>and with the voice of Mentor. "Telemachus," said she, "if you are made<br>of the same stuff as your father you will be neither fool nor coward<br>henceforward, for Ulysses never broke his word nor left his work<br>half done. If, then, you take after him, your voyage will not be<br>fruitless, but unless you have the blood of Ulysses and of Penelope in<br>your veins I see no likelihood of your succeeding. Sons are seldom<br>as good men as their fathers; they are generally worse, not better;<br>still, as you are not going to be either fool or coward<br>henceforward, and are not entirely without some share of your father's<br>wise discernment, I look with hope upon your undertaking. But mind you<br>never make common cause with any of those foolish suitors, for they<br>have neither sense nor virtue, and give no thought to death and to the<br>doom that will shortly fall on one and all of them, so that they shall<br>perish on the same day. As for your voyage, it shall not be long<br>delayed; your father was such an old friend of mine that I will find<br>you a ship, and will come with you myself. Now, however, return<br>home, and go about among the suitors; begin getting provisions ready<br>for your voyage; see everything well stowed, the wine in jars, and the<br>barley meal, which is the staff of life, in leathern bags, while I<br>go round the town and beat up volunteers at once. There are many ships<br>in Ithaca both old and new; I will run my eye over them for you and<br>will choose the best; we will get her ready and will put out to sea<br>without delay."<br>Thus spoke Minerva daughter of Jove, and Telemachus lost no time<br>in doing as the goddess told him. He went moodily and found the<br>suitors flaying goats and singeing pigs in the outer court. Antinous<br>came up to him at once and laughed as he took his hand in his own,<br>saying, "Telemachus, my fine fire-eater, bear no more ill blood<br>neither in word nor deed, but eat and drink with us as you used to do.<br>The Achaeans will find you in everything- a ship and a picked crew<br>to boot- so that you can set sail for Pylos at once and get news of<br>your noble father."<br>"Antinous," answered Telemachus, "I cannot eat in peace, nor take<br>pleasure of any kind with such men as you are. Was it not enough<br>that you should waste so much good property of mine while I was yet<br>a boy? Now that I am older and know more about it, I am also stronger,<br>and whether here among this people, or by going to Pylos, I will do<br>you all the harm I can. I shall go, and my going will not be in vain<br>though, thanks to you suitors, I have neither ship nor crew of my own,<br>and must be passenger not captain."<br>As he spoke he snatched his hand from that of Antinous. Meanwhile<br>the others went on getting dinner ready about the buildings, jeering<br>at him tauntingly as they did so.<br>"Telemachus," said one youngster, "means to be the death of us; I<br>suppose he thinks he can bring friends to help him from Pylos, or<br>again from Sparta, where he seems bent on going. Or will he go to<br>Ephyra as well, for poison to put in our wine and kill us?"<br>Another said, "Perhaps if Telemachus goes on board ship, he will<br>be like his father and perish far from his friends. In this case we<br>should have plenty to do, for we could then divide up his property<br>amongst us: as for the house we can let his mother and the man who<br>marries her have that."<br>This was how they talked. But Telemachus went down into the lofty<br>and spacious store-room where his father's treasure of gold and bronze<br>lay heaped up upon the floor, and where the linen and spare clothes<br>were kept in open chests. Here, too, there was a store of fragrant<br>olive oil, while casks of old, well-ripened wine, unblended and fit<br>for a god to drink, were ranged against the wall in case Ulysses<br>should come home again after all. The room was closed with well-made<br>doors opening in the middle; moreover the faithful old house-keeper<br>Euryclea, daughter of Ops the son of Pisenor, was in charge of<br>everything both night and day. Telemachus called her to the store-room<br>and said:<br>"Nurse, draw me off some of the best wine you have, after what you<br>are keeping for my father's own drinking, in case, poor man, he should<br>escape death, and find his way home again after all. Let me have<br>twelve jars, and see that they all have lids; also fill me some<br>well-sewn leathern bags with barley meal- about twenty measures in<br>all. Get these things put together at once, and say nothing about<br>it. I will take everything away this evening as soon as my mother<br>has gone upstairs for the night. I am going to Sparta and to Pylos<br>to see if I can hear anything about the return of my dear father.<br>When Euryclea heard this she began to cry, and spoke fondly to<br>him, saying, "My dear child, what ever can have put such notion as<br>that into your head? Where in the world do you want to go to- you, who<br>are the one hope of the house? Your poor father is dead and gone in<br>some foreign country nobody knows where, and as soon as your back is<br>turned these wicked ones here will be scheming to get you put out of<br>the way, and will share all your possessions among themselves; stay<br>where you are among your own people, and do not go wandering and<br>worrying your life out on the barren ocean."<br>"Fear not, nurse," answered Telemachus, "my scheme is not without<br>heaven's sanction; but swear that you will say nothing about all<br>this to my mother, till I have been away some ten or twelve days,<br>unless she hears of my having gone, and asks you; for I do not want<br>her to spoil her beauty by crying."<br>The old woman swore most solemnly that she would not, and when she<br>had completed her oath, she began drawing off the wine into jars,<br>and getting the barley meal into the bags, while Telemachus went<br>back to the suitors.<br>Then Minerva bethought her of another matter. She took his shape,<br>and went round the town to each one of the crew, telling them to<br>meet at the ship by sundown. She went also to Noemon son of<br>Phronius, and asked him to let her have a ship- which he was very<br>ready to do. When the sun had set and darkness was over all the<br>land, she got the ship into the water, put all the tackle on board her<br>that ships generally carry, and stationed her at the end of the<br>harbour. Presently the crew came up, and the goddess spoke<br>encouragingly to each of them.<br>Furthermore she went to the house of Ulysses, and threw the<br>suitors into a deep slumber. She caused their drink to fuddle them,<br>and made them drop their cups from their hands, so that instead of<br>sitting over their wine, they went back into the town to sleep, with<br>their eyes heavy and full of drowsiness. Then she took the form and<br>voice of Mentor, and called Telemachus to come outside.<br>"Telemachus," said she, "the men are on board and at their oars,<br>waiting for you to give your orders, so make haste and let us be off."<br>On this she led the way, while Telemachus followed in her steps.<br>When they got to the ship they found the crew waiting by the water<br>side, and Telemachus said, "Now my men, help me to get the stores on<br>board; they are all put together in the cloister, and my mother does<br>not know anything about it, nor any of the maid servants except one."<br>With these words he led the way and the others followed after.<br>When they had brought the things as he told them, Telemachus went on<br>board, Minerva going before him and taking her seat in the stern of<br>the vessel, while Telemachus sat beside her. Then the men loosed the<br>hawsers and took their places on the benches. Minerva sent them a fair<br>wind from the West, that whistled over the deep blue waves whereon<br>Telemachus told them to catch hold of the ropes and hoist sail, and<br>they did as he told them. They set the mast in its socket in the cross<br>plank, raised it, and made it fast with the forestays; then they<br>hoisted their white sails aloft with ropes of twisted ox hide. As<br>the sail bellied out with the wind, the ship flew through the deep<br>blue water, and the foam hissed against her bows as she sped onward.<br>Then they made all fast throughout the ship, filled the mixing-bowls<br>to the brim, and made drink offerings to the immortal gods that are<br>from everlasting, but more particularly to the grey-eyed daughter of<br>Jove.<br>Thus, then, the ship sped on her way through the watches of the<br>night from dark till dawn.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Homer">Homer</a>, translated by Samuel Butler<div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=410325" data-title="The Odyssey: Book 2 de Homer" data-description="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 ..."></div> </div> </div>

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