O Muse, sing to me of the man full of resources, who wandered very much after he had destroyed the sacred city of Troy, and saw the cities of many men, and learned their manners. Many griefs also in his mind did he suffer on the sea, although seeking to preserve his own life, and the return of his companions; but not even thus, although anxious, did he extricate his companions: for they perished by their own infatuation, fools! who devoured the oxen of the Sun who journeys on high; but he deprived them of their return. O goddess, daughter of Jove, relate to us also some of these things.
‘Youths, my suitors, since godlike Ulysses is dead, stay urging my marriage until I shall finish this veil, that my threads may not perish in vain, a shroud for the hero Laertes, at the time when the destructive fate of long-slumbering death shall seize him. Lest some one amongst the Grecian women be indignant against me, should he lie without a wrapper, having possessed many things.’ Thus she spoke, and our proud mind was persuaded. Then during the day she wove the mighty web; but at night, when she had placed the torches near her, she unravelled it. Thus for three years, indeed, she escaped by deceit, and persuaded the Grecians. But when the fourth year came, and the hours advanced on, then indeed some one of the women, who knew it well, told it; and we found her unravelling the splendid web; so that she finished it of necessity, although unwilling.
“Severe are ye gods, envious above others, who grudge that goddesses should sleep openly with men, if any one has made for herself a dear husband. As when rosy-fingered Aurora took Orion, so long you gods who live easily envied her, until in Ortygia chaste Diana of the golden throne slew him, attacking him with her mild weapons; and as when fair-haired Ceres, yielding to her passion, was united in love and in the couch with Jasion, in thrice-ploughed fallow land; nor was Jupiter a lone time without knowing it, who slew him, striking him with his white thunder. So now you gods grudge that a mortal man should be present with me, whom I indeed saved when going alone on the keel of a ship;
But she found him sitting on the shore; nor were his eyes ever dried from tears, but his pleasant life was wasted away, as he bewailed his return, since it did not please the Nymph. But during the nights indeed he slept even by necessity in the hollow caves, against his will, near her who was willing; but during the day sitting on the rocks and shores, [wasting his mind with tears, and mournings, and griefs,] he looked over the barren sea, pouring forth tears;
Thus having spoken, divine Ulysses went from under the thickets; and with his strong hand he broke a branch of leaves from the thick wood, that he might cover the unseemly parts of a man around his body. And he hastened, like as a lion nourished in the mountains, trusting in his might, that goes rained and blown upon; and his eyes burn; and he comes after oxen, or sheep, or the wild stags; for hunger commands him to enter even a close abode to make an attempt upon the flocks: thus Ulysses, although naked, was about to mingle with the fair-haired damsels; for necessity came upon him. But he appeared dreadful to them, being defiled by the brine; and they fled in terror each in different ways through the projecting shores. But the daughter of Alcinous alone remained; for Minerva put confidence in her mind, and took fear from her limbs;
These things, then, the very famous bard sang; but Ulysses was melted, and a tear moistened his cheeks under his eyelids. And as a woman weeps falling about her dear husband, who falls before his own city and people, warding off the fatal day from his town and children; she indeed, gazing on him dying and gasping, spread about him laments shrilly; but they behind smiting her with spears on the back and the shoulders, lead her into captivity, to have both toil and calamity, and with most piteous grief her cheeks fade. So Ulysses poured a piteous tear from under his eye-brows.
“Thus I spoke; but he answered me not at all with his cruel mind; but he rushing, threw his hands on my companions, and snatching two together, like whelps, he dashed them against the earth, and the brains flowed out on the ground, and bedewed the earth. And cutting these up, limb by limb, he made ready supper: and he eat like a mountain-nurtured lion, nor did he leave entrails or flesh, or marrowy bones. But we weeping held up our hands to Jove, beholding the cruel deeds; and despair possessed our mind. But when the Cyclops had filled his enormous belly, eating men’s flesh, and chinking pure milk after it, he lay within the cave, stretched out in the midst of the sheep.
‘O Cyclops, didst thou ask of me my name in common report? I will tell thee; but do thou give me a hospitable gift, as thou didst promise: No-man is my name; my mother, and my father, and all the rest of my companions call me No-man.’
“Thus I spoke; but he again answered me with a cruel mind: ‘No-man I will eat the last after his companions, but the others first; this indeed shall be thy hospitable present.’
“‘Who art thou? from whence amongst men? where are thy city and parents? Astonishment possesses me, that thou wast not soothed, drinking these drugs. For not yet has any other man sustained these drugs, whoever shall have drunk them, and they shall have first passed his lips: [but thou hast some mind in thy breast which cannot be charmed.] Art thou Ulysses with many turns, whom the golden-wanded Argicide always told me would come, as he was returning from Troy in a swift black ship? But come now, place thy sword in the sheath, and then we will ascend my bed, that being mixed in the bed and in love, we may trust in one another.’
“Thus she spoke; but I, meditating in my mind, wished to lay hold of the soul of my departed mother. Thrice indeed I essayed it, and my mind urged me to lay hold of it, but thrice it flew from my hands, like unto a shadow, or even to a dream: but sharp grief arose in my heart still more; and addressing her, I spoke winged words:
“‘Mother mine, why dost thou not remain for me, desirous to take hold of thee, that even in Hades, throwing around our dear hands, we may both be satiated with sad grief? Has illustrious Proserpine sent forth this an image for me, that I may lament still more, mourning?’
‘Do not, O illustrious Ulysses, speak to me of death; I would wish, being on earth, to serve for hire with another man of no estate, who had not much livelihood, rather than rule over all the departed dead. But come, tell me an account of my noble son; did he follow to the war so as to be a chief or not? and, tell me if thou hast heard any thing of blameless Peleus; whether has he still honour amongst the many Myrmidonians? or do they dishonour him in Greece and Pthia, because old age possesses his hands and feet? for I am not assistant to him under the beams of the sun, being such a one, as when I slew the best of the people in wide Troy, fighting for the Grecians.
“‘Come hither, O much-praised Ulysses, great glory of the Grecians, stop thy ship, that thou mayest hear our voice; for no one has yet passed by here in a black ship, before he has heard the sweet voice from our mouths; but he goes away delighted, and acquainted with more things. For we ken all things, whatever the Grecians and Trojans suffered by the will of the gods in spacious Troy; and we know whatever things are done in the food-abounding earth.’
all deaths are hateful to wretched mortals; but, through hunger, it is most miserable to die and draw on one’s fate. But come, having driven away the best of the oxen of the Sun, we will sacrifice to the immortals who possess the wide heaven. But if we come to Ithaca, our father-land, we will immediately build a rich temple to the Sun, who journeys on high, where we may place many and excellent images. But if by any means wrathful on account of the straight-horned oxen, he should wish to destroy our ship, and the other gods follow, I had rather at once lose my life gaping in the wave, than waste away any longer, remaining on a desert island.’
Thus having spoken, he entered the well-built house: and he went straight through the palace to the illustrious suitors. But the fate of black death laid hold of Argus immediately when he saw Ulysses in the twentieth year.
As when a man, while a large fire is blazing, turns a paunch full of fat and blood, from side to side, and is anxious that it should be roasted very quickly; so did he roll himself on one side and the other, meditating how he might lay his hands upon the shameless suitors, being alone amongst many; but Minerva came near to him, descending from heaven: and in her person she was like unto a woman, and she stood over his head, and addressed him in words:
“Why dost thou still watch, thou who art ill-fated above all mortals?
Thus spoke the suitors; but much-planning Ulysses, as soon as he handled the large bow, and looked at it upon all sides, as when a man skilled in the harp and in song easily stretches a cord upon a new pin, joining on both sides the well-twisted entrail of a sheep; so did Ulysses bend the great bow without difficulty. But with his right he laid hold of the string and tried it; and it twanged beautifully, like unto a swallow in voice.
But much-planning Ulysses stripped himself of his rags, and leaped upon the large threshold, holding the bow, and the quiver full of arrows: and he poured out the swift arrows there before his feet; and addressed the suitors:
“This decisive contest has at length been accomplished: but now I will see whether I can hit another mark, which no man as yet has struck, but may Apollo give me glory.”
Thus he spoke; and fastening the cable of an azure-prowed ship to a tall column, he threw it round the dome, stretching it out on high, that no one might reach the ground with her feet. But as when either broad-winged thrushes or doves strike against a net, which stood in a thicket, as they are entering their nest, and a hateful bed has received them: so they held their heads in order, and around all their necks were cords, that they might die as miserably as possible. And they struggled convulsively with their feet for a little while, not very long.
Thus indeed she spoke, trying her husband; but Ulysses grieving addressed his wife, who knew prudent things:
“O lady; very grievous indeed is this word thou hast uttered. Who has placed my bed elsewhere? difficult would it be even for one who is very skilful, except the deity himself, coming, were with ease, if he wished it, to put it in another place. No living mortal among men alive, even if he were in the vigour of youth, would easily move it away; since a great sign is wrought in the well-worked bed; which I laboured, nor any one else.
And as when the land has appeared welcome to [men] swimming, whose well-built ship Neptune has wrecked in the sea, urged by the wind, and the dark billows, but few have escaped from the hoary sea, swimming to the shore, and much brine has incrusted round their body, but they gladly have stepped upon the land, escaping evil; so her husband was welcome to her beholding him: but she had not yet altogether let go her white arms from his neck.