if he hadn’t flung that brazen boast, the mad blind fool.
“In the teeth of the gods,” he bragged, “I have escaped
the ocean’s sheer abyss!” Poseidon heard that frantic vaunt
and the god grasped his trident in both his massive hands
and struck the Gyraean headland, hacked the rock in two,
and the giant stump stood fast but the jagged spur
570 where Ajax perched at first, the raving madman —
toppling into the sea, it plunged him down, down
in the vast, seething depths. And so he died,
573 having drunk his fill of brine.
Your brother?
574 He somehow escaped that fate; Agamemnon got away
575 in his beaked ships. Queen Hera pulled him through.
But just as he came abreast of Malea’s beetling cape
a hurricane snatched him up and swept him way off course —
groaning, desperate —driving him over the fish-infested sea
579 to the wild borderland where Thyestes made his home
580 in the days of old and his son Aegisthus lived now.
But even from there a safe return seemed likely,
yes, the immortals swung the wind around to fair
and the victors sailed home. How he rejoiced,
Atrides setting foot on his fatherland once more —
he took that native earth in his hands and kissed it,
hot tears flooding his eyes, so thrilled to see his land!
But a watchman saw him too —from a lookout high above —
a spy that cunning Aegisthus stationed there,
luring the man with two gold bars in payment.
590 One whole year he’d watched . . .
so the great king would not get past unseen,
his fighting power intact for self-defense.
The spy ran the news to his master’s halls
and Aegisthus quickly set his stealthy trap.
Picking the twenty best recruits from town
he packed them in ambush at one end of the house,
at the other he ordered a banquet dressed and spread
and went to welcome the conquering hero, Agamemnon,
went with team and chariot, and a mind aswarm with evil.
600 Up from the shore he led the king, he ushered him in —
suspecting nothing of all his doom —he feasted him well
then cut him down as a man cuts down some ox at the trough!
Not one of your brother’s men-at-arms was left alive,
none of Aegisthus’ either. All, killed in the palace.’
So Proteus said, and his story crushed my heart.
I knelt down in the sand and wept. I’d no desire
to go on living and see the rising light of day.
But once I’d had my fill of tears and writhing there,
the Old Man of the Sea who never lies continued,
610 ‘No more now, Menelaus. How long must you weep?
Withering tears, what good can come of tears?
None I know of. Strive instead to return
to your native country —hurry home at once!
Either you’ll find the murderer still alive
or Orestes will have beaten you to the kill.
You’ll be in time to share the funeral feast.’
So he pressed, and I felt my heart, my old pride,
for all my grieving, glow once more in my chest
and I asked the seer in a rush of winging words,
620 ‘Those two I know now. Tell me the third man’s name.
Who is still alive, held captive off in the endless seas?
Unless he’s dead by now. I want to know the truth
though it grieves me all the more.’
‘Odysseus’ —
the old prophet named the third at once —
‘Laertes’ son, who makes his home in Ithaca . . .
I saw him once on an island, weeping live warm tears
in the nymph Calypso’s house —she holds him there by force.
He has no way to voyage home to his own native land,
no trim ships in reach, no crew to ply the oars
630 and send him scudding over the sea’s broad back.
But about your own destiny, Menelaus,
632 dear to Zeus, it’s not for you to die
and meet your fate in the stallion-land of Argos,
no, the deathless ones will sweep you off to the world’s end,
635 the Elysian Fields, where gold-haired Rhadamanthys waits,
where life glides on in immortal ease for mortal man;
no snow, no winter onslaught, never a downpour there
638 but night and day the Ocean River sends up breezes,
singing winds of the West refreshing all mankind.
640 All this because you are Helen’s husband now —
the gods count you the son-in-law of Zeus.’
So he divined and down the breaking surf he dove
as I went back to the ships with my brave men,
my heart a rising tide at every step.
Once I reached my craft hauled up on shore
we made our meal and the godsent night came down
and then we slept at the sea’s smooth shelving edge.
When young Dawn with her rose-red fingers shone once more
we hauled the vessels down to the sunlit breakers first
650 then stepped the masts amidships, canvas brailed —
the crews swung aboard, they sat to the oars in ranks
and in rhythm churned the water white with stroke on stroke.
Back we went to the Nile swelled by the rains of Zeus,
I moored the ships and sacrificed in a splendid rite,
and once I’d slaked the wrath of the everlasting gods
I raised a mound for Agamemnon, his undying glory.
All this done, I set sail and the gods sent me
a stiff following wind that sped me home,
home to the native land I love.
But come,
660 my boy, stay on in my palace now with me,
at least till ten or a dozen days have passed.
Then I’ll give you a princely send-off —shining gifts,
663 three stallions and a chariot burnished bright —
and I’ll add a gorgeous cup so you can pour
libations out to the deathless gods on high
and remember Menelaus all your days.”
Telemachus,
summoning up his newfound tact, replied,
“Please, Menelaus, don’t keep me quite so long.
True, I’d gladly sit beside you one whole year
670 without a twinge of longing for home or parents.
It’s wonderful how you tell your stories, all you say —
I delight to listen! Yes, but now, I’m afraid,
my comrades must be restless in sacred Pylos,
and here you’d hold me just a little longer.
As for the gift you give me, let it be a keepsake.
676 Those horses I really cannot take to Ithaca;
better to leave them here to be your glory.
You rule a wide level plain
where the fields of clover roll and galingale
680 and wheat and oats and glistening full-grain barley.
No running-room for mares in Ithaca, though, no meadows.
Goat, not stallion, land, yet it means the world to me.
None of the rugged islands slanting down to sea
is good for pasture or good for bridle paths,
but Ithaca, best of islands, crowns them all!”
So he declared. The lord of the warcry smiled,
patted him with his hand and praised his guest, concluding,
688 “Good blood runs in you, dear boy, your words are proof.
Certainly I’ll exchange the gifts. The power’s mine.
690 Of all the treasures lying
heaped in my palace
you shall have the finest, most esteemed. Why,
I’ll give you a mixing-bowl, forged to perfection —
it’s solid silver finished off with a lip of gold.
694 Hephaestus made it himself. And a royal friend,
695 Phaedimus, king of Sidon, lavished it on me
when his palace welcomed me on passage home.
How pleased I’d be if you took it as a gift!”
And now as the two confided in each other,
banqueters arrived at the great king’s palace,
700 leading their own sheep, bearing their hearty wine,
and their wives in lovely headbands sent along the food.
And so they bustled about the halls preparing dinner . . .
But all the while the suitors, before Odysseus’ palace,
amused themselves with discus and long throwing spears,
out on the leveled grounds, free and easy as always,
full of swagger. But lord Antinous sat apart,
dashing Eurymachus beside him, ringleaders,
head and shoulders the strongest of the lot.
Phronius’ son Noëmon approached them now,
710 quick to press Antinous with a question:
“Antinous, have we any notion or not
when Telemachus will return from sandy Pylos?
He sailed in a ship of mine and now I need her back
714 to cross over to Elis Plain where I keep a dozen horses,
brood-mares suckling some heavy-duty mules, unbroken.
I’d like to drive one home and break him in.”
That dumbfounded them both. They never dreamed
the prince had gone to Pylos, Neleus’ city —
certain the boy was still nearby somewhere,
720 out on his farm with flocks or with the swineherd.
“Tell me the truth!” Antinous wheeled on Noëmon.
“When did he go? And what young crew went with him?
Ithaca’s best? Or his own slaves and servants?
Surely he has enough to man a ship.
Tell me this —be clear —I’ve got to know:
did he commandeer your ship against your will
or did you volunteer it once he’d won you over?”
“I volunteered it, of course,” Noëmon said.
“What else could anyone do, when such a man,
730 a prince weighed down with troubles,
asked a favor? Hard to deny him anything.
And the young crew that formed his escort? Well,
they’re the finest men on the island, next to us.
And Mentor took command —I saw him climb aboard —
or a god who looked like Mentor head to foot,
and that’s what I find strange. I saw good Mentor
yesterday, just at sunup, here. But clearly
738 he boarded ship for Pylos days ago.”
With that he headed back to his father’s house,
740 leaving the two lords stiff with indignation.
They made the suitors sit down in a group
and stop their games at once. Eupithes’ son
Antinous rose up in their midst to speak,
his dark heart filled with fury,
blazing with anger —eyes like searing fire:
“By god, what a fine piece of work he’s carried off!
Telemachus —what insolence —and we thought his little jaunt
would come to grief. But in spite of us all, look,
the young cub slips away, just like that —
750 picks the best crew in the land and off he sails.
And this is just the start of the trouble he can make.
Zeus kill that brazen boy before he hits his prime!
Quick, fetch me a swift ship and twenty men —
I’ll waylay him from ambush, board him coming back
in the straits between Ithaca and rocky Same.
This gallant voyage of his to find his father
will find him wrecked at last!”
They all roared approval, urged him on,
rose at once and retired to Odysseus’ palace.
760 But not for long was Penelope unaware
of the grim plots her suitors planned in secret.
762 The herald Medon told her. He’d overheard their schemes,
listening in outside the court while they wove on within.
He rushed the news through the halls to tell the queen
who greeted him as he crossed her chamber’s threshold:
“Herald, why have the young blades sent you now?
To order King Odysseus’ serving-women
to stop their work and slave to fix their feast?
I hate their courting, their running riot here —
770 would to god that this meal, here and now,
were their last meal on earth!
Day after day,
all of you swarming, draining our life’s blood,
my wary son’s estate. What, didn’t you listen
to your fathers —when you were children, years ago —
telling you how Odysseus treated them, your parents?
Never an unfair word, never an unfair action
among his people here, though that’s the way
of our god-appointed kings,
hating one man, loving the next, with luck.
780 Not Odysseus. Never an outrage done to any man alive.
But you, you and your ugly outbursts, shameful acts,
they’re plain to see. Look at the thanks he gets
for all past acts of kindness!”
Medon replied,
sure of his own discretion, “Ah my queen,
if only that were the worst of all you face.
Now your suitors are plotting something worse,
harsher, crueler. God forbid they bring it off!
They’re poised to cut Telemachus down with bronze swords
on his way back home. He’s sailed off, you see . . .
790 for news of his father —to sacred Pylos first,
then out to the sunny hills of Lacedaemon.”
Her knees gave way on the spot, her heart too.
She stood there speechless a while, struck dumb,
tears filling her eyes, her warm voice choked.
At last she found some words to make reply:
“Oh herald, why has my child gone and left me?
No need in the world for him to board the ships,
those chariots of the sea that sweep men on,
driving across the ocean’s endless wastes . . .
800 Does he want his very name wiped off the earth?”
Medon, the soul of thoughtfulness, responded,
“I don’t know if a god inspired your son
or the boy’s own impulse led him down to Pylos,
but he went to learn of his father’s journey home,
or whatever fate he’s met.”
Back through King Odysseus’ house he went
but a cloud of heartbreak overwhelmed the queen.
She could bear no longer sitting on a chair
though her room had chairs aplenty.
810 Down she sank on her well-built chamber’s floor,
weeping, pitifully, as the women whimpered round her,
all the women, young and old, who served her house.
Penelope, sobbing uncontrollably, cried out to them,
“Hear me, dear ones! Zeus has given me torment —
me above all the others born and bred in my day.
My lionhearted husband, lost, long years ago,
who excelled the Argives all in every strength —
that great man whose fame resounds through Hellas
right to the depths of Argos!
But now my son,
820 my darling boy —the whirlwinds have ripped him
out of the halls without a trace! I never heard
he’d gone —n
ot even from you, you hard, heartless . . .
not one of you even thought to rouse me from my bed,
though well you knew when he boarded that black ship.
Oh if only I had learned he was planning such a journey,
he would have stayed, by god, keen as he was to sail —
or left me dead right here within our palace.
828 Go, someone, quickly! Call old Dolius now,
the servant my father gave me when I came,
830 the man who tends my orchard green with trees,
so he can run to Laertes, sit beside him,
tell him the whole story, point by point.
Perhaps —who knows? —he’ll weave some plan,
he’ll come out of hiding, plead with all these people
mad to destroy his line, his son’s line of kings!”
“Oh dear girl,” Eurycleia the fond old nurse replied,
“kill me then with a bronze knife —no mercy —or let me live,
here in the palace —I’ll hide nothing from you now!
I knew it all, I gave him all he asked for,
840 bread and mellow wine, but he made me take
a binding oath that I, I wouldn’t tell you,
no, not till ten or a dozen days had passed
or you missed the lad yourself and learned he’d gone,
so tears would never mar your lovely face . . .
Come, bathe now, put on some fresh clothes,
climb to the upper rooms with all your women
and pray to Pallas, daughter of storming Zeus —
she may save Telemachus yet, even at death’s door.
Don’t worry an old man, worried enough by now.
850 I can’t believe the blessed gods so hate
851 the heirs of King Arcesius, through and through.
One will still live on —I know it —born to rule
this lofty house and the green fields far and wide.”
With that
she lulled Penelope’s grief and dried her eyes of tears.
And the queen bathed and put fresh clothing on,
climbed to the upper rooms with all her women
857 and sifting barley into a basket, prayed to Pallas,
“Hear me, daughter of Zeus whose shield is thunder —
tireless one, Athena! If ever, here in his halls,
860 resourceful King Odysseus
burned rich thighs of sheep or oxen in your honor,
oh remember it now for my sake, save my darling son,
defend him from these outrageous, overbearing suitors!”
She shrilled a high cry and the goddess heard her prayer
The Odyssey(Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition) Page 17