By known Ulysses’ foot. More brought, and he
Supplied beside with sweetest ointments, she
His seat drew near the fire, to keep him warm,
And with his piec’d rags hiding close his harm.
The Queen came near, and said: “Yet, guest, afford
Your further patience, till but in a word
I’ll tell my woes to you; for well I know
That Rest’s sweet hour her soft foot orders now,
When all poor men, how much soever griev’d,
Would gladly get their woe-watch’d pow’rs reliev’d.
But God hath giv’n my grief a heart so great
It will not down with rest, and so I set
My judgment up to make it my delight.
All day I mourn, yet nothing let the right
I owe my charge both in my work and maids;
And when the night brings rest to others’ aids
I toss my bed; Distress, with twenty points,
Slaught’ring the pow’rs that to my turning joints
Convey the vital heat. And as all night
Pandareus’ daughter, poor Edone, sings,
Clad in the verdure of the yearly springs,
When she for Itylus, her lovéd son,
By Zethus’ issue in his madness done
To cruel death, pours out her hourly moan,
And draws the ears to her of ev’ry one;
So flows my moan that cuts in two my mind,
And here and there gives my discourse the wind,
Uncertain whether I shall with my son
Abide still here, the safe possession
And guard of all goods, rev’rence to the bed
Of my lov’d lord, and to my far-off spread
Fame with the people, putting still in use,
Or follow any best Greek I can chuse
To his fit house, with treasure infinite,
Won to his nuptials. While the infant plight
And want of judgment kept my son in guide,
He was not willing with my being a bride,
Nor with my parting from his court; but now,
Arriv’d at man’s state, he would have me vow
My love to some one of my Wooers here,
And leave his court; offended that their cheer
Should so consume his free possessions.
To settle then a choice in these my moans,
Hear and expound a dream that did engrave
My sleeping fancy: Twenty geese I have,
All which, me thought, mine eye saw tasting wheat
In water steep’d, and joy’d to see them eat;
When straight a crook-beak’d eagle from a hill
Stoop’d, and truss’d all their necks, and all did kill;
When, all left scatter’d on the pavement there,
She took her wing up to the Gods’ fair sphere.
I, ev’n amid my dream, did weep and mourn
To see the eagle, with so shrewd a turn,
Stoop my sad turrets; when, methought, there came
About my mournings many a Grecian dame,
To cheer my sorrows; in whose most extreme
The hawk came back, and on the prominent beam
That cross’d my chamber fell, and us’d to me
A human voice, that sounded horribly,
And said: ‘Be confident, Icarius’ seed,
This is no dream, but what shall chance indeed.
The geese the Wooers are, the eagle, I,
Was heretofore a fowl, but now imply
Thy husband’s being, and am come to give
The Wooers’ death, that on my treasure live.’
With this sleep left me, and my waking way
I took, to try if any violent prey
Were made of those my fowls, which well enough
I, as before, found feeding at their trough
Their yoted wheat.” “O woman,” he replied,
“Thy dream can no interpretation bide
But what the eagle made, who was your lord,
And said himself would sure effect afford
To what he told you; that confusion
To all the Wooers should appear, and none
Escape the fate and death he had decreed.”
She answer’d him: “O guest, these dreams exceed
The art of man t’ interpret; and appear
Without all choice or form; nor ever were
Perform’d to all at all parts. But there are
To these light dreams, that like thin vapours fare,
Two two-leav’d gates, the one of ivory,
The other horn. Those dreams, that fantasy
Takes from the polish’d ivory port, delude
The dreamer ever, and no truth include;
Those, that the glitt’ring horn-gate lets abroad,
Do evermore some certain truth abode.
But this my dream I hold of no such sort
To fly from thence; yet, whichsoever port
It had access from, it did highly please
My son and me. And this my thoughts profess:
That day that lights me from Ulysses’ court
Shall both my infamy and curse consort.
I, therefore, purpose to propose them now,
In strong contention, Ulysses’ bow;
Which he that eas’ly draws, and from his draft
Shoots through twelve axes (as he did his shaft,
All set up in a row, and from them all
His stand-far-off kept firm) my fortunes shall
Dispose, and take me to his house from hence,
Where I was wed a maid, in confluence
Of feast and riches; such a court here then
As I shall ever in my dreams retain.”
“Do not,” said he, “defer the gameful prize,
But set to task their importunities
With something else than nuptials; for your lord
Will to his court and kingdom be restor’d
Before they thread those steels, or draw his bow.”
“O guest,” replied Penelope, “would you
Thus sit and please me with your speech, mine ears
Would never let mine eyelids close their spheres!
But none can live without the death of sleep,
Th’ Immortals in our mortal memories keep
Our ends and deaths by sleep, dividing so,
As by the fate and portion of our woe,
Our times spent here, to let us nightly try
That while we live, as much live as we die.
In which use I will to my bed ascend,
Which I bedew with tears, and sigh past end
Through all my hours spent, since I lost my joy
For vile, lewd, never-to-be-naméd, Troy,
Yet there I’ll prove for sleep, which take you here,
Or on the earth, if that your custom were,
Or have a bed, dispos’d for warmer rest.”
Thus left she with her ladies her old guest,
Ascended her fair chamber, and her bed,
Whose sight did ever duly make her shed
Tears for her lord; which still her eyes did steep,
Till Pallas shut them with delightsome sleep.
THE END OF THE NINETEENTH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS.
ENDNOTES.
1 Χοὶνικος ἅπτηται, they will needs turn this, quadram (for modium) gustet. Though the words bear no such signification, but give a proverb then in use r
epetition, which was: he shall not join or make a spoke in the nave of my chariot, or chariot-wheel. Χοίνικον, or χοίνικις, signifying modiolus rotæ, and ἅπτω, recto.
2 Intending with truth itself, not his show only.
3 Autolycus gives his grandchild Ulysses his name: from whence the Odysseys is derived, ‘Οδυσσεύς, derived of ὀδύζομαι, ex ὀδύνη factum; signifying dolorem proprie corporis, nam ira ex dolore oritur.
THE TWENTIETH BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS
THE ARGUMENT
Ulysses, in the Wooers’ beds,
Resolving first to kill the maids.
That sentence giving off, his care
For other objects doth prepare.
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
ψ.
Jove’s thunder chides,
But cheers the King,
The Wooers’ prides
Discomfiting.
Ulysses in the entry laid his head,
And under him an ox-hide newly-flay’d,
Above him sheep-fells store; and over those
Eurynomé cast mantles. His repose
Would bring no sleep yet, studying the ill
He wish’d the Wooers; who came by him still
With all their wenches, laughing, wantoning,
In mutual lightness; which his heart did sting,
Contending two ways, if, all patience fled,
He should rush up and strike those strumpets dead,
Or let that night be last, and take th’ extreme
Of those proud Wooers, that were so supreme
In pleasure of their high-fed fantasies.
His heart did bark within him to surprise
Their sports with spoils; no fell she-mastiff can,
Amongst her whelps, fly eag’rer on a man
She doth not know, yet scents him something near,
And fain would come to please her tooth, and tear,
Than his disdain, to see his roof so fil’d
With those foul fashions, grew within him wild
To be in blood of them. But, finding best
In his free judgment to let passion rest,
He chid his angry spirit, and beat his breast,
And said: “Forbear, my mind, and think on this:
There hath been time when bitter agonies
Have tried thy patience. Call to mind the day
In which the Cyclop, which pass’d manly sway
Of violent strength, devour’d thy friends; thou then
Stood’st firmly bold, till from that hellish den
Thy wisdom brought thee off, when nought but death
Thy thoughts resolv’d on.” This discourse did breathe
The fiery boundings of his heart, that still
Lay in that æsture, without end his ill
Yet manly suff’ring. But from side to side
It made him toss apace. You have not tried
A fellow roasting of a pig before
A hasty fire, his belly yielding store
Of fat and blood, turn faster, labour more
To have it roast, and would not have it burn,
Than this and that way his unrest made turn
His thoughts and body, would not quench the fire,
And yet not have it heighten his desire
Past his discretion, and the fit enough
Of haste and speed, that went to all the proof
His well-laid plots, and his exploits requir’d,
Since he, but one, to all their deaths aspir’d.
In this contention Pallas stoop’d from heav’n,
Stood over him, and had her presence giv’n
A woman’s form, who sternly thus began:
“Why, thou most sour and wretched-fated man
Of all that breathe, yet liest thou thus awake?
The house in which thy cares so toss and take
Thy quiet up is thine; thy wife is there;
And such a son, as if thy wishes were
To be suffic’d with one they could not mend.”
“Goddess,” said he, “’tis true; but I contend
To right their wrongs, and, though I be but one,
To lay unhelp’d and wreakful hand upon
This whole resort of impudents, that here
Their rude assemblies never will forbear.
And yet a greater doubt employs my care,
That if their slaughters in my reaches are,
And I perform them, Jove and you not pleas’d,
How shall I fly their friends? And would stand seis’d
Of counsel to resolve this care in me.”
“Wretch,” she replied, “a friend of worse degree
Might win thy credence, that a mortal were, I
And us’d to second thee, though nothing near
So pow’rful in performance nor in care;
Yet I, a Goddess, that have still had share
In thy achievements, and thy person’s guard,
Must still be doubted by thy brain, so hard
To credit anything above thy pow’r;
And that must come from heav’n; if ev’ry hour
There be not personal appearance made,
And aid direct giv’n, that may sense invade.
I’ll tell thee, therefore, clearly: If there were
Of divers-languag’d men an army here
Of fifty companies, all driving hence
Thy sheep and oxen, and with violence
Offer’d to charge us, and besiege us round,
Thou shouldst their prey reprise, and them confound.
Let sleep then seize thee. To keep watch all night
Consumes the spirits, and makes dull the sight.”
Thus pour’d the Goddess sleep into his eyes,
And reascended the Olympian skies.
When care-and-lineament-resolving sleep
Had laid his temples in his golden steep,
His-wise-in-chaste-wit-worthy wife did rise,
First sitting up in her soft bed, her eyes
Open’d with tears, in care of her estate,
Which now her friends resolv’d to terminate
To more delays, and make her marry one.
Her silent tears then ceas’d, her orison
This Queen of women to Diana made:
“Rev’rend Diana, let thy darts invade
My woeful bosom, and my life deprive,
Now at this instant, or soon after drive
My soul with tempests forth, and give it way
To those far-off dark vaults, where never day
Hath pow’r to shine, and let them cast it down
Where refluent Oceanus doth crown
His curléd head, where Pluto’s orchard is,
And entrance to our after miseries.
As such stern whirlwinds ravish’d to that stream
Pandareus’ daughters, when the Gods to them
Had reft their parents, and them left alone,
Poor orphan children, in their mansion;
Whose desolate life did Love’s sweet Queen incline
To nurse with presséd milk and sweetest wine;
Whom Juno deck’d beyond all other dames
With wisdom’s light, and beauty’s moving flames;
Whom Phœbe goodliness of stature render’d;
And to whose fair hands wise Minerva tender’d
The loom and needle in their utmost skill;
And while Love’s Empress scal’d th’ Olympian hill
To beg of lightning-lo
ving Jove (since he
The means to all things knows, and doth decree
Fortunes, infortunes, to the mortal race)
For those poor virgins, the accomplish’d grace
Of sweetest nuptials, the fierce Harpies prey’d
On ev’ry good and miserable maid,
And to the hateful Furies gave them all
In horrid service; yet, may such fate fall
From steep Olympus on my loathéd head,
Or fair-chair’d Phœbe strike me instant dead,
That I may undergo the gloomy shore
To visit great Ulysses’ soul, before
I soothe my idle blood and wed a worse.
And yet, beneath how desperate a curse
Do I live now! It is an ill that may
Be well endur’d, to mourn the whole long day,
So night’s sweet sleeps, that make a man forget
Both bad and good, in some degree would let
My thoughts leave grieving; but, both day and night,
Some cruel God gives my sad memory sight.
This night, methought, Ulysses grac’d my bed
In all the goodly state with which he led
The Grecian army; which gave joys extreme
To my distress, esteeming it no dream,
But true indeed; and that conceit I had,
That when I saw it false I might be mad.
Such cruel fates command in my life’s guide.”
By this the morning’s orient dews had dyed
The earth in all her colours; when the King,
In his sweet sleep, suppos’d the sorrowing
That she us’d waking in her plaintive bed
To be her mourning, standing by his head,
As having known him there; who straight arose,
And did again within the hall dispose
The carpets and the cushions, where before
They serv’d the seats. The hide without the door
He carried back, and then, with held-up hands,
He pray’d to Him that heav’n and earth commands:
“O Father Jove, if through the moist and dry
You, willing, brought me home, when misery
Had punish’d me enough by your free dooms,
Let some of these within those inner rooms,
Startled with horror of some strange ostent,
Come here, and tell me that great Jove hath bent
Threat’nings without at some lewd men within.”
To this his pray’r Jove shook his sable chin,
And thunder’d from those pure clouds that, above
The Complete Poetical Works of George Chapman Page 153
