The Odyssey

ASSEMBLY OF THE PEOPLE OF ITHACA—SPEECHES OF TELEMACHUS AND OF THE
SUITORS—TELEMACHUS MAKES HIS PREPARATIONS AND STARTS FOR PYLOS WITH
MINERVA DISGUISED AS MENTOR.


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 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. Minerva endowed him
with a presence of such divine comeliness that all marvelled at him as
he went by, and when he took his place in his father’s seat even the
oldest councillors made way for him.

Aegyptius, a man bent double with age, and of infinite experience, was
the first to speak. His son Antiphus had gone with Ulysses to Ilius,
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.17
He had three sons left, of whom two still worked on their father’s
land, while the third, Eurynomus, was one of the suitors; nevertheless
their father could not get over the loss of Antiphus, and was still
weeping for him when he began his speech.

“Men of Ithaca,” he said, “hear my words. From the day Ulysses left us
there has been no meeting of our councillors 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 Jove will grant him his heart’s
desire.”

Telemachus 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 Aegyptius, “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 Icarius, 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 Ulysses 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 of heaven, lest
the gods should be displeased and turn upon you. I pray you by Jove and
Themis, who is the beginning and the end of councils, [do not] hold
back, my friends, and leave me singlehanded18—unless it be that my
brave father Ulysses 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.”19

With this Telemachus 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 Antinous, who spoke
thus:

“Telemachus, insolent braggart that you are, how dare you try to throw
the blame upon us suitors? It is your mother’s fault not ours, for she
is a very artful woman. This three years past, and close on four, she
had been driving us out of our minds, by encouraging each one of us,
and sending him messages without meaning one word of what she says. 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 needlework. ‘Sweet hearts,’ said she, ‘Ulysses is indeed dead,
still do not press me to marry again immediately, wait—for I would not
have skill in needlework perish unrecorded—till I have completed a pall
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 place will talk
if he is laid out without a pall.’

“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 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 Minerva has taught her, and because she is so clever.
We never yet heard of such a woman; we know all about Tyro, Alcmena,
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 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 honour and glory, 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.”

Telemachus answered, “Antinous, 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 Icarius 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 heaven will
also punish me; for my mother when she leaves the house will call on
the Erinyes to avenge her; besides, it would not be a creditable thing
to do, and I will have nothing to say to it. If you choose to take
offence 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 spunging upon one man, heaven help me, but Jove
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 Jove 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
all this might be; whereon Halitherses, who was the best prophet 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. Ulysses 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 Ulysses 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.”

Eurymachus son of Polybus 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. Ulysses 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 Telemachus 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 Telemachus, 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 Telemachus’s 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. 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 Telemachus said, “Eurymachus, 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
in quest of my father who has so long been missing. Some one may tell
me something, or (and people often hear things in this way) some
heaven-sent message may direct me. If I can hear of him as alive and on
his way home 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
barrow to his memory, and make my mother marry again.”

With these words he sat down, and Mentor20 who had been a friend of
Ulysses, 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 Ulysses, 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 hearts,
and wager their heads that Ulysses 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 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.”

Leiocritus, son of Evenor, 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 Ulysses
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 Ulysses.

Then Telemachus went all alone by the sea side, washed his hands in the
grey waves, and prayed to Minerva.

“Hear me,” he cried, “you god who visited me yesterday, and bade me
sail the seas in search 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, Minerva came close up to him in the likeness and
with the voice of Mentor. “Telemachus,” said she, “if you are made of
the same stuff as your father you will be neither fool nor coward
henceforward, for Ulysses 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 Ulysses 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
with any of those foolish suitors, for they have neither sense nor
virtue, 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 town and beat 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 Minerva daughter of Jove, and Telemachus lost no time in
doing as the goddess told him. He went moodily home, and found the
suitors flaying goats and singeing pigs in the outer court. Antinous
came up to him at once and laughed as he took his hand in his own,
saying, “Telemachus, 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.”

“Antinous,” answered Telemachus, “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, 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 captain.”

As he spoke he snatched his hand from that of Antinous. Meanwhile the
others went on getting dinner ready about the buildings,21 jeering at
him tauntingly as they did so.

“Telemachus,” 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 Telemachus 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 Telemachus 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 Ulysses should come home
again after all. The room was closed with well-made doors opening in
the middle; moreover the faithful old house-keeper Euryclea, daughter
of Ops the son of Pisenor, was in charge of everything both night and
day. Telemachus 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 return of my dear father.”

When Euryclea 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 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 Telemachus, “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 Telemachus went back to
the suitors.

Then Minerva 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 Phronius, 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 harbour. Presently the crew came up,
and the goddess spoke encouragingly to each of them.

Furthermore she went to the house of Ulysses, 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 Telemachus to come outside.

“Telemachus,” 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 Telemachus followed in her steps. When
they got to the ship they found the crew waiting by the water side, and
Telemachus said, “Now my men, help me to get the stores on board; they
are all put together in the cloister, 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, Telemachus went on board,
Minerva going before him and taking her seat in the stern of the
vessel, while Telemachus sat beside her. Then the men loosed the
hawsers and took their places on the benches. Minerva sent them a fair
wind from the West,22 that whistled over the deep blue waves23 whereon
Telemachus 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 deep blue
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 grey-eyed daughter of Jove.

Thus, then, the ship sped on her way through the watches of the night
from dark till dawn.