The Odyssey

CALYPSO—ULYSSES REACHES SCHERIA ON A RAFT.


And now, as Dawn rose from her couch beside Tithonus—harbinger of light
alike to mortals and immortals—the gods met in council and with them,
Jove the lord of thunder, who is their king. Thereon Minerva began to
tell them of the many sufferings of Ulysses, for she pitied him away
there in the house of the nymph Calypso.

“Father Jove,” said she, “and all you other gods that live in
everlasting bliss, I hope there may never be such a thing as a kind and
well-disposed ruler any more, nor one who will govern equitably. I hope
they will be all henceforth cruel and unjust, for there is not one of
his subjects but has forgotten Ulysses, who ruled them as though he
were their father. There he is, lying in great pain in an island where
dwells the nymph Calypso, who will not let him go; and he cannot get
back to his own country, for he can find neither ships nor sailors to
take him over the sea. Furthermore, wicked people are now trying to
murder his only son Telemachus, who is coming home from Pylos and
Lacedaemon, where he has been to see if he can get news of his father.”

“What, my dear, are you talking about?” replied her father, “did you
not send him there yourself, because you thought it would help Ulysses
to get home and punish the suitors? Besides, you are perfectly able to
protect Telemachus, and to see him safely home again, while the suitors
have to come hurry-skurrying back without having killed him.”

When he had thus spoken, he said to his son Mercury, “Mercury, you are
our messenger, go therefore and tell Calypso we have decreed that poor
Ulysses is to return home. He is to be convoyed neither by gods nor
men, but after a perilous voyage of twenty days upon a raft he is to
reach fertile Scheria,50 the land of the Phaeacians, who are near of
kin to the gods, and will honour him as though he were one of
ourselves. They will send him in a ship to his own country, and will
give him more bronze and gold and raiment than he would have brought
back from Troy, if he had had all his prize money and had got home
without disaster. This is how we have settled that he shall return to
his country and his friends.”

Thus he spoke, and Mercury, guide and guardian, slayer of Argus, did as
he was told. Forthwith he bound on his glittering golden sandals with
which he could fly like the wind over land and sea. He took the wand
with which he seals men’s eyes in sleep or wakes them just as he
pleases, and flew holding it in his hand over Pieria; then he swooped
down through the firmament till he reached the level of the sea, whose
waves he skimmed like a cormorant that flies fishing every hole and
corner of the ocean, and drenching its thick plumage in the spray. He
flew and flew over many a weary wave, but when at last he got to the
island which was his journey’s end, he left the sea and went on by land
till he came to the cave where the nymph Calypso lived.

He found her at home. There was a large fire burning on the hearth, and
one could smell from far the fragrant reek of burning cedar and sandal
wood. As for herself, she was busy at her loom, shooting her golden
shuttle through the warp and singing beautifully. Round her cave there
was a thick wood of alder, poplar, and sweet smelling cypress trees,
wherein all kinds of great birds had built their nests—owls, hawks, and
chattering sea-crows that occupy their business in the waters. A vine
loaded with grapes was trained and grew luxuriantly about the mouth of
the cave; there were also four running rills of water in channels cut
pretty close together, and turned hither and thither so as to irrigate
the beds of violets and luscious herbage over which they flowed. 51
Even a god could not help being charmed with such a lovely spot, so
Mercury stood still and looked at it; but when he had admired it
sufficiently he went inside the cave.

Calypso knew him at once—for the gods all know each other, no matter
how far they live from one another—but Ulysses was not within; he was
on the sea-shore as usual, looking out upon the barren ocean with tears
in his eyes, groaning and breaking his heart for sorrow. Calypso gave
Mercury a seat and said: “Why have you come to see me,
Mercury—honoured, and ever welcome—for you do not visit me often? Say
what you want; I will do it for you at once if I can, and if it can be
done at all; but come inside, and let me set refreshment before you.”

As she spoke she drew a table loaded with ambrosia beside him and mixed
him some red nectar, so Mercury ate and drank till he had had enough,
and then said:

“We are speaking god and goddess to one another, and you ask me why I
have come here, and I will tell you truly as you would have me do. Jove
sent me; it was no doing of mine; who could possibly want to come all
this way over the sea where there are no cities full of people to offer
me sacrifices or choice hecatombs? Nevertheless I had to come, for none
of us other gods can cross Jove, nor transgress his orders. He says
that you have here the most ill-starred of all those who fought nine
years before the city of King Priam and sailed home in the tenth year
after having sacked it. On their way home they sinned against
Minerva,52 who raised both wind and waves against them, so that all his
brave companions perished, and he alone was carried hither by wind and
tide. Jove says that you are to let this man go at once, for it is
decreed that he shall not perish here, far from his own people, but
shall return to his house and country and see his friends again.”

Calypso trembled with rage when she heard this, “You gods,” she
exclaimed, “ought to be ashamed of yourselves. You are always jealous
and hate seeing a goddess take a fancy to a mortal man, and live with
him in open matrimony. So when rosy-fingered Dawn made love to Orion,
you precious gods were all of you furious till Diana went and killed
him in Ortygia. So again when Ceres fell in love with Iasion, and
yielded to him in a thrice-ploughed fallow field, Jove came to hear of
it before so very long and killed Iasion with his thunderbolts. And now
you are angry with me too because I have a man here. I found the poor
creature sitting all alone astride of a keel, for Jove had struck his
ship with lightning and sunk it in mid ocean, so that all his crew were
drowned, while he himself was driven by wind and waves on to my island.
I got fond of him and cherished him, and had set my heart on making him
immortal, so that he should never grow old all his days; still I cannot
cross Jove, nor bring his counsels to nothing; therefore, if he insists
upon it, let the man go beyond the seas again; but I cannot send him
anywhere myself for I have neither ships nor men who can take him.
Nevertheless I will readily give him such advice, in all good faith, as
will be likely to bring him safely to his own country.”

“Then send him away,” said Mercury, “or Jove will be angry with you and
punish you”.

On this he took his leave, and Calypso went out to look for Ulysses,
for she had heard Jove’s message. She found him sitting upon the beach
with his eyes ever filled with tears, and dying of sheer home sickness;
for he had got tired of Calypso, and though he was forced to sleep with
her in the cave by night, it was she, not he, that would have it so. As
for the day time, he spent it on the rocks and on the sea shore,
weeping, crying aloud for his despair, and always looking out upon the
sea. Calypso then went close up to him said:

“My poor fellow, you shall not stay here grieving and fretting your
life out any longer. I am going to send you away of my own free will;
so go, cut some beams of wood, and make yourself a large raft with an
upper deck that it may carry you safely over the sea. I will put bread,
wine, and water on board to save you from starving. I will also give
you clothes, and will send you a fair wind to take you home, if the
gods in heaven so will it—for they know more about these things, and
can settle them better than I can.”

Ulysses shuddered as he heard her. “Now goddess,” he answered, “there
is something behind all this; you cannot be really meaning to help me
home when you bid me do such a dreadful thing as put to sea on a raft.
Not even a well found ship with a fair wind could venture on such a
distant voyage: nothing that you can say or do shall make me go on
board a raft unless you first solemnly swear that you mean me no
mischief.”

Calypso smiled at this and caressed him with her hand: “You know a
great deal,” said she, “but you are quite wrong here. May heaven above
and earth below be my witnesses, with the waters of the river Styx—and
this is the most solemn oath which a blessed god can take—that I mean
you no sort of harm, and am only advising you to do exactly what I
should do myself in your place. I am dealing with you quite
straightforwardly; my heart is not made of iron, and I am very sorry
for you.”

When she had thus spoken she led the way rapidly before him, and
Ulysses followed in her steps; so the pair, goddess and man, went on
and on till they came to Calypso’s cave, where Ulysses took the seat
that Mercury had just left. Calypso set meat and drink before him of
the food that mortals eat; but her maids brought ambrosia and nectar
for herself, and they laid their hands on the good things that were
before them. When they had satisfied themselves with meat and drink,
Calypso spoke, saying:

“Ulysses, noble son of Laertes, so you would start home to your own
land at once? Good luck go with you, but if you could only know how
much suffering is in store for you before you get back to your own
country, you would stay where you are, keep house along with me, and
let me make you immortal, no matter how anxious you may be to see this
wife of yours, of whom you are thinking all the time day after day; yet
I flatter myself that I am no whit less tall or well-looking than she
is, for it is not to be expected that a mortal woman should compare in
beauty with an immortal.”

“Goddess,” replied Ulysses, “do not be angry with me about this. I am
quite aware that my wife Penelope is nothing like so tall or so
beautiful as yourself. She is only a woman, whereas you are an
immortal. Nevertheless, I want to get home, and can think of nothing
else. If some god wrecks me when I am on the sea, I will bear it and
make the best of it. I have had infinite trouble both by land and sea
already, so let this go with the rest.”

Presently the sun set and it became dark, whereon the pair retired into
the inner part of the cave and went to bed.

When the child of morning rosy-fingered Dawn appeared, Ulysses put on
his shirt and cloak, while the goddess wore a dress of a light gossamer
fabric, very fine and graceful, with a beautiful golden girdle about
her waist and a veil to cover her head. She at once set herself to
think how she could speed Ulysses on his way. So she gave him a great
bronze axe that suited his hands; it was sharpened on both sides, and
had a beautiful olive-wood handle fitted firmly on to it. She also gave
him a sharp adze, and then led the way to the far end of the island
where the largest trees grew—alder, poplar and pine, that reached the
sky—very dry and well seasoned, so as to sail light for him in the
water.53 Then, when she had shown him where the best trees grew,
Calypso went home, leaving him to cut them, which he soon finished
doing. He cut down twenty trees in all and adzed them smooth, squaring
them by rule in good workmanlike fashion. Meanwhile Calypso came back
with some augers, so he bored holes with them and fitted the timbers
together with bolts and rivets. He made the raft as broad as a skilled
shipwright makes the beam of a large vessel, and he fixed a deck on top
of the ribs, and ran a gunwale all round it. He also made a mast with a
yard arm, and a rudder to steer with. He fenced the raft all round with
wicker hurdles as a protection against the waves, and then he threw on
a quantity of wood. By and by Calypso brought him some linen to make
the sails, and he made these too, excellently, making them fast with
braces and sheets. Last of all, with the help of levers, he drew the
raft down into the water.

In four days he had completed the whole work, and on the fifth Calypso
sent him from the island after washing him and giving him some clean
clothes. She gave him a goat skin full of black wine, and another
larger one of water; she also gave him a wallet full of provisions, and
found him in much good meat. Moreover, she made the wind fair and warm
for him, and gladly did Ulysses spread his sail before it, while he sat
and guided the raft skilfully by means of the rudder. He never closed
his eyes, but kept them fixed on the Pleiads, on late-setting Bootes,
and on the Bear—which men also call the wain, and which turns round and
round where it is, facing Orion, and alone never dipping into the
stream of Oceanus—for Calypso had told him to keep this to his left.
Days seven and ten did he sail over the sea, and on the eighteenth the
dim outlines of the mountains on the nearest part of the Phaeacian
coast appeared, rising like a shield on the horizon.

But King Neptune, who was returning from the Ethiopians, caught sight
of Ulysses a long way off, from the mountains of the Solymi. He could
see him sailing upon the sea, and it made him very angry, so he wagged
his head and muttered to himself, saying, “Good heavens, so the gods
have been changing their minds about Ulysses while I was away in
Ethiopia, and now he is close to the land of the Phaeacians, where it
is decreed that he shall escape from the calamities that have befallen
him. Still, he shall have plenty of hardship yet before he has done
with it.”

Thereon he gathered his clouds together, grasped his trident, stirred
it round in the sea, and roused the rage of every wind that blows till
earth, sea, and sky were hidden in cloud, and night sprang forth out of
the heavens. Winds from East, South, North, and West fell upon him all
at the same time, and a tremendous sea got up, so that Ulysses’ heart
began to fail him. “Alas,” he said to himself in his dismay, “what ever
will become of me? I am afraid Calypso was right when she said I should
have trouble by sea before I got back home. It is all coming true. How
black is Jove making heaven with his clouds, and what a sea the winds
are raising from every quarter at once. I am now safe to perish. Blest
and thrice blest were those Danaans who fell before Troy in the cause
of the sons of Atreus. Would that I had been killed on the day when the
Trojans were pressing me so sorely about the dead body of Achilles, for
then I should have had due burial and the Achaeans would have honoured
my name; but now it seems that I shall come to a most pitiable end.”

As he spoke a sea broke over him with such terrific fury that the raft
reeled again, and he was carried overboard a long way off. He let go
the helm, and the force of the hurricane was so great that it broke the
mast half way up, and both sail and yard went over into the sea. For a
long time Ulysses was under water, and it was all he could do to rise
to the surface again, for the clothes Calypso had given him weighed him
down; but at last he got his head above water and spat out the bitter
brine that was running down his face in streams. In spite of all this,
however, he did not lose sight of his raft, but swam as fast as he
could towards it, got hold of it, and climbed on board again so as to
escape drowning. The sea took the raft and tossed it about as Autumn
winds whirl thistledown round and round upon a road. It was as though
the South, North, East, and West winds were all playing battledore and
shuttlecock with it at once.

When he was in this plight, Ino daughter of Cadmus, also called
Leucothea, saw him. She had formerly been a mere mortal, but had been
since raised to the rank of a marine goddess. Seeing in what great
distress Ulysses now was, she had compassion upon him, and, rising like
a sea-gull from the waves, took her seat upon the raft.

“My poor good man,” said she, “why is Neptune so furiously angry with
you? He is giving you a great deal of trouble, but for all his bluster
he will not kill you. You seem to be a sensible person, do then as I
bid you; strip, leave your raft to drive before the wind, and swim to
the Phaeacian coast where better luck awaits you. And here, take my
veil and put it round your chest; it is enchanted, and you can come to
no harm so long as you wear it. As soon as you touch land take it off,
throw it back as far as you can into the sea, and then go away again.”
With these words she took off her veil and gave it him. Then she dived
down again like a sea-gull and vanished beneath the dark blue waters.

But Ulysses did not know what to think. “Alas,” he said to himself in
his dismay, “this is only some one or other of the gods who is luring
me to ruin by advising me to quit my raft. At any rate I will not do so
at present, for the land where she said I should be quit of all
troubles seemed to be still a good way off. I know what I will do—I am
sure it will be best—no matter what happens I will stick to the raft as
long as her timbers hold together, but when the sea breaks her up I
will swim for it; I do not see how I can do any better than this.”

While he was thus in two minds, Neptune sent a terrible great wave that
seemed to rear itself above his head till it broke right over the raft,
which then went to pieces as though it were a heap of dry chaff tossed
about by a whirlwind. Ulysses got astride of one plank and rode upon it
as if he were on horseback; he then took off the clothes Calypso had
given him, bound Ino’s veil under his arms, and plunged into the
sea—meaning to swim on shore. King Neptune watched him as he did so,
and wagged his head, muttering to himself and saying, “There now, swim
up and down as you best can till you fall in with well-to-do people. I
do not think you will be able to say that I have let you off too
lightly.” On this he lashed his horses and drove to Aegae where his
palace is.

But Minerva resolved to help Ulysses, so she bound the ways of all the
winds except one, and made them lie quite still; but she roused a good
stiff breeze from the North that should lay the waters till Ulysses
reached the land of the Phaeacians where he would be safe.

Thereon he floated about for two nights and two days in the water, with
a heavy swell on the sea and death staring him in the face; but when
the third day broke, the wind fell and there was a dead calm without so
much as a breath of air stirring. As he rose on the swell he looked
eagerly ahead, and could see land quite near. Then, as children rejoice
when their dear father begins to get better after having for a long
time borne sore affliction sent him by some angry spirit, but the gods
deliver him from evil, so was Ulysses thankful when he again saw land
and trees, and swam on with all his strength that he might once more
set foot upon dry ground. When, however, he got within earshot, he
began to hear the surf thundering up against the rocks, for the swell
still broke against them with a terrific roar. Everything was enveloped
in spray; there were no harbours where a ship might ride, nor shelter
of any kind, but only headlands, low-lying rocks, and mountain tops.

Ulysses’ heart now began to fail him, and he said despairingly to
himself, “Alas, Jove has let me see land after swimming so far that I
had given up all hope, but I can find no landing place, for the coast
is rocky and surf-beaten, the rocks are smooth and rise sheer from the
sea, with deep water close under them so that I cannot climb out for
want of foot hold. I am afraid some great wave will lift me off my legs
and dash me against the rocks as I leave the water—which would give me
a sorry landing. If, on the other hand, I swim further in search of
some shelving beach or harbour, a hurricane may carry me out to sea
again sorely against my will, or heaven may send some great monster of
the deep to attack me; for Amphitrite breeds many such, and I know that
Neptune is very angry with me.”

While he was thus in two minds a wave caught him and took him with such
force against the rocks that he would have been smashed and torn to
pieces if Minerva had not shown him what to do. He caught hold of the
rock with both hands and clung to it groaning with pain till the wave
retired, so he was saved that time; but presently the wave came on
again and carried him back with it far into the sea—tearing his hands
as the suckers of a polypus are torn when some one plucks it from its
bed, and the stones come up along with it—even so did the rocks tear
the skin from his strong hands, and then the wave drew him deep down
under the water.

Here poor Ulysses would have certainly perished even in spite of his
own destiny, if Minerva had not helped him to keep his wits about him.
He swam seaward again, beyond reach of the surf that was beating
against the land, and at the same time he kept looking towards the
shore to see if he could find some haven, or a spit that should take
the waves aslant. By and by, as he swam on, he came to the mouth of a
river, and here he thought would be the best place, for there were no
rocks, and it afforded shelter from the wind. He felt that there was a
current, so he prayed inwardly and said:

“Hear me, O King, whoever you may be, and save me from the anger of the
sea-god Neptune, for I approach you prayerfully. Any one who has lost
his way has at all times a claim even upon the gods, wherefore in my
distress I draw near to your stream, and cling to the knees of your
riverhood. Have mercy upon me, O king, for I declare myself your
suppliant.”

Then the god staid his stream and stilled the waves, making all calm
before him, and bringing him safely into the mouth of the river. Here
at last Ulysses’ knees and strong hands failed him, for the sea had
completely broken him. His body was all swollen, and his mouth and
nostrils ran down like a river with sea-water, so that he could neither
breathe nor speak, and lay swooning from sheer exhaustion; presently,
when he had got his breath and came to himself again, he took off the
scarf that Ino had given him and threw it back into the salt54 stream
of the river, whereon Ino received it into her hands from the wave that
bore it towards her. Then he left the river, laid himself down among
the rushes, and kissed the bounteous earth.

“Alas,” he cried to himself in his dismay, “what ever will become of
me, and how is it all to end? If I stay here upon the river bed through
the long watches of the night, I am so exhausted that the bitter cold
and damp may make an end of me—for towards sunrise there will be a keen
wind blowing from off the river. If, on the other hand, I climb the
hill side, find shelter in the woods, and sleep in some thicket, I may
escape the cold and have a good night’s rest, but some savage beast may
take advantage of me and devour me.”

In the end he deemed it best to take to the woods, and he found one
upon some high ground not far from the water. There he crept beneath
two shoots of olive that grew from a single stock—the one an ungrafted
sucker, while the other had been grafted. No wind, however squally,
could break through the cover they afforded, nor could the sun’s rays
pierce them, nor the rain get through them, so closely did they grow
into one another. Ulysses crept under these and began to make himself a
bed to lie on, for there was a great litter of dead leaves lying
about—enough to make a covering for two or three men even in hard
winter weather. He was glad enough to see this, so he laid himself down
and heaped the leaves all round him. Then, as one who lives alone in
the country, far from any neighbor, hides a brand as fire-seed in the
ashes to save himself from having to get a light elsewhere, even so did
Ulysses cover himself up with leaves; and Minerva shed a sweet sleep
upon his eyes, closed his eyelids, and made him lose all memories of
his sorrows.