By this time the whole household was afoot, and a score of busy hands were at work, under the direction of Eurycleia, preparing for the coming of the wooers. For it was a general holiday, being the festival of Apollo, and the guests were expected earlier than usual. Some went to the public fountain to fetch water, some swept and sprinkled the floor, and some sponged the tables and scoured the drinking vessels.

Presently the herdsmen came in, driving before them the beasts for sacrifice; and of these the first to arrive was Eumaeus, who brought three fat hogs as his part of the daily tribute. Leaving his charge to grub about in the courtyard, he came up to Odysseus, and inquired how he had fared among the wooers on the previous day. "I fared ill,"

answered Odysseus, "and ill fare the villains who deal thus with the stranger under another man's roof!"

A rude voice here broke in upon him, and Melanthius the goatherd thrust himself between them, jostling Odysseus, and reviling him in brutal terms, "What, still loitering here, thou vagabond? Wilt thou go begging at other men's tables, or art thou waiting to taste of my fists?" Odysseus deigned no reply, but shook his head, biding his time.

Another herdsman now entered the courtyard; this was Philoetius, who had charge of the herds of Odysseus on the mainland. He brought a heifer and two or three fat goats, having crossed over to Ithaca by the ferry. When he saw Odysseus he took Eumaeus aside, and inquired who he was. "He is of kingly aspect," remarked the new-comer, "in spite of his wretched garb. But even kings may come to beggary, if it be Heaven's will."

Having heard from Eumaeus what he had to tell, Philoetius approached Odysseus, and taking his right hand greeted him kindly, saying: "Welcome, old friend, for my master's sake! E'en such, methinks, is his case, if he still lives and looks upon the daylight. Ah! what a thought is that! It brings the sweat of agony to my brow when I think that even now he may be wandering in rags from door to door, begging for a morsel of bread, while his flocks and herds roam in thousands on the hills. What shall I do? It is not to be borne that all this wealth should increase and multiply, to feed the mouths of thieves and rogues. Often have I resolved to drive off my cattle into a far country, and no longer to abet these men in their riotous living; but my duty to Telemachus, and the hope that even now my lord may return, still hold me back."

Perceiving the neatherd to be loyal and staunch, Odysseus resolved to take him partly into his confidence, and answered accordingly: "Thy hope is nearer to fulfilment than thou thinkest. Hear me swear, by the hearth of Odysseus, and by the board at which I have fed, that before thou leavest Ithaca thou shalt see thy master with thine own eyes--thou shalt see him slaying the wooers who play the master here."

"Would that I might live to behold that day!" cried Philoetius. "May I never eat bread again, if the wooers felt not the might of my hands."

Eumaeus also declared himself ready to risk all by the side of Odysseus.

While they were thus conversing, the whole body of the wooers came thronging into the house, and the daily banquet began. At the inner end of the hall, commanding the door which led to the women's quarters, was a sort of platform or dais of stone, raised to some height above the general level of the floor, and facing the main entrance. Here Telemachus, as giver of the feast, was seated; and while the servants were handing round the dishes he called Odysseus from his place by the door, and made him sit down by his side. "Sit down here," he said, "and eat and drink thy fill. And you, sirs," he added, addressing the wooers, "keep a guard on your hands and your tongues. This is no tavern, but my own house, and I will not suffer my guest to be wronged by word or deed under my roof."

This bold speech pa.s.sed for the present unchallenged, though many a threatening look was directed at the young prince. By order of Telemachus, Odysseus received an equal portion with the other guests, and the banquet proceeded. Presently a new instance of the wooers'

brutality was given, as if they were resolved to keep the edge of his anger fresh and keen. The author of this outrage was Ctesippus, a wealthy lord of Same. Taking up a bullock's foot from a basket, in which the refuse of the meal was thrown, he made this merry jest: "The stranger has received an equal share of our meat, as is but right; for who would wish to stint a guest of Telemachus? And now I will make him a present over and above, that he may bestow somewhat on the bathwoman, or some other of the servants." Suiting the action to the word he hurled the missile with savage force at Odysseus; but he, ever on the alert, avoided it by bowing his head, and it struck the wall with a crash.

"Ctesippus," said Telemachus sternly, "it is well for thee that thou hast missed, else thou hadst died by my hand. Is it not enough that ye slaughter my cattle and pour out my wine like water, but must I sit here day after day while ye fill my house with riot and injury and outrage?"

The wooers sat silent, being somewhat abashed by the just rebuke; and after a long pause, one of them, whose name was Agelaus, answered mildly: "Telemachus says well, for indeed he hath been sorely provoked. Let there be an end of these mad doings, which it is a shame to see. And if Telemachus will be advised by me he will urge his mother to make choice of a husband, that he may henceforth dwell unmolested in his father's house. Why will she delay us further?

Surely by this time she must have given up all hope of ever seeing Odysseus again."

"Now by the woes of my father!" answered Telemachus, "I hinder her not from wedding whom she pleases; nay, I bid her do so, and offer bridal gifts besides. But I cannot drive her by force from my doors."

His words had a strange effect on the wooers: with one accord they broke out into a yelling peal of laughter, like women in a hysteric fit, while their eyes were filled with tears. And, more awful still!

their meat dropped blood as they conveyed it to their lips, and an unearthly wailing was heard, like the cry of a spirit in torment.

Among those present was Theoclymenus, the man of second sight, and in that very hour the vision came upon him, and he cried aloud from the place where he sat: "Woe unto you, ye doomed and miserable men! Thick darkness is wrapped about you, the darkness of the grave! All the air is loud with wailing, and your cheeks are wet with tears. See, see!

the walls and the rafters are sprinkled with blood, and the porch and the courtyard are thronged with ghosts, hurrying downward to the nether pit; and the sun has died out of heaven, and all the house lies in darkness and the shadow of death."

But the wooers had now recovered from their strange fit, and they laughed gaily at the terrible warning of the seer. "Poor man!" said Eurymachus, "he has left his wits at home. Go, someone, and show him the way to the town, if he finds it so dark here."

"I need no guide," answered Theoclymenus, "I have eyes and ears, and feet, and a steady brain, so that I shall not go astray. Farewell, unhappy men! Your hour of grace is past." And forthwith he arose and went his way to the town.

When he was gone the wooers began jeering at Telemachus, and taunted him with the behaviour of his guests. "Thou hast a rare taste," said one, "in the choice of thy company! First, this filthy beggar that c.u.mbers the ground with his greedy carca.s.s, and after him comes the mad prophet, and screams like a raven over our meat"

One meaning glance pa.s.sed between Telemachus and his father; the day was drawing on, and they cared not now to bandy words with the wooers.

And so the merry feast came to an end with jesting, and mirth, and laughter; and after a few short hours they were to sit down to supper--such a supper as they had never tasted before, with a hero and a G.o.ddess to spread the board.

The Bow of Odysseus

I

The time had now arrived for the great trial of strength and skill of which Penelope had spoken, and which was to decide deeper and deadlier issues than those of marriage. Among the treasures which Odysseus had left behind him was a famous bow, which he had received as a gift from Iphitus, son of Eurytus, whom he met in his youth during a visit to Messene. He who strung this bow, and shot an arrow through a line of axes set up in the hall, was to be rewarded by the hand of Penelope.

"Mother, it is time!" whispered Telemachus, soon after the departure of Theoclymenus. Obeying the signal, Penelope, who had been sitting in the hall listening to the talk of the wooers, left her place, and ascending a steep staircase made her way to the store-room, which was situated at the farther end of the house. In her hand she carried a brazen key with a handle of ivory; and when she came to the door, she loosened the strap which served to draw the bolt from the outside, and inserting the key drew back the bolt. The double doors flew open with a crash, and the treasury with all its wealth was revealed. Great coffers of cedar-wood lined the walls, filled with fine raiment, which her own hands had wrought. It was a cool and quiet retreat, dimly lighted, remote from all rude sounds, full of fragrant odours, and fit to guard the possessions of a prince. And there, hanging from a pin, and heedfully wrapped in its case, was seen the fatal bow. She took it down, and, sitting on one of the coffers, laid it on her knees, and gazed on it fondly with her eyes full of tears. How often had she seen it in the hands of Odysseus, when he went forth at sunrise to hunt the hare and the deer! How often had she taken it from him when he came back at evening loaded with the spoils of the chase! And now a keen shaft from this very bow was to cut the last tender chord of memory, and make her another man's wife!

With a heavy heart she took the bow with its quiver in her hands, and descending the staircase re-entered the hall, followed by her maidens, who carried a chest containing the axes.

"Behold the bow, fair sirs!" she said to the wooers, "and behold me, the prize for this fine feat of archery!" Therewith she gave the bow to Eumaeus, who received it with tears; and Philoetius wept likewise when he saw the treasured weapon of his lord. These signs of emotion stirred the anger of Antinous, who rebuked the herdsmen fiercely.

"Peace, fools!" he cried. "Peace, miserable churls! Why pierce ye the heart of the lady with your howlings? Has she not grief enough already? Go forth, and howl with the dogs outside, and we will make trial of the bow; yet me thinks it will be long ere anyone here shall string it"

"Anyone save thyself, thou wouldst say!" rejoined Telemachus with a loud laugh. Then, seeing his mother regarding him with gentle reproach, he added: "Tis strange that I should feel so gay and light of heart at the moment when I am about to lose my mother. Zeus, methinks, has turned my brain, and made me laugh when I should weep.

But come, ye bold wooers, which of you will be the first to enter the lists for this matchless prize, a lady without peer in all the land of h.e.l.las? Why sit ye thus silent? Must I show you the way? So be it, then; and if I can bend the bow, and shoot an arrow straight, the prize shall be mine, and my mother shall abide here in her widowed state."

So saying he sprang up, flung off his cloak, and laid aside his sword.

And first he made a long shallow trench in the floor of the hall, and set up the axes with their double heads in a straight line, stamping down the earth about the handles to make all firm. Then he took the bow from Eumaeus; it was a weighty and powerful weapon, fashioned from the horns of an ibex, which were firmly riveted into a ma.s.sive bridge, and great force was required to string it. Telemachus set the end against the floor, and strove with all his might to drive the string into its socket. Three times he tried, and failed; but the fourth time, making a great effort, he was on the point of succeeding, when his father nodded to him to desist. "Plague on it!" cried Telemachus, laying the bow aside with an air of vexation, "must I be called a poltroon all my life, or is it that I have not yet attained the full measure of my strength? Let the others now take their turn."

Then one by one the wooers rose up, in the order in which they sat, and tried to bend the bow. The first to essay it was Leiodes, a soothsayer, and a man of gentle and G.o.dly mind. But he was a soft liver, unpractised in all manly pastimes, and the bow was like iron in his white, womanish hands. "I fear that this bow will make an end of many a bold spirit," he said, little guessing how true his words were to prove; "for better it were to die than to go away beaten and broken men, after all the long years of our wooing."

"Fie on thee!" cried Antinous, "thinkest thou that there are no better men here than thou art? Doubt not that one of those present shall bend the bow and win the lady." Then he called Melanthius, and bade him light a fire, and bring a ball of lard to anoint the bow and make it easier to bend. The lard was brought, and the wooers sat in turn by the fire, rubbing and anointing the bow, but all to no purpose. Only Antinous and Eurymachus still held back, each in the full a.s.surance that he, and none other, had strength to bend the bow.

II

Odysseus sat watching the wooers from his place at the upper end of the hall, and his heart misgave him when he thought of the appalling task which he had undertaken. He had acquitted himself like a hero in many a hard-fought field, but never in all his life had he faced such odds as these. While he thus mused, and weighed the chances in his mind, he saw Eumaeus and Philoetius leave the hall together, and pa.s.s out through the courtyard gate. Then a sudden thought struck him, and muttering to himself, "I must risk it," he rose and followed the two men. He found them talking together outside the courtyard fence, and in order to make trial of their temper he addressed them in these cautious terms: "Tell me truly, good friends, which side would ye take, if by some miracle Odysseus suddenly appeared in this house?

Would ye be for the wooers or for him?"

Eumaeus and Philoetius with one voice protested that they were ready to hazard their lives for the rights of their master, whereupon Odysseus hesitated no longer, but answered: "The miracle has been wrought; I am he! After twenty years of toil and wandering Heaven hath brought me home. I have watched ye both, and I know that ye alone among all the thralls remain true to me. Only continue steadfast for this day, and your reward is a.s.sured. I will build houses for ye both, close to my own, and ye shall dwell there with your wives, as my friends and neighbours, equals in honour with Telemachus, my son."

The swineherd and neatherd listened with amazement, willing to believe, but still half in doubt; but when Odysseus showed them the scar, which they had seen many a time before, they were convinced, and embraced their old master with tears and cries of joy. Having allowed them some moments to indulge their feelings, Odysseus checked them with a warning gesture. "Take heed to yourselves," he said, "or your cries will betray us. And now mark what I shall tell you. I will go back to the house first, and do ye two follow me one by one. To thee, Philoetius, I give charge to make fast the gate of the courtyard, with bolt, and with bar, and with cord. And thou, Eumaeus, when the time comes, shalt bring the bow and place it in my hands, whether the wooers cry out on thee or not; and when thou hast given me the bow, go straightway and command the women to make fast the doors of their apartments, and remain quiet by their work until I have finished what I have to do."

At the moment when Odysseus returned to his place in the hall, Eurymachus was just making a last attempt to bend the bow. "Out on it!" he cried, finding all his efforts of no avail. "It is a shame to think how far beneath Odysseus we all are in the strength of our hands; 'tis this that stings me, much more than the loss of the lady."

"Thou mistakest the cause," answered Antinous. "This day is the holy feast of the divine archer, Apollo, and doubtless he is jealous because we try our skill in his own art on his sacred day. Let us leave the axes where they stand, and try our fortune again to-morrow."

The proposal was received with general applause, and forthwith the whole company called loud for wine, and began drinking heavily to drown their disappointment Odysseus watched the progress of the revel with grim satisfaction, and when the flushed faces and thick talk of the wooers showed that they were far gone in drunkenness he asked, with an air of deep humility, to be allowed to try his hand at stringing the bow. His request was greeted with a loud cry of contempt and indignation from all the wooers; and Antinous especially was highly incensed, threatening him with dire pains and penalties for his presumption. Hereupon Penelope interposed, and rebuked Antinous for his violence. "Why should not the stranger try his skill with the rest?" asked she. "Thinkest thou that the poor man will win me for his wife if he succeeds? Sure I am that he is not so foolish as to entertain such a thought."

"'Tis not for that," said Eurymachus, answering her. "He cannot be so mad as that. But what a shame to all this n.o.ble company if a houseless beggar should accomplish a feat which none of us was able to perform."

"Talk not of shame," replied Penelope with scorn. "Are ye not covered with shame already, by your foul deeds done in this house in the absence of its lord? Give him the bow, I say! And if he string it, by Apollo's grace, I will clothe him in a new cloak and doublet, and give him a sharp javelin, to keep off dogs and men, and a two-edged sword, and sandals for his feet, and give him safe conduct to whatsoever place he desires to reach."

The decisive moment was at hand, and Telemachus saw the necessity of removing his mother from the scene of the approaching conflict.

"Mother," he said in a tone of authority, "leave these things to me; I am master here. Evening draws on, and it is time for thee to retire."

When Penelope had withdrawn, Eumaeus took the bow, and was about to carry it to Odysseus, but paused half-way, in doubt and alarm, for a perfect storm of threats and abuse a.s.sailed his ears. "Halt, thou dog!

Put down the bow! Art thou tired of thy life?" Appalled by the menacing cries of the wooers, the swineherd stood hesitating; but Telemachus raised his voice, and commanded him instantly to deliver the bow to Odysseus. "I will teach thee," he said, "who is thy master; thou shalt carry the marks of my hands to thy farm, if thou do not as I tell thee. Would that I could as easily drive the whole of this drunken rout from my doors!"

"Well bragged, Sir Valiant!" cried Antinous; and all the wooers laughed boisterously when they heard him. Seizing his opportunity while their attention was thus diverted, Eumaeus came and placed the bow in the hands of Odysseus; then, calling Eurycleia, he bade her make fast the door of the women's apartments. Meanwhile Philoetius secured the gates of the courtyard, and returning to his place sat watching the movements of Odysseus. With anxious eye the hero scrutinised the great weapon, turning it this way and that, to see if it had been injured by worms or natural decay. To his great joy he found that it was sound and untouched. Then, easily as a minstrel fastens a new cord to a lyre, without effort he strung the bow, and bending it made the string tw.a.n.g loud and clear, like the shrill voice of the swallow.

A hundred mocking eyes and sneering faces had been turned towards him, as he sat fingering the bow and weighing it in his hands; but pale grew those faces now, and blank was that gaze. To add to their terror, at this moment a loud peal of thunder shook the house. Filled with high courage by the happy omen, Odysseus took an arrow, and, fitting it to the string, sent it with sure aim from the place where he sat along the whole line of axeheads, from the first to the last.

"Telemachus," he said, "thy guest hath not shamed thee. My hand is firm, and mine eye is true, poor worn-out wanderer though I be. Now let us give these fair guests their supper, and afterwards entertain them with music and with dancing, which are the fit accompaniment of a feast."