The Odyssey of Homer. Homer
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her, she sank in soft repose. Then Pallas, teeming with a new design, Set forth an airy phantom in the form Of fair Iphthima, daughter of the brave Icarius, and Eumelus’ wedded wife In Pheræ. Shaped like her the dream she sent Into the mansion of the godlike Chief Ulysses, with kind purpose to abate 970 The sighs and tears of sad Penelope. Ent’ring the chamber-portal, where the bolt Secured it, at her head the image stood, And thus, in terms compassionate, began. Sleep’st thou, distress’d Penelope? The Gods, Happy in everlasting rest themselves, Forbid thy sorrows. Thou shalt yet behold Thy son again, who hath by no offence Incurr’d at any time the wrath of heav’n. To whom, sweet-slumb’ring in the shadowy gate 980 By which dreams pass, Penelope replied. What cause, my sister, brings thee, who art seen Unfrequent here, for that thou dwell’st remote? And thou enjoin’st me a cessation too From sorrows num’rous, and which, fretting, wear My heart continual; first, my spouse I lost With courage lion-like endow’d, a prince All-excellent, whose never-dying praise Through Hellas and all Argos flew diffused; And now my only son, new to the toils 990 And hazards of the sea, nor less untaught The arts of traffic, in a ship is gone Far hence, for whose dear cause I sorrow more Than for his Sire himself, and even shake With terror, lest he perish by their hands To whom he goes, or in the stormy Deep; For num’rous are his foes, and all intent To slay him, ere he reach his home again. Then answer thus the shadowy form return’d. Take courage; suffer not excessive dread 1000 To overwhelm thee, such a guide he hath And guardian, one whom many wish their friend, And ever at their side, knowing her pow’r, Minerva; she compassionates thy griefs, And I am here her harbinger, who speak As thou hast heard by her own kind command. Then thus Penelope the wise replied. Oh! if thou art a goddess, and hast heard A Goddess’ voice, rehearse to me the lot Of that unhappy one, if yet he live 1010 Spectator of the cheerful beams of day, Or if, already dead, he dwell below. Whom answer’d thus the fleeting shadow vain. I will not now inform thee if thy Lord Live, or live not. Vain words are best unspoken. So saying, her egress swift beside the bolt She made, and melted into air. Upsprang From sleep Icarius’ daughter, and her heart Felt heal’d within her, by that dream distinct Visited in the noiseless night serene. 1020 Meantime the suitors urged their wat’ry way, To instant death devoting in their hearts Telemachus. There is a rocky isle In the mid sea, Samos the rude between And Ithaca, not large, named Asteris. It hath commodious havens, into which A passage clear opens on either side, And there the ambush’d Greeks his coming watch’d.
9 Hesychius tells us, that the Greecians ornamented with much attention the front wall of their courts for the admiration of passengers.
10 Οφθαλμῶν τε βολαι.
11 Antilochus was his brother.
12 The son of Aurora, who slew Antilochus, was Memnon.
13 Because Pisistratus was born after Antilochus had sailed to Troy.
14 Proteus
15 Seals, or sea-calves.
16 From the abruptness of this beginning, Virgil, probably, who has copied the story, took the hint of his admired exordium.
Nam quis te, juvenum confidentissime, nostras.
Egit adire domos.
17 Son of Oïleus.
18 Δαιτυμων—generally signifies the founder of a feast; but we are taught by Eustathius to understand by it, in this place, the persons employed in preparing it.
19 This transition from the third to the second person belongs to the original, and is considered as a fine stroke of art in the poet, who represents Penelope in the warmth of her resentment, forgetting where she is, and addressing the suitors as if present.
20 Mistaking, perhaps, the sound of her voice, and imagining that she sang.—Vide Barnes in loco.
BOOK V
ARGUMENT
Mercury bears to Calypso a command from Jupiter that she dismiss Ulysses. She, after some remonstrances, promises obedience, and furnishes him with instruments and materials, with which he constructs a raft. He quits Calypso’s island; is persecuted by Neptune with dreadful tempests, but by the assistance of a sea nymph, after having lost his raft, is enabled to swim to Phæacia.
Aurora from beside her glorious mate
Tithonus now arose, light to dispense
Through earth and heav’n, when the assembled Gods
In council sat, o’er whom high-thund’ring Jove
Presided, mightiest of the Pow’rs above.
Amid them, Pallas on the num’rous woes
Descanted of Ulysses, whom she saw
With grief, still prison’d in Calypso’s isle.
Jove, Father, hear me, and ye other Pow’rs
Who live for ever, hear! Be never King 10
Henceforth to gracious acts inclined, humane,
Or righteous, but let ev’ry sceptred hand
Rule merciless, and deal in wrong alone,
Since none of all his people whom he sway’d
With such paternal gentleness and love
Remembers, now, divine Ulysses more.
He, in yon distant isle a suff’rer lies
Of hopeless sorrow, through constraint the guest
Still of the nymph Calypso, without means
Or pow’r to reach his native shores again, 20
Alike of gallant barks and friends depriv’d,
Who might conduct him o’er the spacious Deep.
Nor is this all, but enemies combine
To slay his son ere yet he can return
From Pylus, whither he hath gone to learn
There, or in Sparta, tidings of his Sire.
To whom the cloud-assembler God replied.
What word hath pass’d thy lips, daughter belov’d?
Hast thou not purpos’d that arriving soon
At home, Ulysses shall destroy his foes? 30
Guide thou, Telemachus, (for well thou canst)
That he may reach secure his native coast,
And that the suitors baffled may return.
He ceas’d, and thus to Hermes