And ivory was the handle. Soon she reached
The furthest room with her attendant maids.
There lay the treasures of Ulysses—brass
And gold, and steel divinely wrought. There lay
His bow unstrung; there lay his quiver charged
With arrows; many were the deadly shafts
It held, a stranger’s gift, who met him once
In Lacedaemon, Iphitus by name,
The son of Eurytus, and like the gods
In presence. In Messenè met the twain,
And in the mansion of Orsilochus,
The warlike. Thither had Ulysses come
To claim a debt from all the region round;
For rovers from Messene to their ships
Had driven and carried off from Ithaca
Three hundred sheep and those who tended them.
For this Ulysses, though a stripling yet,
Came that long voyage, on an embassy,
Sent by his father and the other chiefs.
And Iphitus had come in search of steeds
Which he had lost—twelve mares, and under them
Twelve hardy mules, their foals. That errand brought
The doom of death upon him. For he came,
In journeying, to the abode of Hercules,
The mighty hero-son of Jupiter,
Famed for his labors, who, in his own house,
Slew Iphitus, the stranger. Cruel wretch!
Who reverenced not the vengeance of the gods,
Nor what was due to his own board, at which
He placed his guest, and slew him afterward,
And in his stables kept the goodly mares.
’Twas when this guest was seeking for his steeds
He met Ulysses, and bestowed on him
The bow, which mighty Eurytus once bore,
And dying in his lofty palace left
The weapon to his son. Ulysses gave
In turn a trenchant sword and massive lance,
A pledge of kindly hospitality,
Begun, but not continued till they sat
Each at the other’s table; for the son
Of Jove first took the life of him who gave
The bow, the godlike son of Eurytus.
That bow Ulysses, when he went to war
In his black galleys, never took with him,
But left it in his palace, to be kept
In memory of a beloved friend,
And only bore it in his own domain.
Now when the glorious lady reached the room,
And stood upon the threshold, wrought of oak
And polished by the workman’s cunning hand,
Who stretched the line upon it, and set up
Its posts, and hung its shining doors, she loosed
With a quick touch the thong that held the ring.
Put in the key, and with a careful aim
Struck back the sounding bolts. As when a bull
Roars in the field, such sound the beautiful doors,
Struck with the key, gave forth, and instantly
They opened to her. Up the lofty floor
She stepped, where stood the coffer that contained
The perfumed garments. Reaching forth her hand,
The queen took down the bow, that hung within
Its shining case, and sat her down, and laid
The case upon her knees, and, drawing forth
The monarch’s bow, she wept aloud. As soon
As that new gush of tears had ceased to fall,
Back to the hall she went, and that proud throng
Of suitors, bearing in her hand the bow
Unstrung, and quiver, where the arrows lay
Many and deadly. Her attendant maids
Brought also down a coffer, where were laid
Much brass and steel, provided by the king
For games like these. The glorious lady then,
In presence of the suitors, stood beside
The columns that upheld the stately roof.
She held a lustrous veil before her cheeks,
And, while on either side of her a maid
Stood modestly, bespake the suitors thus:—
“Hear, noble suitors! ye who throng these halls,
And eat and drink from day to day, while long
My husband has been gone; your sole excuse
For all this lawlessness the claim ye make
That I become a bride. Come then, for now
A contest is proposed. I bring to you
The mighty bow that great Ulysses bore.
Whoe’er among you he may be whose hand
Shall bend this bow, and send through these twelve rings
An arrow, him I follow hence, and leave
This beautiful abode of my young years,
With all its plenty—though its memory,
I think, will haunt me even in my dreams.”
She spake, and bade the master of the swine,
The good Eumaeus, place the bow and rings
Of hoary steel before the suitor-train.
In tears he bore the bow and laid it down.
The herdsman also wept to see again
His master’s bow. Antinoüs called to both
With a loud voice, and chid them angrily:—
“Ye silly rustics, who can never see
Beyond the hour, why trouble with your tears
The lady who had grief enough besides
For her lost husband? Sit and share the feast
In silence, or go forth and leave the bow;
A difficult contest it will be for us,
Nor, as I think, will this fair bow be bent
With ease, since surely there is no man here
Such as Ulysses was. I saw him once,
While but a child, and still remember him.”
He spake, yet in his secret heart believed
That he should bend the bow, and send a shaft
Through all the rings. And yet he was the first
To taste the steel—an arrow from the hand
Of the great chief Ulysses—whom he wronged
In his own palace, and to equal wrong
Encouraged others. Then Telemachus
Rose in his sacred might, and thus began:—
“Alas! it must be that Saturnian Jove
Has made me lose my wits. Wise as she is,
My mother promises to leave her home
And follow someone else, and yet I laugh,
And am delighted in my foolish heart.
Come then, since such a contest is proposed,
Ye suitors! and for such a woman too.
The like is not in all the lands of Greece,
Argos, Mycenae, or the hallowed shore
Of Pylos, or in Ithaca itself,
Or the dark mainland coast. Ye know it well;
Why should I praise my mother? Come then, all;
Let there be no excuses for delay,
Nor longer leave the bow untried, that we
May see the event. I too am moved to try;
And if I bend the bow, and send a shaft
Through all the rings, my gracious mother then
Will not, to my great grief, renounce her home,
And, following another, leave me here,
Although my prowess even now might win
The glorious prizes that my father won.”
He spake and, rising, from his shoulders took
The purple cloak, and laid the trenchant sword
Aside; and first he placed the rings of steel
In order, opening for them in the ground
A long trench by a line, and stamping close
The earth around them. All admired the skill
With which he ranged them, never having seen
The game before. And then he took his place
Upon
