"Here I am, my dear sir," said he, "stay your
hand therefore, and tell your father, or he will kill me in his rage against
the suitors for having wasted his substance and been so foolishly disrespectful
to yourself."
Odysseus smiled at him and answered, "Fear not;
Telemakhos has saved your life, that you may know in future, and tell other
people, how greatly better good deeds prosper than evil ones. Go, therefore,
outside the cloisters into the outer court, and be out of the way of the
slaughter - you and the bard - while I finish my work here inside."
The pair went into the outer court as fast as
they could, and sat down by Zeus’ great altar, looking fearfully round, and
still expecting that they would be killed. Then Odysseus searched the whole
court carefully over, to see if anyone had managed to hide himself and was
still living, but he found them all lying in the dust and weltering in their
blood. They were like fishes which fishermen have netted out of the sea, and
thrown upon the beach to lie gasping for water till the heat of the sun makes
an end of them. Even so were the suitors lying all huddled up one against the
other.
Then Odysseus said to Telemakhos, "Call nurse
Eurykleia; I have something to say to her."
Telemakhos went and knocked at the door of the
women's room. "Make haste," said he, "you old woman who have been set over all
the other women in the house. Come outside; my father wishes to speak to
you."
When Eurykleia heard this she unfastened the
door of the women's room and came out, following Telemakhos. She found Odysseus
among the corpses bespattered with blood and filth like a lion that has just
been devouring an ox, and his breast and both his cheeks are all bloody, so
that he is a fearful sight; even so was Odysseus besmirched from head to foot
with gore. When she saw all the corpses and such a quantity of blood, she was
beginning to cry out for joy, for she saw that a great deed had been done; but
Odysseus checked her, "Old woman," said he, "rejoice in silence; restrain
yourself, and do not make any noise about it; it is an unholy thing to vaunt
over dead men. Heaven's doom and their own evil deeds have brought these men to
destruction, for they respected no man in the whole world, neither rich nor
poor, who came near them, and they have come to a bad end as a punishment for
their wickedness and folly. Now, however, tell me which of the women in the
house have misconducted themselves, and who are innocent."
"I will tell you the truth [alêtheia], my son," answered Eurykleia. "There are
fifty women in the house whom we teach to do things, such as carding wool, and
all kinds of household work. Of these, twelve in all have misbehaved, and have
been wanting in respect to me, and also to Penelope. They showed no disrespect
to Telemakhos, for he has only lately grown and his mother never permitted him
to give orders to the female servants; but let me go upstairs and tell your
wife all that has happened, for some god has been sending her to sleep."
"Do not wake her yet," answered Odysseus, "but
tell the women who have misconducted themselves to come to me."
Eurykleia left the room to tell the women, and
make them come to Odysseus; in the meantime he called Telemakhos, the stockman,
and the swineherd. "Begin," said he, "to remove the dead, and make the women
help you. Then, get sponges and clean water to swill down the tables and seats.
When you have thoroughly cleansed the whole cloisters, take the women into the
space between the domed room and the wall of the outer court, and run them
through with your swords till they are quite dead, and have forgotten all about
love and the way in which they used to lie in secret with the suitors."
On this the women came down in a body, weeping
and wailing bitterly. First they carried the dead bodies out, and propped them
up against one another in the gatehouse. Odysseus ordered them about and made
them do their work quickly, so they had to carry the bodies out. When they had
done this, they cleaned all the tables and seats with sponges and water, while
Telemakhos and the two others shoveled up the blood and dirt from the ground,
and the women carried it all away and put it out of doors. Then when they had
made the whole place quite clean and orderly, they took the women out and
hemmed them in the narrow space between the wall of the domed room and that of
the yard, so that they could not get away: and Telemakhos said to the other
two, "I shall not let these women die a clean death, for they were insolent to
me and my mother, and used to sleep with the suitors."
So saying he made a ship's cable fast to one of
the bearing-posts that supported the roof of the domed room, and secured it all
around the building, at a good height, lest any of the women's feet should
touch the ground; and as thrushes or doves beat against a net that has been set
for them in a thicket just as they were getting to their nest, and a terrible
fate awaits them, even so did the women have to put their heads in nooses one
after the other and die most miserably. Their feet moved convulsively for a
while, but not for very long.
As for Melanthios, they took him through the
room into the inner court. There they cut off his nose and his ears; they drew
out his vitals and gave them to the dogs raw, and then in their fury they cut
off his hands and his feet.
When they had done this they washed their hands
and feet and went back into the house, for all was now over; and Odysseus said
to the dear old nurse Eurykleia, "Bring me sulfur, which cleanses all
pollution, and fetch fire also that I may burn it, and purify the cloisters.
Go, moreover, and tell Penelope to come here with her attendants, and also all
the maid servants that are in the house."
"All that you have said is true," answered
Eurykleia, "but let me bring you some clean clothes - a shirt and cloak. Do not
keep these rags on your back any longer. It is not right."
"First light me a fire," replied Odysseus.
She brought the fire and sulfur, as he had
bidden her, and Odysseus thoroughly purified the cloisters and both the inner
and outer courts. Then she went inside to call the women and tell them what had
happened; whereon they came from their apartment with torches in their hands,
and pressed round Odysseus to embrace him, kissing his head and shoulders and
taking hold of his hands. It made him feel as if he should like to weep, for he
remembered every one of them.
Scroll 23
Eurykleia now went upstairs laughing to tell her
mistress that her dear husband had come home. Her aged knees became young again
and her feet were nimble for joy as she went up to her mistress and bent over
her head to speak to her. "Wake up Penelope, my dear child," she exclaimed,
"and see with your own eyes something that you have been wanting this long time
past. Odysseus has at last indeed come home again, and has killed the suitors
who were giving so much trouble in his house, eating up his estate and
ill-treating his son."
"My good nurse," answered Penelope, "you must be
mad. The gods sometimes send some very sensible people out of their minds, and
make foolish people become sensible. This is what they must have been doing to
you; for you always used to be a reasonable person. Why should you thus mock me
when I have trouble enough already - talking such nonsense, and waking me up
out of a sweet sleep that had taken possession of my eyes and closed them? I
have never slept so soundly from the day my poor husband went to that city with
the ill-omened name. Go back again into the women's room; if it had been any
one else, who had woke me up to bring me such absurd news I should have sent
her away with a severe scolding. As it is, your age shall protect you."
"My dear child," answered Eurykleia, "I am not
mocking you. It is quite true as I tell you that Odysseus is come home again.
He was the stranger whom they all kept on treating so badly in the room.
Telemakhos knew all the time that he was come back, but kept his father's
secret that he might have his revenge on all these wicked people.
Then Penelope sprang up from her couch, threw
her arms round Eurykleia, and wept for joy. "But my dear nurse," said she,
"explain this to me; if he has really come home as you say, how did he manage
to overcome the wicked suitors single handed, seeing what a number of them
there always were?"
"I was not there," answered Eurykleia, "and do
not know; I only heard them groaning while they were being killed. We sat
crouching and huddled up in a corner of the women's room with the doors closed,
till your son came to fetch me because his father sent him. Then I found
Odysseus standing over the corpses that were lying on the ground all round him,
one on top of the other. You would have enjoyed it if you could have seen him
standing there all bespattered with blood and filth, and looking just like a
lion. But the corpses are now all piled up in the gatehouse that is in the
outer court, and Odysseus has lit a great fire to purify the house with sulfur.
He has sent me to call you, so come with me that you may both be happy together
after all; for now at last the desire of your heart has been fulfilled; your
husband is come home to find both wife and son alive and well, and to take his
revenge in his own house on the suitors who behaved so badly to him."
"‘My dear nurse," said Penelope, "do not exult
too confidently over all this. You know how delighted every one would be to see
Odysseus come home - more particularly myself, and the son who has been born to
both of us; but what you tell me cannot be really true. It is some god who is
angry with the suitors for their great wickedness [hubris], and has made an end of them; for they respected no man in
the whole world, neither rich nor poor, who came near them, who came near them,
and they have come to a bad end in consequence of their iniquity. Odysseus is
dead far away from the Achaean land; he will never return home again [nostos]."
Then nurse Eurykleia said, "My child, what are
you talking about? But you were all hard of belief and have made up your mind
that your husband is never coming, although he is in the house and by his own
fire side at this very moment. Besides I can give you another proof [sêma]; when I was washing him I perceived the scar
which the wild boar gave him, and I wanted to tell you about it, but in his
wisdom [noos] he would not let me, and clapped his
hands over my mouth; so come with me and I will make this bargain with you - if
I am deceiving you, you may have me killed by the cruelest death you can think
of."
"My dear nurse," said Penelope, "however wise
you may be you can hardly fathom the counsels of the gods. Nevertheless, we
will go in search of my son, that I may see the corpses of the suitors, and the
man who has killed them."
On this she came down from her upper room, and
while doing so she considered whether she should keep at a distance from her
husband and question him, or whether she should at once go up to him and
embrace him. When, however, she had crossed the stone floor of the room, she
sat down opposite Odysseus by the fire, against the wall at right angles to
that by which she had entered, while Odysseus sat near one of the
bearing-posts, looking upon the ground, and waiting to see what his wife would
say to him when she saw him. For a long time she sat silent and as one lost in
amazement. At one moment she looked him full in the face, but then again
directly, she was misled by his shabby clothes and failed to recognize him,
till Telemakhos began to reproach her and said:
"Mother - but you are so hard that I cannot call
you by such a name - why do you keep away from my father in this way? Why do
you not sit by his side and begin talking to him and asking him questions? No
other woman could bear to keep away from her husband when he had come back to
her after twenty years of absence, and after having gone through so much; but
your heart always was as hard as a stone."
Penelope answered, "My son, I am so lost in
astonishment that I can find no words in which either to ask questions or to
answer them. I cannot even look him straight in the face. Still, if he really
is Odysseus come back to his own home again, we shall get to understand one
another better by and by, for there are tokens [sêmata] with which we two are alone acquainted, and which are hidden
from all others."
Odysseus smiled at this, and said to
Telemakhos, "Let your mother put me to any proof she likes; she will make up
her mind about it presently. She rejects me for the moment and believes me to
be somebody else, because I am covered with dirt and have such bad clothes on;
let us, however, consider what we had better do next. When one man has killed
another in a dêmos, even though he was not one who
would leave many friends to take up his quarrel, the man who has killed him
must still say good bye to his friends and flee the country; whereas we have
been killing the stay of a whole city, and all the picked youth of Ithaca. I would have you consider this
matter."
"Look to it yourself, father," answered
Telemakhos, "for they say you are the wisest counselor in the world, and that
there is no other mortal man who can compare with you. We will follow you with
right good will, nor shall you find us fail you in so far as our strength holds
out."
"I will say what I think will be best,"
answered Odysseus. "First wash and put your shirts on; tell the maids also to
go to their own room and dress; Phemios shall then strike up a dance tune on
his lyre, so that if people outside hear, or any of the neighbors, or some one
going along the street happens to notice it, they may think there is a wedding
in the house, and no rumors [kleos] about the death
of the suitors will get about in the town, before we can escape to the woods
upon my own land. Once there, we will settle which of the courses of action
[kerdos] heaven grants us shall seem
wisest."
Thus did he speak, and they did even as he had
said. First they washed and put their shirts on, while the women got ready.
Then Phemios took his lyre and set them all longing for sweet song and stately
dance. The house re-echoed with the sound of men and women dancing, and the
people outside said, "I suppose the queen has been getting married at last. She
ought to be ashamed of herself for not continuing to protect her husband's
property until he comes home."
This was what they said, but they did not know
what it was that had been happening. The upper servant Eurynome washed and
anointed Odysseus in his own house and gave him a shirt and cloak, while Athena
made him look taller and stronger than before; she also made the hair grow
thick on the top of his head, and flow down in curls like hyacinth blossoms;
she shed kharis about his head and shoulders just
as a skillful workman who has studied art of all kinds under Hephaistos or
Athena - and his work is full of kharis - enriches
a piece of silver plate by gilding it. He came from the bath looking like one
of the immortals, and sat down opposite his wife on the seat he had left. "My
dear," said he, "heaven has endowed you with a heart more unyielding than woman
ever yet had. No other woman could bear to keep away from her husband when he
had come back to her after twenty years of absence, and after having gone
through so much. But come, nurse, get a bed ready for me; I will sleep alone,
for this woman has a heart as hard as iron."
"My dear," answered Penelope, "I have no wish
to set myself up, nor to depreciate you; but I am not struck by your
appearance, for I very well remember what kind of a man you were when you set
sail from Ithaca. Nevertheless,
Eurykleia, take his bed outside the bed chamber that he himself built. Bring
the bed outside this room, and put bedding upon it with fleeces, good
coverlets, and blankets."
She said this to try him, but Odysseus was very
angry and said, "Wife, I am much displeased at what you have just been saying.
Who has been taking my bed from the place in which I left it? He must have
found it a hard task, no matter how skilled a workman he was, unless some god
came and helped him to shift it. There is no man living, however strong and in
his prime, who could move it from its place. For it was wrought to be a great
sign [sêma]; it is a marvelous curiosity which I
made with my very own hands. There was a young olive growing within the
precincts of the house, in full vigor, and about as thick as a bearing-post. I
built my room round this with strong walls of stone and a roof to cover them,
and I made the doors strong and well-fitting. Then I cut off the top boughs of
the olive tree and left the stump standing. This I dressed roughly from the
root upwards and then worked with carpenter's tools well and skillfully,
straightening my work by drawing a line on the wood, and making it into a
bed-prop. I then bored a hole down the middle, and made it the center-post of
my bed, at which I worked till I had finished it, inlaying it with gold and
silver; after this I stretched a hide of crimson leather from one side of it to
the other. So you see I know all about this sign [sêma], and I desire to learn whether it is still there, or whether
any one has been removing it by cutting down the olive tree at its roots."
When she heard the sure proofs [sêmata] Odysseus now gave her, she fairly broke down.
She flew weeping to his side, flung her arms about his neck, and kissed him.
"Do not be angry with me Odysseus," she cried, "you, who are the wisest of
humankind. We have suffered, both of us. Heaven has denied us the happiness of
spending our youth, and of growing old, together; do not then be aggrieved or
take it amiss that I did not embrace you thus as soon as I saw you. I have been
shuddering all the time through fear that someone might come here and deceive
me with a lying story; for there are many people who plan wicked schemes [kerdea]. Zeus’ daughter Helen would never have yielded
herself to a man from a foreign country, if she had known that the sons of
Achaeans would come after her and bring her back. Heaven put it in her heart to
do wrong, and she gave no thought to that transgression [atê], which has been the source of all our sorrows [penthos]. Now, however, that you have convinced me by
showing that you know all the proofs [sêmata] of
our bed (which no human being has ever seen but you and I and a single maid
servant, the daughter of Aktor, who was given me by my father on my marriage,
and who keeps the doors of our room), hard of belief though I have been, I can
mistrust no longer."
Then Odysseus in his turn melted, and wept as
he clasped his dear and faithful wife to his bosom. As the sight of land is
welcome to men who are swimming towards the shore, when Poseidon has wrecked
their ship with the fury of his winds and waves - a few alone reach the land,
and these, covered with brine, are thankful when they find themselves on firm
ground and out of danger - even so was her husband welcome to her as she looked
upon him, and she could not tear her two fair arms from about his neck. Indeed
they would have gone on indulging their sorrow till rosy-fingered morn
appeared, had not Athena determined otherwise, and held night back in the far
west, while she would not suffer Dawn to leave Okeanos, nor to yoke the two
steeds Lampos and Phaethon that bear her onward to break the day upon
humankind.
At last, however, Odysseus said, "Wife, we have
not yet reached the end of our trials [athloi]. I
have an unknown amount of toil [ponos] still to
undergo. It is long and difficult, but I must go through with it, for thus the
shade [psukhê] of Teiresias prophesied concerning
me, on the day when I went down into Hades to ask about my return [nostos] and that of my companions. But now let us go
to bed, that we may lie down and enjoy the blessed boon of sleep."
"You shall go to bed as soon as you please,"
replied Penelope, "now that the gods have sent you home to your own good house
and to your country. But as heaven has put it in your mind to speak of it, tell
me about the task [athlos] that lies before you. I
shall have to hear about it later, so it is better that I should be told at
once."
"My dear," answered Odysseus, "why should you
press me to tell you? Still, I will not conceal it from you, though you will
not like it. I do not like it myself, for Teiresias bade me travel far and
wide, carrying an oar, till I came to a country where the people have never
heard of the sea, and do not even mix salt with their food. They know nothing
about ships, nor oars that are as the wings of a ship. He gave me this certain
token [sêma] which I will not hide from you. He
said that a wayfarer should meet me and ask me whether it was a winnowing
shovel that I had on my shoulder. On this, I was to fix my oar in the ground
and sacrifice a ram, a bull, and a boar to Poseidon; after which I was to go
home and offer hecatombs to all the gods in heaven, one after the other. As for
myself, he said that death should come to me from the sea, and that my life
should ebb away very gently when I was full of years and peace of mind, and my
people should be prosperous [olbios]. All this, he
said, should surely come to pass."
And Penelope said, "If the gods are going to
grant you a happier time in your old age, you may hope then to have some
respite from misfortune."
Thus did they converse. Meanwhile Eurynome and
the nurse took torches and made the bed ready with soft coverlets; as soon as
they had laid them, the nurse went back into the house to go to her rest,
leaving the bed chamber woman Eurynome to show Odysseus and Penelope to bed by
torch light. When she had conducted them to their room she went back, and they
then came joyfully to the rites of their own old bed. Telemakhos, Philoitios,
and the swineherd now left off dancing, and made the women leave off also. They
then laid themselves down to sleep in the cloisters.
When Odysseus and Penelope had had their fill
of love they fell talking with one another. She told him how much she had to
bear in seeing the house filled with a crowd of wicked suitors who had killed
so many sheep and oxen on her account, and had drunk so many casks of wine.
Odysseus in his turn told her what he had suffered, and how much trouble he had
himself given to other people. He told her everything, and she was so delighted
to listen that she never went to sleep till he had ended his whole story.
He began with his victory over the Kikones, and
how he thence reached the fertile land of the Lotus-eaters. He told her all
about the Cyclops and how he had
punished him for having so ruthlessly eaten his brave comrades; how he then
went on to Aeolus, who received him hospitably and furthered him on his way,
but even so he was not to reach home, for to his great grief a gale carried him
out to sea again; how he went on to the Laestrygonian city Telepylos, where the
people destroyed all his ships with their crews, save himself and his own ship
only. Then he told of cunning Circe and her craft, and how he sailed to the
chill house of Hades, to consult the ghost [psukhê]
of the Theban seer Teiresias, and how he saw his old comrades in arms, and his
mother who bore him and brought him up when he was a child; how he then heard
the wondrous singing of the Sirens, and went on to the wandering rocks and
terrible Charybdis and to Scylla, whom no man had ever yet passed in safety;
how his men then ate the cattle of the sun-god, and how Zeus therefore struck
the ship with his thunderbolts, so that all his men perished together, himself
alone being left alive; how at last he reached the Ogygian island and the nymph
Calypso, who kept him there in a cave, and fed him, and wanted him to marry
her, in which case she intended making him immortal so that he should never
grow old, but she could not persuade him to let her do so; and how after much
suffering he had found his way to the Phaeacians, who had treated him as though
he had been a god, and sent him back in a ship to his own country after having
given him gold, bronze, and raiment in great abundance. This was the last thing
about which he told her, for here a deep sleep took hold upon him and eased the
burden of his sorrows.
Then Athena thought of another matter. When she
deemed that Odysseus had had enough both of his wife and of repose, she bade
gold-enthroned Dawn rise out of Okeanos that she might shed light upon
humankind. On this, Odysseus rose from his comfortable bed and said to
Penelope, "Wife, we have both of us had our full share of trials [athlos], you, here, in lamenting my absence, and I in
being prevented from getting home [nostos] though I
was longing all the time to do so. Now, however, that we have at last come
together, take care of the property that is in the house. As for the sheep and
goats which the wicked suitors have eaten, I will take many myself by force
from other people, and will compel the Achaeans to make good the rest till they
shall have filled all my yards. I am now going to the wooded lands out in the
country to see my father who has so long been grieved on my account, and to
yourself I will give these instructions, though you have little need of them.
At sunrise it will at once get abroad that I have been killing the suitors; go
upstairs, therefore, and stay there with your women. See nobody and ask no
questions."
As he spoke he girded on his armor. Then he
roused Telemakhos, Philoitios, and Eumaios, and told them all to put on their
armor also. This they did, and armed themselves. When they had done so, they
opened the gates and sallied forth, Odysseus leading the way. It was now
daylight, but Athena nevertheless concealed them in darkness and led them
quickly out of the town.