Page:History of Greece Vol I.djvu/346

 314 HISTORY OF GREECE, I pass over the numerous other tales which circulated among the ancients, illustrating the ubiquity of the Grecian and Trojan heroes as well as that of the Argonauts, one of the most strik- ing features in the Hellenic legendary world. 1 Amongst them all, the most interesting, individually, is Odysseus, whose roman- tic adventures in fabulous places and among fabulous persons have been made familiarly known by Homer. The goddesses Kalypso and Circe ; the semi-divine mariners of Phacacia, whose ships are endowed with consciousness and obey without a steers- man ; the one-eyed Cyclopes, the gigantic Lasstrygones, and the wind-ruler JEolus ; the Sirens who ensnare by their song, as the Lotophagi fascinate by their food all these pictures formed in- tegral and interesting portions of the old epic. Homer leaves Odysseus reestablished in his house and family ; but so marked a personage could never be permitted to remain in the tameness of domestic life : the epic poem called the Telegonia ascribed to him a subsequent series of adventures. After the suitors had been buried by their relatives, he offered sacrifice to the Nymphs, and then went to Elis to inspect his herds of cattle there pastur- ing : the Eleian Polyxenus welcomed him hospitably, and made him a present of a bowl : Odysseus then returned to Ithaka, and fulfilled the rites and sacrifices prescribed to him by Teiresias in his visit to the under-world. This obligation discharged, he went to the country of the Thesprotians, and there married the queen Kallidike: he headed the Thesprotians in a war against the Brygians, the latter being conducted by Ares himself, who fierce- ly assailed Odysseus ; but the goddess Athene stood by him, and he was enabled to make head against Ares until Apollo came 1 Strabo, i. p. 48. After dwelling emphatically on the long voyages of Dionysus, Herakles, Jason, Odysseus, and Menelaus, he says, Alveiav 6r. Kal 'AvTijvopa Kal 'EVETOVS, Kal d?r/luf roi)f IK TOV TpuiKov note/iov TrTiavy&ev-af elf iraaav TJ)V oiKOV/xevrfv, u^iov u}j TUV naTiaiuv av&puiruv vo/tiaat; Svvepr) yap (5# rotf TOTE *E/l/lj?cw, 6poiue Kal Tolf pafSapoif, 6iu rbv Tijf <rrpa- raaf xpovov, unopafeiv TIL re kv OIKQ Kal TTJ crpareia nopitr&evra- wore fiiT& TTJV TOV 'I/ltoii KaTauTpotyi/v Tovt; TE viKqaavTaf eirl ZrjaTeiav TpaKctr&ai did Tuf airopiaf, Kal 7ro3,/l<i pu^ov Toiif jjTTTj'&evTaf KOI irEpfyEVOfisvovc EK TOV no^Efiov. Kat <5?) Kal iro^Etf vTrd TOVTU v KT lo&ijvat, "Keyovrai K a T a iraffav TT)V l|w T^f 'EAAadof napahiav, KOTI 6' 8irov Kal TTJV