Page:The Iliad and Odyssey of Homer (IA iliadodysseyofho02home).pdf/27

I. Rememb'ring still an husband praised from side To side, and in the very heart of Greece. Then answer thus Telemachus return'd. My mother! wherefore should it give thee pain If the delightful bard that theme pursue To which he feels his mind impell'd? the bard Blame not, but rather Jove, who, as he wills, Materials for poetic art supplies. No fault is his, if the disastrous fate He sing of the Achaians, for the song Wins ever from the hearers most applause That has been least in use. Of all who fought At Troy, Ulysses hath not lost, alone, His day of glad return; but many a Chief Hath perish'd also. Seek thou then again Thy own apartment, spindle ply and loom, And task thy maidens; management belongs To men of joys convivial, and of men Especially to me, chief ruler here. She heard astonish'd; and the prudent speech Reposing of her son deep in her heart, Again with her attendant maidens sought Her upper chamber. There arrived, she wept Her lost Ulysses, till Minerva bathed Her weary lids in dewy sleep profound. Then echoed through the palace dark-bedimm'd With evening shades the suitors boist'rous roar, For each the royal bed burn'd to partake,