Page:The Iliad and Odyssey of Homer (IA iliadodysseyofho02home).pdf/314

306 Behind it, distant in the dusky West. Rugged it is, not yielding level course To the swift steed, and yet no barren spot, However small, but rich in wheat and wine; Nor wants it rain or fertilising dew, But pasture green to goats and beeves affords, Trees of all kinds, and fountains never dry. Ithaca therefore, stranger, is a name Known ev'n at Troy, a city, by report, At no small distance from Achaia's shore. The Goddess ceased; then, toil-enduring Chief Ulysses, happy in his native land, (So taught by Pallas, progeny of Jove) In accents wing'd her answ'ring, utter'd prompt Not truth, but figments to truth opposite, For guile, in him, stood never at a pause. O'er yonder flood, even in spacious Crete I heard of Ithaca, where now, it seems, I have, myself, with these my stores arrived; Not richer stores than, flying thence, I left To my own children; for from Crete I fled For slaughter of Orsilochus the swift, Son of Idomeneus, whom none in speed Could equal throughout all that spacious isle. His purpose was to plunder me of all