Page:The Odyssey of Homer, with the Hymns, Epigrams, and Battle of the Frogs and Mice (Buckley 1853).djvu/297

107—147. "O lady, no one of mortals over the boundless earth would find fault with thee; for thy fame reaches the wide heaven, as of some blameless king, who, godlike, ruling over many and mighty men, upholds equity: and the dark earth produces wheat and barley, and the trees are heavy laden with fruit; and it brings forth strong sheep, and the sea furnishes fish on account of his good government; and the people are virtuous under him. Now therefore inquire of me the other things in thine house: but do not ask my race and paternal land, lest thou shouldst the more fill my mind with pains, as I call things to my recollection: but I am a man of much grief; nor is it at all fit that I should sit in another person's house mourning and wailing; since it is worse to grieve for ever without ceasing; for fear any one of the servants should blame me, or even thou thyself; and should say that I increase my tears, having my mind heavy with wine."

But him prudent Penelope thus answered: "Stranger, of a truth the immortals destroyed my excellence, and form, and person, when the Grecians embarked for Ilium; and amongst them was my husband Ulysses. If he indeed coming should manage my property, so would my fame be greater and more honourable: but now I am grieved; for the deity has made so many evils rush upon me. [For as many chiefs as rule over the islands, Dulichium, and Samos, and woody Zacynthus, and those who govern in western Ithaca itself, these woo me against my will, and waste away mine house.] Therefore I have no regard for strangers, or for suppliants, or at all for heralds, who are public officers: but regretting Ulysses I am melted away in my dear heart. And they hasten on my marriage; but I wind deceits: first of all the deity inspired my mind to weave a large garment in the palace, having begun a large web, slender and round; but I straightway addressed them: 'Youths, my suitors, since divine Ulysses has died, do ye remain, urging my marriage; until I shall finish this garment, (that my threads may not perish in vain,) a shroud for the hero Laertes, for the time when the destructive fate of long-sleeping death shall seize on him. Lest some one of the Grecian women amongst the people should be indignant with me, if he, who having possessed many things,