Page:The Odyssey of Homer, with the Hymns, Epigrams, and Battle of the Frogs and Mice (Buckley 1853).djvu/323

89—127. sitting down, or going out of doors, weep, leaving the bow there, no despicable contest for the suitors: for I do not think they will easily stretch this well-polished bow. For there is not such a man amongst all these, as Ulysses was; and I myself saw him,—for I am able to remember,—but I was still a child."

Thus he spoke; but his mind hoped in his breast, that he would [be able to] stretch the string, and dart an arrow through the steel. He however was the first to taste the arrow from the hands of blameless Ulysses, whom he once dishonoured, sitting in the palace, and excited all his companions against him. And the sacred might of Telemachus addressed them:

"Alas! truly hath Jove, the son of Saturn, made me foolish. My dear mother, although she is prudent, says, that she will follow another, leaving this house: but I laugh, and am delighted in my foolish mind. But come, suitors, since this contest has appeared, there is not such a woman now in the Grecian land, nor in sacred Pylos, nor in Argos, nor Mycene, [nor Ithaca itself, nor black Epirus,] and ye yourselves know this; why need I praise my mother? But come, do not draw aside with pretext, nor turn any more away a long time from the stretching of the bow, that we may see you. And I myself would try the bow; but if I shall stretch it, and dart an arrow through the steel, my venerable mother, going with another, should not leave this house for me sorrowing, when I am left behind, able even now to obtain the glorious prizes of my sire."

He spoke; and rushing upright, he put his purple cloak off his shoulders; and put his sharp sword from off his shoulders. First indeed he placed the hatchets, digging one long trench for all, and he directed it according to a rule; and he stamped in the earth about them: but astonishment possessed all, seeing how orderly he placed them; and he never before had seen them. And he stood, going upon the threshold, and tried the bow: thrice he bent it, anxious to draw it, but thrice he let go the bow, hoping this in his mind, that he would [be able to] stretch the string, and dart an arrow through the