The Story of the Odyssey | Page 8

Mentor: "This is good, dear father. Let
Telemachus abide with thee; but I will go back to the ship, and cheer
the company, and tell them all. There I will sleep this night, and
to-morrow I go to the Cauconians [Footnote: Cau-co'-ni- ans.], where
there is owing to me a debt neither small nor of yesterday. But do thou
send this man on his way in thy chariot."
Then the goddess departed in the semblance of a sea-eagle, and all that

saw it were amazed.
Then the old man took Telemachus by the hand, and said: "No coward
or weakling art thou like to be, whom the gods attend even now in thy
youth. This is none other than Athene, daughter of Zeus, the same that
stood by thy father in the land of Troy."
After this the old man led the company to his house. Here he mixed for
them a bowl of wine eleven years old; and they prayed to Athene, and
then lay down to sleep. Telemachus slept on a bedstead beneath the
gallery, and Peisistratus slept by him.
The next day, as soon as it was morning, Nestor and his sons arose.
And the old man said: "Let one man go to the plain for a heifer, and let
another go to the ship of Telemachus, and bid all the company come
hither, leaving two only behind. And a third shall command the
goldsmith to gild the horns of the heifer, and let the handmaids prepare
all things for a feast."
They did as the old man commanded; and after they had offered
sacrifice, and had eaten and drunk, old Nester said, "Put now the horses
in the chariot, that Telemachus may go his way."
So they yoked the horses, and the dame that kept the stores put into the
chariot food and wine and dainties, such as princes eat. And
Peisistratus took the reins, and Telemachus rode with him. And all that
day they journeyed; and when the land grew dark they came to the city
of Pherae [Footnote: Phe'-rae.], and there they rested; and the next day,
travelling again, came to Lacedaemon [Footnote: La-ce-dae'-mon.], to
the palace of King Menelaus.

CHAPTER IV
IN SPARTA
Now it chanced that Menelaus had made a great feast that day, for his

daughter, the child of the fair Helen, was married to the son of Achilles,
to whom she had been promised at Troy; and his son had also taken a
wife. And the two wayfarers stayed their chariot at the door, and the
steward spied them, and said to Menelaus:--
"Lo! here are two strangers who are like the children of kings. Shall we
keep them here, or send them to another?"
But Menelaus was wroth, and said: "Shall we, who have eaten so often
of the bread of hospitality, send these strangers to another? Nay,
unyoke their horses and bid them sit down to meat." So the squires
loosed the horses from the yoke, and fastened them in the stall, and
gave them grain to eat and led the men into the hall. Much did they
marvel at the sight, for there was a gleam as of the sun or moon in the
palace of Menelaus. And when they had gazed their fill, they bathed
them in the polished baths. After that they sat them down by the side of
Menelaus. Then a handmaid bare water in a pitcher of gold, and poured
it over a basin of silver that they might wash their hands. Afterwards
she drew a polished table to their side, and a dame brought food, and
set it by them, laying many dainties on the board, and a carver placed
by them platters of flesh, and set near them golden bowls.
Then said Menelaus: "Eat and be glad; afterwards I will ask you who
ye are, for ye seem like to the sons of kings."
And when they had ended the meal, Telemachus, looking round at the
hall, said to his companion:--
"See the gold and the amber, and the silver and the ivory. This is like
the hall of Zeus."
This he spake with his face close to his comrade's ear, but Menelaus
heard him and said:--
"With the halls of the gods nothing mortal may compare. And among
men also there may be the match of these things. Yet I have wandered
far, and got many possessions in many lands. But woe is me! Would
that I had but the third part of this wealth of mine, and that they who

perished at Troy were alive again! And most of all I mourn for the great
Ulysses, for whether he be alive or dead no man knows."
But Telemachus wept to hear mention of his father, holding up his
purple cloak before