The Odysseys of Homer, together with the shorter poems · Homer
ANOTHER ARGUMENT
When which sight did greet The poor old woman (such works being for eyes Of no soft temper) out she brake in cries, Whose vent, though throughly open’d, he yet clos’d, Call’d her more near, and thus her plaints compos’d: “Forbear, nor shriek thus, but vent joys as loud. _It is no piety to bemoan the proud,_ Though ends befall them moving ne’er so much, These are the portions of the Gods to such. _Men’s own impieties in their instant act Sustain their plagues, which are with stay but rackt._ But these men Gods nor men had in esteem, Nor good nor bad had any sense in them, Their lives directly ill were, therefore, cause That Death in these stern forms so deeply draws. Recount, then, to me those licentious dames That lost my honour and their sex’s shames.” “I’ll tell you truly,” she replied: “There are Twice five-and-twenty women here that share All work amongst them; whom I taught to spin, And bear the just bands that they suffer’d in. Of all which only there were twelve that gave Themselves to impudence and light behave, Nor me respecting, nor herself—the Queen.
And for your son he hath but lately been Of years to rule; nor would his mother bear His empire where her women’s labours were, But let me go and give her notice now Of your arrival. Sure some God doth show His hand upon her in this rest she takes, That all these uproars bears and never wakes.” “Nor wake her yet,” said he, “but cause to come Those twelve light women to this utter room.” She made all utmost haste to come and go, And bring the women he had summon’d so. Then both his swains and son he bade go call The women to their aid, and clear the hall Of those dead bodies, cleanse each board and throne With wetted sponges. Which with fitness done, He bade take all the strumpets ’twixt the wall Of his first court and that room next the hall, In which the vessels of the house were scour’d, And in their bosoms sheath their ev’ry sword, Till all their souls were fled, and they had then Felt ’twas but pain to sport with lawless men. This said, the women came all drown’d in moan, And weeping bitterly. But first was done The bearing thence the dead; all which beneath The portico they stow’d, where death on death They heap’d together.
Then took all the pains Ulysses will’d. His son yet and the swains With paring-shovels wrought. The women bore Their parings forth, and all the clotter’d gore. The house then cleans’d, they brought the women out, And put them in a room so wall’d about That no means serv’d their sad estates to fly. Then said Telemachus: “These shall not die A death that lets out any wanton blood, And vents the poison that gave lust her food, The body cleansing, but a death that chokes The breath, and altogether that provokes And seems as bellows to abhorréd lust, That both on my head pour’d depraves unjust, And on my mother’s, scandalling the Court, With men debauch’d, in so abhorr’d a sort.” This said, a halser of a ship they cast About a cross-beam of the roof, which fast They made about their necks, in twelve parts cut, And hal’d them up so high they could not put Their feet to any stay.
As which was done, Look how a mavis, or a pigeon, In any grove caught with a springe or net, With struggling pinions ’gainst the ground doth beat Her tender body, and that then strait bed Is sour to that swing in which she was bred; So striv’d these taken birds, till ev’ry one Her pliant halter had enforc’d upon Her stubborn neck, and then aloft was haul’d To wretched death. A little space they sprawl’d, Their feet fast moving, but were quickly still. Then fetch’d they down Melanthius, to fulfill The equal execution; which was done In portal of the hall, and thus begun: They first slit both his nostrils, cropp’d each ear, His members tugg’d off, which the dogs did tear And chop up bleeding sweet; and, while red-hot The vice-abhorring blood was, off they smote His hands and feet; and there that work had end. Then wash’d they hands and feet that blood had stain’d, And took the house again. And then the King Euryclea calling, bade her quickly bring All-ill-expelling brimstone, and some fire, That with perfumes cast he might make entire The house’s first integrity in all. And then his timely will was, she should call Her Queen and ladies; still yet charging her That all the handmaids she should first confer.
She said he spake as fitted; but, before, She held it fit to change the weeds he wore, And she would others bring him, that not so His fair broad shoulders might rest clad, and show His person to his servants was to blame. “First bring me fire,” said he. She went and came With fire and sulphur straight; with which the hall And of the huge house all rooms capital He throughly sweeten’d. Then went nurse to call The handmaid servants down; and up she went To tell the news, and will’d them to present Their service to their sov’reign. Down they came Sustaining torches all, and pour’d a flame Of love about their lord, with welcomes home, With huggings of his hands, with laboursome Both heads and foreheads kisses, and embraces, And plied him so with all their loving graces That tears and sighs took up his whole desire; For now he knew their hearts to him entire. THE END OF THE TWENTY-SECOND BOOK OF HOMER’S ODYSSEYS. Ulysses to his wife is known. A brief sum of his travels shown. Himself, his son, and servants go T’ approve the Wooers’ overthrow.
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.