The Odyssey Page 0,136

heart, be silent, lest some other person in the hall may know. Or else,—I tell you, and certainly it shall be done,—if God by me subdues the lordly suitors, I will not spare even you, nurse though you are, when I shall slay the other serving-women in my halls.”

Then answered heedful Eurycleia: “My child, what word has passed the barrier of your teeth? You know how steadfast, how inflexible my spirit is. I shall hold fast like stubborn rock or iron. And this I will say further: mark it well. If God by you subdues the lordly suitors, then I will name the women of the hall and tell you who dishonor you and who are guiltless.”

But wise Odysseus answered her and said: “Mother, why talk of them? You have no need. I will myself observe them well and find out each. Be quiet with your story! Leave the matter to the gods!”

So he spoke, and through the hall forth went the aged woman to fetch water for his feet; for all the first was spilled. Now when she had washed him and anointed him with oil, again Odysseus drew his bench closer beside the fire, to warm himself,—but with his tatters hid the scar,—and thus began heedful Penelope:

“Stranger, there is but little more that I will ask; because the season of sweet rest will soon be here, for those to whom kind sleep will come when they are sad. But upon me God sends incessant sorrow. Day after day my joys are tears and sighs, as I watch my household tasks and watch my women. Then when night comes and slumber visits all, I lie in bed, and crowding on my heavy heart sharp cares sting me to weeping. As when Pandareos’ daughter, the russet nightingale, sings sweetly at the coming in of spring, perched in the thick-leaved trees, and to and fro pours out her thrilling voice, in lamentation for her dear child, Itylus, whom with the sword she one day blindly slew, her son by royal Zethus;36 so does my doubtful heart toss to and fro whether to bide beside my son and keep all here in safety,—my goods, my maids, and my great high-roofed house,—and thus revere my husband’s bed and heed the public voice, or finally to follow some chief of the Achaeans who woos me in my hall with countless gifts. My son, while but a child and slack of understanding, did not permit my marrying and departing from my husband’s house; but now that he is grown and come to man’s estate, he prays me to go home again and leave the hall, so troubled is he for that wealth which the Achaeans waste. But come, interpret now and hear this dream of mine. I have twenty geese about the place who pick up corn out of the water, and I amuse myself with watching them. But from the mountain came a great hook-beaked eagle and broke the necks of all and killed my geese. In heaps they lay, scattered about the buildings, while he was borne aloft into the sacred sky. So I began to weep and wail,—still in my dream,—and fair-haired Achaean women gathered round and found me sadly sobbing that the eagle killed my geese. Then down again he came, lit on a jutting rafter, and with a human voice he checked my tears and said: ‘Courage, O daughter of renowned Icarius! This is no dream, but true reality, which yet shall come to pass. The geese are suitors; and I, the eagle, was at the first a bird, but now, this second time, am come your husband to bring a ghastly doom on all the suitors.’ At these his words sweet slumber left me, and opening my eyes I saw the geese about the buildings devouring corn beside the trough just as they used to do.”

Then wise Odysseus answered her and said: “Lady, the dream cannot be understood by wresting it to other meanings; Odysseus surely has himself revealed what yet shall be. The suitors’ overthrow is plain: on all it falls; none shall escape from death and doom.”

But heedful Penelope said to him once more: “Stranger, in truth dreams do arise perplexed and hard to tell, dreams which come not, in men’s experience, to their full issue. Two gates there are for unsubstantial dreams, one made of horn and one of ivory. The dreams that pass through the carved ivory delude and bring us tales that turn to