In the hut of the swineherd, there is no domestic life, the woman is absent. This condition is specially ascribed to the present state of things in Ithaca. Eumaeus, though he be a slave, could have a household, "a dwelling and ground and wife," if his old master were at home. Even now he has his own servant, bought with his own wealth. Slavery was not a hard condition in the house of Ulysses; it was domestic in the best sense probably. Indeed the slaves were often of as high birth as their masters, who in turn might be slaves in the next fluctuation of war. Eumaeus himself was of kingly blood, and he retains his regal character in his servitude. Ulysses has now reached the fortress which is to be the rallying-point of his army of three heroes, and from which he is to issue to the work of the time. But that is hereafter. In the present Book, we have his play with Eumaeus, his disguise, which assumes three main attitudes. First, he is passive, chiefly asking and listening; thus he gets out of Eumaeus what information he wishes; then he plays an active part in his disguise, telling his own history under the mask of fiction; finally he assumes an open disguise, that is, he tells of one of his artifices at Troy, and then states his present object in telling it. The simple Eumaeus, however, does not suspect him in all these transformations. Still we may notice in the swineherd a strong feeling of oneness with the stranger, an unconscious presentiment of who he is. I. The approach of Ulysses to the lodge of Eumaeus is an experience which one may have in the mountains of Greece to-day. We can find the same general outline of a hut with its surrounding fence and court, in which domestic animals are penned, particularly during the night. Then there is that same welcome from the dogs, which issue forth in a pack with an unearthly howling, growling and barking at the approaching stranger, till somebody appear and pelt them with stones. Often must the wandering Homer have had such a greeting! The hospitable swineherd, Eumaeus, the poet must have met with in his travels; the whole scene and character are drawn directly from real life. A similar reception we have had in a remote pastoral lodge, dogs included. But the modern pedestrian will hardly employ the ruse of Ulysses, that of sitting down on the ground and letting his staff drop out of his hand. He will use his weapon and grasp for a stone everywhere present on the Greek soil, though the fight be unequal. Still the sentence of Pliny (_Nat. Hist._ VIII. 61) deserves always to be cited in this connection: _impetus eorum (canum) et soevitia mitigatur ab homine considente humi_; as if dogs in the height of their rage might be touched with the plea of piety.