Meanwhile the noble swineherd, taking the curved bow, was bearing it away. But the suitors all broke into uproar in the hall, and a rude youth would say, "Where are you carrying the curved bow, you miserable swineherd? Crazy fool! Soon out among the swine, away from men, swift dogs shall eat you,--dogs you yourself have bred,--will but Apollo and the other deathless Gods be gracious!" At these their words the bearer of the bow laid it down where he stood, frightened because the crowd within the hall cried out upon him. But from the other side Telemachus called threatening aloud, "Nay, father! Carry on the bow! You cannot well heed all. Take care, or I, a nimbler man than you, will drive you to the fields with pelting stones. Superior in strength I am to you. Ah, would I were as much beyond the others in the house, beyond these suitors, in my skill and strength of arm! Then would I soon send somebody away in sorrow from my house; for men work evil here." He spoke, and all burst into merry laughter and laid aside their bitter anger with Telemachus. And so the swineherd, bearing the bow along the hall, drew near to wise Ulysses and put it in his hands; then calling aside nurse Eurycleia, thus he said,-- "Telemachus bids you, heedful Eurycleia, to lock the hall's close-fitting doors; and if a woman from the inner room hears moaning or a strife within our walls, let her not venture forth, but stay in silence at her work." Such were his words; unwinged, they rested with her. She locked the doors of the stately hall. Then silently from the house Philoetius stole forth and straightway barred the gates of the fenced court. Beneath the portico there lay a curved ship's cable, made of biblus plant. With this he lashed the gates, then passed indoors himself, and went and took the seat from which he first arose, eyeing Ulysses. Now Ulysses already held the bow and turned it round and round, trying it here and there to see if worms had gnawed the horn while its lord was far away. And glancing at his neighbor one would say,-- "A sort of fancier and a trickster with the bow this fellow is. No doubt at home he has himself a bow like that, or means to make one like it. See how he turns it in his hands this way and that, ready for mischief,--rascal!" Then would another rude youth answer thus: "Oh, may he always meet with luck as good as when he is unable now to bend the bow!"