Since thou wert born so of Penelope. The style may by thy after acts be won, Of so great sire the high undoubted son. Say truth in this then: What’s this feasting here? What all this rout? Is all this nuptial cheer? Or else some friendly banquet made by thee? For here no shots are, where all sharers be. Past measure contumeliously this crew Fare through thy house; which should th’ ingenuous view Of any good or wise man come and find, (Impiety seeing play’d in ev’ry kind) He could not but through ev’ry vein be mov’d.” Again Telemachus: “My guest much lov’d. Since you demand and sift these sights so far, I grant ’twere fit a house so regular, Rich, and so faultless once in government, Should still at all parts the same form present That gave it glory while her lord was here. But now the Gods, that us displeasure bear, Have otherwise appointed, and disgrace My father most of all the mortal race. For whom I could not mourn so were he dead, Amongst his fellow-captains slaughteréd By common enemies, or in the hands Of his kind friends had ended his commands, After he had egregiously bestow’d His pow’r and order in a war so vow’d, And to his tomb all Greeks their grace had done, That to all ages he might leave his son Immortal honour; but now Harpies have Digg’d in their gorges his abhorréd grave. Obscure, inglorious, death hath made his end, And me, for glories, to all griefs contend. Nor shall I any more mourn him alone, The Gods have giv’n me other cause of moan. For look how many optimates remain In Samos, or the shores Dulichian, Shady Zacynthus, or how many bear Rule in the rough brows of this island here; So many now my mother and this house At all parts make defam’d and ruinous; And she her hateful nuptials nor denies, Nor will despatch their importunities, Though she beholds them spoil still as they feast All my free house yields, and the little rest Of my dead sire in me perhaps intend To bring ere long to some untimely end.” This Pallas sigh’d and answer’d: “O,” said she, “Absent Ulysses is much miss’d by thee, That on these shameless suitors he might lay His wreakful hands. Should he now come, and stay In thy court’s first gates, arm’d with helm and shield, And two such darts as I have seen him wield, When first I saw him in our Taphian court, Feasting, and doing his desert’s disport; When from Ephyrus he return’d by us From Ilus, son to Centaur Mermerus, To whom he travell’d through the wat’ry dreads, For bane to poison his sharp arrows’ heads, That death, but touch’d, caus’d; which he would not give, Because he fear’d the Gods that ever live Would plague such death with death; and yet their fear Was to my father’s bosom not so dear As was thy father’s love; (for what he sought My loving father found him to a thought.) If such as then Ulysses might but meet With these proud wooers, all were at his feet But instant dead men, and their nuptialls Would prove as bitter as their dying galls. But these things in the Gods’ knees are repos’d,