“Now, by Jupiter,” replied Telemachus, “I do not prevent my mother’s choice. She may take whom she will. But far be it from me to drive my mother from the house by any hasty word or to compel her to a choice!” Athene touched the suitors with madness. They laughed until their faces were distorted, while Ulysses, Telemachus, and the servants looked on with horror. But Theoclymenus, the stranger seer from Pylos, cried aloud as in an ecstasy of prophecy: “Unhappy men, what has come over you? Your eyes are veiled, your heads are bruised, and your cheeks wet with unnatural tears. Ha, I see blood! It drips from the walls! It stands in pools! The courtyard is full of shadows, hastening out into the darkness of the spirit land. The sun is extinguished—a horrible darkness reigneth!” The wild laughter arose once more. The suitors only grew noisier in their rash blindness. The early meal was partaken of in a wild turmoil, and not one suspected what awaited them in the evening. When afternoon came the noble Penelope remembered her purpose of inviting the suitors to a trial of skill, and ascended to the chamber where the treasures of her dear lord were kept. His favorite bow, of pliant horn, was hanging there, dusty and unsightly, for it had not been touched for twenty years. Penelope’s tears fell upon her dear lord’s weapon as she took it down from the wall and brushed away the dust. She sat down, laid it across her knees, and sobbed aloud. When her grief had spent itself she left the chamber with the bow in her hands, followed by her maidens carrying the heavy quiver, full of arrows. She entered the portal of the hall of columns modestly wrapped in her long veil. Beside her stood an attendant maiden. She spoke: “Come, ye brave suitors who gather in my house daily to dance and feast and who pretend to woo me. Hear me and listen to the trial which he must stand who would become my husband. Here are the bow and arrows of my dear lord, Ulysses, and here the rings. Him will I follow as spouse who can most easily bend the bow and shoot through the twelve rings. My dear son shall lose his patrimony through no fault of mine.” She gave the weapon to Eumæus to carry into the hall, and when the good man held the well-known bow in his hands, he began to weep and kiss the weapon. Philœtius also wept, for at the sight of the bow the memory of his beloved master overcame him. Antinous snarled at the faithful creatures and bade them quickly bring in the bow.