As he spoke Zeus sent two eagles
from the top of the mountain, and they flew on and on with the wind,
sailing side by side in their own lordly flight. When they were right
over the middle of the assembly they wheeled and circled about,
beating the air with their wings and glaring death into the eyes of
them that were below; then, fighting fiercely and tearing at one
another, they flew off towards the right over the town. The people
wondered as they saw them, and asked each other what an this might
be; whereon Halitherses, who was the best seer and reader of omens
among them, spoke to them plainly and in all honesty,
saying:
"Hear me, men of Ithaca, and I
speak more particularly to the suitors, for I see mischief brewing
for them. Odysseus is not going to be away much longer; indeed he is
close at hand to deal out death and destruction, not on them alone,
but on many another of us who live in Ithaca. Let us then be wise in
time, and put a stop to this wickedness before he comes. Let the
suitors do so of their own accord; it will be better for them, for I
am not prophesying without due knowledge; everything has happened to
Odysseus as I foretold when the Argives set out for Troy, and he with
them. I said that after going through much hardship and losing all
his men he should come home again in the twentieth year and that no
one would know him; and now all this is coming true."
Eurymakhos son of Polybos then
said, "Go home, old man, and prophesy to your own children, or it may
be worse for them. I can read these omens myself much better than you
can; birds are always flying about in the sunshine somewhere or
other, but they seldom mean anything. Odysseus has died in a far
country, and it is a pity you are not dead along with him, instead of
prating here about omens and adding fuel to the anger of Telemakhos
which is fierce enough as it is. I suppose you think he will give you
something for your family, but I tell you - and it shall surely be -
when an old man like you, who should know better, talks a young one
over till he becomes troublesome, in the first place his young friend
will only fare so much the worse - he will take nothing by it, for
the suitors will prevent this - and in the next, we will lay a
heavier fine, sir, upon yourself than you will at all like paying,
for it will bear hardly upon you. As for Telemakhos, I warn him in
the presence of you all to send his mother back to her father, who
will find her a husband and provide her with all the marriage gifts
so dear a daughter may expect. Till then we shall go on harassing him
with our suit; for we fear no man, and care neither for him, with all
his fine speeches, nor for any fortune-telling of yours. You may
preach as much as you please, but we shall only hate you the more. We
shall go back and continue to eat up Telemakhos' estate without
paying him, till such time as his mother leaves off tormenting us by
keeping us day after day on the tiptoe of expectation, each vying
with the other in his suit for a prize of such rare perfection
[aretê]. Besides we cannot go after the other
women whom we should marry in due course, but for the way in which
she treats us."
Then Telemakhos said,
"Eurymakhos, and you other suitors, I shall say no more, and entreat
you no further, for the gods and the people of Ithaca now know my
story. Give me, then, a ship and a crew of twenty men to take me
hither and thither, and I will go to Sparta and to Pylos to inquire
about the nostos of my father who has so long been missing.
Some one may tell me something, or (and people often hear
kleos in this way) some heaven-sent message may direct me. If
I can hear of him as alive and achieving his homecoming
[nostos] I will put up with the waste you suitors will
make for yet another twelve months. If on the other hand I hear of
his death, I will return at once, celebrate his funeral rites with
all due pomp, build a grave marker [sêma] to his
memory, and make my mother marry again."
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