[244] ἀργαλέον δέ. This is a passage greatly vexed by commentators. Eustath. and the Schol. make “πλέονεσσι” follow “ἀργαλέον”, in the sense that even numerical odds do not ensure victory over men whose courage is heightened by good cheer. But the construction of “πλεόνεσσι” is doubtless after “μαχήσασθαι”, if we compare (251) “εἰ πλεόνεσσι μάχοιτο”, and the similar sentiment in Od.16. 88“πρῆξαι δ᾽ ἀργαλέον τι μετὰ πλεόνεσσιν ἐόντα”
“ἄνδρα καὶ ἴφθιμον”. What then is the subject of “μαχήσασθαι”? Fäsi takes it to be the Suitors, as if Leiocritus, for himself and his fellows, was bewailing the hardship or unfairness of having to sustain the attack of the whole of the Ithacan people summoned to the rescue by Mentor (241); and this appears also to be the interpretation of Nitzsch. According to this the passage will be a bantering remonstrance against carrying a point by the might of superior numbers. ποῖον ἔειπες would then, prosaically, be equivalent to ‘See what is implied in your appeal to the people of Ithaca!’ ἀργαλέον, Nitzsch remarks, is not simply ‘hard’ in the sense of ‘difficult,’ but in the sense of ‘oppressive.’ Your appeal to numbers is a barbarity, there is no fairness in it. ‘It is ill fighting against odds,’ especially when the stakes are not equal, when one may lose his life, and can only win a dinner. The case is then pressed home with an illustration, “εἴ περ γάρ κε . . μενοινήσειε” (cp. “εἴ περ γάρ κ᾽ ἐθέλοιμεν”, etc. Il.1. 580). Suppose Odysseus to appear on the scene and try to force us out single-handed (“αὐτός”); why then, the results would be all the other way; the odds would be on our side and he would fall, and this parallelism is further suggested by the use of “Ἰθακήσιος” as an epithet here to Odysseus. ‘You are summoning a vast number of Ithacans against the Suitors; how if it were the resistance of one Ithacan to an overwhelming number of Suitors!’ Such violent and contrary results argue the wrongness of the method, “σὺ δ᾽ οὐ κατὰ μοῖραν ἔειπες”.The alternative rendering is to regard the words as a counter threat to Mentor. ‘You will find it a hard matter to fight about a meal, with men who moreover (“καί”) outnumber you. You call us the “παῦροι μνηστῆρες”, but, inasmuch as I do not think the people of Ithaca will mix themselves up in the quarrel, we nevertheless outnumber you, who are but one. Why, even Odysseus himself could not stand before us, and shalt thou stand?’ With “περὶ δαιτί” compare “περὶ παιδὶ μάχη” Il.16. 568, “περὶ οἷσι μαχειόμενος κτεάτεσσι” Od.17. 471.
