THE

ODYSSEY OF HOMER,

TRANSLATED INTO

ENGLISH BLANK VERSE.

ARGUMENT OF THE FIRST BOOK.

In a Council of the Gods, Minerva calls their attention to Ulysses, still a wanderer. They resolve to grant him a safe return to Ithaca. Minerva descends to encourage Telemachus, and in the form of Mentes directs him in what manner to proceed. Throughout this book the extravagance and profligacy of the suitors are occasionally suggested.

ODYSSEY.

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BOOK I.

MUSE make the man thy theme, for shrewdness fam'd

And genius versatile; who far and wide

A Wand'rer, after Ilium overthrown,

Discover d various cities, and the mind

And manners learn'd of men in lands remote.
He num'rous woes, on Ocean toss'd, endur'd,
Anxious to save himself, and to conduct
His foll'wers to their home; yet all his care
Preserv'd them not; they perish'd self-destroy'd
By their own fault; infatuate! who devour d
The oxen of the all-o'erseeing Sun,
And, punish'd for that crime, return'd no more.
Daughter divine of Jove, these things record,
As it may please thee, even in our ears.

The rest, all those who had perdition 'scap'd
By war or on the Deep, dwelt now at home;
Him only, of his country and his wife

1

Alike desirous, in her hollow grot

Calypso, beauteous Goddess, still detain'd
Wooing him to her arms; and when, at length,
Year rolling after year, the season came,
That should restore him, by the will of Heav'n,
To his lov'd Ithaca (nor even there,

Friends only should he meet, but many a foe),
Then all the Pow'rs above with pity view'd
His num'rous toils, save Neptune; He alone,
With ceaseless rage pursuing him, withheld
Godlike Ulysses from his native shores.
But Neptune, now, the Æthiopians sought
(The Æthiopians, utmost of mankind,
These Eastward situate, those toward the West),
Call'd to a hecatomb of bulls and lambs*.

There sitting, pleas'd he banqueted; the Gods
In Jove's abode, mean-time, assembled all,
'Midst whom the Sire of Heav'n and Earth began.
For he recall'd to mind Ægisthus slain
By Agamemnon's celebrated son

Orestes, and retracing in his thought

That dread event, the Immortals thus address'd:
How rash are humankind! who charge on Us

*The Ethiopians, according to Diodorus Siculus, are said to have been the first of the human race, who celebrated the worship of the Gods; from whom they received, in recompense of their devotions, an immunity from conquest by the kings their neighbours.

Their suff'rings, far more truly the result
Of their own folly, than of our decrees*.
So now Ægisthus, under no constraint
Of Destiny, had ta'en Atrides' wife

To his own bed, and him at his return
Hath foully slain, though not unwarn'd by Us,
That he would surely perish; for we sent
The watchful Argicide†, who bade him fear
Alike, to slay the king, or woo the queen;
For that Atrides' son Orestes, soon
As grown mature, and eager to assume
The sway in Argos, should avenge the deed.
So Hermes spake, but his advice mov'd not
Ægisthus, on whose head the whole arrear
Of vengeance heap'd at last hath therefore fall'n.

To whom Minerva, Goddess azure-ey'd:
O Jove, Saturnian Sire, o'er all supreme!

*

Chrysippus, as quoted by Gellius, inveighs with much reasonable indignation against those profligate and audacious persons, who, to excuse a slavish obedience to their lusts, have recourse to the plea of Fatality, ascribing all their wickedness, not to their own impious rashness, the proper and true source of it, but to the will of Heaven.-Homer however, as he observes, the wisest as well as the most ancient of the poets, was the first also to censure this egregious folly.-C.

† Argus, the son of Arestor, was called the Toλuouμaros núwv or dog with many eyes, on account of the vigilance with which he guarded Io the daughter of Inachus; but Mercury, by command of Jupiter, slew him, and was thence entitled the Argicide.-B.