“Bear this, O herald, to Demodocus, That he may eat. Him, even in my grief, Will I embrace, for worthily the bards Are honored and revered o’er all the earth By every race of men. The Muse herself Hath taught them song; she loves the minstrel tribe.”
He spake; the herald laid the flesh before Demodocus the hero, who received The gift well pleased. Then all the guests put forth Their hands and shared the viands on the board; And when their thirst and hunger were allayed, Thus to the minstrel sage Ulysses spake:—
“Demodocus, above all other men I give thee praise, for either has the Muse, Jove’s daughter, or Apollo, visited And taught thee. Truly hast thou sung the fate Of the Achaian warriors—what they did And suffered—all their labors as if thou Hadst been among them, or hadst heard the tale From an eyewitness. Now, I pray, proceed, And sing the invention of the wooden horse Made by Epeius with Minerva’s aid, And by the chief Ulysses artfully Conveyed into the Trojan citadel, With armed warriors in its womb to lay The city waste. And I, if thou relate The story rightly, will at once declare To all that largely hath some bounteous god Bestowed on thee the holy gift of song.”
He spake; the poet felt the inspiring god, And sang, beginning where the Argives hurled Firebrands among their tents, and sailed away In their good galleys, save the band that sat Beside renowned Ulysses in the horse, Concealed from sight, amid the Trojan crowd, Who now had drawn it to the citadel. So there it stood, while, sitting round it, talked The men of Troy, and wist not what to do. By turns three counsels pleased them—to hew down The hollow trunk with the remorseless steel; Or drag it to a height, and cast it thence Headlong among the rocks; or, lastly, leave The enormous image standing and unharmed, An offering to appease the gods. And this At last was done; for so had fate decreed That they should be destroyed whene’er their town Should hold within its walls the horse of wood, In which the mightiest of the Argives came Among the sons of