shifts, beyond all those Of whom we ever heard that lived of yore, The bright-haired ladies of the Achaian race, Tyro, Alcmena, and Mycenè, famed For glossy tresses, none of them endowed As is Penelope, though this last shift Be ill devised—so long will we consume Thy substance and estate as she shall hold Her present mood, the purpose which the gods Have planted in her breast. She to herself Gains great renown, but surely brings on thee Loss of much goods. And now we go not hence To our affairs nor elsewhere, till she wed Whichever of the Greeks may please her most.”
And then rejoined discreet Telemachus:— “Antinoüs, grievous wrong it were to send Unwilling from this palace her who bore And nursed me. Whether he be living yet Or dead, my father is in distant lands; And should I, of my own accord and will, Dismiss my mother, I must make perforce Icarius large amends, and that were hard. And he would do me mischief, and the gods Would send yet other evils on my head. For then my mother, going forth, would call On the grim Furies, and the general curse Of all men would be on me. Think not I Will ever speak that word. But if ye bear A sense of injury for what is past, Go from these halls; provide for other feasts, Consuming what is yours, and visiting Each other’s homes in turn. But if it seem To you the wiser and the better way To plunder one man’s goods, go on to waste My substance. I shall call the eternal gods To aid me, and, if Jupiter allow Fit retribution for your crimes, ye die Within this very palace unavenged.”
So spake Telemachus. The Thunderer, Jove, Sent flying from a lofty mountaintop Two eagles. First they floated on the wind Close to each other, and with wings outspread; But as they came to where the murmuring crowd Was gathered just beneath their flight, they turned And clapped their heavy pinions, looking down With deadly omen on the heads below, And with their talons tore each other’s cheeks And necks, and then they darted to the right Away through Ithaca among its roofs.