Peisistratus, the son of Nestor, spake In answer:
“Menelaus, foster-child Of Jove and son of Atreus! sovereign king! He is, as thou hast said, that hero’s son; But he is modest, and he deems that ill It would become him, on arriving here, If he should venture in discourse while thou Art present, in whose voice we take delight As if it were the utterance of a god. The knight Gerenian Nestor sent me forth To guide him hither—for he earnestly Desired to see thee, that thou mightest give Counsel in what he yet should say or do. For bitterly a son, who finds at home No others to befriend him, must lament The absence of a father. So it is With young Telemachus; for far away His father is, and in the land are none Who have the power to shelter him from wrong.”
The fair-haired Menelaus answered thus:— “O wonder! Then the son of one most dear, Who for my sake so oft has braved and borne The conflicts of the battlefield, hath come Beneath my roof. I thought that I should greet His father with a warmer welcome here Than any other of the Argive race, When Jove the Olympian Thunderer should grant A safe return to us across the deep In our good ships. I would have founded here For him a city in Argos, and have built Dwellings, and would have brought from Ithaca Him and his son, and all his wealth and all His people. To this end I would have caused Some neighboring district where my sway is owned To be dispeopled. Dwelling here we oft Should then have met each other, and no cause Would e’er have parted us, two faithful friends Delighting in each other, till at last Came Death’s black cloud to wrap us in its shade. A god, no doubt, hath seen in this a good Too great for us, and thus to him alone, Unhappy man! denied a safe return.”