spoke so boldly. And one said,
'Because his father, Odysseus, was king, this youth thinks he should be
king by inheritance. But may Zeus, the god, never grant that he be
king.'

Then said Telemachus, 'If the god Zeus should grant that I be King, I am
ready to take up the Kingship of the land of Ithaka with all its toils
and all its dangers.' And when Telemachus said that he looked like a
young king indeed.

But they sat in peace and listened to what the minstrel sang. And when
evening came the wooers left the hall and went each to his own house.
Telemachus rose and went to his chamber. Before him there went an
ancient woman who had nursed him as a child--Eurycleia was her name. She
carried burning torches to light his way. And when they were in his
chamber Telemachus took off his soft doublet and put it in Eurycleia's
hands, and she smoothed it out and hung it on the pin at his bed-side.
Then she went out and she closed the door behind with its handle of
silver and she pulled the thong that bolted the door on the other side.
And all night long Telemachus lay wrapped in his fleece of wool and
thought on what he would say at the council next day, and on the goddess
Athene and what she had put into his heart to do, and on the journey
that was before him to Nestor in Pylos and to Menelaus and Helen in
Sparta.

IV

As soon as it was dawn Telemachus rose from his bed. He put on his
raiment, bound his sandals on his feet, hung his sharp sword across his
shoulder, and took in his hand a spear of bronze. Then he went forth to
where the Council was being held in the open air, and two swift hounds
went beside him.

The chief men of the land of Ithaka had been gathered already for the
council. When it was plain that all were there, the man who was oldest
amongst them, the lord AEgyptus, rose up and spoke. He had sons, and two
of them were with him yet, tending his fields. But one, Eurynomous by
name, kept company with the wooers of Telemachus' mother. And AEgyptus
had had another son; he had gone in Odysseus' ship to the war of Troy,
and AEgyptus knew he had perished on his way back. He constantly mourned
for this son, and thinking upon him as he spoke, AEgyptus had tears in
his eyes.

[Illustration]

'Never since Odysseus summoned us together before he took ship for the
war of Troy have we met in council,' said he. 'Why have we been brought
together now? Has someone heard tidings of the return of Odysseus? If it