the tale of my journey. And
I have an order to leave with thee. Take this stranger into the City,
that he may go about as he desires, asking alms from the people.'

Odysseus in the guise of a beggar said, 'I thank thee, lord Telemachus.
I would not stay here, for I am not of an age to wait about a hut and
courtyard, obeying the orders of a master, even if that master be as
good a man as thy swineherd. Go thy way, lord Telemachus, and Eumaeus, as
thou hast bidden him, will lead me into the City.'

Telemachus then passed out of the courtyard and went the ways until he
came into the City. When he went into the house, the first person he saw
was his nurse, old Eurycleia, who welcomed him with joy. To Eurycleia he
spoke of the guest who had come on his ship, Theoclymenus. He told her
that this guest would be in the house that day, and that he was to be
treated with all honour and reverence. The wooers came into the hall and
crowded around him, with fair words in their mouths. Then all sat down
at tables, and Eurycleia brought wheaten bread and wine and dainties.

Just at that time Odysseus and Eumaeus were journeying towards the City.
Odysseus, in the guise of a beggar, had a ragged bag across his
shoulders and he carried a staff that the swineherd had given him to
help him over the slippery ground. They went by a rugged path and they
came to a place where a spring flowed into a basin made for its water,
and where there was an altar to the Nymphs, at which men made offerings.

As Eumaeus and Odysseus were resting at the spring, a servant from
Odysseus' house came along. He was a goatherd, and Melanthius was his
name. He was leading a flock of goats for the wooers to kill, and when
he saw the swineherd with the seeming beggar he cried out:

'Now we see the vile leading the vile. Say, swineherd, whither art thou
leading this wretch? It is easy to see the sort of fellow he is! He is
the sort to rub shoulders against many doorposts, begging for scraps.
Nothing else is he good for. But if thou wouldst give him to me,
swineherd, I would make him watch my fields, and sweep out my stalls,
and carry fresh water to the kids. He'd have his dish of whey from me.
But a fellow like this doesn't want an honest job--he wants to lounge
through the country, filling his belly, without doing anything for the
people who feed him up. If he goes to the house of Odysseus, I pray that
he be pelted from the door.'

He said all this as he came up