the fight; and he also was henceforth to have
the sole right to receive the broken meats at the wooers' feasts.

Odysseus now pretended to draw back, as if he feared an encounter with
a man younger than himself; but at last he consented to the match, on
condition that the wooers would swear an oath not to strike him a foul
blow while he was fighting with Irus. To this they all agreed, and
forthwith Odysseus stripped to the waist, and girded his rags about
his loins. By some strange magic his limbs seemed to have filled out;
and when the wooers saw his mighty chest and broad shoulders they
cried out in amazement "Methinks Irus will pay dearly for his ire,"[1]
said one. "Look what a brawny thigh the old carle shows under his
rags!"

[Footnote 1: The pun is an attempt to reproduce a similar word-play in
the original.]

Irus himself was not less astonished than dismayed, so that they were
obliged to use force to make him face his opponent; and as he stood
there quaking with fear Antinous reviled him bitterly, and threatened,
if he were defeated, to carry him to the mainland, and hand him over
to a robber chieftain, nicknamed the Mutilator, and notorious for his
cruelties. "He will carve thee into collops and fling them to his
dogs," said the ferocious prince.

Little encouraged, as may be supposed, this prospect, Irus in his
despair aimed a blow at Odysseus, and struck him on the right
shoulder. Then Odysseus, who had resolved to put forth but half his
force, lest he should betray himself to the wooers, struck the
wretched man under the ear. There was a crash of broken bones, and
down went Irus in the dust, spitting blood, and beating the ground
with his heels. The wooers hailed his fall with shouts of laughter,
and Odysseus, seizing the prostrate beggar by the foot, dragged him
through the courtyard gate, and propped him against the wall. "Sit
there," he said, placing his staff in his hand, "and keep off dogs and
swine. Methinks thou hast had enough of playing the tyrant among
strangers and beggars."

When he returned to his place on the threshold he found the wooers in
high good humour at the defeat of Irus. "May heaven fulfil all thy
heart's desire!" cried one who sat near, "seeing that thou hast rid us
of that hungry, brawling rogue." His words had a meaning which he
little guessed, and Odysseus rejoiced when he heard them. Then
Antinous brought the pudding, all steaming from the fire, and set it
by him; and Amp