lypso, who held him eight years by force on her
island. We read, indeed, that, at the expiration of these years,
Odysseus was always weeping, and his sweet life ebbed away in longing
for his home. But all the sentiment is taken out of this by the words
which follow: [Greek: epei ouketi aendane numphae] "_because the nymph
pleased him no more_!" Even so Tannhaeuser tired of the pleasures in
the grotto of Venus, and begged to be allowed to leave.

While thus permitting himself the unrestrained indulgence of his
passions, without a thought of his wife, Odysseus has the barbarian's
stern notions regarding the duties of women who belong to him. There
are fifty young women in his palace at home who ply their hard tasks
and bear the servant's lot. Twelve of these, having no one to marry,
yield to the temptations of the rich princes who sue for the hand of
Penelope in the absence of her husband.

Ulysses, on his return, hears of this, and forthwith takes measures to
ascertain who the guilty ones are. Then he tells his son Telemachus
and the swineherd and neatherd to

"go and lead forth these serving-maids out of the
stately hall to a spot between the roundhouse and the
neat courtyard wall, and smite them with your long
swords till you take life from all, so that they may
forget their secret amours with the suitors."

The "discreet" Telemachus carried out these orders, leading the maids
to a place whence there was no escape and exclaiming:

"'By no honorable death would I take away the lives of
those who poured reproaches on my head and on my
mother, and lay beside the suitors.'"

"He spoke and tied the cable of a dark-bowed ship to a
great pillar, then lashed it to the roundhouse,
stretching it high across, too high for one to touch
the feet upon the ground. And as the wide-winged
thrushes or the doves strike on a net set in the
bushes; and when they think to go to roost a cruel bed
receives them; even so the women held their heads in
line, and around every neck a noose was laid that they
might die most vilely. They twitched their feet a
little, but not long."

A more dastardly, cowardly, unmanly deed is not on record in all human
literature, yet the instigator of it, Odysseus, is always the "wise,"
"royal," "princely," "good," and "godlike," and there is not the
slightest hint that the great poet views his assassination of the p