sleep while making the passage. But the wise man is to come to
knowledge hereafter.

He has arrived in Ithaca, and entered a safe port; he, still deep in
slumber, is laid on the shore with all his goods and gifts, when the
mariners turn back. At this point we have an interesting description of
the surroundings, wherein we may observe the poet's employment of
nature as a setting for the returned Ulysses. There is the secure haven
shutting off the winds and waves of the sea; at the end of the haven
stands the olive tree, product of culture, and hinting the civilized
world, which Ulysses now enters; it was a tree sacred to Pallas in
later Greek legend, and, doubtless, in Homer's time also. Next came the
cave of the Nymphs called Naiads, with its curious shapes of stone, the
work of the Nymphs to the old Greek eye, but named stalagmites and
stalactites in modern speech. Two are the entrances, one for Gods and
one for men; both human and divine visitors come thither, it is indeed
a point of meeting for the two influences, which is its essential
suggestion. Ulysses, lying with his goods beneath the olive tree and
near the cave, is under divine protection, which here Nature herself is
made to declare. This scenery is not introduced for its own sake, but
for the divinity in it, whereof another example is to follow in the
case of Neptune.

There have been repeated attempts to identify the locality described by
the poet with the present geography of Ithaca. Travelers have imagined
that they have found the haven and cave, notably this was the case with
Sir William Gell; but the more common view now is that they were
mistaken. Homer from his knowledge of Greece, which has everywhere
harbors, caves and olive-trees, constructed an ideal landscape for his
own purpose, quite as every poet does. He may or may not have seen
Ithaca; in either case, the poetic result is the same.

II. The physical transition from Phaeacia to Ithaca is accomplished;
while Ulysses is asleep, the poet casts a glance backward at the
marvelous ship and at the marvelous land which has just been left
behind. Both are henceforth to be forever closed to the real world and
its intercourse; the realm of fable is shut off from Ithaca, and from
the rest of this poem.

The matter is presented in the form of a conflict between the Phaeacians
and Neptune, between the sea-faring people and the sea; clearly it is
one of the many struggles between Man and Nature which th