But Euryclea, with dispatchful care,

And sage Eurynome, the couch prepare;

Instant they bid the blazing torch display

Around the dome and artificial day;

Then to repose her steps the matron bends,

And to the queen Eurynome descends;

A torch she bears, to light with guiding fires

The royal pair; she guides them, and retires

The instant his fair spouse Ulysses led

To the chaste love-rites of the nuptial bed.


And now the blooming youths and sprightly fair

Cease the gay dance, and to their rest repair;

But in discourse the king and consort lay,

While the soft hours stole unperceived away;

Intent he hears Penelope disclose

A mournful story of domestic woes,

His servants’ insults, his invaded bed,

How his whole flocks and herds exhausted bled,

His generous wines dishonour’d shed in vain,

And the wild riots of the suitor-train.

The king alternate a dire tale relates,

Of wars, of triumphs, and disastrous fates;

All he unfolds; his listening spouse turns pale

With pleasing horror at the dreadful tale;

Sleepless devours each word; and hears how slain

Cicons on Cicons swell the ensanguined plain;

How to the land of Lote unbless’d he sails;

And images the rills and flowery vales!

How dash’d like dogs, his friends the Cyclops tore

(Not unrevenged), and quaff’d the spouting gore;

How the loud storms in prison bound, he sails

From friendly Aeolus with prosperous gales:

Yet fate withstands! a sudden tempest roars,

And whirls him groaning from his native shores:

How on the barbarous Laestrigonian coast,

By savage hands his fleet and friends lie lost;

How scarce himself survived: he paints the bower,

The spells of Circe, and her magic power;

His dreadful journey to the realms beneath,

To seek Tiresias in the vales of death;

How in the doleful mansions lie survey’d

His royal mother, pale Anticlea’s shade;

And friends in battle slain, heroic ghosts!

Then how, unharm’d, he pass’d the Syren-coasts,