[5] There is in the
Original
an evident stress laid on the word ?
Odyssey - Cowper
There lay Telemachus, on finest wool
Reposed, contemplating all night his course
Prescribed by Pallas to the Pylian shore.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] We are told that Homer was under obligations to Mentes, who had
frequently given him a passage in his ship to different countries which
he wished to see, for which reason he has here immortalised him.
[2] Milton uses the word--Sewers and seneschals.
[3] ? ? ? ? ? ? , a convivial meeting, at which every man paid his proportion,
at least contributed something; but it seems to have been a meeting at
which strict sobriety was observed, else Pallas would not have inferred
from the noise and riot of this, that it was not such a one.
[4] ? ? ? ? --a word spoken, with respect to the speaker, casually; but with
reference to the inquirer supposed to be sent for his information by the
especial appointment and providential favour of the Gods.
[5] There is in the Original an evident stress laid on the word ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ,
which is used in both places. It was a sort of Lex Talionis which
Telemachus hoped might be put in force against them; and that Jove would
demand no satisfaction for the lives of those who made him none for the
waste of his property.
BOOK II
ARGUMENT
Telemachus having convened an assembly of the Greecians, publicly calls
on the Suitors to relinquish the house of Ulysses. During the continuance
of the Council he has much to suffer from the petulance of the Suitors,
from whom, having informed them of his design to undertake a voyage in
hope to obtain news of Ulysses, he asks a ship, with all things necessary
for the purpose. He is refused, but is afterwards furnished with what he
wants by Minerva, in the form of Mentor. He embarks in the evening
without the privity of his mother, and the Goddess sails with him.
Aurora, rosy daughter of the dawn,
Now ting'd the East, when habited again,
Uprose Ulysses' offspring from his bed.
Athwart his back his faulchion keen he flung,
His sandals bound to his unsullied feet,
And, godlike, issued from his chamber-door.
