THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.

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a vessel and goes in search of his father. He visits the courts of Nestor and Mene- laus; sees the beautiful Helen restored and repentant, and hears many stories of the war. After vain seeking he returns to Ithaca. Meanwhile Odysseus on the raft of Calypso is wrecked by the sea god Poseidon, whose anger he had incurred when he had put out the one eye of Poseidon's son—the Cyclops, Polyphemus. Saved by the aid of his patron Athene, Odysseus is tossed upon the rocky shore of the Island of Scheria, bleeding and exhausted. Upon this island dwell a colony of cultivated Phoenicians. The daughter of the King Alcinous is the lovely Princess Nausicaä. She is in the dawn of womanhood, and into her gentle heart comes the dream of married love; so she wishes to wash her linen for her bridal day. But she does not acknowledge her thought even to herself, and under the plea of washing the linen of the king she drives with her maidens to the shore where sea and river meet. After trampling the clothes in the clear wave, the maidens play at games and so disturb Odysseus asleep among the leaves. Naked and bloody, soiled by the wave and the earth, he appears like a wild beast before the maidens, driving them back in a fright. But his ever ready tongue wins the heart of the princess, and giving him clothing she tells him to follow her to the city behind the wain, yet not to keep close to her after they reach town, lest the gossips should talk. So Odysseus throws himself upon the hospitality of King Alcinous and Queen Arete, and having rested and bathed his glorious limbs, he tells to his wondering listeners his adventures from the time of the Fall of Troy. He speaks of his haii-breadth escape from the one-eyed giant Polyphemus whom he had blinded, an escape made by suspending himself to the wool on the belly of a ram; of the gift of the bag of the winds by King Hiolus, pierced by his curious fol­lowers, and of how the freed winds then blew them to and fro upon the wide sea; of his life on the Island of Circe, on which his men were turned into swine; of his adventures in dread Hades, where he converses with the ghosts of the dead heroes; of his sail through the Sirens’ Pass, when he is bound to the mast lest he should be beguiled to destruction by the entrancing song; of his passage through the fearful Straits of Scylla and Charybdis; and of other enthralling adventures ended by total loss of men and ships and his imprisonment on Calypso’s Island.

Then he begs of his host to give him safe convoy to his home in Ithaca. This request is granted, and many guests-gifts are bestowed upon the man whose speech wins all hearts, and the princess, his savior, may cherish only his words, but worthy words they are: “ May the gods grant thee all thy heart’s desire; a husband and a home, and a mind at one with his may they give—a good gift, for there is nothing mightier and nobler than when man and wife are of one heart and mind in a house, a grief to their foes, and to their friends great joy, but their own hearts know it best. ”

So Odysseus is taken by his friends to Ithaca, and there, disguised as a beggar, he goes to the hut of the faithful swineherd Eumaeus, and learns all that has occurred during his absence. At this point Telemachus returns, and the father revealing him­self to the son, they lovingly embrace, while pitifully falls the tears beneath their brows. Then the two, with the aid of Athene, devise a plan for killing all the suitors. Odysseus goes to his home still in the guise of a beggar, receives the insults of the suitors, talks with Penelope, and is nearly betrayed by his old nurse who discovers a familiar scar while washing his feet. The suitors make trial of their strength by attempting to draw the bow of Odysseus, but no one can draw it until Odysseus takes it in his hand and easily sends the arrow through the twelve axe-rings. Then he turns upon the suitors, and by the aid of the gods all are slaughtered, and Odysseus is re­venged. The wise Penelope, however, refuses to believe that the stranger is her husband, and tries to prove him by ordering the nurse to bring out the goodly bed of Odysseus, which he made for himself. But says Odysseus: “ Verily, a bitter word is this, lady, that thou hast spoken. Who has set my bed otherwhere? Hard would it be for one, how skilled soever, unless a god were to come, that might easily set it in another place, if so he would. But of men there is none living, howsoever strong in his youth, that could lightly upheave it, for a great marvel is wrought in the fashion of the bed,