BOOK V.
ARGUMENT.
Aurora rose from her bed beside illustrious Tithonus,[1] that she might bear light to immortals and men: but the gods sat in conclave, and amongst them Jupiter, who thunders from on high, and whose power is greatest. To them Minerva related the many toils of Ulysses, remembering [him]; for he was her care, when in the house of the Nymph.
"O father Jove, and ye other blessed gods who exist for ever, let no sceptre-bearing king be any more provident, mild, and gentle, nor thinking rightful things in his mind, but let him ever be severe and do unlawful things; since no one of the people, over whom he reigned, is mindful of divine Ulysses, and he was mild as a father: but he lies in an island suffering great grief, in the palace of the Nymph Calypso, who detains him by necessity; and he is unable to come to his paternal land. For there are not ships for him fitted with oars, and companions who may conduct him over the wide back of the sea. Now again they desire to slay his beloved son, about to return home; but he has gone to divine Pylos and mighty Lacedæmon[2] for news for his father."
But her, cloud-collecting Jove addressed in answer: "My child what word has escaped thy lips? For hast thou not indeed thyself devised this plan, that Ulysses may indeed return and be revenged on them? But do thou skilfully conduct Telemachus, for thou art able, that he may reach his paternal land unhurt; but let the suitors return back[3] in their ship."
- ↑ The son of Laomedon, brother of Priam, and husband of Aurora.
- ↑ Loewe regards δῖαν here as equivalent to εὐρεῖαν, like Λακεδαίμονα εὐρύχορον.
- ↑ Notwithstanding the suppositions of ancient grammarians, that παλιμπετὲς is the contracted nominative plural, it is clearly shown by Buttmann to be the adverbial neuter. See Lexil. p. 296, sqq.
