Homer

“ A menial train the flowing bowl supply.
Others, apart, the spacious hall prepare,
And form the costly feast with busy care.
There young Telemachus, his bloomy face
Glowing celestial sweet, with godlike grace
Amid the circle shines: but hope and fear
(Painful vicissitude!) his bosom tear.
Now, imaged in his mind, he sees restored
In peace and joy the people's rightful lord;
The proud oppressors fly the vengeful sword. ”

“ For brave Ulysses, still by fate oppress'd.
Amidst an isle, around whose rocky shore
The forests murmur, and the surges roar,
The blameless hero from his wish'd-for home
A goddess guards in her enchanted dome;
(Atlas her sire, to whose far-piercing eye
The wonders of the deep expanded lie;
The eternal columns which on earth he rears
End in the starry vault, and prop the spheres) .
By his fair daughter is the chief confined,
Who soothes to dear delight his anxious mind ”

“ To hail Ulysses' safe return I came;
But still the frown of some celestial power
With envious joy retards the blissful hour.
Let not your soul be sunk in sad despair;
He lives, he breathes this heavenly vital air,
Among a savage race, whose shelfy bounds
With ceaseless roar the foaming deep surrounds. ”

“ That from his realm retards his god-like sire;
Delivering early to the voice of fame
The promise of a green immortal name."
She said: the sandals of celestial mould,
Fledged with ambrosial plumes, and rich with gold,
Surround her feet: with these sublime she sails
The aerial space, and mounts the winged gales;
O'er earth and ocean wide prepared to soar,
Her dreaded arm a beamy javelin bore,
Ponderous and vast: which, when her fury burns,
Proud tyrants humbles, and whole hosts o'erturns. ”

“ From great Anchialus, renown'd and wise;
Mentes my name; I rule the Taphian race,
Whose bounds the deep circumfluent waves embrace;
A duteous people, and industrious isle,
To naval arts inured, and stormy toil. ”

“ And form to measured airs the mazy dance;
To Phemius was consign'd the chorded lyre,
Whose hand reluctant touch'd the warbling wire;
Phemius, whose voice divine could sweetest sing
High strains responsive to the vocal string.
Meanwhile, in whispers to his heavenly guest
His indignation thus the prince express'd:
"Indulge my rising grief, whilst these (my friend)
With song and dance the pompous revel end.
Light is the dance, and doubly sweet the lays,
When for the dear delight another pays. ”

“ She holds a conference with Telemachus, in the shape of Mantes, king of Taphians; in which she advises him to take a journey in quest of his father Ulysses, to Pylos and Sparta, where Nestor and Menelaus yet reigned; then, after having visibly displayed her divinity, disappears. The suitors of Penelope make great entertainments, and riot in her palace till night. ”