time, a man both brave and of great stature, Telemus son of Eurymus,who was an excellent seer, and did all the prophesying for theCyclopes till he grew old; he told me that all this would happen to mesome day, and said I should lose my sight by the hand of Ulysses. Ihave been all along expecting some one of imposing presence andsuperhuman strength, whereas he turns out to be a little insignificantweakling, who has managed to blind my eye by taking advantage of me inmy drink; come here, then, Ulysses, that I may make you presents toshow my hospitality, and urge Neptune to help you forward on yourjourney- for Neptune and I are father and son. He, if he so will,shall heal me, which no one else neither god nor man can do.'"Then I said, 'I wish I could be as sure of killing you outright andsending you down to the house of Hades, as I am that it will take morethan Neptune to cure that eye of yours.'"On this he lifted up his hands to the firmament of heaven andprayed, saying, 'Hear me, great Neptune; if I am indeed your owntrue-begotten son, grant that Ulysses may never reach his homealive; or if he must get back to his friends at last, let him do solate and in sore plight after losing all his men [let him reach hishome in another man's ship and find trouble in his house.']"Thus did he pray, and Neptune heard his prayer. Then he picked up arock much larger than the first, swung it aloft and hurled it withprodigious force. It fell just short of the ship, but was within alittle of hitting the end of the rudder. The sea quaked as the rockfell into it, and the wash of the wave it raised drove us onwards onour way towards the shore of the island."When at last we got to the island where we had left the rest of ourships, we found our comrades lamenting us, and anxiously awaitingour return. We ran our vessel upon the sands and got out of her onto the sea shore; we also landed the Cyclops' sheep, and dividedthem equitably amongst us so that none might have reason tocomplain. As for the ram, my companions agreed that I should have itas an extra share; so I sacrificed it on the sea shore, and burned itsthigh bones to Jove, who is the lord of all. But he heeded not mysacrifice, and only thought how he might destroy my ships and mycomrades."Thus through the livelong day to the going down of the sun wefeasted our fill on meat and drink, but when the sun went down andit came on dark, we camped upon the beach. When the child ofmorning, rosy-fingered Dawn, appeared, I bade my men on board andloose the hawsers. Then they took their places and smote the greysea with their oars; so we sailed on with sorrow in our hearts, butglad to have escaped death though we had lost our comrades.BOOK X.THENCE we went on to the Aeoli island where lives Aeolus son ofHippotas, dear to the immortal gods. It is an island that floats (asit were) upon the sea, iron bound with a wall that girds it. Now,Aeolus has six daughters and six lusty sons, so he made the sons marrythe daughters, and they all live with their dear father and mother,feasting and enjoying every conceivable kind of luxury. All day longthe atmosphere of the house is loaded with the savour of roastingmeats till it groans again, yard and all; but by night they sleep ontheir well-made bedsteads, each with his own wife between theblankets. These were the people among whom we had now come."Aeolus entertained me for a whole month asking me questions all thetime about Troy, the Argive fleet, and the return of the Achaeans. Itold him exactly how everything had happened, and when I said I mustgo, and asked him to further me on my way, he made no sort ofdifficulty, but set about doing so at once. Moreover, he flayed me aprime ox-hide to hold the ways of the roaring winds, which he shutup in the hide as in a sack- for Jove had made him captain over thewinds, and he could stir or still each one of them according to hisown pleasure. He put the sack in the ship and bound the mouth sotightly with a silver thread that not even a breath of a side-windcould blow from any quarter. The West wind which was fair for us didhe alone let blow as it chose; but it all came to nothing, for we werelost through our own folly."Nine days and nine nights did we sail, and on the tenth day ournative land showed on the horizon. We got so close in that we couldsee the stubble fires burning, and I, being then dead beat, fellinto a light sleep, for I had never let the rudder out of my ownhands, that we might get home the faster. On this the men fell totalking among themselves, and said I was bringing back gold and silverin the sack that Aeolus had given me. 'Bless my heart,' would one turnto his neighbour, saying, 'how this man gets honoured and makesfriends to whatever city or country he may go. See what fine prizes heis taking home from Troy, while we, who have travelled just as faras he has, come back with hands as empty as we set out with- and nowAeolus has given him ever so much more. Quick- let us see what itall is, and how much gold and silver there is in the sack he gavehim.'"Thus they talked and evil counsels prevailed. They loosed the sack,whereupon the wind flew howling forth and raised a storm thatcarried us weeping out to sea and away from our own country. Then Iawoke, and knew not whether to throw myself into the sea or to live onand make the best of it; but I bore it, covered myself up, and laydown in the ship, while the men lamented bitterly as the fiercewinds bore our fleet back to the Aeolian island."When we reached it we went ashore to take in water, and dinedhard by the ships. Immediately after dinner I took a herald and one ofmy men and went straight to the house of Aeolus, where I found himfeasting with his wife and family; so we sat down as suppliants on thethreshold. They were astounded when they saw us and said, 'Ulysses,what brings you here? What god has been ill-treating you? We tookgreat pains to further you on your way home to Ithaca, or whereverit was that you wanted to go to.'"Thus did they speak, but I answered sorrowfully, 'My men haveundone me; they, and cruel sleep, have ruined me. My friends, mendme this mischief, for you can if you will.'"I spoke as movingly as I could, but they said nothing, till theirfather answered, 'Vilest of mankind, get you gone at once out of theisland; him whom heaven hates will I in no wise help. Be off, foryou come here as one abhorred of heaven. "And with these words he sentme sorrowing from his door."Thence we sailed sadly on till the men were worn out with longand fruitless rowing, for there was no longer any wind to help them.Six days, night and day did we toil, and on the seventh day we reachedthe rocky stronghold of Lamus- Telepylus, the city of theLaestrygonians, where the shepherd who is driving in his sheep andgoats [to be milked] salutes him who is driving out his flock [tofeed] and this last answers the salute. In that country a man whocould do without sleep might earn double wages, one as a herdsman ofcattle, and another as a shepherd, for they work much the same bynight as they do by day."When we reached the harbour we found it land-locked under steepcliffs, with a narrow entrance between two headlands. My captains tookall their ships inside, and made them fast close to one another, forthere was never so much as a breath of wind inside, but it wasalways dead calm. I kept my own ship outside, and moored it to arock at the very end of the point; then I climbed a high rock toreconnoitre, but could see no sign neither of man nor cattle, onlysome smoke rising from the ground. So I sent two of my company with anattendant to find out what sort of people the inhabitants were."The men when they got on shore followed a level road by which thepeople draw their firewood from the mountains into the town, tillpresently they met a young woman who had come outside to fetchwater, and who was daughter to a Laestrygonian named Antiphates. Shewas going to the fountain Artacia from which the people bring in theirwater, and when my men had come close up to her, they asked her whothe king of that country might be, and over what kind of people heruled; so she directed them to her father's house, but when they gotthere they found his wife to be a giantess as huge as a mountain,and they were horrified at the sight of her."She at once called her husband Antiphates from the place ofassembly, and forthwith he set about killing my men. He snatched upone of them, and began to make his dinner off him then and there,whereon the other two ran back to the ships as fast as ever theycould. But Antiphates raised a hue and cry after them, and thousandsof sturdy Laestrygonians sprang up from every quarter- ogres, not men.They threw vast rocks at us from the cliffs as though they had beenmere stones, and I heard the horrid sound of the ships crunching upagainst one another, and the death cries of my men, as theLaestrygonians speared them like fishes and took them home to eatthem. While they were thus killing my men within the harbour I drew mysword, cut the cable of my own ship, and told my men to row with alftheir might if they too would not fare like the rest; so they laid outfor their lives, and we were thankful enough when we got into openwater out of reach of the rocks they hurled at us. As for the othersthere was not one of them left."Thence we sailed sadly on, glad to have escaped death, though wehad lost our comrades, and came to the Aeaean island, where Circelives a great and cunning goddess who is own sister to the magicianAeetes- for they are both children of the sun by Perse, who isdaughter to Oceanus. We brought our ship into a safe harbour without aword, for some god guided us thither, and having landed we there fortwo days and two nights, worn out in body and mind. When the morningof the third day came I took my spear and my sword, and went away fromthe ship to reconnoitre, and see if I could discover signs of humanhandiwork, or hear the sound of voices. Climbing to the top of ahigh look-out I espied the smoke of Circe's house rising upwardsamid a dense forest of trees, and when I saw this I doubted whether,having seen the smoke, I would not go on at once and find out more,but in the end I deemed it best to go back to the ship, give the mentheir dinners, and send some of them instead of going myself."When I had nearly got back to the ship some god took pity upon mysolitude, and sent a fine antlered stag right into the middle of mypath. He was coming down his pasture in the forest to drink of theriver, for the heat of the sun drove him, and as he passed I struckhim in the middle of the back; the bronze point of the spear wentclean through him, and he lay groaning in the dust until the life wentout of him. Then I set my foot upon him, drew my spear from the wound,and laid it down; I also gathered rough grass and rushes and twistedthem into a fathom or so of good stout rope, with which I bound thefour feet of the noble creature together; having so done I hung himround my neck and walked back to the ship leaning upon my spear, forthe stag was much too big for me to be able to carry him on myshoulder, steadying him with one hand. As I threw him down in front ofthe ship, I called the men and spoke cheeringly man by man to eachof them. 'Look here my friends,' said I, 'we are not going to die somuch before our time after all, and at any rate we will not starveso long as we have got something to eat and drink on board.' On thisthey uncovered their heads upon the sea shore and admired the stag,for he was indeed a splendid fellow. Then, when they had feasted theireyes upon him sufficiently, they washed their hands and began tocook him for dinner."Thus through the livelong day to the going down of the sun westayed there eating and drinking our fill, but when the sun wentdown and it came on dark, we camped upon the sea shore. When the child