Page 222 - the-odyssey

afraid and got ready the bulls.
Thus did the chiefs and rulers of the Phaeacians pray to
king Neptune, standing round his altar; and at the same
time {118} Ulysses woke up once more upon his own soil.
He had been so long away that he did not know it again;
moreover, Jove’s daughter Minerva had made it a foggy day,
so that people might not know of his having come, and that
she might tell him everything without either his wife or his
fellow citizens and friends recognising him {119} until he
had taken his revenge upon the wicked suitors. Everything,
therefore, seemed quite different to him—the long straight
tracks, the harbours, the precipices, and the goodly trees,
appeared all changed as he started up and looked upon his
native land. So he smote his thighs with the flat of his hands
and cried aloud despairingly.
‘Alas,’ he exclaimed, ‘among what manner of people am
I fallen? Are they savage and uncivilised or hospitable and
humane? Where shall I put all this treasure, and which way
shall I go? I wish I had staid over there with the Phaeacians;
or I could have gone to some other great chief who would
have been good to me and given me an escort. As it is I do
not know where to put my treasure, and I cannot leave it
here for fear somebody else should get hold of it. In good
truth the chiefs and rulers of the Phaeacians have not been
dealing fairly by me, and have left me in the wrong country;
they said they would take me back to Ithaca and they have
not done so: may Jove the protector of suppliants chastise
them, for he watches over everybody and punishes those
who do wrong. Still, I suppose I must count my goods and

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