Melanthius

this nuisance of a beggar to mar our feasts? He is a man to stand and rub his shoulders on many doorposts, begging for scraps, not for swords or cauldrons.2 If thou wouldest give me this fellow to keep my farmstead, to sweep out the pens and to carry young shoots to the kids, then by drinking whey he might get himself a sturdy thigh. But since he has learned only deeds of evil, he will not care to busy himself with work, but is minded rather to go skulking through the land, that by begging he may feed his insatiate belly. But I will speak out to thee, and this word shall verily be brought to pass. If he comes to the palace of divine Odysseus, many a footstool, hurled about his head by the hands of those that are men, shall be broken on his ribs1 as he is pelted through the house.” So he spoke, and as he passed he kicked Odysseus on the hip in his folly, yet he did not drive him from the path,

take on a black, benched ship far from Ithaca, that he may bring me in much wealth. Would that Apollo, of the silver bow, might smite Telemachus to-day in the halls, or that he might be slain by the wooers, as surely as for Odysseus in a far land the day of return has been lost.” So saying, he left them there, as they walked slowly on,

“Hear me, wooers of the glorious queen, regarding this stranger, for verily I have seen him before. Truly it was the swineherd that led him hither, but of the man himself I know not surely from whence he declares his birth to be.” So he spoke, and Antinous rebuked the swineherd, saying:

'Tis plain, methinks, that we two shall not part company till we taste one another's fists, for thy begging is in no wise decent. Also it is not here alone that there are feasts of the Achaeans.”

from the store-room arms to don, for it is within, methinks, and nowhere else that Odysseus and his glorious son have laid the arms.” So saying, Melanthius, the goatherd, mounted up by the steps2 of the hall to the store-rooms of Odysseus. Thence he took twelve shields, as many spears,