nd cried,--

"Eumaeus, this must be the palace of the king! No one could mistake it.
See, there is room after room, and a spacious courtyard with a wall and
coping-stones and solid double doors to make it safe. And I am sure that a
great company is seated there at the banquet, for I can smell the roasted
meat and hear the sound of the lyre."

Then Eumaeus said, "Your wits are quick enough; it is the very place. And
now tell me: would you rather go in alone and face the princes while I
wait here, or will you stay behind and let me go in first? But if you wait
here, you must not wait too long, for some one might catch sight of you
and strike you and drive you from the gate."

Then the hero said to him, "I understand; I knew what I had to meet. Do
you go first and I will wait behind. For I have some knowledge of thrusts
and blows, and my heart has learned to endure; for I have suffered much in
storm and battle, and I can bear this like the rest."

But while they were talking, a dog who was lying there lifted his head and
pricked his ears. It was the hound Argus, whom Ulysses had reared himself
long ago before the war, but had to leave behind when he went away to
Troy. Once he used to follow the hunters to the chase, but no one cared
for him now when his master was away, and he lay there covered with
vermin, on a dung-heap in front of the gates. Yet even so, when he felt
that Ulysses was near him, he wagged his tail and dropped his ears; but he
had not strength enough to drag himself up to his master. And when Ulysses
saw it, he turned away his face so that Eumaeus should not see the tears in
his eyes, and said, "Eumaeus, it is strange that they let that dog lie
there in the dung. He looks a noble creature, but perhaps he has never
been swift enough for the chase, and they have only kept him for his
beauty."

"Ah, yes!" Eumaeus answered, "it is easy to see that he has no master now.
If you had been here when Ulysses went to Troy, you would have wondered at
the creature's pace and strength. In the thickest depth of the forest no
quarry could escape him, and no hound was ever keener-scented. But now he
is old and wretched and his lord has perished far away, and the heedless
women take no care of him. Slaves can do nothing as they ought when the
master is not there, for a man loses half his manhood when he falls into
slavery."

Then Eumaeus went on into the palace and up to the hall where the suitors
were. But Argus had