radiant arms 440
His shoulders, called Telemachus; he roused
Eumaeus and the herdsman too, and bade
All take their martial weapons in their hand.
Not disobedient they, as he enjoin'd,
Put armour on, and issued from the gates
Ulysses at their head. The earth was now
Enlighten'd, but Minerva them in haste
Led forth into the fields, unseen by all.

FOOTNOTES:

[108] The proof consisted in this--that the bed being attached to the
stump of an olive tree still rooted, was immovable, and Ulysses having
made it himself, no person present, he must needs be apprized of the
impossibility of her orders, if he were indeed Ulysses; accordingly, this
demonstration of his identity satisfies all her scruples.

[109] See the note on the same passage, Book XI.

[110] Aristophanes the grammarian and Aristarchus chose that the Odyssey
should end here; but the story is not properly concluded till the tumult
occasioned by the slaughter of so many Princes being composed, Ulysses
finds himself once more in peaceful possession of his country.

BOOK XXIV

ARGUMENT

Mercury conducts the souls of the suitors down to Ades. Ulysses discovers
himself to Laertes, and quells, by the aid of Minerva, an insurrection of
the people resenting the death of the suitors.

And now Cyllenian Hermes summon'd forth
The spirits of the suitors; waving wide
The golden wand of pow'r to seal all eyes
In slumber, and to ope them wide again,
He drove them gibb'ring down into the shades,[111]
As when the bats within some hallow'd cave
Flit squeaking all around, for if but one
Fall from the rock, the rest all follow him,
In such connexion mutual they adhere,
So, after bounteous Mercury, the ghosts, 10
Troop'd downward gibb'ring all the dreary way.[111]
The Ocean's flood and the Leucadian rock,
The Sun's gate also and the land of Dreams
They pass'd, whence, next, into the meads they came
Of Asphodel, by shadowy forms possess'd,
Simulars of the dead. They found the souls
Of brave Pelides there, and of his friend
Patroclus, of Antilochus renown'd,
And of the mightier Ajax, for his form
And bulk (Achilles sole except) of all 20
The sons of the Achaians most admired.
These waited on Achilles. Then, appear'd
The mournful ghost of Agamemnon, son
Of Atreus,