Polybus

They reign uncontrolled in your palace, and devour your wealth, our very life and support.

Why should I mention Pisander, Polybus, Aglaimedon, and covetous Eurymachus and Antinous, besides many others, who all in your absence live upon the means gained at the hazard of your life? Indigent Irus and your goatherd Melanthius serve to finish your disgrace.

We are only three in number unable to defend ourselves: your wife weak and helpless, Laertes an old man, and Telemachus a child.

That beloved boy we were lately in danger of losing, as against all our wills he prepared to go in quest of you to Pylos.

Nevertheless, I will be chief in my own house, and I will rule those whom Ulysses has won for me.

Then Eurymachus, son of Polybus, answered, It rests with heaven to decide who shall be chief among us, but you shall be master in your own house and under your own possessions.

No one, while there is a man in Ithaca, shall do you violence and rob you.

And now, my good fellow, I want to know about this stranger.

Everything has happened to Ulysses as I foretold when the Argives set out for Troy, and he with them.

I said that after going through much hardship and losing all his men, he should come home again in the twentieth year, and that no one would know him, and now all this is coming true.

Eurymachus, son of Polybus, then said, Go home, old man, and prophesy to your own children, or it may be worse for them.

I can read these omens myself much better than you can.

They reign uncontrolled in your palace, and devour your wealth, our very life, and support.

Why should I mention Pisander, Polybus, Aglomedon, and covetous Eurymachus and Antinous, beside many others who all in your absence live upon the means gained at the hazard of your life? Indigent Iris, and your ghost-herd Melantius serve to finish your disgrace.

We are only three in number, unable to defend ourselves.

Your wife, weak and helpless.