He would have bent the
bow at the fourth attempt had not his father's glance warned him to yield
it to the suitors.
Although the bow was rubbed and softened with oil, all failed in their
attempts to draw it; and when the beggar asked to be allowed to try, their
wrath burst forth. What shame would be theirs if the beggar succeeded in
doing that in which they had failed! But Telemachus, who asserted his
rights more day by day, insisted that the beggar should try to bend the
bow, if he so desired. Sending his mother and her maids to their bower, he
watched his father as he easily bent the mighty bow, snapped the cord with
a sound at which the suitors grew pale, and sent the arrow through the
rings. Then casting aside his rags, the supposed beggar sprang upon the
threshold, and knowing that by his orders, Eumaeus, Philoetius, and
Eurycleia had secured the portals so that escape was impossible, he sent
his next shaft through the throat of Antinoues. "Dogs! ye thought I never
would return! Ye dreaded not the gods while ye devoured my substance and
pursued my wife! Now vengeance is mine! Destruction awaits you all!"
Too late Eurymachus sprang up and besought the monarch to grant them their
lives if they made good their waste and returned to their homes. Ulysses
had brooded too long over his injuries; his wife and son had suffered too
many years from their persecutions for him to think of mercy.
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