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Book XII

Odysseus, his passage by the Sirens, and by Scylla and
Charybdis. The sacrilege committed by his men in the isle
Thrinacia. The destruction of his ships and men. How he
swam on a plank nine days together, and came to Ogygia,
where he stayed seven years with Calypso.

'Now after the ship had left the stream of the river
Oceanus, and was come to the wave of the wide sea, and the
isle Aeaean, where is the dwelling place of early Dawn and
her dancing grounds, and the land of sunrising, upon our
coming thither we beached the ship in the sand, and
ourselves too stept ashore on the sea beach. There we fell
on sound sleep and awaited the bright Dawn.

'So soon as early Dawn shone forth, the rosy-fingered, I
sent forth my fellows to the house of Circe to fetch the
body of the dead Elpenor. And speedily we cut billets of
wood and sadly we buried him, where the furthest headland
runs out into the sea, shedding big tears. But when the
dead man was burned and the arms of the dead, we piled a
barrow and dragged up thereon a pillar, and on the topmost
mound we set the shapen oar.

'Now all that task we finished, and our coming from out of
Hades was not unknown to Circe, but she arrayed herself and
speedily drew nigh, and her handmaids with her bare flesh
and bread in plenty and dark red wine. And the fair goddess
stood in the midst and spake in our ears, saying:

'"Men overbold, who have gone alive into the house of
Hades, to know death twice, while all men else die once for
all. Nay come, eat ye meat and drink wine here all day
long; and with the breaking of the day ye shall set sail,
and myself I will show you the path and declare each thing,
that ye may not suffer pain or hurt through any grievous
ill-contrivance by sea or on the land."

'So spake she, and our lordly souls consented thereto. Thus
for that time we sat the livelong day, until the going down
of the sun, feasting on abundant flesh and on sweet wine.
Now when the sun sank and darkness came on, my company laid
them to rest by the hawsers of the ship. Then she took me
by the hand and led me apart from my dear company, and made
me to sit down and laid herself at my feet, and asked all
my tale. And I told her all in order duly. Then at the last
the Lady Circe spake unto me, saying:

'"Even so, now all these things have an end; do thou then
hearken even as I tell thee, and the god himself shall
bring it back to thy mind. To the Sirens first shalt thou
come, who bewitch all men, whosoever shall come to them.
Whoso draws nigh them unwittingly and hears the sound of
the Sirens' voice, never doth he see wife or babes stand by
him on his return, nor have they joy at his coming; but the
Sirens enchant him with their clear song, sitting in the
meadow, and all about is a great heap of bones of men,
corrupt in death, and round the bones the skin is wasting.
But do thou drive thy ship past, and knead honey-sweet wax,
and anoint therewith the ears of thy company, lest any of
the rest hear the song; but if thou myself art minded to
hear, let them bind thee in the swift ship hand and foot,
upright in the mast-stead, and from the mast let rope-ends
be tied, that with delight thou mayest hear the voice of
the Sirens. And if thou shalt beseech thy company and bid
them to loose thee, then let them bind thee with yet more
bonds. But when thy friends have driven thy ship past
these, I will not tell thee fully which path shall
thenceforth be thine, but do thou thyself consider it, and
I will speak to thee of either way. On the one side there
are beetling rocks, and against them the great wave roars
of dark-eyed Amphitrite. These, ye must know, are they the
blessed gods call the Rocks Wandering. By this way even
winged things may never pass, nay, not even the cowering
doves that bear ambrosia to Father Zeus, but the sheer rock
evermore takes away one even of these, and the Father sends
in another to make up the tale. Thereby no ship of men ever
escapes that comes thither, but the planks of ships and the
bodies of men confusedly are tossed by the waves of the sea
and the storms of ruinous fire. One ship only of all that
fare by sea hath passed that way, even Argo, that is in all
men's minds, on her voyage from Aeetes. And even her the
wave would lightly have cast there upon the mighty rocks,
but Here sent her by for love of Jason.

'"On the other part are two rocks, whereof the one reaches
with sharp peak to the wide heaven, and a dark cloud
encompasses it; this never streams away, and there is no
clear air about the peak neither in summer nor in harvest
tide. No mortal man may scale it or set foot thereon, not
though he had twenty hands and feet. For the rock is