Part 2 — THE STORY OF NAUSICAA

BY M. M. BIRD

One night, Nausicaa, sole daughter of Alcinous, the Phæacian King, had a dream. She dreamt that the daughter of Dymas, her favorite playmate, stood at her bedside and gently chid her. "Shame upon thee, lie-a-bed," she cried, "to waste the shining hours. 'Twill soon be thy wedding-day, and thy bridal robe and the garments for thy bridesmaids have still to be washed and bleached. Get up and ask thy father to order for thee the wain and mules to draw it, and we'll all go a-washing, thou and I and our favorite playmates, to that clear pool where the river pauses before it plunges into the sea."

At dawn Nausicaa awoke, but daylight did not dispel the dream, for it was Minerva herself who sent it. She waylaid her father as he went to the Council of the Elders and cried to him: "Father dear, may I have the high wain and the mules to-day? There is much soiled raiment to be washed—mine and thine and that of my three brothers who dwell with me in the palace." But of the bridal of her dream she said nothing, for she was a bashful maiden.

And her father, smiling at her strange eagerness, said, "My darling child may take the car; whate'er our daughter asks, we give."

Swiftly her attendants prepared the wain and harnessed the mules. They loaded it with the soiled robes and dresses that the maiden brought from her bower, and the good mother put on top a basket filled with cates and dainties, and a wine-skin, and a cruse of olive oil wherewith to anoint the maidens after their bath.

Nausicaa climbed into the wain, and away they sped with laughter and with song, this bright bevy of maidens. When they reached the spot where all the falling streams emptied their waters into a wide basin, they unharnessed the mules and let them loose to graze on the plain, while all the girls set gayly to their task.

At length they had finished their toil; every garment had been steeped and trodden with their dainty feet, and rinsed and spread out to dry on the hot sands, which sparkled in the sunlight. Then the maidens undressed and dabbled and splashed one another, and frolicked in the crystal pool. Tired with work and play they anointed their dripping limbs with the olive oil and sat down to rest in the shade. And Nausicaa unpacked the basket, and they ate and drank of the good things that the Queen had provided. This done, and while the clothes were yet drying in the sun, they played ball in the meadow, tossing it from one to another; and all the while Nausicaa guided their movements, keeping time with a rustic ballad measure.

Meanwhile, all unknown to these merry maidens, deep in the shelter of a low-branched tree, Ulysses lay asleep. A tempest had wrecked his ship and robbed him of all his companions, and he had only the day before, by help of the goddess Leucothea, been saved, and hardly saved, from the devouring sea. Clinging to a spar he had been cast upon the Phæacian shore after many hours in the storm-tossed deep. Worn and bruised by battling with the breakers, he had sought shelter under the drooping branches of two ancient olive trees. Beneath this covert he made a great bed of fallen leaves, and heaping them above him, soon fell into a deep slumber sent in mercy to restore him by the ever-watchful Minerva.

It chanced that in their game a girl missed the ball that Nausicaa threw, and it fell into the rapid stream, and was lost. The girls all shrieked, and the piercing cry waked the sleeping Ulysses.

"Alas!" he lamented, "upon what inhospitable coast have I been cast? Is it possessed by fierce barbarians who will slay, or by men who will prove pitiful? Do I hear the voices of nymphs, or dryads, or of human maids?"

The hero rose straightway from his leafy bed, and tearing off a green bough to hide his nakedness, he stepped forth to discover his fate. When the affrighted maidens saw this wild and savage man advancing, they fled and hid themselves among the rocks and caves of the broken shore. Not so Nausicaa. Inspired by Minerva with a boldness not her own, she stood and watched this strange interloper. He was now close to her, but he dared not clasp her knees, as suppliants are wont to do, for fear of alarming her, but, keeping his distance, he told her of his perils by sea. For twenty nights he had been wrestling with the waves, and had hardly reached this present haven. Now, famished and exhausted, he waited anxiously to learn where he stood, and only begged some garment to clothe his nakedness.

"Lady," he added, with cunning flattery, "I know not whether thou art mortal or divine, so fair a maiden I now behold. Only once in Delos I saw so goodly a thing as thou—the sapling of a palm tree that sprung from the altar of Apollo."

The fair Nausicaa was touched by his courtly words and bearing, and, marred as he was by the salt sea-foam, she marked his noble features. She answered his questions with graceful sweetness, telling with whom he had found refuge and assuring him of their hospitality. She called her girls and blamed them for their idle fears. Obedient to her directions they led Ulysses to the secret pool where he might bathe, they gave him of the oil to anoint himself, and laid ready for him one of the shining garments that they had just washed and dried in the sun.

The maidens surveyed with wonder the majestic figure of the stranger when he returned to them, bathed and anointed, and clad in the pomp of royal vesture. And Nausicaa, gazing with admiration on him, whispered a prayer to Heaven that some such noble spouse might fall to her happy lot.

They hastened then to serve him, setting before him food and wine, and he ate and drank eagerly, for he was half starved. Then, as evening approached, Nausicaa's cares were directed to their return to her father's palace. The mules were harnessed to the car, and she then turned to the stranger and gave him instructions how to reach the palace. For fear of slanderous tongues, she would not permit him to accompany her train, but caused him to follow at a seemly distance. She promised to go to her royal father and intercede with him for the stranger, whom she directed to follow her to the palace with all reasonable haste. There she advised that he should seek the Queen, Arete, whom he would find at that hour busied with her weaving. If he disclosed his mournful tale to her sympathetic ear, he would be assured of assistance, and doubtless live to see his native land once again.

Thereon she whipped up her team of mules, and they started at a canter, but she was careful soon to rein them in that Ulysses might keep pace with them. But when they neared the town he stayed awhile in a sacred grove while Nausicaa went on her way through the crowded streets, where all turned to gaze at the princess, and thought she had never looked so beautiful. At the palace gates her brothers gathered round and received from her hands the garments she had washed for them. Then she hastened to her mother's chamber.

Ulysses slowly approached the famous city of the Phæacians. Lest the lordly mien and regal robes of the stranger should attract the attention of the low-born crowd, Minerva spread a mist about her hero wherein he could walk unperceived and unmolested. When he had passed the walls of the city, he saw a girl carrying a pitcher (it was his goddess in disguise). He accosted her and begged her to show him the palace of Alcinous. This she did, and only left him at the gates, telling him that Arete was a gracious Queen, and if he won her favor, she might speed him on his homeward way. She vanished, leaving the hero to admire the beauties of the royal gates. These were of massive brass; a high cornice was reared above them, rich plates of gold overlaid the folding doors, and the pillars were of silver. Two rows of sculptured dogs in gold and silver, formed by Vulcan with divine art, stood guardian at Alcinous' gate, and within was a pleached garden, planted with fruit trees of all kinds, whose fruit faileth not, winter and summer alike. Pear ripens on pear, apple on apple, fig upon fig, and new grapes redden on the vine while the old grapes are treading in the wine-press.

Long while Ulysses gazed and wondered. Then he crossed the threshold, and passing unperceived through the banqueting hall, he sought the inner chamber where sat the royal pair. And he cast his hands about the knees of Arete, and besought her pity, and that of the King, for a wretched exile worn with griefs and long toil. Then he sat him down among the ashes of their hearth.

The King was moved with compassion. He raised the suppliant to a seat beside his own, and bade him share the feast. After pouring a due libation to Jupiter, the god of suppliants, Alcinous summoned his captains and princes to meet in council the following day to debate the cause of the stranger and devise proper means to transport him safe to the distant shore he designed to reach.

When all had taken their departure and Ulysses was left alone with the King and Queen, Arete asked him who he was, whence he came, and who had given him that robe? For well she knew the garments her own hands had fashioned.

Ulysses answered with the tale of his shipwreck and the gentle ministrations of her fair daughter, but his name he did not reveal. But Alcinous answered: "My daughter was much to blame in that she brought thee not to our house. Gladly would I give her to a man so goodly as thou, and I would bestow on thee lands and wealth if thou would'st stay. But no man will I detain against his will; and if thou would'st depart I will furnish thee with ships and an escort to speed thee on the way."

Next day there was feasting in the hall to entertain the guest, and Demodocus the famous minstrel was there, and he sang the Song of Troy, of Agamemnon and Hector, aye, and of the feud 'twixt Achilles and Ulysses. And Ulysses, as he listened, drew his cloak over his head to hide his tears.

After the feast there were games—racing, wrestling, and throwing the discus; and when the stranger was invited to make trial of his strength he hurled a huge rock that flew twice as far as the farthest quoit; and to this day the islanders point out to travelers Ulysses' stone.

Again at evening there was feasting in the hall. And Ulysses, as he came from the bath, anointed with oil and clad in the royal mantle that Alcinous had given him, on his way to join the feast, met the white-armed Nausicaa standing in the doorway. "Farewell, stranger," she whispered; "depart in peace; and in thy far home think sometimes on the little maid who saved thee from the sea."

And Ulysses answered: "Nausicaa, to thee I owe my life, and if God grants me to reach my home, all my days I will do worship to thee, as to a god."

Then he hastened to join the feasters, and set him in the seat assigned to him at Alcinous' right hand. Noticing Demodocus, the sweet minstrel, standing by a pillar alone, he called a henchman and said, "Take from me this mess of wild boar, and when he has eaten thereof and drunk, bid him sing me, as he will, the lay of the Wooden Horse." And the inspired minstrel brought back to him so vividly that tale of fire and carnage that Ulysses was moved to tears; and Alcinous asked him whether he had lost some kinsman in the fray, or some friend dearer than a brother. Then Ulysses disclosed his name, and gave the King the full and true story of all his wanderings from the fall of Troy to the shipwreck that landed him on this friendly shore.

When the long tale was ended Alcinous spake to his lordly company. "Let us speed our parting guest, the bravest and the noblest that has ever visited our land. With raiment and gold have I myself furnished him, but each of you give him a tripod or a caldron for a keepsake."

As the King said so was it done, and Alcinous himself saw all the precious gifts safely stowed in the ship he had provided. Then they pledged one another in a parting cup, and Ulysses bade farewell to his generous and great-hearted hosts. Worn out with the emotions of those crowded hours he wrapped himself in his mantle and lay down to sleep in the stern, while the spread sails caught the freshening breeze and the galley flew over the waters.

When the morning star shone bright in the heavens, the hills of Ithaca appeared like a cloud upon the horizon, and as day broke the ship drew into a little bay and grounded on the sands. Seeing that Ulysses was still wrapped in unbroken slumber, the sailors took him gently upon his couch and placed him on the rocky shore of his own Ithaca. Alcinous' royal gifts they placed beside him in the shade of a wild olive tree. Then they relaunched their bark and sped back across the main.

Thus Ulysses reached once more his native land, but the end of his perils was not yet.