They skinned the stag and made a fire, and roasted the sweet flesh upon their spear points. While they sat eating, a man with a white face came running over the shore towards them, and as they saw him come they rose with their arms in fear, for they knew that once more they had come to some dangerous and evil place, and that a deadly peril lurked in the forest.
They saw he who ran was Eurylochus, and that he ran in terror.
But none followed him in pursuit, nor did any arrow come singing like a bee from the shelter of the neighbouring trees.
Eurylochus rushed up to them and sank exhausted by the fire. Ulysses gave him wine, and motioned the others to ask no questions but to let the man tell his tale in his own way. For he knew it would be more vivid so.
“More evil, comrades!” he sobbed out at last, “and good men and true lost to us for ever. Know you where we have landed? This accursed place is Ææa, the home of the Goddess Circe, and I have seen her face to face.”
Ulysses started violently, and despair crept into his eyes as he motioned Eurylochus to proceed.
“We went up through the valleys,” said the lieutenant, “and entered the wood. After we had walked long, and were thirsty and weary, we came to an open glade in which stood the house of Circe. It was built of polished marble with copper roofs, and the trees made a thick wall on all sides of the glade. A very strange, silent place! All round the house were lions and mountain wolves playing with each other. We turned to fly in fear, but the beasts fawned upon us with gentle paws and waving tails, and we saw their eyes were sad and tame, and they were all unlike the beasts of the field. They were as dogs at supper begging for food from their masters. But it was an awful sight nevertheless.
“Now, as we stood waiting in the porch, we heard a sweet low song inside the palace, sweeter than any mortal song, like the flutes and harps of the gods. Then we looked in, and we saw the goddess weaving at a golden loom, and going up and down before it as she sang. And Polites—oh, dear Polites!—called out to her, and the song ceased, and Circe came out to us, and bade us enter, and her beauty was like moonlight. Then the men went in, but I remained, mindful of the Cyclops and fearing harm. So I sat down in the wood, and the beasts played round me, and the lions licked my hands with their hard rough tongues. But I could see what was toward in the palace hall.
“The goddess led them to rich couches and chairs, and she prepared a drink for them of golden honey and purple wine, white fresh cheese, and meal of corn. But she poured a brew of magic herbs into the drink, and when they had passed the bowl from hand to hand and drunk she waved a wand of cedar wood over them.”
He stopped, choking with emotion and shaking with horror at what he had seen. He covered his face with his hands.