To this the rest of
the suitors with violent clamours acceded, and a circle was made for the
combatants, and a fat goat was proposed as the victor's prize, as at the
Olympic or the Pythian games. Then Ulysses, seeing no remedy, or being not
unwilling that the suitors should behold some proof of that strength which
ere long in their own persons they were to taste of, stripped himself, and
prepared for the combat. But first he demanded that he should have fair
play shown him, that none in that assembly should aid his opponent, or
take part against him, for, being an old man, they might easily crush him
with their strengths. And Telemachus passed his word that no foul play
should be shown him, but that each party should be left to their own
unassisted strengths, and to this he made Antinous and the rest of the
suitors swear.
But when Ulysses had laid aside his garments, and was bare to the waist,
all the beholders admired at the goodly sight of his large shoulders,
being of such exquisite shape and whiteness, and at his great and brawny
bosom, and the youthful strength which seemed to remain in a man thought
so old; and they said, What limbs and what sinews he has! and coward fear
seized on the mind of that great vast beggar, and he dropped his threats,
and his big words, and would have fled, but lord Antinous stayed him, and
threatened him that if he declined the combat, he would put him in a ship,
and land him on the shores where king Echetus reigned, the roughest tyrant
which at that time the world contained, and who had that antipathy to
rascal beggars, such as he, that when any landed on his coast he would
crop their ears and noses and give them to the dogs to tear.
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