Epeisodion 1
Cyclops
nor clash of brass, nor roll of drums. Pray, how is it with my newly-born lambs in the caves? are they at the teat, running close to the side of their dams? Is the full amount of milk for cheeses milked out in baskets of rushes?
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How now? what say you? One of ye will soon be shedding tears from the weight of my club; look up, not down.
210
Chorus
There! my head is bent back till I see Zeus himself; I behold both the stars and Orion.
Cyclops
Is my breakfast quite ready?
Chorus
’Tis laid; be thy throat only ready.
215
Cyclops
Are the bowls too full of milk?
Chorus
Aye, so that thou canst swill off a whole hogshead, so it please thee.
Cyclops
Sheeps’ milk or cows’ milk or a mixture of both?
Chorus
Whichever thou wilt; don’t swallow me, that’s all.
Cyclops
Not I; for you would start kicking in the pit of my stomach and kill me by your antics. (Catching sight of Odysseus and his followers.) Ha! what is this crowd I see near the folds? Some pirates or robbers have put in here. Yes, I really see the lambs from my caves
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tied up there with twisted osiers, cheese-presses scattered about, and old Silenus with his bald pate all swollen with blows.
225
Silenus
Oh! oh! poor wretch that I am, pounded to a fever.
Cyclops
By whom? who has been pounding thy head, old sirrah?
Silenus
These are the culprits, Cyclops, all because I refused to let them plunder thee.
230
Cyclops
Did they not know I was a god and sprung from gods?
Silenus
That was what I told them, but they persisted in plundering thy goods, and, in spite of my efforts, they actually began to eat the cheese and carry off the lambs; and they said they would
tie thee in a three-cubit pillory and tear out thy bowels by force at thy navel, and flay thy back thoroughly with the scourge; and then, after binding thee, fling thy carcase down among the benches of their ship to sell to some one
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for heaving up stones, or else throw thee into a mill.
240
Cyclops
Oh, indeed! Be off then and sharpen my cleavers at once; heap high the faggots and light them; for they shall be slain forthwith and fill this maw of mine,
what time I pick my feast hot from the coals, waiting not for carvers, and fish up the rest from the cauldron boiled and sodden; for I have had my fill of mountain-fare and sated myself with banquets of lions and stags, but ’tis long I have been without human flesh.
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Silenus
Truly, master, a change like this is all the sweeter after everyday fare; for just of late there have been no fresh arrivals of strangers at these caves.
250
Odysseus
Hear the strangers too in turn, Cyclops. We had come near the cave from our ship,
wishing to procure provisions by purchase, when this fellow sold us the lambs and handed them over for a stoup of wine to drink himself,—a voluntary act on both sides,—there was no violence employed at all. No, there is not a particle of truth in the story he tells,
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now that he has been caught selling thy property behind thy back.
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Silenus
I? Perdition catch thee!
Odysseus
If I am lying, yes.
Silenus
O Cyclops, by thy sire Poseidon, by mighty Triton and Nereus, by Calypso and the daughters of Nereus,
by the sacred billows and all the race of fishes! I swear to thee, most noble sir, dear little Cyclops, master mine, it is not I who sell thy goods to strangers, else may these children, dearly as I love them, come to an evil end.
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Chorus
Keep that for thyself; with my own eyes I saw thee sell the goods to the strangers; and if I lie, perdition catch my sire! but injure not the strangers.
270
Cyclops
Ye lie; for my part I put more faith in him than Rhadamanthus, declaring him more just.
