“Father,” answered Telemachus, “thou hast the name of wise, beyond all living men.  Be it thine, therefore, to declare thy counsel, and I will follow it, to the utmost stretch of my power.”

“Thus, then, shalt thou do,” said Odysseus:  “let all the household put on clean raiment, and bid the minstrel take his harp and make sweet music for the festal dance.  Then foot it merrily, everyone, that all they who pass by the house may think that ye are keeping the marriage feast.  In this wise the rumour of the wooers’ death shall not reach the town until we have had time to collect our men and prepare for our defence.”

Telemachus went forthwith to carry out his father’s orders.  The whole household, men and women, arrayed themselves in festal attire, and soon the hall echoed to the throbbing notes of the lyre, and the loud patter of the dancers’ feet.  And those who heard it from without said to one another:  “So the long wooing of our queen has come to an end at last!  Fickle woman, that could not endure unto the end, and keep faith with the husband of her youth!”

III

After giving his orders to Telemachus, Odysseus had retired to refresh himself with the bath, and put on fresh raiment, while Penelope remained seated in her former place.  After an interval of some length he re-entered the hall, and sat down face to face with his wife.  But what miracle was this?  The haggard, timeworn beggar was gone, and in his place sat her husband, as she had known him in the days of old, with the added dignity which he had gained by twenty years of strenuous life.  But the frost which had lain upon her spirit during her long period of weary waiting was not easily to be broken, and still she doubted.  After a long silence Odysseus spoke, and now for the first time his tones had a ring of reproach:  “Still not a word for thy husband, who has come back to thee after twenty years?  Surely the very demon of unbelief possesses thee!” Even then Penelope made no answer, for she was waiting to put the final test, and at length Odysseus gave her the opportunity.  “Go, Eurycleia,” he said, “and prepare a bed for me; I will leave this iron-hearted wife and go to my rest.”

“Ay, do so,” said Penelope, “take the bed from the chamber which he built with his own hands, and lay it in another room, that he may slumber there.”  This she said to prove him, for the bed and the chamber had a secret history, known only to herself and her husband and the faithful nurse.

Odysseus rose bravely to the test:  whether divining his wife’s purpose or not, he exclaimed, with an air of surprise and indignation:  “Lady, what meanest thou by this order?  Who hath moved my bed from its place?  He must be of more than mortal skill who could remove it, for it was fashioned in wondrous wise, and with my own hands I wrought it, to be a sign and a secret between thee and me.  And this was the manner of the work.  Within the