New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1872-02-14

Hector, and his supporters. Hector's death
is terrible. For many battles he is held to
be the champion, and the Greeks are driven
finally beyond their stockade. On the death
of Petroclus Achilles sallies out and en-
cages Hector, who first leads him a race
around the walls, Homer magnifying the
prowess of hisherO, and showing that no
mortal can stand against him. He finally
turns and is at bay, when he is slain with
Achilles spear. Then Selling his hair, he
binds him to the chariot and drags his body
around the walls, notwithstanding the pro-
tests Of his friends at such an indignity on
a fallen adversary.
The Court of Jove.
And now comes Aurora rising from the
clouds. and here, too, NE have Jove with
Minerva, goddess Of wisdom, and Juno
While the contederated Greeks lay siege to
Troy the gods and goddesses frequently in
terfere in the fray, the thunderer sits aloit
every inch a king, but with quite a mortal
wink that turks about the eyes; while juno
type of fashionable married lady, with
bare white arms, for which she is made IA
nous by poets, is near by, wearing the ma
rital yoke--it looks as though it would re-
guire little effort to shake it Off. Homer
sings OF the gods, giving them human spites,
piques and passions; Juno is ''down on
Troy; Jupiter is grandly forgetful of the
miseries of men; Minerva is the Mentor of
Ulysses, and in the Odyssey pilots him out.
The following after consists of Neptune,
who also takes mortal shape in the fights
before Illium. Here he sits on a rock by
the sea; Nereids drive the dolphins, his sea
steeds; and the sea-god, with the customary
| shape, gives place to the trials of Ulysses
| or Odysseus, that come after in close order;
the file never breaking until the classic pro
| cession has passed away.
Polyphemus, Defeat.
Here comes the giant Polyphemus, King
of the Cyclops, a race of one-eyed people,
| and he is in the act of sending one of the
companions of Ulysses, who in accordance
with the custom of those days, had sat upon
the hearth as suppliants. In vain were
their prayers for mercy. Futile were their
appeals to Polyphemus as he entered,
| having shepherded his goats He seized
and tore them to pieces and swal-
lowed them, Homer says, like puppies,
blood, bones and all. Having satisfied his
appetite, he turns to Ulysses. who, in mod
ern style, solicts him to "take a drink
offering the good wine. with skin of which
he had provided himself. The giant washes
~, ~ III, l.,
offered him, and becomes drunk, when his
prisoner, sharpening an ashen spear and
heating it in the flames, thrusts it into the
! single orb of the brute, and in this manner
| forever ''shut his eye" Ulysses had an
nounced himself as Noman, and when
reused by the cries OF Polyphemus his tribe
rushed in to his support. They were very
much disgusted to hear him yell that No
man had hurt him, and believed he had
been bereft of what little reason such beasts
of men usually have.
Perhaps one had better say little of the
adventure which the hero of the Odyssey
had with Eolus, the god of all the winds,
| who presented him with a skinful of all
the Wind family, leaving Zephyr outside
to watt him safely home, which this
agreeable breeze went on to do until the
journeys end loomed up before the traveller
in all its glory of purple shores. Short
must be the narrative of his sad mishaps:
for, falling asleep his companions event
! for the skinful Of winds from curiosity.
| Out came all the family at once, and the
bark was swept out again, and the untor-
tunate man was once more away from home.
Circean WiIes.
Here is Circe, the charmer, in the act of
Transforming the companions of Ulysses
| into swine. Her magic art, however. fails
on Odysseus.
The Bower of Calypso.
| Calypso OBTAINING Ulysses; PrOteus at
their feet, and the winged Mercury notify
| ing the fair one she must send him forward
to the gods This is the succeeding group,
and it expresses pretty romance OF the
Grecan cast 1t is the fifth book Of the
poem, and the gods are in council, Minerva
complaining bitterly that Ulysses is kept
so long an exile from his home. Moved by
the appeal Of Minerva, Jupiter dispatches
Mercury to Calypso to announce that
| Ulysses must be released from the tolls
with which she has bound him. Such his
sovereign will. 1t must be obeyed. The
| description of the island grotto where Ca
| lypso dwells is in Homer one of the most
beautiful. Mercury speeds on his errand
and announces it; a better message is this
for the nymph, as she has set her heart
upon her mortal lover, and she denounces
0lympian Jove for begrudging her this
harmless fancy. Ulysses shall go, and Ca
| lypso, in announcing the message from
| Jove, finds him on the beach looking toward
| Ithaca, and, although she has not murmur-
ed at Jove, yet she is mortified to find the
| want of reluctance on his part to leave
her Woman like is this.
The Sirens, Scylla and Cbarybdis.
| Then, taking its place as the succeeding
group one sees the sirens, sisters, like all
sirens feminine, charming, and beguiling
| Ulysses to the shore, he chained to a ship
which lighter grows as he attempts to fol-
low them. The sirens lay lin the yersel
couched in flowers, Turing all passing mar
iners to their destruction by the fascination
of their song. Lashed to the mast. so that
he may not be beguiled or led toward the
sirens, and having been forewarned by Circe
what to do, he fills the ears of all his crew
with melted wax SO that they might not be
induced by the charmed voices. Ulysses is
not to be unbound under any circumstances.
The sirens sing:
"Hither, Odysseus, great Achaan name,
i IL II nxadl l.,tu. t1-n lar