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So, hero, draw nigh thereto, as I command thee, and dig a trench as it were a cubit in length and breadth, and about it pour a drink-offering to all the dead, first with mead and thereafter with sweet wine, and for the third time with water, and sprinkle white meal thereon; and entreat with many prayers the strengthless heads of the dead, and promise that on thy return to Ithaca thou wilt offer in thy halls a barren heifer, the best thou hast, and will fill the pyre with treasure, and wilt sacrifice apart, to Teiresias alone, a black ram without spot, the fairest of your flock.
Then I spake out among my company in sorrow of heart: "Hear my words, my men, albeit in evil plight, that I may declare unto you the oracles of Teiresias and of Circe of Aia, who very straitly charged me to shun the isle of Helios, the gladdener of the world. For there she said the most dreadful mischief would befal us. Nay, drive ye then the black ship beyond and past that isle."
"To him I made answer: 'So be it, Teiresias. All these things the gods have ordered after their own will. But tell me this. Here I see the soul of my mother that is dead; and she sits near the blood, but regards me not, nor speaks to me. How can she know that I am indeed her son?
'Even so she spake, and I answered her, and said: "O my mother, necessity was on me to come down to the house of Hades to seek to the spirit of Theban Teiresias.
There did she devour them; and they cried to me terribly the while. Verily, of all the things that I have seen upon the sea, this was the most piteous of all. "After this we came to the island of the Three Capes; and from my ship I heard the lowing of the kine and the bleating of the sheep. Thereupon I called to mind the saying of Teiresias, how he charged me to shun the island of the Sun.
Then Odysseus remembered the warnings of Circe and Teiresias, and sought to persuade his men to sail past the island and fly from the reach of temptation. But they murmured against him, and Eurylochus, his lieutenant, gave voice to their feelings thus: "Thou man of iron, thou hast no pity on us, but thinkest that we are all as hardy and as strong as thou art.
Or when thou hadst honour in the wise counsels of Teiresias, or in Iolaos the cunning charioteer, or the unwearied spears of the Spartoi? or when out of the noise of the strong battle-cry thou sentest Adrastos home to horse-breeding Argos, of his countless company forlorn? or when thou madest the Dorian colony of the men of Lakedaimon stand upright upon its feet , and the sons of Aigeus thy progeny took Amyklai, according to the oracles of Pytho?
"When I had got the men together I said to them, 'You think you are about to start home again, but Circe has explained to me that instead of this, we have got to go to the house of Hades and Proserpine to consult the ghost of the Theban prophet Teiresias.
'So spake I, and the fair goddess answered me anon: "Son of Laertes, of the seed of Zeus, Odysseus of many devices, tarry ye now no longer in my house against your will; but first must ye perform another journey, and reach the dwelling of Hades and of dread Persephone to seek to the spirit of Theban Teiresias, the blind soothsayer, whose wits abide steadfast.
With a wild unearthly cry they came crowding to the trench, eager to drink of the blood. But Odysseus, though quaking with fear, stood his ground firmly, and held his drawn sword over the trench to keep off the multitude, until he had seen and spoken with Teiresias.
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