Cattle of Helios

Episode #7:  The Cattle of Helios

But now, at last, putting the Rocks, Scylla and dread Charybdis far astern,

we quickly reached the good green island of the Sun

where Helios, lord Hyperion, keeps his fine cattle,

broad in the brow, and flocks of purebred sheep.

Still aboard my black ship in the open sea

I could hear the lowing cattle driven home,

the bleating sheep. And I was struck once more

by the words of the blind Theban prophet, Tiresias,

and Aeaean Circe too: time and again they told me

to shun this island of the Sun, the joy of man.

So I warned my shipmates gravely, sick at heart,

'Listen to me, my comrades, brothers in hardship,

let me tell you the dire prophecies of Tiresias

and Aeaean Circe too: time and again they told me

to shun this island of the Sun, the joy of man.

Here, they warned, the worst disaster awaits us.

Row straight past these shores—race our black ship on!'

So I said, and the warnings broke their hearts.

But Eurylochus waded in at once—with mutiny on his mind:

'You're a hard man, Odysseus. Your fighting spirit's

stronger than ours, your stamina never fails.

You must be made of iron head to foot. Look,

your crew's half-dead with labor, starved for sleep,

and you forbid us to set foot on land, this island here,

washed by the waves, where we might catch a decent meal again.

Drained as we are, night falling fast, you'd have us desert

this haven and blunder off, into the mist-bound seas?

Out of the night come winds that shatter vessels—

how can a man escape his headlong death

if suddenly, out of nowhere, a cyclone hits,

bred by the South or stormy West Wind? They're the gales

that tear a ship to splinters—the gods, our masters,

willing or not, it seems. No, let's give way

to the dark night, set out our supper here.

Sit tight by our swift ship and then at daybreak

board and launch her, make for open sea!'

So Eurylochus urged, and shipmates cheered.

Then I knew some power was brewing trouble for us,

so I let fly with an anxious plea:  'Eurylochus,

I'm one against all—the upper hand is yours.

But swear me a binding oath, all here,

that if we come on a herd of cattle or fine flock of sheep,

not one man among us—blind in his reckless ways—

will slaughter an ox or ram. Just eat in peace,

content with the food immortal Circe gave us.'

They quickly swore the oath that I required

and once they had vowed they'd never harm the herds,

they moored our sturdy ship in the deep narrow harbor,

close to a fresh spring, and all hands disembarked

and adeptly set about the evening meal.

Once they'd put aside desire for food and drink,

they recalled our dear companions, wept for the men

that Scylla plucked from the hollow ship and ate alive,

and a welcome sleep came on them in their tears.

But then, at the night's third watch, the stars just wheeling down,
Zeus who marshals the storm clouds loosed a ripping wind,
a howling, demonic gale, shrouding over in thunderheads
the earth and sea at once—and night swept down from the sky.     
When young Dawn with her rose-red fingers shone once more
we hauled our craft ashore, securing her in a vaulted cave
where nymphs have lovely dancing-rings and hold their sessions.
There I called a muster, warning my shipmates yet again,
'Friends, we've food and drink aplenty aboard the ship—
keep your hands off all these herds or we will pay the price!
The cattle, the sleek flocks, belong to an awesome master,
Helios, god of the sun who sees all, hears all things.'

So I warned, and my headstrong men complied.

But for one whole month the South Wind blew nonstop,      
no other wind came up, none but the South-southeast.
As long as our food and ruddy wine held out, the crew,
eager to save their lives, kept hands off the herds.
But then, when supplies aboard had all run dry,
when the men turned to hunting, forced to range
for quarry with twisted hooks: for fish, birds,
anything they could lay their hands on—
hunger racked their bellies—I struck inland,
up the island, there to pray to the gods.

If only one might show me some way home!      
Crossing into the heartland, clear of the crew,
I rinsed my hands in a sheltered spot, a windbreak,
but soon as I'd prayed to all the gods who rule Olympus,
down on my eyes they poured a sweet, sound sleep . . .

 

Then Eurylochus opened up his fatal plan to friends:
'Listen to me, my comrades, brothers in hardship.
All ways of dying are hateful to us poor mortals,
true, but to die of hunger, starve to death—
that's the worst of all. So up with you now,

let's drive off the pick of Helios' sleek herds,      
slaughter them to the gods who rule the skies up there.
If we ever make it home to Ithaca, native ground,

erect at once a glorious temple to the Sungod,

line the walls with hoards of dazzling gifts!

But if the Sun, inflamed for his longhorn cattle,

means to wreck our ship and the other gods pitch in

— I'd rather die at sea, with one deep gulp of death,

than die by inches on this desolate island here!'

So he urged, and shipmates cheered again.

At once they drove off the Sungod's finest cattle—

close at hand, not far from the blue-prowed ship they grazed,

those splendid beasts with their broad brows and curving horns.

Surrounding them in a ring, they lifted prayers to the gods,

plucking fresh green leaves from a tall oak for the rite,

since white strewing-barley was long gone in the ship.

Once they'd prayed, slaughtered and skinned the cattle,

they cut the thighbones out, they wrapped them round in fat,

a double fold sliced clean and topped with strips of flesh.

And since they had no wine to anoint the glowing victims,

they made libations with water, broiling all the innards,

and once they'd burned the bones and tasted the organs—

hacked the rest into pieces, piercing them with spits.

That moment soothing slumber fell from my eyes

and down I went to our ship at the water's edge

but on my way, nearing the long beaked craft, t

he smoky savor of roasts came floating up around me . . .

I groaned in anguish, crying out to the deathless gods:

'Father Zeus! the rest of you blissful gods who never die—

you with your fatal sleep, you lulled me into disaster.

Left on their own, look what a monstrous thing my crew concocted!'

Quick as a flash, with her flaring robes Lampetie sped the news

to the Sun on high that we had killed his herds

and Helios burst out in rage to all the immortals:

'Father Zeus! the rest of you blissful gods who never die—

punish them all, that crew of Laertes' son Odysseus—

what an outrage! They, they killed my cattle,

the great joy of my heart. . . day in, day out,

when I climbed the starry skies and when I wheeled

back down from the heights to touch the earth once more.    

Unless they pay me back in blood for the butchery of my herds,

down I go to the House of Death and blaze among the dead!'

But Zeus who marshals the thunderheads insisted,

'Sun, you keep on shining among the deathless gods

and mortal men across the good green earth.

And as for the guilty ones, why, soon enough

on the wine-dark sea I'll hit their racing ship

with a white-hot bolt, I'll tear it into splinters.'

As soon as I reached our ship at the water's edge

I took the men to task, upbraiding each in turn,

but how to set things right? We couldn't find a way.

The cattle were dead already ...

and the gods soon showed us all some fateful signs—

the hides began to crawl, the meat, both raw and roasted,

bellowed out on the spits, and we heard a noise

like the moan of lowing oxen.