all the prizes. Acroneōs, Ocyalus, Elatreus, Nauteus, Prymneus, Anchialus, Eretmeus, Ponteus, Proreus, Thoön, Anabesineus, and Amphialus son of Polynëus son of Tecton. There was also Euryalus son of Naubolus, who was like Mars himself, and was the best looking man among the Phæacians except Laodamas. Three sons of Alcinous, Laodamas, Halios, and Clytoneus competed also.
120The foot races came first. The course was set out for them from the starting post, and they raised a dust upon the plain as they all flew forward at the same moment. Clytonëus came in first by a long way; he left every one else behind him by the length of the furrow that a couple of mules can plough in a fallow field.[1] They then turned to the painful art of wrestling, and here Euryalus proved to be the best man. Amphialus excelled all the others in jumping, while at throwing the disc there was no one who could approach Elatreus. Alcinous's son Laodamas was the best boxer, and he it was who presently said, when they had all been diverted with the games, "Let us ask the stranger whether he excels in any of these sports; he seems very powerfully built; his thighs, calves, hands, and neck are of prodigious strength, nor is he at all old, but he has suffered much lately, and there is nothing like the sea for making havoc with a man, no matter how strong he is."
140"You are quite right, Laodamas," replied Euryalus, "go up to your guest and speak to him about it yourself."
143When Laodamas heard this he made his way into the middle of the crowd and said to Ulysses, "I hope, Sir, that you will enter yourself for some one or other of our competitions if you are skilled in any of them—and you must have gone in for many a one before now. There is nothing that does any one so much credit all his life long as the showing himself a proper man with his hands and feet. Have a try
- ↑ The writer apparently deems that the words "as compared with what oxen can plough in the same time" go without saying. Not so the writer of the Iliad from which the Odyssean passage is probably taken. He explains that mules can plough quicker than oxen (Il. X. 351—353).
