Over the Wine-Dark Sea

"Cape Tainaron," Sostratos answered. "We took him across to Italy. With all the wars in those parts, a soldier wouldn't have any trouble finding work."

From the couch Philodemos shared with Sostratos' father, he said, "With all the wars everywhere these days, a soldier has no trouble finding work."

"Wherever Alexidamos draws his drakhma a day and his rations, he'll likely lay his hands on more somehow or other," Damophon said. "His father was reliable, but I stopped buying from Alexidamos even before he sold the boat. He was the sort who'd drench yesterday's fish in seawater to make them look fresh. Any man can have that trick played on him once, but only a fool lets it happen twice." He glanced over to Sostratos. "Did he give you trouble?"

"Nothing we couldn't handle," Sostratos said, and Menedemos dipped his head.

When Sostratos reclined once more, Menedemos rose from the couch and said, "I'll give you the most famous return of all -  Odysseus' return to Ithake, and to his own home town. Here's how Homer tells it:

"Then Odysseus of many wiles, answering him, said,
"I know. I understand. You order someone with discernment.
 But let us go, and you lead all the way.
 But give me, if you have one anywhere, a stick
 On which to lean, since you said the road was rough."
 He spoke, and flung his shabby pouch, full of holes,
 Around his shoulder with a strap.
 Then Eumaios gave him a staff that suited him.
 The pair went off, but dogs and herdsmen stayed behind
 To protect the farmhouse. He led the king to the city
 In the guise of a wretched old beggarman
 Leaning on his staff, and pitiful were the clothes on his back . . .."

Menedemos recited from the Odyssey for some time. As always, the ancient tale drew in all who listened to it, no matter how well everyone knew it. Even Sostratos, sophisticate though he was, found himself falling under Homer's spell. How does he do it? Sostratos wondered. The same question occurred to him whenever he read Herodotos or Thoukydides. They were all writers he, like most Hellenes, despaired of matching.

When Menedemos took his place on the couch once more, his father rose from the adjoining one. Sostratos hoped Philodemos might say something graceful about the return of the Aphrodite, but he didn't. Instead, he spoke of how the Rhodians had ousted the Macedonian garrison in the city after news of Alexander's death arrived, and "how we had our freedom restored to us, and nothing for a polis is more important than its freedom. May we keep it in the future as we regained it in the past."

He reclined again. The symposiasts clapped their hands, Sostratos among them -  and Menedemos, too, he noted. Philodemos had struck an important chord, all the more important because Ptolemaios and Antigonos were fighting again. When giants clashed, how could a dwarf like Rhodes stay safe? That comparison made Sostratos smile.

Host and symposiarch, Lysistratos got to his feet last of all. "I'll be brief, for we've got people waiting in the courtyard," Sostratos' father said. "A voyage to Great Hellas is always a risk. I thank the gods that my son and my nephew and almost all the crew came home safe. That's the most important thing. You always have another chance if it's true, even if the business end of things didn't go so well. But when they not only sailed west but came back with one of the biggest profits an akatos ever brought home -  well, my friends, all I can tell you is that I'm proud to be kin to both of them. Euge, Sostratos! Euge, Menedemos!"

"Euge!" the symposiasts shouted, and clapped their hands and raised their cups in salute. "Euge! Euge!"

"Thank you all," Sostratos said. "A man who deserves special praise is our bold keleustes Diokles there. You couldn't hope to find a better sailor. Euge, Diokles!"

"Euge!" the symposiasts echoed. Diokles' lined features wore the bashful, proud grin of a boy praised for his beauty for the first time.

"Now everybody here will try to hire him away from us," Menedemos said.

"Tell me he hasn't earned the chance," Sostratos said, and Menedemos only shrugged. He couldn't do it, and they both knew as much.