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THE ODYSSEY: BOOK 24. THE LAST JOURNEY OF THE WOOERS by HOMER

First Line: AND NOW CYLLENIAN HERMES SUMMONED FORTH
Last Line: SIMULARS OF THE DEAD.
Subject(s): MYTHOLOGY - CLASSICAL;

AND now Cyllenian Hermes summon'd forth
The spirits of the suitors; waving wide
The golden wand of power to seal all eyes
In slumber, and to ope them wide again,
He drove them gibbering down into the shades,
As when the bats within some hallow'd cave
Flit squeaking all around, for if but one
Fall from the rock, the rest all follow him,
In such connexion mutual they adhere;
So, after bounteous Mercury, the ghosts
Troop'd downward gibbering all the dreary way.
The Ocean's flood and the Leucadian rock,
The Sun's gate also and the land of Dreams
They pass'd, whence next into the meads they came
Of Asphodel, by shadowy forms possess'd,
Simulars of the dead.



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