In this excerpt from book 23 in the Odyssey, Homer uses an epic simile to describe the bravery and fighting skills of Ulysses. W
hich line states the direct comparison? I saw it not (she cries), but heard alone, When death was busy, a loud dying groan; The damsel-train turn’d pale at every wound, Immured we sate, and catch’d each passing sound; When death had seized her prey, thy son attends, And at his nod the damsel-train descends; There terrible in arms Ulysses stood, And the dead suitors almost swam in blood: Thy heart had leap’d the hero to survey, Stern as the surly lion o’er his prey, Glorious in gore, now with sulphereous fire The dome he purges, now the flame aspires; Heap’d lie the dead without the palace walls— Haste, daughter, haste, thy own Ulysses calls! Thy every wish the bounteous gods bestow; Enjoy the present good, and former woe. Ulysses lives, his vanquish’d foes to see; He lives to thy Telemachus and thee!
