that for many days no man had entered. Then the Wanderer shouted twice,
and thrice, but the only answer was an echo from the hill. He went in,
hoping to find food, or perhaps a spark of fire sheltered under the dry
leaves. But all was vacant and cold as death.

The Wanderer came forth into the warm sunlight, set his face to the hill
again, and went on his way to the city of Ithaca.

He saw the sea from the hill-top glittering as of yore, but there were
no brown sails of fisher-boats on the sea. All the land that should now
have waved with the white corn was green with tangled weeds. Half-way
down the rugged path was a grove of alders, and the basin into which
water flowed from the old fountain of the Nymphs. But no maidens were
there with their pitchers; the basin was broken, and green with mould;
the water slipped through the crevices and hurried to the sea. There
were no offerings of wayfarers, rags and pebbles, by the well; and on
the altar of the Nymphs the flame had long been cold. The very ashes
were covered with grass, and a branch of ivy had hidden the stone of
sacrifice.

On the Wanderer pressed with a heavy heart; now the high roof of his own
hall and the wide fenced courts were within his sight, and he hurried
forward to know the worst.

Too soon he saw that the roofs were smokeless, and all the court was
deep in weeds. Where the altar of Zeus had stood in the midst of the
court there was now no altar, but a great, grey mound, not of earth, but
of white dust mixed with black. Over this mound the coarse grass pricked
up scantily, like thin hair on a leprosy.