Nothing could be worse than things were.  More than a hundred powerful young chiefs of the Ionian isles had taken possession of his palace, and were daily revelling there, thrusting his son Telemachus aside, and insisting that Penelope should choose one of them as her husband.  She could only put them off by declaring she could wed no one till she had finished the winding-sheet she was making for old Laertes, her father-in-law; while to prevent its coming to an end she undid by night whatever she wove by day.  Telemachus had gone to seek his father, but came home baffled to Eumæus’ hut, and there was allowed to recognise Ulysses.  But it was as a beggar, broken-down and foot-sore, that Ulysses sought his palace, and none knew him there but his poor old dog Argus, who licked his feet, and died for joy.  The suitors, in their pride, made game of the poor stranger, but Penelope sent for him, in case he brought news of her husband.  Even to her he told a feigned story, but she bade the old nurse Euryclea take care of him, and wash his feet.  While doing so, the old woman knew him by a scar left by the tusk of a wild boar long ago, and Ulysses could hardly stifle her cry of joy; but she told him all, and who could be trusted among the slaves.  The plans were fixed. Telemachus, with much difficulty, persuaded his mother to try to get rid of the suitors by promising to wed him only who could bend Ulysses’ bow. One after another tried in vain, and then, amid their sneers, the beggar took it up, and bent it easily, hit the mark, and then aimed it against them!  They were all at the banquet-table in the hall.  Eumæus and the other faithful servants had closed all the doors, and removed all the arms, and there was a terrible slaughter both of these oppressors and the servants who had joined with them against their queen and her son.