I should obviously gain by doing
so, for I should return fuller-handed to my own people and should
thus be both more respected and more loved by my acquaintance.
Still to receive such presents--"
The king perceived his embarrassment, and at once relieved him. "No
one," he exclaimed, "who looks at you can for one moment take you
for a charlatan or a swindler. I know there are many of these
unscrupulous persons going about just now with such plausible
stories that it is very hard to disbelieve them; there is, however,
a finish about your style which convinces me of your good
disposition," and so on for more than I have space to quote; after
which Ulysses again proceeds with his adventures.
When he had finished them Alcinous insists that the leading
Phaeacians should each one of them give Ulysses a still further
present of a large kitchen copper and a three-legged stand to set it
on, "but," he continues, "as the expense of all these presents is
really too heavy for the purse of any private individual, I shall
charge the whole of them on the rates": literally, "We will repay
ourselves by getting it in from among the people, for this is too
heavy a present for the purse of a private individual.
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