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My father was a scholar and knew Greek.     When I was five years old, I asked him once     What do you read about?     The siege of Troy.     What is a siege, and what is Troy?     Whereat     He piled up chairs and tables for a town,     Set me a-top for Priam, called our cat     Helen, enticed away from home (he said)     By wicked Paris, who couched somewhere close     Under the footstool, being cowardly,     But whom, since she was worth the pains, poor puss,     Towzer and Tray, our dogs, the Atreidai, sought     By taking Troy to get possession of     Always when great Achilles ceased to sulk,     (My pony in the stable), forth would prance     And put to flight Hector, our page-boys self.     This taught me who was who and what was what:     So far I rightly understood the case     At five years old; a huge delight it proved     And still proves, thanks to that insructor sage     My Father, who knew better than turn straight     Learnings full flare on weak-eyed ignorance,     Or, worse yet, leave weak eyes to grow sand-blind,     Content with darkness and vacuity.     It happened, two or three years afterward     That, I and playmates playing at Troy Siege,     My Father came upon our make-believe.     How would you like to read yourself the tale     Properly told, of which I gave you first     Merely such notion as a boy could bear?     Pope, now, would give you the precise account     Of what, some day, by dint of scholarship     Youll hear, who knows? from Homer very mouth.     Learn Greek by all means, read the Blind Old Man,     Sweetest of Singers tuphlos which means blind,     Hedistos which means sweetest. Time enough!     Try, anyhow, to master him some day;     Until when, take what serves for substitute,     Read Pope, by all means!     So I ran through Pope,     Enjoyed the tale, what history so true?     Also attacked my Primer, duly drudged,     Grew fitter thus for what was promised next,     The very thing itself, the actual words,     When I could turn, say, Buttmann to account.     Time passed, I ripened somewhat: one fine day,     Quite ready for the Iliad, nothing less?     Theres Heine, where the big books block the shelf:     Dont skip a word, thumb well the Lexicon!     I thumbed well and skipped nowise till I learned     Who was who, what was what, from Homers tongue,     And there an end of learning. Had you asked     The all-accomplished scholar, twelve years old,     Who was it wrote the Iliad? what a laugh     Why, Homer, all the world knows: of his life     Doubtless some facts exist: its everywhere:     We have not settled, though, his place of birth:     He begged, for certain, and was blind beside:     Seven cities claimed him, Scio, with best right,     Thinks Byron. What he wrote? Those Hymns we have.     Then theres the Battle of the Frogs and Mice,     Thats all, unless they dig Margites up     (Id like that) nothing more remains to know.     Thus did youth spend a comfortable time;     Until, Whats this the Germans say in fact     That Wolf found out first? Its unpleasant work     Their chop and change, unsettling ones belief:     All the same, where we live, we learn, thats sure.     So, I bent brow oer Prolegomena.     And after Wolf, a dozen of his like     Proved there was never any Troy at all,     Neither Besiegers nor Besieged, nay, worse,     No actual Homer, no authentic text,     No warrant for the fiction I, as fact,     Had treasured in my heart and soul so long,     Ay, mark you! and as fact held still, still hold,     Spite of new knowledge, in my heart of hearts     And soul of souls, facts essence freed and fixed     From accidental fancys guardian sheath.     Assuredly thenceforward, thank my stars!     However it got there, deprive who could,     Wring from the shrine my precious tenantry,     Helen, Ulysses, Hector and his Spouse,     Achilles and his Friend? though Wolf, ah, Wolf!     Why must he needs come doubting, spoil a dream?     But then, No dreams worth waking, Browning says:     And heres the reason why I tell thus much.     I, now mature man, you anticipate,     May blame my Father justifiably     For letting me dream out my nonage thus,     And only by such slow and sure degrees     Permitting me to sift the grain from chaff,     Get truth and falsehood known and named as such.     Why did he ever let me dream at all,     Not bid me taste the story in its strength?     Suppose my childhood was scarce qualified     To rightly understand mythology,     Silence at least was in his power to keep:     I might have, somehow, correspondingly,     Well, who knows by what method, gained my gains,     Been taught, by forthrights not meanderings,     My aim should be to loathe, like Peleus son,     A lie as Hells Gate, love my wedded wife,     Like Hector, and so on with all the rest.     Could not I have excogitated this     Without believing such man really were?     That is, he might have put into my hand     The Ethics? In translation, if you please,     Exact, no pretty lying that improves,     To suit the modern taste: no more, no less,     The Ethics: tis a treatise I find hard     To read aright now that my hair is gray,     And I can manage the original.     At five years old, how ill had fared its leaves!     Now, growing double oer the Stagirite,     At least I soil no page with bread and milk,     Nor crumple, dogs-ear and deface, boys way.