So firmly did they believe divination a thing most
sacred, that when Ulysses, wearied of wandering,
took a phansie to learn the truth as touching his
affaires, he went off unto Hell, not “to behold dead
men and a land that is joyless,” Odyssey, XI, 94. but because he would
come to speech with Tiresias. And when he was
come to the place whereunto Circe directed him, and
had dug his pit and slain his sheep, although many dead
that were by, and amongst them his own mother,
were fain to drink of the blood, he suffered none of
them, not even his very mother, until he had wet the
throstle of Tiresias and constrained him to deliver
the prophecy, verily enduring to behold his mother’s
shadow athirst.