Peace is Restored — Laertes, the dead suitors, and Athena's peace

Book 24 of The Odyssey by Homer

Hermes of Cyllene summoned the spirits of the slain suitors. He held in his hand the golden wand with which he seals men's eyes in sleep or wakes them as he pleases, and with this he led them on, gibbering like bats that cling to one another in the hollow of some great cave and squeak when one of them falls from the cluster. So the ghosts of the suitors followed Hermes, squeaking and fluttering, past the streams of Oceanus and the White Rock, past the gates of the Sun and the land of Dreams, until they reached the meadow of asphodel where the spirits of the dead have their habitation.

There they found the shade of Agamemnon, son of Atreus, with those who had been killed alongside him in the house of Aegisthus. The shade of Amphimedon, one of the fallen suitors, told Agamemnon the tale of their destruction — how Penelope had held them off with her weaving, how Odysseus had returned in beggar's guise, how the bow-contest was set and the slaughter followed. Agamemnon's ghost listened and cried out in wonder and admiration. "Happy Odysseus," he said, "son of Laertes, what a wife you have won! How faithful has Penelope been, she who never forgot her wedded lord. The fame of her virtue shall never die, and the gods themselves shall make a song for mortal men in honor of her constancy. Not so the daughter of Tyndareus — she who contrived her husband's murder. Her song shall be one of hatred, and she has brought an evil name upon all women, even those who are virtuous."

Meanwhile Odysseus, with Telemachus and the two herdsmen, had left the town and traveled to the well-tended farm of old Laertes, which the old man had made for himself long ago with great toil. There was a house and a row of huts where the servants who did his bidding could eat and sleep, and an old Sicilian woman who looked after him in his decline. Odysseus told his companions to go inside and prepare a meal, for he wished to find his father alone and see whether Laertes would know him after so many years.