Odyssey 6.271 · Book 6, lines 271–274
Nausicaa dreads the townsfolk's tongues
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ἀλλʼ ἱστοὶ καὶ ἐρετμὰ νεῶν καὶ νῆες ἐῖσαι, ᾗσιν ἀγαλλόμενοι πολιὴν περόωσι θάλασσαν. τῶν ἀλεείνω φῆμιν ἀδευκέα, μή τις ὀπίσσω μωμεύῃ· μάλα δʼ εἰσὶν ὑπερφίαλοι κατὰ δῆμον·
But there are masts and oars of ships and trim ships, in which they glory as they cross the grey sea. Of these men I dread the cruel gossip, lest afterward someone should blame me; for they are very insolent throughout the district;
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The setting
Nausicaa is still speaking to Odysseus as they near the town. She has been describing her people, the Phaeacians — not archers but sailors, glorying in their ships. Now she explains why he must not be seen walking beside her.
A note on this passage
Nausicaa turns from her people's pride in seafaring to a smaller, sharper fear: their talk. She calls the townsfolk insolent and their gossip cruel, and she is plainly bracing herself against it. The shift is quick — from the wide grey sea to the narrow street where a girl's name can be spoiled.
The undercurrent is how little the danger has to do with Odysseus. He is a shipwrecked suppliant she has just saved; the threat she weighs is her own reputation among neighbors who will not know the story. Her tact is really social calculation, and the poem lets us hear a young woman already thinking like the mistress of a house.
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