My work is something like the Penelope's web, never done, but ever in hand.

He thus promised to solve the problem on the condition that the king in turn would support him in his courting of Penelope, the daughter of Icarius.

Without knowing the Odyssey, man would know nothing of the fidelity of Penelope, without Shakespeare, he would know nothing of the doubts of Hamlet, or the love between Romeo and Juliet.