u, stranger, and why lingerest thou
with thy company in this desert place? I am Eidothea, daughter of
Proteus, the ancient one of the sea; and I am ready to help thee, if
thou wilt tell me thy need.'

"Then I told her how I had been kept an unwilling captive on the
island, and begged her to let me know what power I had offended, that
he might be appeased by sacrifice, and suffer the wind to blow. 'There
is one who can tell thee all that thou desirest to know,' answered
she. 'Yea, Proteus, my father, will show thee how to win thy path
across the watery waste. No secrets are hidden from him, neither on
earth nor in the sea; and he can tell thee all that hath befallen in
thy house in the long years of thine absence. Now hearken, and I will
tell thee how thou mayest wring from him all his secrets. Every day at
noon he comes forth from the sea, and lays him down to sleep in a
rocky cave; and about him are couched his herd of seals. I will bring
thee to the place in the early morning, and set thee in ambush to
await his coming. Choose three of the stoutest of thy men to aid thee
in the adventure, and as soon as thou seest him asleep rush upon him
and hold him fast. He will struggle hard, and take a hundred different
shapes; but loose him not until he return to his own form, and then
will he reveal to thee all that he has to tell.'

"So saying, the goddess disappeared beneath the waves. Next morning I
went with three picked men to the appointed place, and soon Eidothea
arrived, bearing four hides of seals, freshly flayed. Then she
hollowed out four pits in the sand for us to lie in, and clothed us in
the skins, and couched us together. Now that bed had like to have been
our last, for we were stifled by the dreadful stench of the seabred
seals. But the goddess saw our distress, and found a remedy; for she
brought ambrosia and set it beneath our nostrils, and that heavenly
perfume overpowered the noisome stench.

"So all the morning we lay and wafted patiently, and at noon the seals
came up out of the sea and lay down in order on the sand. Last of all
came Proteus, and counted his herd, reckoning us among their number,
with no suspicion of guile. We waited until he was fast asleep, and
then we rushed from our ambush and seized him hand and foot. Long and
hard was the struggle, and many the shapes which he took. First he
became a bearded lion, then a snake, then a leopard, then a huge boar;
after these he turned into running w