ians, while they negligently
revelled and feasted, and slew many of them, and recovered the spoil.
They, dispirited and thinned in their numbers, with difficulty made
their retreat good to the ships. Thence they set sail, sad at heart,
yet something cheered that with such fearful odds against them they
had not all been utterly destroyed. A dreadful tempest ensued, which
for two nights and two days tossed them about, but the third day the
weather cleared, and they had hopes of a favourable gale to carry them
to Ithaca; but as they doubled the Cape of Malea, suddenly a north
wind arising, drove them back as far as Cythera. After that, for the
space of nine days, contrary winds continued to drive them in an
opposite direction to the point to which they were bound, and the
tenth day they put in at a shore where a race of men dwell that are
sustained by the fruit of the lotos tree. Here Ulysses sent some
of his men to land for fresh water, who were met by certain of the
inhabitants, that gave them some of their country food to eat; not
with any ill intention towards them, though in the event it proved
pernicious; for, having eaten of this fruit, so pleasant it proved to
their appetite, that they in a minute quite forgot all thoughts of
home, or of their countrymen, or of ever returning back to the ships
to give an account of what sort of inhabitants dwelt there, but they
would needs stay and live there among them, and eat of that precious
food for ever; and when Ulysses sent other of his men to look for
them, and to bring them back by force, they strove, and wept, and
would not leave their food for heaven itself, so much the pleasure of
that enchanting fruit had bewitched them. But Ulysses caused them to
be bound hand and foot, and cast under the hatches; and set sail with
all possible speed from that baneful coast, lest others after them
might taste the lotos, which had such strange qualities to make men
forget their native country, and the thoughts of home.

Coasting on all that night by unknown and out of the way shores, they
came by day-break to the land where the Cyclops dwell, a sort of giant
shepherds that neither sow nor plough, but the earth unfilled produces
for them rich wheat and barley and grapes, yet they have neither bread
nor wine, nor know the arts of cultivation, nor care to know them:
for they live each man to himself, without laws or government, or any
thing like a state or kingdom, but their dwellings ar