Then she called her maids and said, “Stay where you are, you girls.  Can you not see a man without running away from him?  Do you take him for a robber or a murderer?  Neither he nor any one else can come here to do us Phaeacians any harm, for we are dear to the gods, and live apart on a land’s end that juts into the sounding sea, and have nothing to do with any other people.  This is only some poor man who has lost his way, and we must be kind to him, for strangers and foreigners in distress are under Jove’s protection, and will take what they can get and be thankful; so, girls, give the poor fellow something to eat and drink, and wash him in the stream at some place that is sheltered from the wind.”

On this the maids left off running away and began calling one another back.  They made Ulysses sit down in the shelter as Nausicaa had told them, and brought him a shirt and cloak.  They also brought him the little golden cruse of oil, and told him to go and wash in the stream.  But Ulysses said, “Young women, please to stand a little on one side that I may wash the brine from my shoulders and anoint myself with oil, for it is long enough since my skin has had a drop of oil upon it.  I cannot wash as long as you all keep standing there.  I am ashamed to strip {56} before a number of good looking young women.”

Then they stood on one side and went to tell the girl, while Ulysses washed himself in the stream and scrubbed the brine from his back and from his broad shoulders.  When he had thoroughly washed himself, and had got the brine out of his hair, he anointed himself with oil, and put on the clothes which the girl had given him; Minerva then made him look taller and stronger than before, she also made the hair grow thick on the top of his head, and flow down in curls like hyacinth blossoms; she glorified him about the head and shoulders as a skilful workman who has studied art of all kinds under Vulcan and Minerva enriches a piece of silver plate by gilding it—­and his work is full of beauty.  Then he went and sat down a little way off upon the beach, looking quite young and handsome, and the girl gazed on him with admiration; then she said to her maids: 

“Hush, my dears, for I want to say something.  I believe the gods who live in heaven have sent this man to the Phaeacians.  When I first saw him I thought him plain, but now his appearance is like that of the gods who dwell in heaven.  I should like my future husband to be just such another as he is, if he would only stay here and not want to go away.  However, give him something to eat and drink.”

They did as they were told, and set food before Ulysses, who ate and drank ravenously, for it was long since he had had food of any kind.  Meanwhile, Nausicaa bethought her of another matter.  She got the linen folded and placed in the waggon, she then yoked the mules, and, as she took her seat, she called Ulysses: