Page:The Song of the Sirens.djvu/141

 solstice they weighed anchor from the harbor of Apollonia and sailing all day long at full speed under a clear sky before a strong fair south-westerly wind they entered about sunset into the roadstead off Phaestus in Crete. At Phaestus they remained three nights. About midnight of the third night the wind shifted to southeasterly and Tamos, going about the inns and also the camps by the strand outside the harbor, roused the servants of the suitors and lastly the retinue of Polyteles. At sunrise they steered westerly, coasting along the shore of Crete to Cimarus. From there they crossed past Aegilia to Cythera. As being lovers and bound upon a mission of love they spent the next day in sacrifices and prayers about the temple of the great goddess of Cythera, Aphrodite Anadyomene, whom the Romans later called Venus.

The second morning the wind held and they were at sea before the sun rose. About the slack time of the afternoon they saw the forested ridges of Zacynthus rising in front of them from the sapphire sea. Before the shadows of its peaks were long on the waves they skirted Mount Elatus and came safely into the harbor of Zacynthus town. As the wind again shifted during the night to due southerly they made haste again to put to sea and skimming between the mainland and the flanks of Same, Ithaca and