Not until morning did the host ask his guests their business. Telemachus told him the story of the insolent suitors, and begged Menelaus for some news of his father. “Ah!” cried the hero when he had heard the tale, “it shall be as though the doe had left her young in the lion’s cave and had gone away to graze upon the hills. When the lion returns and finds the strange brood, he destroys them. Thus will Ulysses return to his house and make a terrible end of those trespassers! Could they but see him in the majesty of his power as he once threw Philomelides in Lesbos, then truly they would have little stomach for courting. But, dear youth, as thou hast asked me, I will tell thee what the old prophet Proteus in Egypt once told me of him. On my return voyage angry gods detained me for twenty days on an island at the mouth of the Nile, for I had carelessly forgotten to make the customary offering of atonement. Our food was nearly gone, my companions lost courage, and I should perhaps have perished with them had a goddess not taken pity on me. Idothea, the lovely daughter of Proteus, looked upon us with compassion, and once when I had wandered far from the others, she came and spoke to me. Then I told her my plight, and begged her to tell me some means of gaining the favor of the heavenly powers to discern which of the gods was hindering my journey and how I might reach home through the endless leagues of ocean. “‘Gladly, oh stranger,’ said she, ‘will I tell thee of an unfailing means. Thou knowest that my father, the old sea god, Proteus, is omniscient, and if thou canst surprise him by some cunning scheme he might easily tell thee all that thou wishest to know.’ ‘Good,’ said I; ‘but tell me what means I can employ to ensnare him.’ ‘Listen,’ answered the goddess; ‘every day when the sun is at the zenith the god rises from the sea, and comes on shore to sleep in the cool grottoes. With him come also the seals to sun themselves upon the shore. Therefore, if thou wouldst approach him unseen thou must conceal thyself in the skin of a seal and take thy place amongst the others. I will help thee. Come here early to-morrow morning with three picked companions, and I will furnish you all with glossy skins. When my father comes up, the first thing he does is to count his seals as a shepherd counts his sheep; then he lies down amongst them. As soon as thou seest that he has fallen asleep it is time to use force. You must all seize him and hold him fast, not letting go, no matter how he struggles to free himself. He will use all his arts of transformation to get away, now as fire, now as water, and now as some rapacious animal. But ye must not cease to contend with him until he shall have reassumed his proper form. Then loose the bonds, and let him tell thee what thou wishest to know.’