He was
greatly astonished, and in turn gave us an account
of his own fortunes.
"By birth, friends, I am a Cypriote. Being engaged

 

in commerce, I set out from my
native land
with my boy, whom you see, and a number of
slaves as well, and sailed for Italy, carrying a
cargo of all sorts of wares in a large ship, which
you perhaps saw lying in fragments at the whale's
mouth. Well, as far as Sicily we had a favorable
voyage, but there a tempest fell upon us and drove
us three days out to sea, where we fell in with the
whale and were swallowed bodily. We two alone
were saved; all the others perished. We buried
our comrades and built the temple to Poseidon,
and then we fell into our present mode of life, tilling our kitchen-garden, and eating fish and fruits.
The forest, as you see, is extensive, and there are
actually quantities of grapes in it, which make the
sweetest wine. The spring, too, which perhaps
you know, gives very clear and cold water. We
make our bed of leaves; we have no lack of fire;
we capture the birds that fly in; we take alive the
fish that find their way into the monster's gills;
and there, too, we bathe when we wish. There is
a salt lake, also, not far off, more than two miles
in circumference, stocked with fish of all sorts.
There we swim and sail, too, in a small skiff that
I built myself. This is the twenty-seventh year
since we were swallowed.