547Meanwhile Theseus, having done his part in the shared labour, was going to the Erechthean citadel of the Tritonian goddess. 549Achelous, swollen with rain, blocked his way and caused him delay as he went. 550'Come under my roof, famous son of Cecrops,' he says, 'and do not trust yourself to the greedy waters: they are accustomed to carry solid tree-trunks and to roll boulders sideways with a great roar. 553I have seen tall stables bordering the bank swept away together with their flocks: there it was no use for the herds to be strong, nor for the horses to be swift. 556This torrent too, when the snows melt from the mountain, has drowned many young bodies in its whirling flood.
558It is safer to rest, until the river runs within its usual bounds, until its own channel holds its thin waters.' 560The son of Aegeus assented and replied: 'I shall make use, Achelous, of your house and your advice'; 561and he made use of both. 562He enters halls built of porous pumice and rough tufa: the floor was moist with soft moss, and shells, alternating with murex, panelled the ceiling. 565And now, when Hyperion had measured out two parts of the daylight, Theseus and the companions of his labours reclined on couches: on this side the son of Ixion, on that the Troezenian hero Lelex, his temples now sprinkled with scattered grey hairs, and others whom the river of the Acarnanians had thought worthy of equal honour, delighted with so great a guest.
571At once barefoot nymphs set the tables placed beside them with feasts, and when the food was removed they set down wine in jewelled cups. 573Then the greatest hero, looking out over the waters lying below his eyes, said: 'What is that place?' 575and pointed with his finger, 'and tell me what name that island bears: though it does not seem to be one.' 577To this the river said: 'What you see is not one: five lands lie there; the distance hides the divisions. 579And so that you may wonder less at what scorned Diana did, these were once Naiads. 580When they had sacrificed twice five bullocks and called the gods of the countryside to the rites, forgetting me they led their festal dances.
583I swelled up, and as great as I am when I flow at my fullest, so great was I, and, monstrous alike in fury and in flood, I tore woods from woods and fields from fields, and rolled the nymphs, who then at last remembered me, together with their ground into the sea. 587My waves and the sea's split apart the continuous land and broke it into as many parts as the Echinades you see in the midst of the waves. 590Yet, as you see yourself, far, look, far off one island has drawn away, dear to me; 591the sailor calls it Perimele. 592From her, whom I loved, I took the name of maiden.
593Her father Hippodamas took this hard, and pushed the body of his daughter, to her death, from a cliff into the deep. 595I caught her, and bearing her as she swam, I said: "O trident-bearer, who won by lot the realm of the wandering waves, next to the heavens, bring help, and, I pray, to her who was drowned by a father's savagery, Neptune, grant a place; 602or let her be a place herself." 609While I speak, new land embraced her swimming limbs,