Homer's description of the ships of the Phaeacians has been
thought to look like an anticipation of the wonders of modern
steam navigation. Alcinous says to Ulysses:
"Say from what city, from what regions tossed,
And what inhabitants those regions boast?
So shalt thou quickly reach the realm assigned,
In wondrous ships, self-moved, instinct with mind;
No helm secures their course, no pilot guides;
Like man intelligent they plough the tides,
Conscious of every coast and every bay
That lies beneath the sun's all-seeing ray."
--Odyssey, Book VIII.
Lord Carlisle, in his "Diary in the Turkish and Greek Waters,"
thus speaks of Corfu, which he considers to be the ancient
Phaeacian island:
"The sites explain the 'Odyssey.' The temple of the sea-god could
not have been more fitly placed, upon a grassy platform of the
most elastic turf, on the brow of a crag commanding harbor, and
channel, and ocean. Just at the entrance of the inner harbor there
is a picturesque rock with a small convent perched upon it, which
by one legend is the transformed pinnace of Ulysses.
"Almost the only river in the island is just at the proper
distance from the probable site of the city and palace of the
king, to justify the princess Nausicaa having had resort to her
chariot and to luncheon when she went with the maidens of the
court to wash their garments.
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