When he has
reached the queen, the cloak of thick darkness falls off, and he is
revealed to all present, kneeling at the feet of Queen Arete, to
whom he makes his appeal. It has already been made apparent in a
passage extolling her virtue at some length, but which I have not
been able to quote, that Queen Arete is, in the eyes of the writer,
a much more important person than her husband Alcinous.

Every one, of course, is very much surprised at seeing Ulysses, but
after a little discussion, from which it appears that the writer
considers Alcinous to be a person who requires a good deal of
keeping straight in other matters besides clean linen, it is settled
that Ulysses shall be feted on the following day and then escorted
home. Ulysses now has supper and remains with Alcinous and Arete
after the other guests are gone away for the night. So the three
sit by the fire while the servants take away the things, and Arete
is the first to speak. She has been uneasy for some time about
Ulysses' clothes, which she recognized as her own make, and at last
she says, "Stranger, there is a question or two that I should like
to put to you myself. Who in the world are you? And who gave you
those clothes? Did you not say you had come here from beyond the
seas?"

Ulysses explains matters, but still withholds his name, nevertheless
Alcinous (who seems to have shared in the general opinion that it
was high time his daughter got married, and that, provided she
married somebody, it did not much matter who the bridegroom might
be) exclaimed, "By Father Jove, Minerva, and Apollo, now that I see
what kind of a person you are and how exactly our opinions coincide
upon every subject, I should so like it if you would stay with us
always, marry Nausicaa, and become my son-in-law." Ulysses turns
the conversation immediately, and meanwhile Queen Arete told her
maids to put a bed in the corridor, and make it with red blankets,
and it was to have at least one counterpane. They were also to put
a woollen nightgown for Ulysses. "The maids took a torch, and made
the bed as fast as they could: when they had done so they came up
to Ulysses and said, 'This way, sir, if you please, your room is
quite ready'; and Ulysses was very glad to hear them say so."

On the following day Alcinous holds a meeting of the Phaeacians and
proposes that Ulysses should have a ship got ready to take him home
at once: this being settled he invites all the leadin