The nymph Caenis, having suffered violence from Neptune, prevails on her ravisher to change her sex, and make her in vulnerable.
Then Nestor thus: “What once this age has known In fated Cycnus, and in him alone, These eyes have seen in Caeneus long before, Whose body not a thousand swords could bore, Caeneus in courage and in strength excell’d; And still his Othrys with his fame is fill’d: But what did most his martial deeds adorn— Though since he changed his sex, a woman born.”
A novelty so strange, and full of fate, His listening audience ask’d him to relate. Achilles thus commends their common suit: “Oh father, first for prudence in repute, Tell, with that eloquence so much thy own, What thou hast heard, or what of Caeneus known: What was he; whence his change of sex begun: What trophies, join’d in wars with thee, he won: Who conquer’d him; and in what fatal strife The youth, without a wound, could lose his life?”