When he came to the narrowest passage over the sea, he caused the cattle to swim over before him into Sicily, and he himself catched hold of one of the horns of the oxen, and in that manner swam along for the space of thirteen furlongs, as Timreus reports the matter. Afterwards, desiring to go round the island, he went on his journey from Peloriados to Eryx, and, passing along the shore, the nymphs opened the hot baths for him, where he refreshed himself after his tedious journey. These baths were two in number, the Hemerian and Egestean, so called from the places. After Hercules came into the country of Eryx, Eryx the son of Venus and Bula, the king of the country, challenged Hercules to wrestle with him. Both sides proposed the wager to be won and lost; Eryx laid to stake his kingdom, but Hercules his oxen; Eryx at first disdained such an unequal wager, not fit to be compared with his country; but when Hercules, on the other side, answered, that if he lost them, he should lose together with them immortality, Eryx was contented with the condition, and engaged in the contest: but he was overcome, and so was stripped out of the possession of his country, which Hercules gave to the inhabitants, allowing them to take the fruits to their own use, till some one of his posterity came to demand it, which afterwards happened: for, many ages after, Dorieus the Lacedaemonian (sailing into Sicily) recovered his ancestor’s dominion, and there built Heraclea, which, growing great on a sudden, became the object of the Carthaginians’ envy and fear, lest, growing stronger than Carthage itself, it should deprive them of their sovereignty; and for that reason they besieged it with a mighty army, and took it by force, and razed it to the ground; of which we shall speak particularly in its proper place.

Hercules having viewed Sicily round, came to the city now called Syracuse, where, when he came to be informed of the rape of Proserpine, he offered magnificent sacrifices to the goddesses, and at Cyane sacrificed the goodliest of his bulls, and ordered the inhabitants to sacrifice yearly to Proserpine, and observe an anniversary festival at Cyane. Then travelling through the heart of the country with his oxen, he was set upon by the Sicani, with a strong body of men; whom, after a cruel battle, he routed, and cut off most of them, amongst whom (it is reported) there were captains of extraordinary valour, who are honoured as demi-gods to this day; to wit, Leucaspis, Pedicrates, Buphonas, Caugates, Cygaus, and Crytidas. Thence he passed through the country of the Leontines, and much admired the pleasantness of the territory; and, by reason of the singular respect he found from the inhabitants, he left there eternal monuments of his presence.