After saying this he describes the method of fishing the sword-fish as practised near the Scyllaean rock.
There is a single signaller for the whole fleet of small sculling boats.
In each boat, whenever the signaller announces the appearance of the sword-fish, one man rows and another stands on the prow holding a harpoon. The fish swims with the third part of his body out of the water.
When the boat gets near it the man strikes it from close quarters and then pulls out of its body the shaft of the spear, leaving the point, which is barbed and is on purpose loosely fixed into the shaft, having a long line attached to it. They give the wounded fish line until he is tired out by his struggles and his effort to escape.
Then they land him or pull him into the boat, unless he is exceedingly heavy.
If the shaft happens to fall into the sea, it is not lost, for it is composed of oak and pinewood, so that when the oaken part of it sinks owing to its weight the rest remains on the surface and can be easily picked up.
Sometimes the rower is wounded through the boat owing to the length of the fish's sword, and the fact that in his force and in the method of hunting him he is like a wild board.
From all this, he says, one may conjecture that according to Homer Ulysses is wandering near <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Sicily&groupId=973&placeId=1724">Sicily</a>, since he attributes to Scylla that method of fishing which is especially practised by the natives near the Scyllaean rock,
and also because what he says about Charybdis resembles what happens in the straits.
And as for "thrice she disgorges,"
it is rather an error in the text for "twice" than an error of fact. And what happens in the island of <a class="linkToPlace" target="_blank" href="/place?placename=Meninx&groupId=754&placeId=1374">Meninx</a> is in agreement with the description of the Lotus-eaters.
Walbank Commentary