and drove them straggling-wise across a sandy place, turning their hoof-prints aside. Also, he bethought him of a crafty ruse and reversed the marks of their hoofs, making the front behind and the hind before, while he himself walked the other way.Hermes makes the cattle walk backwards way, so that they seem to be going towards the meadow instead of leaving it (cp. 1. 345); he himself walks in the normal manner, relying on his sandals as a disguise. Then he wove sandals with wicker-work by the sand of the sea, wonderful things, unthought of, unimagined; for he mixed together tamarisk and myrtle-twigs, fastening together an armful of their fresh, young wood, and tied them, leaves and all securely under his feet as light sandals. That brushwood the glorious Slayer of Argus plucked in Pieria as he was preparing for his journey, making shiftSuch seems to be the meaning indicated by the context, though the verb is taken by Allen and Sikes to mean, “to be like oneself,” and so “to be original.” as one making haste for a long journey. But an old man tilling his flowering vineyard saw him as he was hurrying down the plain through grassy Onchestus. So the Son of Maia began and said to him: