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[Illustration: A GREEK SHEPHERD, OLYMPIA.]
Edition d'Elite
Historical Tales
The Romance of Reality
By
CHARLES MORRIS
_Author of "Half-Hours with the Best American Authors," "Tales from the
Dramatists," etc._
IN FIFTEEN VOLUMES
Volume X
Greek
J.B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY
PHILADELPHIA AND LONDON
Copyright, 1896, by J.B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY.
Copyright, 1904, by J.B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY.
Copyright, 1908, by J.B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
HOW TROY WAS TAKEN 7
THE VOYAGE OF THE ARGONAUTS 28
THESEUS AND ARIADNE 33
THE SEVEN AGAINST THEBES 41
LYCURGUS AND THE SPARTAN LAWS 50
ARISTOMENES, THE HERO OF MESSENIA 60
SOLON, THE LAW-GIVER OF ATHENS 67
THE FORTUNE OF CROESUS 77
THE SUITORS OF AGARISTE 86
THE TYRANTS OF CORINTH 93
THE RING OF POLYCRATES 100
THE ADVENTURES OF DEMOCEDES 109
DARIUS AND THE SCYTHIANS 117
THE ATHENIANS AT MARATHON 126
XERXES AND HIS ARMY 135
HOW THE SPARTANS DIED AT THERMOPYLAE 144
THE WOODEN WALLS OF ATHENS 154
PLATAEA'S FAMOUS DAY 165
FOUR FAMOUS MEN OF ATHENS 174
HOW ATHENS ROSE FROM ITS ASHES 186
THE PLAGUE AT ATHENS 194
THE ENVOYS OF LIFE AND DEATH 200
THE DEFENCE OF PLATAEA 205
HOW THE LONG WALLS WENT DOWN 213
SOCRATES AND ALCIBIADES 221
THE RETREAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND 231
THE RESCUE OF THEBES 245
THE HUMILIATION OF SPARTA 259
TIMOLEON, THE FAVORITE OF FORTUNE 271
THE SACRED WAR 288
ALEXANDER THE GREAT AND DARIUS 296
THE WORLD'S GREATEST ORATOR 305
THE OLYMPIC GAMES 315
PYRRHUS AND THE ROMANS 324
PHILOPOEMEN AND THE FALL OF SPARTA 334
THE DEATH-STRUGGLE OF GREECE 345
ZENOBIA AND LONGINUS 351
THE LITERARY GLORY OF GREECE 360
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
GREEK.
PAGE
A GREEK SHEPHERD, OLYMPIA _Frontispiece_.
PARTING OF HECTOR AND ANDROMACHE 15
OEDIPUS AND ANTIGONE 42
GRECIAN LADIES AT HOME 87
THE ACROPOLIS OF ATHENS 98
RUINS OF THE PARTHENON 130
THE PLACE OF ASSEMBLY OF THE ATHENIANS 145
THE VICTORS AT SALAMIS 160
ANCIENT ENTRANCE TO THE STADIUM, ATHENS 181
A REUNION AT THE HOUSE OF ASPASIA 190
PIRAEUS, THE PORT OF ATHENS 213
PRISON OF SOCRATES, ATHENS 229
GATE OF THE AGORA, OR OIL MARKET, ATHENS 255
BED OF THE RIVER KLADEOS 289
THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT 300
THE MODERN OLYMPIC GAMES IN THE STADIUM 316
THE THEATRE OF BACCHUS, ATHENS 322
REMAINS OF THE TEMPLE OF MINERVA, CORINTH 345
THE RUINS OF PALMYRA 358
ALONG THE COAST OF GREECE 362
_HOW TROY WAS TAKEN._
The far-famed Helen, wife of King Menelaus of Sparta, was the most
beautiful woman in the world. And from her beauty and faithlessness came
the most celebrated of ancient wars, with death and disaster to numbers
of famous heroes and the final ruin of the ancient city of Troy. The
story of these striking events has been told only in poetry. We propose
to tell it again in sober prose.
But warning must first be given that Helen and the heroes of the Trojan
war dwelt in the mist-land of legend and tradition, that cloud-realm
from which history only slowly emerged. The facts with which we are here
concerned are those of the poet, not those of the historian. It is far
from sure that Helen ever lived. It is far from sure that there ever was
a Trojan war. Many people doubt the whole story. Yet the ancient Greeks
accepted it as history, and as we are telling their story, we may fairly
include it among the historical tales of Greece. The heroes concerned
are certainly fully alive in Homer's great poem, the "Iliad," and we can
do no better than follow the story of this stirring poem, while adding
details from other sources.
Mythology tells us that, once upon a time, the three goddesses, Venus,
Juno, and Minerva, had a contest as to which was the most beautiful, and
left the decision to Paris, then a shepherd on Mount Ida, though really
the son of King Priam of Troy. The princely shepherd decided in favor of
Venus, who had promised him in reward the love of the most beautiful of
living women, the Spartan Helen, daughter of the great deity Zeus (or
Jupiter). Accordingly the handsome and favored youth set sail for
Sparta, bringing with him rich gifts for its beautiful queen. Menelaus
received his Trojan guest with much hospitality, but, unluckily, was
soon obliged to make a journey to Crete, leaving Helen to entertain the
princely visitor. The result was as Venus had foreseen. Love arose
between the handsome youth and the beautiful woman, and an elopement
followed, Paris stealing away with both the wife and the money of his
confiding host. He set sail, had a prosperous voyage, and arrived safely
at Troy with his prize on the third day. This was a fortune very
different from that of Ulysses, who on his return from Troy took ten
years to accomplish a similar voyage.
As might naturally be imagined, this elopement excited indignation not
only in the hearts of Menelaus and his brother Agamemnon, but among the
Greek chieftains generally, who sympathized with the husband in his
grief and shared his anger against Troy. War was declared against that
faithless city, and most of the chiefs pledged themselves to take part
in it, and to lend their aid until Helen was recovered or restored. Had
they known all that was before them they might have hesitated, since it
took ten long years to equip the expedition, for ten years more the war
continued, and some of the leaders spent ten years in their return. But
in those old days time does not seem to have counted for much, and
besides, many of the chieftains had been suitors for the hand of Helen,
and were doubtless moved by their old love in pledging themselves to her
recovery.
Some of them, however, were anything but eager to take part. Achilles
and Ulysses, the two most important in the subsequent war, endeavored to
escape this necessity. Achilles was the son of the sea-nymph Thetis, who
had dipped him when an infant in the river Styx, the waters of which
magic stream rendered him invulnerable to any weapon except in one
spot,--the heel by which his mother had held him. But her love for her
son made her anxious to guard him against every danger, and when the
chieftains came to seek his aid in the expedition, she concealed him,
dressed as a girl, among the maidens of the court. But the crafty
Ulysses, who accompanied them, soon exposed this trick. Disguised as a
pedler, he spread his goods, a shield and a spear among them, before the
maidens. Then an alarm of danger being sounded, the girls fled in
affright, but the disguised youth, with impulsive valor, seized the
weapons and prepared to defend himself. His identity was thus revealed.
Ulysses himself, one of the wisest and shrewdest of men, had also sought
to escape the dangerous expedition. To do so he feigned madness, and
when the messenger chiefs came to seek him they found him attempting to
plough with an ox and a horse yoked together, while he sowed the field
with salt. One of them, however, took Telemachus, the young son of
Ulysses, and laid him in the furrow before the plough. Ulysses turned
the plough aside, and thus showed that there was more method than
madness in his mind.
And thus, in time, a great force of men and a great fleet of ships were
gathered, there being in all eleven hundred and eighty-six ships and
more than one hundred thousand men. The kings and chieftains of Greece
led their followers from all parts of the land to Aulis, in Boeotia,
whence they were to set sail for the opposite coast of Asia Minor, on
which stood the city of Troy. Agamemnon, who brought one hundred ships,
was chosen leader of the army, which included all the heroes of the age,
among them the distinguished warriors Ajax and Diomedes, the wise old
Nestor, and many others of valor and fame.
The fleet at length set sail; but Troy was not easily reached. The
leaders of the army did not even know where Troy was, and landed in the
wrong locality, where they had a battle with the people. Embarking
again, they were driven by a storm back to Greece. Adverse winds now
kept them at Aulis until Agamemnon appeased the hostile gods by
sacrificing to them his daughter Iphigenia,--one of the ways which those
old heathens had of obtaining fair weather. Then the winds changed, and
the fleet made its way to the island of Tenedos, in the vicinity of
Troy. From here Ulysses and Menelaus were sent to that city as envoys to
demand a return of Helen and the stolen property.
Meanwhile the Trojans, well aware of what was in store for them, had
made abundant preparations, and gathered an army of allies from various
parts of Thrace and Asia Minor. They received the two Greek envoys
hospitably, paid them every attention, but sustained the villany of
Paris, and refused to deliver Helen and the treasure. When this word was
brought back to the fleet the chiefs decided on immediate war, and sail
was made for the neighboring shores of the Trojan realm.
Of the long-drawn-out war that followed we know little more than what
Homer has told us, though something may be learned from other ancient
poems. The first Greek to land fell by the hand of Hector, the Trojan
hero,--as the gods had foretold. But in vain the Trojans sought to
prevent the landing; they were quickly put to rout, and Cycnus, one of
their greatest warriors and son of the god Neptune, was slain by
Achilles. He was invulnerable to iron, but was choked to death by the
hero and changed into a swan. The Trojans were driven within their city
walls, and the invulnerable Achilles, with what seems a safe valor,
stormed and sacked numerous towns in the neighborhood, killed one of
King Priam's sons, captured and sold as slaves several others, drove off
the oxen of the celebrated warrior AEneas, and came near to killing that
hero himself. He also captured and kept as his own prize a beautiful
maiden named Briseis, and was even granted, through the favor of the
gods, an interview with the divine Helen herself.
This is about all we know of the doings of the first nine years of the
war. What the Greeks were at during that long time neither history nor
legend tells. The only other event of importance was the death of
Palamedes, one of the ablest Grecian chiefs. It was he who had detected
the feigned madness of Ulysses, and tradition relates that he owed his
death to the revengeful anger of that cunning schemer, who had not
forgiven him for being made to take part in this endless and useless
war.
Thus nine years of warfare passed, and Troy remained untaken and
seemingly unshaken. How the two hosts managed to live in the mean time
the tellers of the story do not say. Thucydides, the historian, thinks
it likely that the Greeks had to farm the neighboring lands for food.
How the Trojans and their allies contrived to survive so long within
their walls we are left to surmise, unless they farmed their streets.
And thus we reach the opening of the tenth year and of Homer's "Iliad."
Homer's story is too long for us to tell in detail, and too full of war
and bloodshed for modern taste. We can only give it in epitome.
Agamemnon, the leader of the Greeks, robs Achilles of his beautiful
captive Briseis, and the invulnerable hero, furious at the insult,
retires in sullen rage to his ships, forbids his troops to take part in
the war, and sulks in anger while battle after battle is fought.
Deprived of his mighty aid, the Greeks find the Trojans quite their
match, and the fortunes of the warring hosts vary day by day.
On a watch-tower in Troy sits Helen the beautiful, gazing out on the
field of conflict, and naming for old Priam, who sits beside her, the
Grecian leaders as they appear at the head of their hosts on the plain
below. On this plain meet in fierce combat Paris the abductor and
Menelaus the indignant husband. Vengeance lends double weight to the
spear of the latter, and Paris is so fiercely assailed that Venus has to
come to his aid to save him from death. Meanwhile a Trojan archer wounds
Menelaus with an arrow, and a general battle ensues.
The conflict is a fierce one, and many warriors on both sides are slain.
Diomedes, a bold Grecian chieftain, is the hero of the day. Trojans fall
by scores before his mighty spear, he rages in fury from side to side of
the field, and at length meets the great AEneas, whose thigh he breaks
with a huge stone. But AEneas is the son of the goddess Venus, who flies
to his aid and bears him from the field. The furious Greek daringly
pursues the flying divinity, and even succeeds in wounding the goddess
of love with his impious spear. At this sad outcome Venus, to whom
physical pain is a new sensation, flies in dismay to Olympus, the home
of the deities, and hides her weeping face in the lap of Father Jove,
while her lady enemies taunt her with biting sarcasms. The whole scene
is an amusing example of the childish folly of mythology.
In the next scene a new hero appears upon the field, Hector, the warlike
son of Priam, and next to Achilles the greatest warrior of the war. He
arms himself inside the walls, and takes an affectionate leave of his
wife Andromache and his infant son, the child crying with terror at his
glittering helmet and nodding plume. This mild demeanor of the warrior
changes to warlike ardor when he appears upon the field. His coming
turns the tide of battle. The victorious Greeks are driven back before
his shining spear, many of them are slain, and the whole host is driven
to its ships and almost forced to take flight by sea from the victorious
onset of Hector and his triumphant followers. While the Greeks cower in
their ships the Trojans spend the night in bivouac upon the field. Homer
gives us a picturesque description of this night-watch, which Tennyson
has thus charmingly rendered into English:
"As when in heaven the stars about the moon
Look beautiful, when all the winds are laid,
And every height comes out, and jutting peak
And valley, and the immeasurable heavens
Break open to their highest, and all the stars
Shine, and the shepherd gladdens in his heart;
So, many a fire between the ships and stream
Of Xanthus blazed before the towers of Troy,
A thousand on the plain; and close by each
Sat fifty in the blaze of burning fire;
And, champing golden grain, the horses stood
Hard by their chariots, waiting for the dawn."
Affairs had grown perilous for the Greeks. Patroclus, the bosom friend
of Achilles, begged him to come to their aid. This the sulking hero
would not do, but he lent Patroclus his armor, and permitted him to
lead his troops, the Myrmidons, to the field. Patroclus was himself a
gallant and famous warrior, and his aid turned the next day's battle
against the Trojans, who were driven back with great slaughter. But,
unfortunately for this hero of the fight, a greater than he was in the
field. Hector met him in the full tide of his success, engaged him in
battle, killed him, and captured from his body the armor of Achilles.
[Illustration: THE PARTING OF HECTOR AND ANDROMACHE.]
The slaughter of his friend at length aroused the sullen Achilles to
action. Rage against the Trojans succeeded his anger against Agamemnon.
His lost armor was replaced by new armor forged for him by Vulcan, the
celestial smith,--who fashioned him the most wonderful of shields and
most formidable of spears. Thus armed, he mounted his chariot and drove
at the head of his Myrmidons to the field, where he made such frightful
slaughter of the Trojans that the river Scamander was choked with their
corpses; and, indignant at being thus treated, sought to drown the hero
for his offence. Finally he met Hector, engaged him in battle, and
killed him with a thrust of his mighty spear. Then, fastening the corpse
of the Trojan hero to his chariot, he dragged it furiously over the
blood-soaked plain and around the city walls. Homer's story ends with
the funeral obsequies of the slain Patroclus and the burial by the
Trojans of Hector's recovered body.
Other writers tell us how the war went on. Hector was replaced by
Penthesileia, the beautiful and warlike queen of the Amazons, who came
to the aid of the Trojans, and drove the Greeks from the field. But,
alas! she too was slain by the invincible Achilles. Removing her
helmet, the victor was deeply affected to find that it was a beautiful
woman he had slain.
The mighty Memnon, son of godlike parents, now made his appearance in
the Trojan ranks, at the head of a band of black Ethiopians, with whom
he wrought havoc among the Greeks. At length Achilles encountered this
hero also, and a terrible battle ensued, whose result was long in doubt.
In the end Achilles triumphed and Memnon fell. But he died to become
immortal, for his goddess mother prayed for and obtained for him the
gift of immortal life.
Such triumphs were easy for Achilles, whose flesh no weapon could
pierce; but no one was invulnerable to the poets, and his end came at
last. He had routed the Trojans and driven them within their gates, when
Paris, aided by Apollo, the divine archer, shot an arrow at the hero
which struck him in his one pregnable spot, the heel. The fear of Thetis
was realized, her son died from the wound, and a fierce battle took
place for the possession of his body. This Ajax and Ulysses succeeded in
carrying off to the Grecian camp, where it was burned on a magnificent
funeral pile. Achilles, like his victim Memnon, was made immortal by the
favor of the gods. His armor was offered as a prize to the most
distinguished Grecian hero, and was adjudged to Ulysses, whereupon Ajax,
his close contestant for the prize, slew himself in despair.
We cannot follow all the incidents of the campaign. It will suffice to
say that Paris was himself slain by an arrow, that Neoptolemus, the son
of Achilles, took his place in the field, and that the Trojans suffered
so severely at his hands that they took shelter behind their walls,
whence they never again emerged to meet the Greeks in the field.
But Troy was safe from capture while the Palladium, a statue which
Jupiter himself had given to Dardanus, the ancestor of the Trojans,
remained in the citadel of that city. Ulysses overcame this difficulty.
He entered Troy in the disguise of a wounded and ragged fugitive, and
managed to steal the Palladium from the citadel. Then, as the walls of
Troy still defied their assailants, a further and extraordinary
stratagem was employed to gain access to the city. It seems a ridiculous
one to us, but was accepted as satisfactory by the writers of Greece.
This stratagem was the following:
A great hollow wooden horse, large enough to contain one hundred armed
men, was constructed, and in its interior the leading Grecian heroes
concealed themselves. Then the army set fire to its tents, took to its
ships, and sailed away to the island of Tenedos, as if it had abandoned
the siege. Only the great horse was left on the long-contested
battle-field.
The Trojans, filled with joy at the sight of their departing foes, came
streaming out into the plain, women as well as warriors, and gazed with
astonishment at the strange monster which their enemies had left. Many
of them wanted to take it into the city, and dedicate it to the gods as
a mark of gratitude for their deliverance. The more cautious ones
doubted if it was wise to accept an enemy's gift. Laocoon, the priest of
Neptune, struck the side of the horse with his spear. A hollow sound
came from its interior, but this did not suffice to warn the indiscreet
Trojans. And a terrible spectacle now filled them with superstitious
dread. Two great serpents appeared far out at sea and came swimming
inward over the waves. Reaching the shore, they glided over the land to
where stood the unfortunate Laocoon, whose body they encircled with
their folds. His son, who came to his rescue, was caught in the same
dreadful coils, and the two perished miserably before the eyes of their
dismayed countrymen.
There was no longer any talk of rejecting the fatal gift. The gods had
given their decision. A breach was made in the walls of Troy, and the
great horse was dragged with exultation within the stronghold that for
ten long years had defied its foe.
Riotous joy and festivity followed in Troy. It extended into the night.
While this went on Sinon, a seeming renegade who had been left behind by
the Greeks, and who had helped to deceive the Trojans by lying tales,
lighted a fire-signal for the fleet, and loosened the bolts of the
wooden horse, from whose hollow depths the hundred weary warriors
hastened to descend.
And now the triumph of the Trojans was changed to sudden woe and dire
lamentation. Death followed close upon their festivity. The hundred
warriors attacked them at their banquets, the returned fleet disgorged
its thousands, who poured through the open gates, and death held
fearful carnival within the captured city. Priam was slain at the altar
by Neoptolemus. All his sons fell in death. The city was sacked and
destroyed. Its people were slain or taken captive. Few escaped, but
among these was AEneas, the traditional ancestor of Rome. As regards
Helen, the cause of the war, she was recovered by Menelaus, and gladly
accompanied him back to Sparta. There she lived for years afterwards in
dignity and happiness, and finally died to become happily immortal in
the Elysian fields.
But our story is not yet at an end. The Greeks had still to return to
their homes, from which they had been ten years removed. And though
Paris had crossed the intervening seas in three days, it took Ulysses
ten years to return, while some of his late companions failed to reach
their homes at all. Many, indeed, were the adventures which these
home-sailing heroes were destined to encounter.
Some of the Greek warriors reached home speedily and were met with
welcome, but others perished by the way, while Agamemnon, their leader,
returned to find that his wife had been false to him, and perished by
her treacherous hand. Menelaus wandered long through Egypt, Cyprus, and
elsewhere before he reached his native land. Nestor and several others
went to Italy, where they founded cities. Diomedes also became a founder
of cities, and various others seem to have busied themselves in this
same useful occupation. Neoptolemus made his way to Epirus, where he
became king of the Molossians. AEneas, the Trojan hero, sought Carthage,
whose queen Dido died for love of him. Thence he sailed to Italy, where
he fought battles and won victories, and finally founded the city of
Rome. His story is given by Virgil, in the poem of the "AEneid." Much
more might be told of the adventures of the returning heroes, but the
chief of them all is that related of the much wandering Ulysses, as
given by Homer in his epic poem the "Odyssey."
The story of the "Odyssey" might serve us for a tale in itself, but as
it is in no sense historical we give it here in epitome.
We are told that during the wanderings of Ulysses his island kingdom of
Ithaca had been invaded by a throng of insolent suitors of his wife
Penelope, who occupied his castle and wasted his substance in riotous
living. His son Telemachus, indignant at this, set sail in search of his
father, whom he knew to be somewhere upon the seas. Landing at Sparta,
he found Menelaus living with Helen in a magnificent castle, richly
ornamented with gold, silver, and bronze, and learned from him that his
father was then in the island of Ogygia, where he had been long detained
by the nymph Calypso.
The wanderer had experienced numerous adventures. He had encountered the
one-eyed giant Polyphemus, who feasted on the fattest of the Greeks,
while the others escaped by boring out his single eye. He had passed the
land of the Lotus-Eaters, to whose magic some of the Greeks succumbed.
In the island of Circe some of his followers were turned into swine. But
the hero overcame this enchantress, and while in her land visited the
realm of the departed and had interviews with the shades of the dead.
He afterwards passed in safety through the frightful gulf of Scylla and
Charybdis, and visited the wind-god AEolus, who gave him a fair wind
home, and all the foul winds tied up in a bag. But the curious Greeks
untied the bag, and the ship was blown far from her course. His
followers afterwards killed the sacred oxen of the sun, for which they
were punished by being wrecked. All were lost except Ulysses, who
floated on a mast to the island of Calypso. With this charming nymph he
dwelt for seven years.
Finally, at the command of the gods, Calypso set her willing captive
adrift on a raft of trees. This raft was shattered in a storm, but
Ulysses swam to the island of Phaeacia, where he was rescued by Nausicaa,
the king's daughter, and brought to the palace. Thence, in a Phaeacian
ship, he finally reached Ithaca.
Here new adventures awaited him. He sought his palace disguised as an
old beggar, so that of all there, only his old dog knew him. The
faithful animal staggered to his feet, feebly expressed his joy, and
fell dead. Telemachus had now returned, and led his disguised father
into the palace, where the suitors were at their revels. Penelope,
instructed what to do, now brought forth the bow of Ulysses, and offered
her hand to any one of the suitors who could bend it. It was tried by
them all, but tried in vain. Then the seeming beggar took in his hand
the stout, ashen bow, bent it with ease, and with wonderful skill sent
an arrow hurtling through the rings of twelve axes set up in line. This
done, he turned the terrible bow upon the suitors, sending its
death-dealing arrows whizzing through their midst. Telemachus and
Eumaeus, his swine-keeper, aided him in this work of death, and a
frightful scene of carnage ensued, from which not one of the suitors
escaped with his life.
In the end the hero, freed from his ragged attire, made himself known to
his faithful wife, defeated the friends of the suitors, and recovered
his kingdom from his foes. And thus ends the final episode of the famous
tale of Troy.
_THE VOYAGE OF THE ARGONAUTS._
We are forced to approach the historical period of Greece through a
cloud-land of legend, in which atones of the gods are mingled with those
of men, and the most marvellous of incidents are introduced as if they
were everyday occurrences. The Argonautic expedition belongs to this age
of myth, the vague vestibule of history. It embraces, as does the tale
of the wanderings of Ulysses, very ancient ideas of geography, and many
able men have treated it as the record of an actual voyage, one of the
earliest ventures of the Greeks upon the unknown seas. However this be,
this much is certain, the story is full of romantic and supernatural
elements, and it was largely through these that it became so celebrated
in ancient times.
The story of the voyage of the ship Argo is a tragedy. Pelias, king of
Ioleus, had consulted an oracle concerning the safety of his dominions,
and was warned to beware of the man with one sandal. Soon afterwards
Jason (a descendant of AEolus, the wind god) appeared before him with one
foot unsandalled. He had lost his sandal while crossing a swollen
stream. Pelias, anxious to rid himself of this visitor, against whom the
oracle had warned him, gave to Jason the desperate task of bringing
back to Locus the Golden Fleece (the fleece of a speaking ram which had
borne Phryxus and Helle through the air from Greece, and had reached
Colchis in Asia Minor, where it was dedicated to Mars, the god of war).
Jason, young and daring, accepted without hesitation the perilous task,
and induced a number of the noblest youth of Greece to accompany him in
the enterprise. Among these adventurers were Hercules, Theseus, Castor,
Pollux, and many others of the heroes of legend. The way to Colchis lay
over the sea, and a ship was built for the adventurers named the Argo,
in whose prow was inserted a piece of timber cut from the celebrated
speaking oak of Dodona.
The voyage of the Argo was as full of strange incidents as those which
Ulysses encountered in his journey home from Troy. Land was first
reached on the island of Lemnos. Here no men were found. It was an
island of women only. All the men had been put to death by the women in
revenge for ill-treatment, and they held the island as their own. But
these warlike matrons, who had perhaps grown tired of seeing only each
other's faces, received the Argonauts with much friendship, and made
their stay so agreeable that they remained there for several months.
Leaving Lemnos, they sailed along the coast of Thrace, and up the
Hellespont (a strait which had received its name from Helle, who, while
riding on the golden ram in the air above it, had fallen and been
drowned in its waters). Thence they sailed along the Propontis and the
coast of Mysia, not, as we may be sure, without adventures. In the
country of the Bebrycians the giant king Amycus challenged any of them
to box with him. Pollux accepted the challenge, and killed the giant
with a blow. Next they reached Bithynia, where dwelt the blind prophet
Phineus, to whom their coming proved a blessing.
Phineus had been blinded by Neptune, as a punishment for having shown
Phryxus the way to Colchis. He was also tormented by the harpies,
frightful winged monsters, who flew down from the clouds whenever he
attempted to eat, snatched the food from his lips, and left on it such a
vile odor that no man could come near it. He, being a prophet, knew that
the Argonauts would free him from this curse. There were with them Zetes
and Calias, winged sons of Boreas, the god of the north winds; and when
the harpies descended again to spoil the prophet's meal, these winged
warriors not only drove them away, but pursued them through the air.
They could not overtake them, but the harpies were forbidden by Jupiter
to molest Phineus any longer.
The blind prophet, grateful for this deliverance, told the voyagers how
they might escape a dreadful danger which lay in their onward way. This
came from the Symplegades, two rocks between which their ships must
pass, and which continually opened and closed, with a violent collision,
and so swiftly that even a bird could scarce fly through the opening in
safety. When the Argo reached the dangerous spot, at the suggestion of
Phineus, a dove was let loose. It flew with all speed through the
opening, but the rocks clashed together so quickly behind it that it
lost a few feathers of its tail. Now was their opportunity. The rowers
dashed their ready oars into the water, shot forward with rapid speed,
and passed safely through, only losing the ornaments at the stern of
their ship. Their escape, however, they owed to the goddess Minerva,
whose strong hand held the rocks asunder during the brief interval of
their passage. It had been decreed by the gods that if any ship escaped
these dreadful rocks they should forever cease to move. The escape of
the Argo fulfilled this decree, and the Symplegades have ever since
remained immovable.
Onward went the daring voyagers, passing in their journey Mount
Caucasus, on whose bare rock Prometheus, for the crime of giving fire to
mankind, was chained, while an eagle devoured his liver. The adventurers
saw this dread eagle and heard the groans of the sufferer himself.
Helpless to release him whom the gods had condemned, they rowed rapidly
away.
Finally Colchis was reached, a land then ruled over by King AEetes, from
whom the heroes demanded the golden fleece, stating that they had been
sent thither by the gods themselves. AEetes heard their request with
anger, and told them that if they wanted the fleece they could have it
on one condition only. He possessed two fierce and tameless bulls, with
brazen feet and fire-breathing nostrils. These had been the gift of the
god Vulcan. Jason was told that if he wished to prove his descent from
the gods and their sanction of his voyage, he must harness these
terrible animals, plough with them a large field, and sow it with
dragons' teeth.
Perilous as this task seemed, each of the heroes was eager to undertake
it, but Jason, as the leader of the expedition, took it upon himself.
Fortune favored him in the desperate undertaking. Medea, the daughter of
AEetes, who knew all the arts of magic, had seen the handsome youth and
fallen in love with him at sight. She now came to his aid with all her
magic. Gathering an herb which had grown where the blood of Prometheus
had fallen, she prepared from it a magical ointment which, when rubbed
on Jason's body, made him invulnerable either to fire or weapons of war.
Thus prepared, he fearlessly approached the fire-breathing bulls, yoked
them unharmed, and ploughed the field, in whose furrows he then sowed
the dragons' teeth. Instantly from the latter sprang up a crop of armed
men, who turned their weapons against the hero. But Jason, who had been
further instructed by Medea, flung a great stone in their midst, upon
which they began to fight each other, and he easily subdued them all.
Jason had accomplished his task, but AEetes proved unfaithful to his
words. He not only withheld the prize, but took steps to kill the
Argonauts and burn their vessel. They were invited to a banquet, and
armed men were prepared to murder them during the night after the feast.
Fortunately, sleep overcame the treacherous king, and the adventurers
warned of their danger, made ready to fly. But not without the golden
fleece. This was guarded by a dragon, but Medea prepared a potion that
put this perilous sentinel to sleep, seized the fleece, and accompanied
Jason in his flight, taking with her on the Argo Absyrtus, her youthful
brother.
The Argonauts, seizing their oars, rowed with all haste from the dreaded
locality. AEetes, on awakening, learned with fury of the loss of the
fleece and his children, hastily collected an armed force, and pursued
with such energy that the flying vessel was soon nearly overtaken. The
safety of the adventurers was again due to Medea, who secured it by a
terrible stratagem. This was, to kill her young brother, cut his body to
pieces, and fling the bleeding fragments into the sea. AEetes, on
reaching the scene of this tragedy, recognized these as the remains of
his murdered son, and sorrowfully stopped to collect them for interment.
While he was thus engaged the Argonauts escaped.
But such a wicked deed was not suffered to go unpunished. Jupiter beheld
it with deep indignation, and in requital condemned the Argonauts to a
long and perilous voyage, full of hardship and adventure. They were
forced to sail over all the watery world of waters, so far as then
known. Up the river Phasis they rowed until it entered the ocean which
flows round the earth. This vast sea or stream was then followed to the
source of the Nile, down which great river they made their way into the
land of Egypt.
Here, for some reason unknown, they did not follow the Nile to the
Mediterranean, but were forced to take the ship Argo on their shoulders
and carry it by a long overland journey to Lake Tritonis, in Libya. Here
they were overcome by want and exhaustion, but Triton, the god of the
region, proved hospitable, and supplied them with the much-needed food
and rest. Thus refreshed, they launched their ship once more on the
Mediterranean and proceeded hopefully on their homeward way.
Stopping at the island of AEaea, its queen Circe--she who had transformed
the companions of Ulysses into swine--purified Medea from the crime of
murder; and at Corcyra, which they next reached, the marriage of Jason
and Medea took place. The cavern in that island where the wedding was
solemnized was still pointed out in historical times.
After leaving Corcyra a fierce storm threatened the navigators with
shipwreck, from which they were miraculously saved by the celestial aid
of the god Apollo. An arrow shot from his golden bow crossed the billows
like a track of light, and where it pierced the waves an island sprang
up, on whose shores the imperilled mariners found a port of refuge. On
this island, Anaphe by name, the grateful Argonauts built an altar to
Apollo and instituted sacrifices in his honor.
Another adventure awaited them on the coast of Crete. This island was
protected by a brazen sentinel, named Talos, wrought by Vulcan, and
presented by him to King Minos to protect his realm. This living man of
brass hurled great rocks at the vessel, and destruction would have
overwhelmed the voyagers but for Medea. Talos, like all the
invulnerable men of legend, had his one weak point. This her magic art
enabled her to discover, and, as Paris had wounded Achilles in the heel,
Medea killed this vigilant sentinel by striking him in his vulnerable
spot.
The Argonauts now landed and refreshed themselves. In the island of
AEgina they had to fight to procure water. Then they sailed along the
coasts of Euboea and Locris, and finally entered the gulf of Pagasae
and dropped anchor at Iolceus, their starting-point.
As to what became of the ship Argo there are two stories. One is that
Jason consecrated his vessel to Neptune on the isthmus of Corinth.
Another is that Minerva translated it to the stars, where it became a
constellation.
So ends the story of this earliest of recorded voyages, whose possible
substratum of fact is overlaid deeply with fiction, and whose geography
is similarly a strange mixture of fact and fancy. Yet though the voyage
is at an end, our story is not. We have said that it was a tragedy, and
the denouement of the tragedy remains to be given.
Pelias, who had sent Jason on this long voyage to escape the fate
decreed for him by the oracle, took courage from his protracted absence,
and put to death his father and mother and his infant brother. On
learning of this murderous act Jason determined on revenge. But Pelias
was too strong to be attacked openly, so the hero employed a strange
stratagem, suggested by the cunning magician Medea. He and his
companions halted at some distance from Iolcus, while Medea entered the
town alone, pretending that she was a fugitive from the ill-treatment of
Jason.
Here she was entertained by the daughters of Pelias, over whom she
gained great influence by showing them certain magical wonders. In the
end she selected an old ram from the king's flocks, cut him up and
boiled him in a caldron with herbs of magic power. In the end the animal
emerged from the caldron as a young and vigorous lamb. The enchantress
now told her dupes that their old father could in the same way be made
young again. Fully believing her, the daughters cut the old man to
pieces in the same manner, and threw his limbs into the caldron,
trusting to Medea to restore him to life as she had the ram.
Leaving them for the assumed purpose of invoking the moon, as a part of
the ceremony, Medea ascended to the roof of the palace. Here she lighted
a fire-signal to the waiting Argonauts, who instantly burst into and
took possession of the town.
Having thus revenged himself, Jason yielded the crown of Iolcus to the
son of Pelias, and withdrew with Medea to Corinth, where they resided
together for ten years. And here the final act in the tragedy was
played.
After these ten years of happy married life, during which several
children were born, Jason ceased to love his wife, and fixed his
affections on Glauce, the daughter of King Creon of Corinth. The king
showed himself willing to give Jason his daughter in marriage, upon
which the faithless hero divorced Medea, who was ordered to leave
Corinth. He should have known better with whom he had to deal. The
enchantress, indignant at such treatment, determined on revenge.
Pretending to be reconciled to the coming marriage, she prepared a
poisoned robe, which she sent as a wedding-present to the hapless
Glauce. No sooner had the luckless bride put on this perilous gift than
the robe burst into flames, and she was consumed; while her father, who
sought to tear from her the fatal garment, met with the same fate.
Medea escaped by means of a chariot drawn by winged serpents, sent her
by her grandfather Helios (the sun). As the story is told by Euripides,
she killed her children before taking to flight, leaving their dead
bodies to blast the sight of their horror-stricken father. The legend,
however, tells a different tale. It says that she left them for safety
before the altar in the temple of Juno; and that the Corinthians,
furious at the death of their king, dragged the children from the altar
and put them to death. As for the unhappy Jason, the story goes that he
fell asleep under the ship Argo, which had been hauled ashore according
to the custom of the ancients, and that a fragment of this ship fell
upon and killed him.
The flight of Medea took her to Athens, where she found a protector and
second husband in AEgeus, the ruler of that city, and father of Theseus,
the great legendary hero of Athens.
_THESEUS AND ARIADNE._
Minos, king of Crete in the age of legend, made war against Athens in
revenge for the death of his son. This son, Androgeos by name, had shown
such strength and skill in the Panathenaic festival that AEgeus, the
Athenian king, sent him to fight with the flame-spitting bull of
Marathon, a monstrous creature that was ravaging the plains of Attica.
The bull killed the valiant youth, and Minos, furious at the death of
his son, laid siege to Athens.
As he proved unable to capture the city, he prayed for aid to his father
Zeus (for, like all the heroes of legend, he was a son of the gods).
Zeus sent pestilence and famine on Athens, and so bitter grew the lot of
the Athenians that they applied to the oracles of the gods for advice in
their sore strait, and were bidden to submit to any terms which Minos
might impose. The terms offered by the offended king of Crete were
severe ones. He demanded that the Athenians should, at fixed periods,
send to Crete seven youths and seven maidens, as victims to the
insatiable appetite of the Minotaur.
This fabulous creature was one of those destructive monsters of which
many ravaged Greece in the age of fable. It had the body of a man and
the head of a bull, and so great was the havoc it wrought among the
Cretans that Minos engaged the great artist Daedalus to construct a den
from which it could not escape. Daedalus built for this purpose the
Labyrinth, a far-extending edifice, in which were countless passages, so
winding and intertwining that no person confined in it could ever find
his way out again. It was like the catacombs of Rome, in which one who
is lost is said to wander helplessly till death ends his sorrowful
career. In this intricate puzzle of a building the Minotaur was
confined.
Every ninth year the fourteen unfortunate youths and maidens had to be
sent from Athens to be devoured by this insatiate beast. We are not told
on what food it was fed in the interval, or why Minos did not end the
trouble by allowing it to starve in its inextricable den. As the story
goes, the living tribute was twice sent, and the third period came duly
round. The youths and maidens to be devoured were selected by lot from
the people of Athens, and left their city amid tears and woe. But on
this occasion Theseus, the king's son and the great hero of Athens,
volunteered to be one of the band, and vowed either to slay the terrible
beast or die in the attempt.
There seem to have been few great events in those early days of Greece
in which Theseus did not take part. Among his feats was the carrying off
of Helen, the famous beauty, while still a girl. He then took part in a
journey to the under-world,--the realm of ghosts,--during which Castor
and Pollux, the brothers of Helen, rescued and brought her home. He was
also one of the heroes of the Argonautic expedition and of an expedition
against the Amazons, or nation of women warriors; he fought with and
killed a series of famous robbers; and he rid the world of a number of
ravaging beasts,--the Calydonian boar, the Crommyonian sow, and the
Marathonian bull, the monster which had slain the son of Minos. He was,
in truth, the Hercules of ancient Athens, and he now proposed to add to
his exploits a battle for life or death with the perilous Minotaur.
The hero knew that he had before him the most desperate task of his
life. Even should he slay the monster, he would still be in the
intricate depths of the Labyrinth, from which escape was deemed
impossible, and in whose endless passages he and his companions might
wander until they died of weariness and starvation. He prayed,
therefore, to Neptune for help, and received a message from the oracle
at Delphi to the effect that Aphrodite (or Venus) would aid and rescue
him.
The ship conveying the victims sailed sadly from Athens, and at length
reached Crete at the port of Knossus, the residence of King Minos. Here
the woful hostages were led through the streets to the prison in which
they were to be confined till the next day, when they were to be
delivered to death. As they passed along the people looked with sympathy
upon their fair young faces, and deeply lamented their coming fate. And,
as Venus willed, among the spectators were Minos and his fair daughter
Ariadne, who stood at the palace door to see them pass.
The eyes of the young princess fell upon the face of Theseus, the
Athenian prince, and her heart throbbed with a feeling she had never
before known. Never had she gazed upon a man who seemed to her half so
brave and handsome as this princely youth. All that night thoughts of
him drove slumber from her eyes. In the early morning, moved by a
new-born love, she sought the prison, and, through her privilege as the
king's daughter, was admitted to see the prisoners. Venus was doing the
work which the oracle had promised.
Calling Theseus aside, the blushing maiden told him of her sudden love,
and that she ardently longed to save him. If he would follow her
directions he would escape. She gave him a sword, which she had taken
from her father's armory and concealed beneath her cloak, that he might
be armed against the devouring beast. And she provided him besides with
a ball of thread, bidding him to fasten the end of it to the entrance of
the Labyrinth, and unwind it as he went in, that it might serve him as a
clue to find his way out again.
As may well be believed, Theseus warmly thanked his lovely visitor, told
her that he was a king's son, and that he returned her love, and begged
her, in case he escaped, to return with him to Athens and be his bride.
Ariadne willingly consented, and left the prison before the guards came
to conduct the victims to their fate. It was like the story of Jason and
Medea retold.
With hidden sword and clue Theseus followed the guards, in the midst of
his fellow-prisoners. They were led into the depths of the Labyrinth
and there left to their fate. But the guards had failed to observe that
Theseus had fastened his thread at the entrance and was unwinding the
ball as he went. And now, in this dire den, for hours the hapless
victims awaited their destiny. Mid-day came, and with it a distant roar
from the monster reverberated frightfully through the long passages.
Nearer came the blood-thirsty brute, his bellowing growing louder as he
scented human beings. The trembling victims waited with but a single
hope, and that was in the sword of their valiant prince. At length the
creature appeared, in form a man of giant stature, but with the horned
head and huge mouth of a bull.
Battle at once began between the prince and the brute. It soon ended.
Springing agilely behind the ravening monster, Theseus, with a swinging
stroke of his blade, cut off one of its legs at the knee. As the
man-brute fell prone, and lay bellowing with pain, a thrust through the
back reached its heart, and all peril from the Minotaur was at an end.
This victory gained, the task of Theseus was easy. The thread led back
to the entrance. By aid of this clue the door of escape was quickly
gained. Waiting until night, the hostages left the dreaded Labyrinth
under cover of the darkness. Ariadne was in waiting, the ship was
secretly gained, and the rescued Athenians with their fair companion
sailed away, unknown to the king.
But Theseus proved false to the maiden to whom he owed his life.
Stopping at the island of Naxos, which was sacred to Dionysus (or
Bacchus), the god of wine, he had a dream in which the god bade him to
desert Ariadne and sail away. This the faithless swain did, leaving the
weeping maiden deserted on the island. Legend goes on to tell us that
the despair of the lamenting maiden ended in the sleep of exhaustion,
and that while sleeping Dionysus found her, and made her his wife. As
for the dream of Theseus, it was one of those convenient excuses which
traitors to love never lack.