their swords against their shields, and boiling over with the red-hot
thirst for battle. Then they began to shout, "Show us the enemy! Lead us
to the charge! Death or victory! Come on, brave comrades! Conquer or
die!" and a hundred other outcries, such as men always bellow forth on a
battle-field, and which these dragon people seemed to have at their
tongues' ends. At last, the front rank caught sight of Jason, who,
beholding the flash of so many weapons in the moonlight, had thought it
best to draw his sword. In a moment all the sons of the dragon's teeth
appeared to take Jason for an enemy; and crying with one voice, "Guard
the Golden Fleece!" they ran at him with uplifted swords and protruded
spears. Jason knew that it would be impossible to withstand this
bloodthirsty battalion with his single arm, but determined, since there
was nothing better to be done, to die as valiantly as if he himself had
sprung from a dragon's tooth.
Medea, however, bade him snatch up a stone from the ground.
"Throw it among them quickly!" cried she. "It is the only way to save
yourself."
The armed men were now so nigh that Jason could discern the fire
flashing out of their enraged eyes, when he let fly the stone, and saw
it strike the helmet of a tall warrior, who was rushing upon him with
his blade aloft. The stone glanced from this man's helmet to the shield
of his nearest comrade, and thence flew right into the angry face of
another, hitting him smartly between the eyes. Each of the three who had
been struck by the stone took it for granted that his next neighbor had
given him a blow; and instead of running any farther towards Jason, they
began a fight among themselves. The confusion spread through the host,
so that it seemed scarcely a moment before they were all hacking,
hewing, and stabbing at one another, lopping off arms, heads, and legs,
and doing such memorable deeds that Jason was filled with immense
admiration; although, at the same time, he could not help laughing to
behold these mighty men punishing each other for an offence which he
himself had committed. In an incredibly short space of time (almost as
short, indeed, as it had taken them to grow up), all but one of the
heroes of the dragon's teeth were stretched lifeless on the field. The
last survivor, the bravest and strongest of the whole, had just force
enough to wave his crimson sword over his head, and give a shout of
exultation, crying, "Victory! Victory! Immortal fame!" when he himself
fell down, and lay quietly among his slain brethren.
And there was the end of the army that had sprouted from the dragons
teeth. That fierce and feverish fight was the only enjoyment which they
had tasted on this beautiful earth.
"Let them sleep in the bed of honor," said the Princess Medea, with a
sly smile at Jason. "The world will always have simpletons enough, just
like them, fighting and dying for they know not what, and fancying that
posterity will take the trouble to put laurel wreaths on their rusty and
battered helmets. Could you help smiling, Prince Jason, to see the
self-conceit of that last fellow, just as he tumbled down?"
"It made me very sad," answered Jason, gravely. "And, to tell you the
truth, princess, the Golden Fleece does not appear so well worth the
winning, after what I have here beheld."
"You will think differently in the morning," said Medea. "True, the
Golden Fleece may not be so valuable as you have thought it; but then
there is nothing better in the world; and one must needs have an object,
you know. Come! Your night's work has been well performed; and to-morrow
you can inform King AEetes that the first part of your allotted task is
fulfilled."
Agreeably to Medea's advice, Jason went betimes in the morning to the
palace of King AEetes. Entering the presence-chamber, he stood at the
foot of the throne, and made a low obeisance.
"Your eyes look heavy, Prince Jason," observed the king; "you appear to
have spent a sleepless night. I hope you have been considering the
matter a little more wisely, and have concluded not to get yourself
scorched to a cinder, in attempting to tame my brazen-lunged bulls."
"That is already accomplished, may it please your Majesty," replied
Jason. "The bulls have been tamed and yoked; the field has been
ploughed; the dragon's teeth have been sown broadcast, and harrowed into
the soil; the crop of armed warriors has sprung up, and they have slain
one another, to the last man. And now I solicit your Majesty's
permission to encounter the dragon, that I may take down the Golden
Fleece from the tree, and depart, with my nine-and-forty comrades."
King AEetes scowled, and looked very angry and excessively disturbed; for
he knew that, in accordance with his kingly promise, he ought now to
permit Jason to win the fleece, if his courage and skill should enable
him to do so. But, since the young man had met with such good luck in
the matter of the brazen bulls and the dragon's teeth, the king feared
that he would be equally successful in slaying the dragon. And
therefore, though he would gladly have seen Jason snapped up at a
mouthful, he was resolved (and it was a very wrong thing of this wicked
potentate) not to run any further risk of losing his beloved fleece.
"You never would have succeeded in this business, young man," said he,
"if my undutiful daughter Medea had not helped you with her
enchantments. Had you acted fairly, you would have been, at this
instant, a black cinder, or a handful of white ashes. I forbid you, on
pain of death, to make any more attempts to get the Golden Fleece. To
speak my mind plainly, you shall never set eyes on so much as one of its
glistening locks."
Jason left the king's presence in great sorrow and anger. He could think
of nothing better to be done than to summon together his forty-nine
brave Argonauts, march at once to the grove of Mars, slay the dragon,
take possession of the Golden Fleece, get on board the Argo, and spread
all sail for Iolchos. The success of the scheme depended, it is true, on
the doubtful point whether all the fifty heroes might not be snapped up,
at so many mouthfuls, by the dragon. But, as Jason was hastening down
the palace steps, the Princess Medea called after him, and beckoned him
to return. Her black eyes shone upon him with such a keen intelligence,
that he felt as if there were a serpent peeping out of them; and
although she had done him so much service only the night before, he was
by no means very certain that she would not do him an equally great
mischief before sunset. These enchantresses, you must know, are never to
be depended upon.
"What says King AEetes, my royal and upright father?" inquired Medea,
slightly smiling. "Will he give you the Golden Fleece, without any
further risk or trouble?"
"On the contrary," answered Jason, "he is very angry with me for taming
the brazen bulls and sowing the dragon's teeth. And he forbids me to
make any more attempts, and positively refuses to give up the Golden
Fleece, whether I slay the dragon or no."
"Yes, Jason," said the princess, "and I can tell you more. Unless you
set sail from Colchis before to-morrow's sunrise, the king means to burn
your fifty-oared galley, and put yourself and your forty-nine brave
comrades to the sword. But be of good courage. The Golden Fleece you
shall have, if it lies within the power of my enchantments to get it for
you. Wait for me here an hour before midnight."
At the appointed hour, you might again have seen Prince Jason and the
Princess Medea, side by side, stealing through the streets of Colchis,
on their way to the sacred grove, in the centre of which the Golden
Fleece was suspended to a tree. While they were crossing the
pasture-ground, the brazen bulls came towards Jason, lowing, nodding
their heads, and thrusting forth their snouts, which, as other cattle
do, they loved to have rubbed and caressed by a friendly hand. Their
fierce nature was thoroughly tamed; and, with their fierceness, the two
furnaces in their stomachs had likewise been extinguished, insomuch that
they probably enjoyed far more comfort in grazing and chewing their cuds
than ever before. Indeed, it had heretofore been a great inconvenience
to these poor animals, that, whenever they wished to eat a mouthful of
grass, the fire out of their nostrils had shrivelled it up, before they
could manage to crop it. How they contrived to keep themselves alive is
more than I can imagine. But now, instead of emitting jets of flame and
streams of sulphurous vapor, they breathed the very sweetest of cow
breath.
After kindly patting the bulls, Jason followed Medea's guidance into the
grove of Mars, where the great oak-trees, that had been growing for
centuries, threw so thick a shade that the moonbeams struggled vainly to
find their way through it. Only here and there a glimmer fell upon the
leaf-strewn earth, or now and then a breeze stirred the boughs aside,
and gave Jason a glimpse of the sky, lest, in that deep obscurity, he
might forget that there was one, overhead. At length, when they had gone
farther and farther into the heart of the duskiness, Medea squeezed
Jason's hand.
"Look yonder," she whispered. "Do you see it?"
Gleaming among the venerable oaks, there was a radiance, not like the
moonbeams, but rather resembling the golden glory of the setting sun. It
proceeded from an object, which appeared to be suspended at about a
man's height from the ground, a little farther within the wood.
"What is it?" asked Jason.
"Have you come so far to seek it," exclaimed Medea, "and do you not
recognize the meed of all your toils and perils, when it glitters before
your eyes? It is the Golden Fleece."
Jason went onward a few steps farther, and then stopped to gaze. Oh, how
beautiful it looked, shining with a marvellous light of its own, that
inestimable prize, which so many heroes had longed to behold, but had
perished in the quest of it, either by the perils of their voyage, or by
the fiery breath of the brazen-lunged bulls.
"How gloriously it shines!" cried Jason, in a rapture. "It has surely
been dipped in the richest gold of sunset. Let me hasten onward, and
take it to my bosom."
"Stay," said Medea, holding him back. "Have you forgotten what guards
it?"
To say the truth, in the joy of beholding the object of his desires, the
terrible dragon had quite slipped out of Jason's memory. Soon, however,
something came to pass that reminded him what perils were still to be
encountered. An antelope, that probably mistook the yellow radiance for
sunrise, came bounding fleetly through the grove. He was rushing
straight towards the Golden Fleece, when suddenly there was a frightful
hiss, and the immense head and half of the scaly body of the dragon was
thrust forth (for he was twisted round the trunk of the tree on which
the fleece hung), and seizing the poor antelope, swallowed him with one
snap of his jaws.
After this feat, the dragon seemed sensible that some other living
creature was within reach on which he felt inclined to finish his meal.
In various directions he kept poking his ugly snout among the trees,
stretching out his neck a terrible long way, now here, now there, and
now close to the spot where Jason and the princess were hiding behind an
oak. Upon my word, as the head came waving and undulating through the
air, and reaching almost within arm's-length of Prince Jason, it was a
very hideous and uncomfortable sight. The gape of his enormous jaws was
nearly as wide as the gateway of the king's palace.
"Well, Jason," whispered Medea (for she was ill-natured, as all
enchantresses are, and wanted to make the bold youth tremble), "what do
you think now of your prospect of winning the Golden Fleece?"
Jason answered only by drawing his sword and making a step forward.
"Stay, foolish youth," said Medea, grasping his arm. "Do not you see you
are lost, without me as your good angel? In this gold box I have a magic
potion, which will do the dragon's business far more effectually than
your sword."
The dragon had probably heard the voices; for, swift as lightning, his
black head and forked tongue came hissing among the trees again, darting
full forty feet at a stretch. As it approached, Medea tossed the
contents of the gold box right down the monster's wide open throat.
Immediately, with an outrageous hiss and a tremendous wriggle,--flinging
his tail up to the tip-top of the tallest tree, and shattering all its
branches as it crashed heavily down again,--the dragon fell at full
length upon the ground, and lay quite motionless.
"It is only a sleeping potion," said the enchantress to Prince Jason.
"One always finds a use for these mischievous creatures, sooner or
later; so I did not wish to kill him outright. Quick! Snatch the prize,
and let us begone. You have won the Golden Fleece."
Jason caught the fleece from the tree, and hurried through the grove,
the deep shadows of which were illuminated as he passed by the golden
glory of the precious object that he bore along. A little way before
him, he beheld the old woman whom he had helped over the stream, with
her peacock beside her. She clapped her hands for joy, and beckoning him
to make haste, disappeared among the duskiness of the trees. Espying the
two winged sons of the North Wind (who were disporting themselves in the
moonlight, a few hundred feet aloft), Jason bade them tell the rest of
the Argonauts to embark as speedily as possible. But Lynceus, with his
sharp eyes, had already caught a glimpse of him, bringing the Golden
Fleece, although several stone-walls, a hill, and the black shadows of
the grove of Mars intervened between. By his advice, the heroes had
seated themselves on the benches of the galley, with their oars held
perpendicularly, ready to let fall into the water.
As Jason drew near, he heard the Talking Image calling to him with more
than ordinary eagerness, in its grave, sweet voice:--
"Make haste, Prince Jason! For your life, make haste!"
With one hound he leaped aboard. At sight of the glorious radiance of
the Golden Fleece, the nine-and-forty heroes gave a mighty shout, and
Orpheus, striking his harp, sang a song of triumph, to the cadence of
which the galley flew over the water, homeward bound, as if careering
along with wings!