THE HOUSE OF MINOS
=172. Minos of Crete= was a descendant of Inachus in the sixth
generation. A son of Jupiter and Europa, he was, after death,
transferred, with his brother Rhadamanthus and with King Æacus, to
Hades, where the three became judges of the Shades. This is the Minos
mentioned by Homer and Hesiod,--the eminent lawgiver. Of his grandson,
Minos II, it is related that when aiming at the crown of Crete, he
boasted of his power to obtain by prayer whatever he desired, and as
a test, he implored Neptune to send him a bull for sacrifice. The
bull appeared, but Minos, astonished at its great beauty, declined
to sacrifice the brute. Neptune, therefore incensed, drove the bull
wild,--worse still, drove Pasiphaë, the wife of Minos, wild with
love of it. The wonderful brute was finally caught and overcome by
Hercules, who rode it through the waves to Greece. But its offspring,
the Minotaur, a monster bull-headed and man-bodied, remained for many
a day a terror to Crete, till finally a famous artificer, Dædalus,
constructed for him a labyrinth, with passages and turnings winding
in and about like the river Mæander, so that whoever was inclosed in
it might by no means find his way out. The Minotaur, roaming therein,
lived upon human victims. For it is said that, after Minos had subdued
Megara,[256] a tribute of seven youths and seven maidens was sent every
year from Athens to Crete to feed this monster; and it was not until
the days of Theseus of Athens that an end was put to both tribute and
Minotaur.[257]
=173. Dædalus and Icarus.=[258] Dædalus, who abetted the love of
Pasiphaë for the Cretan bull, afterwards lost the favor of Minos and
was imprisoned by him. Seeing no other way of escape, the artificer
made, out of feathers, wings for his son Icarus and himself, which he
fastened on with wax. Then poising themselves in the air, they flew
away. Icarus had been warned not to approach too near the sun, and
all went well till they had passed Samos and Delos on the left and
Lebynthos on the right. But then the boy, exulting in his career,
soared upward. The blaze of the torrid sun softened the waxen fastening
of his wings. Off they came, and down the lad dropped into the sea
which after him is named Icarian, even to this day.
[Illustration: FIG. 138. DÆDALUS AND ICARUS]
... With melting wax and loosened strings
Sunk hapless Icarus on unfaithful wings;
Headlong he rushed through the affrighted air,
With limbs distorted and disheveled hair;
His scattered plumage danced upon the wave,
And sorrowing Nereïds decked his watery grave;
O'er his pale corse their pearly sea flowers shed,
And strewed with crimson moss his marble bed;
Struck in their coral towers the passing bell,
And wide in ocean tolled his echoing knell.[259]
The story, save for its tragic conclusion, reads like a remarkable
anticipation of the exploits of the Wright brothers, Blériot, and
Latham with the aëroplane to-day, or of Count Zeppelin with his
airships.
Dædalus, mourning his son, arrived finally in Sicily where, being
kindly received by King Cocalus, he built a temple to Apollo and hung
up his wings, an offering to the god. But Minos, having learned of the
hiding place of the artificer, followed him to Sicily with a great
fleet; and Dædalus would surely have perished, had not one of the
daughters of Cocalus disposed of Minos by scalding him to death while
he was bathing.
It is said that Dædalus could not bear the idea of a rival. His sister
had placed her son Perdix under his charge to be taught the mechanical
arts. He was an apt scholar and gave striking evidences of ingenuity.
Walking on the seashore, he picked up the spine of a fish, and,
imitating it in iron, invented the saw. He invented, also, a pair of
compasses. But Dædalus, envious of his nephew, pushed him off a tower
and killed him. Minerva, however, in pity of the boy, changed him into
a bird, the partridge, which bears his name.
To the descendants of Inachus we shall again return in the account of
the house of Labdacus.
FOOTNOTES:
[256] § 143.
[257] § 177. Apollodorus, 3, 1, § 3; 15, § 8; Pausanias, 1, 27, § 9,
etc.; Ovid, Metam. 7, 456.
[258] Virgil, Æneid, 6, 14-36; Ovid, Metam. 8, 152-259; Hyginus, Fab.
40, 44.
[259] Erasmus Darwin.