While Athens was still only a small city there lived within its walls a
man named Daedalus who was the most skillful worker in wood and stone
and metal that had ever been known. It was he who taught the people how
to build better houses and how to hang their doors on hinges and how to
support the roofs with pillars and posts. He was the first to fasten
things together with glue; he invented the plumb-line and the auger; and
he showed seamen how to put up masts in their ships and how to rig the
sails to them with ropes. He built a stone palace for AEgeus, the young
king of Athens, and beautified the Temple of Athena which stood on the
great rocky hill in the middle of the city.
Daedalus had a nephew named Perdix whom he had taken when a boy to teach
the trade of builder. But Perdix was a very apt learner, and soon
surpassed his master in the knowledge of many things. His eyes were ever
open to see what was going on about him, and he learned the lore of the
fields and the woods. Walking one day by the sea, he picked up the
backbone of a great fish, and from it he invented the saw. Seeing how a
certain bird carved holes in the trunks of trees, he learned how to make
and use the chisel. Then he invented the wheel which potters use in
molding clay; and he made of a forked stick the first pair of compasses
for drawing circles; and he studied out many other curious and useful
things.
Daedalus was not pleased when he saw that the lad was so apt and wise,
so ready to learn, and so eager to do.
"If he keeps on in this way," he murmured, "he will be a greater man
than I; his name will be remembered, and mine will be forgotten."
Day after day, while at his work, Daedalus pondered over this matter,
and soon his heart was filled with hatred towards young Perdix. One
morning when the two were putting up an ornament on the outer wall of
Athena's temple, Daedalus bade his nephew go out on a narrow scaffold
which hung high over the edge of the rocky cliff whereon the temple
stood. Then, when the lad obeyed, it was easy enough, with a blow of a
hammer, to knock the scaffold from its fastenings.
Poor Perdix fell headlong through the air, and he would have been
dashed in pieces upon the stones at the foot of the cliff had not kind
Athena seen him and taken pity upon him. While he was yet whirling
through mid-air she changed him into a partridge, and he flitted away to
the hills to live forever in the woods and fields which he loved so
well. And to this day, when summer breezes blow and the wild flowers
bloom in meadow and glade, the voice of Perdix may still sometimes be
heard, calling to his mate from among the grass and reeds or amid the
leafy underwoods.