an affair like this? It is a matter of state policy, and therefore quite
beyond thy weak comprehension. Go water thy flowers, and think no more of
these Athenian caitiffs, whom the Minotaur shall as certainly eat up for
breakfast as I will eat a partridge for my supper.”
So saying, the king looked cruel enough to devour Theseus and all the
rest of the captives, himself, had there been no Minotaur to save him the
trouble. As he would hear not another word in their favor, the prisoners
were now led away, and clapped into a dungeon, where the jailer advised
to go to sleep as soon as possible, because the Minotaur was in the habit
of calling for breakfast early. The seven maidens and six of the young
men soon sobbed themselves to slumber. But Theseus was not like them.
He felt conscious that he was wiser, and braver, and stronger than his
companions, and that therefore he had the responsibility of all their
lives upon him, and must consider whether there was no way to save them,
even in this last extremity. So he kept himself awake, and paced to and
fro across the gloomy dungeon in which they were shut up.
Just before midnight, the door was softly unbarred, and the gentle
Ariadne showed herself, with a torch in her hand.
“Are you awake, Prince Theseus?” she whispered.
“Yes,” answered Theseus. “With so little time to live, I do not choose to
waste any of it in sleep.”
“Then follow me,” said Ariadne, “and tread softly.”
What had become of the jailer and the guards, Theseus never knew. But,
however that might be, Ariadne opened all the doors, and led him forth
from the darksome prison into the pleasant moonlight.
“Theseus,” said the maiden, “you can now get on board your vessel, and
sail away for Athens.”
“No,” answered the young man; “I will never leave Crete unless I can
first slay the Minotaur, and save my poor companions, and deliver Athens
from this cruel tribute.”
“I knew that this would be your resolution,” said Ariadne. “Come, then,
with me, brave Theseus. Here is your own sword, which the guards deprived
you of. You will need it; and pray Heaven you may use it well.”
Then she led Theseus along by the hand until they came to a dark,
shadowy grove, where the moonlight wasted itself on the tops of the
trees, without shedding hardly so much as a glimmering beam upon their
pathway. After going a good way through this obscurity, they reached a
high marble wall, which was overgrown with creeping plants, that made
it shaggy with their verdure. The wall seemed to have no door, nor any
windows, but rose up, lofty, and massive, and mysterious, and was neither
to be clambered over, nor, so far as Theseus could perceive, to be passed
through. Nevertheless, Ariadne did but press one of her soft little
fingers against a particular block of marble, and, though it looked as
solid as any other part of the wall, it yielded to her touch, disclosing
an entrance just wide enough to admit them. They crept through, and the
marble stone swung back into its place.
“We are now,” said Ariadne, “in the famous labyrinth which Dædalus built
before he made himself a pair of wings, and flew away from our island
like a bird. That Dædalus was a very cunning workman; but of all his
artful contrivances, this labyrinth is the most wondrous. Were we to take
but a few steps from the doorway, we might wander about all our lifetime,
and never find it again. Yet in the very center of this labyrinth is the
Minotaur and, Theseus, you must go thither to seek him.”
“But how shall I ever find him,” asked Theseus, “if the labyrinth so
bewilders me as you say it will?”
Just as he spoke, they heard a rough and very disagreeable roar, which
greatly resembled the lowing of a fierce bull, but yet had some sort of
sound like the human voice. Theseus even fancied a rude articulation in
it, as if the creature that uttered it were trying to shape his hoarse
breath into words. It was at some distance, however, and he really could
not tell whether it sounded most like a bull’s roar or a man’s harsh
voice.
“That is the Minotaur’s noise,” whispered Ariadne, closely grasping the
hand of Theseus, and pressing one of her own hands to her heart, which
was all in a tremble. “You must follow that sound through the windings of
the labyrinth, and, by and by, you will find him. Stay! take the end of
this silken string, I will hold the other end; and then, if you win the
victory, it will lead you again to this spot. Farewell, brave Theseus.”
So the young man took the end of the silken string in his left hand,
and his gold-hilted sword, ready drawn from its scabbard, in the other,
and trod boldly into the inscrutable labyrinth. How this labyrinth was
built is more than I can tell you, but so cunningly contrived a mizmaze
was never seen in the world, before nor since. There can be nothing
else so intricate, unless it were the brain of a man like Dædalus, who
planned it, or the heart of any ordinary man; which last, to be sure,
is ten times as great a mystery as the labyrinth of Crete. Theseus had
not taken five steps before he lost sight of Ariadne and in five more
his head was growing dizzy. But still he went on, now creeping through a
low arch, now ascending a flight of steps, now in one crooked passage,
and now in another, with here a door opening before him, and there one
hanging behind, until it really seemed as if the walls spun round, and
whirled him round along with them. And all the while, through these
hollow avenues, now nearer, now farther off again, resounded the cry of
the Minotaur; and the sound was so fierce, so cruel, so ugly, so like
a bull’s roar, and withal so like a human voice, and yet like neither
of them, that the brave heart of Theseus grew sterner and angrier at
every step; for he felt it an insult to the moon and sky, and to our
affectionate and simple Mother Earth, that such a monster should have the
audacity to exist.
As he passed onward, the clouds gathered over the moon, and the
labyrinth grew so dusky that Theseus could no longer discern the
bewilderment through which he was passing. He would have felt quite
lost, and utterly hopeless of ever again walking in a straight path,
if, every little while, he had not been conscious of a gentle twitch at
the silken cord. Then he knew that the tender-hearted Ariadne was still
holding the other end, and that she was fearing for him, and hoping for
him, and giving him just as much of her sympathy as if she were close by
his side. Oh, indeed, I can assure you, there, was a vast deal of human
sympathy running along that slender thread of silk. But still he followed
the dreadful roar of the Minotaur, which now grew louder and louder, and
finally so very loud that Theseus fully expected to come close upon him,
at every new zigzag and wriggle of the path. And at last, in an open
space, at the very center of the labyrinth, he did discern the hideous
creature.
Sure enough, what an ugly monster it was! Only his horned head belonged
to a bull; and yet, somehow or other, he looked like a bull all over,
preposterously waddling on his hind legs; or, if you happened to view
him in another way, he seemed wholly a man, and all the more monstrous
for being so. And there he was, the wretched thing, with no society, no
companion, no kind of a mate, living only to do mischief, and incapable
of knowing what affection means. Theseus hated him, and shuddered at
him, and yet could not but be sensible of some sort of pity; and all
the more, the uglier and more detestable the creature was. For he kept
striding to and fro, in a solitary frenzy of rage, continually emitting a
hoarse roar, which was oddly mixed up with half-shaped words; and, after
listening a while, Theseus understood that the Minotaur was saying to
himself how miserable he was, and how hungry, and how he hated everybody,
and how he longed to eat up the human race alive.
Ah, the bull-headed villain! And oh, my good little people, you will
perhaps see, one of these days, as I do now, that every human being who
suffers anything evil to get into his nature, or to remain there, is a
kind of Minotaur, an enemy of his fellow-creatures, and separated from
all good companionship, as this poor monster was.
Was Theseus afraid? By no means, my dear auditors. What! a hero like
Theseus afraid! Not had the Minotaur had twenty bull heads instead of
one. Bold as he was, however, I rather fancy that it strengthened his
valiant heart, just at this crisis, to feel a tremulous twitch at the
silken cord, which he was still holding in his left hand. It was as
if Ariadne were giving him all her might and courage; and, much as he
already had, and little as she had to give, it made his own seem twice as
much. And to confess the honest truth, he needed the whole, for now the
Minotaur, turning suddenly about, caught sight of Theseus, and instantly
lowered his horribly sharp horns, exactly as a mad bull does when he
means to rush against an enemy. At the same time, he belched forth a
tremendous roar, in which there was something like the words of human
language, but all disjointed and shaken to pieces by passing through the
gullet of a miserably enraged brute.
Theseus could only guess what the creature intended to say, and that
rather by his gestures than his words, for the Minotaur’s horns were
sharper than his wits, and of a great deal more service to him than his
tongue. But probably this was the sense of what he uttered:
“Ah, wretch of a human being! I’ll stick my horns through you, and toss
you fifty feet high, and eat you up the moment you come down.”
“Come on, then, and try it!” was all that Theseus deigned to reply; for
he was far too magnanimous to assault his enemy with insolent language.
Without more words on either side, there ensued the most awful fight
between Theseus and the Minotaur that ever happened beneath the sun or
moon. I really know not how it might have turned out, if the monster, in
his first headlong rush against Theseus, had not missed him, by a hair’s
breadth, and broken one of his horns short off against the stone wall.
On this mishap he bellowed so intolerably that a part of the labyrinth
tumbled down, and all the inhabitants of Crete mistook the noise for
an uncommonly heavy thunder-storm. Smarting with the pain, he galloped
around the open space in so ridiculous a way that Theseus laughed at it,
long afterwards, though not precisely at the moment. After this, the two
antagonists stood valiantly up to one another, and fought sword to horn,
for a long while. At last, the Minotaur made a run at Theseus, grazed
his left side with his horn, and flung him down; and thinking that he
had stabbed him to the heart, he cut a great caper in the air, opened
his bull mouth from ear to ear, and prepared to snap his head off. But
Theseus by this time had leaped up, and caught the monster off his guard.
Fetching a sword stroke at him with all his force, he hit him fair upon
the neck, and made his bull head skip six yards from his human body,
which fell down flat upon the ground.
So now the battle was ended. Immediately the moon shone out as brightly
as if all the troubles of the world, and all the wickedness and the
ugliness that infest human life, were past and gone forever. And Theseus,
as he leaned on his sword taking breath, felt another twitch of the
silken cord; for all through the terrible encounter, he had held it fast
in his left hand. Eager to let Ariadne know of his success, he followed
the guidance of the thread, and soon found himself at the entrance of the
labyrinth.
“Thou hast slain the monster,” cried Ariadne, clasping her hands.
“Thanks to thee, dear Ariadne,” answered Theseus, “I return victorious.”
“Then,” said Ariadne, “we must quickly summon thy friends, and get them
and thyself on board the vessel before dawn. If morning finds thee here,
my father will avenge the Minotaur.”
To make my story short, the poor captives were awakened, and, hardly
knowing whether it was not a joyful dream, were told of what Theseus had
done, and that they must set sail for Athens before daybreak. Hastening
down to the vessel, they all clambered on board, except Prince Theseus,
who lingered behind them on the strand, holding Ariadne’s hand clasped in
his own.
“Dear maiden,” said he, “thou wilt surely go with us. Thou art too gentle
and sweet a child for such an iron-hearted father as King Minos. He
cares no more for thee than a granite rock cares for the little flower
that grows in one of its crevices. But my father King Ægeus, and my dear
mother, Æthra, and all the fathers and mothers in Athens, and all the
sons and daughters too, will love and honor thee as their benefactress.
Come with us, then; for King Minos will be very angry when he knows what
thou hast done.”
Now, some low-minded people, who pretend to tell the story of Theseus
and Ariadne, have the face to say that this royal and honorable maiden
did really flee away, under cover of the night, with the young stranger
whose life she had preserved. They say, too, that Prince Theseus (who
could have died sooner than wrong the meanest creature in the world)
ungratefully deserted Ariadne on a solitary island, where the vessel
touched on its voyage to Athens. But, had the noble Theseus heard these
falsehoods, he would have served their slanderous authors as he served
the Minotaur! Here is what Ariadne answered, when the brave Prince of
Athens besought her to accompany him:
“No, Theseus,” the maiden said, pressing his hand, and then drawing back
a step or two, “I cannot go with you. My father is old, and has nobody
but myself to love him. Hard as you think his heart is, it would break to
lose me. At first, King Minos will be angry; but he will soon forgive
his only child; and, by and by, he will rejoice, I know, that no more
youths and maidens must come from Athens to be devoured by the Minotaur.
I have saved you, Theseus, as much for my father’s sake as for your own.
Farewell! Heaven bless you!”
All this was so true, and so maiden-like, and was spoken with so sweet a
dignity, that Theseus would have blushed to urge her any longer. Nothing
remained for him, therefore, but to bid Ariadne an affectionate farewell,
and to go on board the vessel, and set sail.
In a few moments the white foam was boiling up before their prow,
as Prince Theseus and his companions sailed out of the harbor, with
a whistling breeze behind them. Talus, the brazen giant, on his
never-ceasing sentinel’s march, happened to be approaching that part of
the coast; and they saw him, by the glimmering of the moonbeams on his
polished surface, while he was yet a great way off. As the figure moved
like clockwork, however, and could neither hasten his enormous strides
nor retard them, he arrived at the port when they were just beyond the
reach of his club. Nevertheless, straddling from headland to headland,
as his custom was, Talus attempted to strike a blow at the vessel, and,
overreaching himself, tumbled at full length into the sea, which splashed
high over his gigantic shape, as when an iceberg turns a somerset. There
he lies yet; and whoever desires to enrich himself by means of brass had
better go thither with a diving bell, and fish up Talus.
On the homeward voyage, the fourteen youths and damsels were in
excellent spirits, as you will easily suppose. They spent most of their
time in dancing, unless when the sidelong breeze made the deck slope too
much. In due season, they came within sight of the coast of Attica, which
was their native country. But here, I am grieved to tell you, happened a
sad misfortune.
You will remember (what Theseus unfortunately forgot) that his father,
King Ægeus, had enjoined it upon him to hoist sunshiny sails, instead
of black ones, in case he should overcome the Minotaur, and return
victorious. In the joy of their success, however, and amidst the sports,
dancing, and other merriment, with which these young folks wore away the
time, they never once thought whether their sails were black, white, or
rainbow colored, and, indeed, left it entirely to the mariners whether
they had any sails at all. Thus the vessel returned, like a raven, with
the same sable wings that had wafted her away. But poor King Ægeus, day
after day, infirm as he was, had clambered to the summit of a cliff that
overhung the sea, and there sat watching for Prince Theseus, homeward
bound; and no sooner did he behold the fatal blackness of the sails, than
he concluded that his dear son, whom he loved so much, and felt so proud
of, had been eaten by the Minotaur. He could not bear the thought of
living any longer; so, first flinging his crown and scepter into the sea
(useless baubles that they were to him now!) King Ægeus merely stooped
forward, and fell headlong over the cliff, and was drowned, poor soul, in
the waves that foamed at its base!
This was melancholy news for Prince Theseus, who when he stepped ashore,
found himself king of all the country, whether he would or no; and such
a turn of fortune was enough to make any young man feel very much out of
spirits. However, he sent for his dear mother to Athens, and, by taking
her advice in matters of state, became a very excellent monarch, and was
greatly beloved by his people.
PEGASUS, THE WINGED HORSE
By Nathaniel Hawthorne
Once, in the old, old times a fountain gushed out of a hill-side, in the
marvellous land of Greece. And, for aught I know, after so many thousand
years, it is still gushing out of the very selfsame spot. At any rate,
there was the pleasant fountain, welling freshly forth and sparkling
adown the hill-side, in the golden sunset, when a handsome young man
named Bellerophon drew near its margin. In his hand he held a bridle,
studded with brilliant gems, and adorned with a golden bit. Seeing an old
man, and another of middle age, and a little boy, near the fountain, and
likewise a maiden, who was dipping up some of the water in a pitcher, he
paused, and begged that he might refresh himself with a draught.
“This is very delicious water,” he said to the maiden as he rinsed and
filled her pitcher, after drinking out of it. “Will you be kind enough to
tell me whether the fountain has any name?”
“Yes; it is called the Fountain of Pirene,” answered the maiden; and
then she added, “My grandmother has told me that this clear fountain was
once a beautiful woman; and when her son was killed by the arrows of the
huntress Diana, she melted all away into tears. And so the water, which
you find so cool and sweet, is the sorrow of that poor mother’s heart!”
“I should not have dreamed,” observed the young stranger, “that so clear
a well-spring with its gush and gurgle, and its cheery dance out of the
shade into the sunlight, had so much as one tear-drop in its bosom! And
this, then, is Pirene? I thank you, pretty maiden, for telling me its
name. I have come from a far-away country to find this very spot.”
A middle-aged country fellow (he had driven his cow to drink out of the
spring) stared hard at young Bellerophon, and at the handsome bridle
which he carried in his hand.
“The water-courses must be getting low, friend, in your part of the
world,” remarked he, “if you come so far only to find the Fountain of
Pirene. But, pray, have you lost a horse? I see you carry the bridle in
your hand; and a very pretty one it is with that double row of bright
stones upon it. If the horse was as fine as the bridle, you are much to
be pitied for losing him.”
“I have lost no horse,” said Bellerophon, with a smile. “But I happen to
be seeking a very famous one, which, as wise people have informed me,
must be found hereabouts, if anywhere. Do you know whether the winged
horse Pegasus still haunts the Fountain of Pirene, as he used to do in
your forefathers’ days?”
But then the country fellow laughed.
Some of you, my little friends, have probably heard that this Pegasus was
a snow-white steed, with beautiful silvery wings, who spent most of his
time on the summit of Mount Helicon. He was as wild, and as swift, and
as buoyant, in his flight through the air, as any eagle that ever soared
into the clouds. There was nothing else like him in the world. He had no
mate; he never had been backed or bridled by a master; and, for many a
long year, he led a solitary and a happy life.
Oh, how fine a thing it is to be a winged horse! Sleeping at night, as he
did, on a lofty mountain-top, and passing the greater part of the day in
the air, Pegasus seemed hardly to be a creature of the earth. Whenever
he was seen, up very high above people’s heads, with the sunshine on his
silvery wings, you would have thought that he belonged to the sky, and
that, skimming a little too low, he had got astray among our mists and
vapors, and was seeking his way back again. It was very pretty to behold
him plunge into the fleecy bosom of a bright cloud, and be lost in it,
for a moment or two, and then break forth from the other side. Or, in a
sullen rainstorm, when there was a gray pavement of clouds over the whole
sky, it would sometimes happen that the winged horse descended right
through it, and the glad light of the upper region would gleam after him.
In another instant, it is true, both Pegasus and the pleasant light would
be gone away together. But any one that was fortunate enough to see this
wondrous spectacle felt cheerful the whole day afterward, and as much
longer as the storm lasted.
In the summer-time and in the beautifulest of weather, Pegasus often
alighted on the solid earth, and, closing his silvery wings, would
gallop over hill and dale for pastime as fleetly as the wind. Oftener
than in any other place, he had been seen near the Fountain of Pirene,
drinking the delicious water, or rolling himself upon the soft grass of
the margin. Sometimes, too (but Pegasus was very dainty in his food), he
would crop a few of the clover-blossoms that happened to be sweetest.
To the Fountain of Pirene, therefore, people’s great-grandfathers had
been in the habit of going (as long as they were youthful, and retained
their faith in winged horses), in hopes of getting a glimpse at the
beautiful Pegasus. But, of late years, he had been very seldom seen.
Indeed, there were many of the country folks, dwelling within half an
hour’s walk of the fountain, who had never beheld Pegasus, and did not
believe that there was any such creature in existence. The country fellow
to whom Bellerophon was speaking chanced to be one of those incredulous
persons.
And that was the reason why he laughed.
“Pegasus, indeed!” cried he, turning up his nose as high as such a flat
nose could be turned up—“Pegasus, indeed! A winged horse, truly! Why,
friend, are you in your senses? Of what use would wings be to a horse?
Could he drag the plow so well, think you? To be sure, there might be a
little saving in the expense of shoes; but then, how would a man like
to see his horse flying out of the stable window?—yes, or whisking him
up above the clouds, when he only wanted to ride to the mill? No, no! I
don’t believe in Pegasus. There never was such a ridiculous kind of a
horse-fowl made!”
“I have some reason to think otherwise,” said Bellerophon, quietly.
And then he turned to an old gray man, who was leaning on a staff, and
listening very attentively, with his head stretched forward, and one
hand at his ear, because, for the last twenty years, he had been getting
rather deaf.
“And what say you, venerable sir?” inquired he. “In your younger days, I
should imagine, you must frequently have seen the winged steed!”
“Ah, young stranger, my memory is very poor!” said the aged man. “When
I was a lad, if I remember rightly, I used to believe there was such a
horse, and so did everybody else. But nowadays, I hardly know what to
think, and very seldom think about the winged horse at all. If I ever saw
the creature, it was a long, long while ago; and, to tell you the truth,
I doubt whether I ever did see him. One day, to be sure, when I was quite
a youth, I remember seeing some hoof-tramps round about the brink of the
fountain. Pegasus might have made those hoof-marks; and so might some
other horse.”
“And have you never seen him, my fair maiden?” asked Bellerophon of the
girl, who stood with the pitcher on her head, while this talk went on.
“You certainly could see Pegasus, if anybody can, for your eyes are very
bright.”