found for him. But he wanted to be certain, if he could, that he was to
have sons to succeed him: so many misfortunes happen to kings who have
no children. But how was he to find out whether he should have children
or not? At that time, and always in Greece before it was converted to
Christianity, there were temples of the gods in various places, at which
it was supposed that men might receive answers to their questions.
These temples were called oracles, or places where oracles were given,
and the most famous of them was the temple of Apollo at Pytho, or
Delphi, far to the north-west of Athens. Here was a deep ravine of a
steep mountain, where the god Apollo was said to have shot a monstrous
dragon with his arrows. He then ordered that a temple should be built
here, and in this temple a maiden, being inspired by the god, gave her
prophecies. The people who came to consult her made the richest presents
to the priests, and the temple was full of cups and bowls of gold and
silver, and held more wealth in its chambers than the treasure houses of
the richest kings.
Aegeus determined to go to Delphi to ask his question: would he have sons
to come after him? He did not tell his people where he was going; he
left the kingdom to be governed by his brother Pallas, and he set out
secretly at night, taking no servant. He did not wear royal dress, and
he drove his own chariot, carrying for his offering only a small cup of
silver, for he did not wish it to be known that he was a king, and told
the priests that he was a follower of Peleus, King of Phthia. In answer
to his question, the maiden sang two lines of verse, for she always
prophesied in verse. Her reply was difficult to understand, as oracles
often were, for the maiden seldom spoke out clearly, but in a kind of
riddle that might be understood in more ways than one; so that, whatever
happened, she could not be proved to have made a mistake.
Aegeus was quite puzzled by the answer he got. He did not return to
Athens, but went to consult the prince of Troezene, named Pittheus, who
was thought the wisest man then living. Pittheus did not know who Aegeus
was, but saw that he seemed of noble birth, tall and handsome, so he
received him very kindly, and kept him in his house for some time,
entertaining him with feasts, dances, and hunting parties. Now Pittheus
had a very lovely daughter, named Aethra. She and Aegeus fell in love
with each other, so deeply that they desired to be married. It was the
custom that the bridegroom should pay a price, a number of cattle, to the
father of the bride, and Aegeus, of course, had no cattle to give. But it
was also the custom, if the lover did some very brave and useful action,
to reward him with the hand of his lady, and Aegeus had his opportunity.
A fleet of pirates landed at Troezene and attacked the town, but Aegeus
fought so bravely and led the men of Pittheus so well, that he not only
slew the pirate chief, and defeated his men, but also captured some of
his ships, which were full of plunder, gold, and bronze, and iron, and
slaves. With this wealth Aegeus paid the bride price, as it was called,
for Aethra, and they were married. Pittheus thought himself a lucky man,
for he had no son, and here was a son-in-law who could protect his
little kingdom, and wear the crown when he himself was dead.
Though Pittheus was believed to be very wise, in this matter he was very
foolish. He never knew who Aegeus really was, that is the king of Athens,
nor did poor Aethra know. In a short time Aegeus wearied of beautiful
Aethra, who continued to love him dearly. He was anxious also to return
to his kingdom, for he heard that his brother Pallas and his many sons
were governing badly; and he feared that Pallas might keep the crown for
himself, so he began to speak mysteriously to Aethra, talking about a
long and dangerous journey which he was obliged to make, for secret
reasons, and from which he might never return alive. Aethra wept
bitterly, and sometimes thought, as people did in these days, that the
beautiful stranger might be no man, but a god, and that he might return
to Olympus, the home of the gods, and forget her; for the gods never
tarried long with the mortal women who loved them.
At last Aegeus took Aethra to a lonely glen in the woods, where, beside
a little mountain stream, lay a great moss-grown boulder that an
earthquake, long ago, had shaken from the rocky cliff above. 'The time
is coming,' said Aegeus 'when you and I must part, and only the gods can
tell when we shall meet again! It may be that you will bear a child,
and, if he be a boy, when he has come to his strength you must lead him
to this great stone, and let no man or woman be there but you two only.
You must then bid him roll away the stone, and, if he has no strength to
raise it, so must it be. But if he can roll it away, then let him take
such things as he finds there, and let him consider them well, and do
what the gods put into his heart.'
Thus Aegeus spoke, and on the dawn of the third night after this day,
when Aethra awoke from sleep, she did not find him by her side. She
arose, and ran through the house, calling his name, but there came no
answer, and from that time Aegeus was never seen again in Troezene, and
people marvelled, thinking that he, who came whence no man knew, and was
so brave and beautiful, must be one of the immortal gods. 'Who but a
god,' they said, 'would leave for no cause a bride, the flower of Greece
for beauty, young, and loving; and a kingdom to which he was not born?
Truly he must be Apollo of the silver bow, or Hermes of the golden
wand.'
So they spoke among each other, and honoured Aethra greatly, but she
pined and drooped with sorrow, like a tall lily flower, that the frost
has touched in a rich man's garden.
II
THE BOYHOOD OF THESEUS
Time went by, and Aethra had a baby, a son. This was her only comfort,
and she thought that she saw in him a likeness to his father, whose true
name she did not know. Certainly he was a very beautiful baby, well
formed and strong, and, as soon as he could walk he was apt to quarrel
with other children of his own age, and fight with them in a harmless
way. He never was an amiable child, though he was always gentle to his
mother. From the first he was afraid of nothing, and when he was about
four or five he used to frighten his mother by wandering from home, with
his little bow and arrows, and staying by himself in the woods. However,
he always found his own way back again, sometimes with a bird or a snake
that he had shot, and once dragging the body of a fawn that was nearly
as heavy as himself. Thus his mother, from his early boyhood, had many
fears for him, that he might be killed by some fierce wild boar in the
woods, for he would certainly shoot at whatever beast he met; or that he
might kill some other boy in a quarrel, when he would be obliged to
leave the country. The other boys, however, soon learned not to quarrel
with Theseus (so Aethra had named her son), for he was quick of temper,
and heavy of hand, and, as for the wild beasts, he was cool as well as
eager, and seemed to have an untaught knowledge of how to deal with
them.
Aethra was therefore very proud of her son, and began to hope that when
he was older he would be able to roll away the great stone in the glen.
She told him nothing about it when he was little, but, in her walks with
him in the woods or on the sea shore, she would ask him to try his
force in lifting large stones. When he succeeded she kissed and praised
him, and told him stories of the famous strong man, Heracles, whose name
was well known through all Greece. Theseus could not bear to be beaten
at lifting any weight, and, if he failed, he would rise early and try
again in the morning, for many men, as soon as they rise from bed, can
lift weights which are too heavy for them later in the day.
When Theseus was seven years old, Aethra found for him a tutor, named
Connidas, who taught him the arts of netting beasts and hunting, and how
to manage the dogs, and how to drive a chariot, and wield sword and
shield, and to throw the spear. Other things Connidas taught him which
were known to few men in Greece, for Connidas came from the great rich
island of Crete. He had killed a man there in a quarrel, and fled to
Troezene to escape the revenge of the man's brothers and cousins. In
Crete many people could read and write, which in Greece, perhaps none
could do, and Connidas taught Theseus this learning.
When he was fifteen years old, Theseus went, as was the custom of young
princes, to the temple of Delphi, not to ask questions, but to cut his
long hair, and sacrifice it to the god, Apollo. He cut the forelock of
his hair, so that no enemy, in battle, might take hold of it, for
Theseus intended to fight at close quarters, hand to hand, in war, not
to shoot arrows and throw spears from a distance. By this time he
thought himself a man, and was always asking where his father was, while
Aethra told him how her husband had left her soon after their marriage,
and that she had never heard of him since, but that some day Theseus
might find out all about him for himself, which no other person would
ever be able to do.
Aethra did not wish to tell Theseus too soon the secret of the great
stone, which hid she knew not what. She saw that he would leave her and
go to seek his father, if he was able to raise the stone and find out
the secret, and she could not bear to lose him, now that day by day he
grew more like his father, her lost lover. Besides, she wanted him not
to try to raise the stone till he came to his strength. But when he was
in his nineteenth year, he told her that he would now go all over Greece
and the whole world seeking for his father. She saw that he meant what
he said, and one day she led him alone to the glen where the great stone
lay, and sat down with him there, now talking, and now silent as if she
were listening to the pleasant song of the burn that fell from a height
into a clear deep pool. Really she was listening to make sure that no
hunter and no lovers were near them in the wood, but she only heard the
songs of the water and the birds, no voices, or cry of hounds, or fallen
twig cracking under a footstep.
At last, when she was quite certain that nobody was near, she whispered,
and told Theseus how her husband, before he disappeared, had taken her
to this place, and shown her the great moss-grown boulder, and said
that, when his son could lift that stone away, he would find certain
tokens, and that he must then do what the gods put into his heart.
Theseus listened eagerly, and said, 'If my father lifted that stone, and
placed under it certain tokens, I also can lift it, perhaps not yet, but
some day I shall be as strong a man as my father.' Then he set himself
to move the stone, gradually putting out all his force, but it seemed
rooted in the earth, though he tried it now on one side and now on
another. At last he flung himself at his mother's feet, with his head in
the grass, and lay without speaking. His breath came hard and quick,
and his hands were bleeding. Aethra laid her hand on his long hair, and
was silent. 'I shall not lose my boy this year,' she thought.
They were long in that lonely place, but at last Theseus rose, and
kissed his mother, and stretched his arms. 'Not to-day!' he said, but
his mother thought in her heart, 'Not for many a day, I hope!' Then they
walked home to the house of Pittheus, saying little, and when they had
taken supper, Theseus said that he would go to bed and dream of better
fortune. So he arose, and went to his own chamber, which was built apart
in the court of the palace, and soon Aethra too went to sleep, not
unhappy, for her boy, she thought, would not leave her for a long time.
But in the night Theseus arose, and put on his shoes, and his smock, and
a great double mantle. He girt on his sword of bronze, and went into the
housekeeper's chamber, where he took a small skin of wine, and some
food. These he placed in a wallet which he slung round his neck by a
cord, and, lastly he stole out of the court, and walked to the lonely
glen, and to the pool in the burn near which the great stone lay. Here
he folded his purple mantle of fine wool round him, and lay down to
sleep in the grass, with his sword lying near his hand.
When he awoke the clear blue morning light was round him, and all the
birds were singing their song to the dawn. Theseus arose, threw off his
mantle and smock, and plunged into the cold pool of the burn, and then
he drank a little of the wine, and ate of the bread and cold meat, and
set himself to move the stone. At the first effort, into which he put
all his strength, the stone stirred. With the second he felt it rise a
little way from the ground, and then he lifted with all the might in
his heart and body, and rolled the stone clean over.
[Illustration: THESEUS TRIES TO LIFT THE STONE.]
Beneath it there was nothing but the fresh turned soil, but in a hollow
of the foot of the rock, which now lay upper-most, there was a wrapping
of purple woollen cloth, that covered something. Theseus tore out the
packet, unwrapped the cloth, and found within it a wrapping of white
linen. This wrapping was in many folds, which he undid, and at last he
found a pair of shoon, such as kings wear, adorned with gold, and also
the most beautiful sword that he had ever seen. The handle was of clear
rock crystal, and through the crystal you could see gold, inlaid with
pictures of a lion hunt done in different shades of gold and silver. The
sheath was of leather, with patterns in gold nails, and the blade was of
bronze, a beautiful pattern ran down the centre to the point, the blade
was straight, and double edged, supple, sharp, and strong. Never had
Theseus seen so beautiful a sword, nor one so well balanced in his hand.
He saw that this was a king's sword; and he thought that it had not been
wrought in Greece, for in Greece was no sword-smith that could do such
work. Examining it very carefully he found characters engraved beneath
the hilt, not letters such as the Greeks used in later times, but such
Cretan signs as Connidas had taught him to read, for many a weary hour,
when he would like to have been following the deer in the forest.
Theseus pored over these signs till he read:
Icmalius me made. Of Aegeus of Athens am I.
Now he knew the secret. His father was Aegeus, the king of Athens.
Theseus had heard of him and knew that he yet lived, a sad life full of
trouble. For Aegeus had no child by his Athenian wife, and the fifty
sons of his brother, Pallas (who were called the Pallantidae) despised
him, and feasted all day in his hall, recklessly and fiercely, robbing
the people, and Aegeus had no power in his own kingdom.
'Methinks that my father has need of me!' said Theseus to himself. Then
he wrapped up the sword and shoon in the linen and the cloth of wool,
and walked home in the early morning to the palace of Pittheus.
When Theseus came to the palace, he went straight to the upper chamber
of his mother, where she was spinning wool with a distaff of ivory. When
he laid before her the sword and the shoon, the distaff fell from her
hand, and she hid her head in a fold of her robe. Theseus kissed her
hands and comforted her, and she dried her eyes, and praised him for his
strength. 'These are the sword and the shoon of your father,' she said,
'but truly the gods have taken away his strength and courage. For all
men say that Aegeus of Athens is not master in his own house; his
brother's sons rule him, and with them Medea, the witch woman, that once
was the wife of Jason.'
'The more he needs his son!' said Theseus. 'Mother, I must go to help
him, and be the heir of his kingdom, where you shall be with me always,
and rule the people of Cecrops that fasten the locks of their hair with
grasshoppers of gold.'
'So may it be, my child,' said Aethra, 'if the gods go with you to
protect you. But you will sail to Athens in a ship with fifty oarsmen,
for the ways by land are long, and steep, and dangerous, beset by cruel
giants and monstrous men.'
'Nay, mother,' said Theseus, 'by land must I go, for I would not be
known in Athens, till I see how matters fall out; and I would destroy
these giants and robbers, and give peace to the people, and win glory
among men. This very night I shall set forth.'
He had a sore and sad parting from his mother, but under cloud of night
he went on his way, girt with the sword of Aegeus, his father, and
carrying in his wallet the shoon with ornaments of gold.
III
ADVENTURES OF THESEUS
Theseus walked through the night, and slept for most of the next day at
a shepherd's hut. The shepherd was kind to him, and bade him beware of
one called the Maceman, who guarded a narrow path with a sheer cliff
above, and a sheer precipice below. 'No man born may deal with the
Maceman,' said the shepherd, 'for his great club is of iron, that cannot
be broken, and his strength is as the strength of ten men, though his
legs have no force to bear his body. Men say that he is the son of the
lame god, Hephaestus, who forged his iron mace; there is not the like of
it in the world.'
'Shall I fear a lame man?' said Theseus, 'and is it not easy, even if he
be so terrible a fighter, for me to pass him in the darkness, for I walk
by night?'
The shepherd shook his head. 'Few men have passed Periphetes the
Maceman,' said he, 'and wiser are they who trust to swift ships than to
the upland path.'
'You speak kindly, father,' said Theseus, 'but I am minded to make the
upland paths safe for all men.'
So they parted, and Theseus walked through the sunset and the dusk,
always on a rising path, and the further he went the harder it was to
see the way, for the path was overgrown with grass, and the shadows were
deepening. Night fell, and Theseus hardly dared to go further, for on
his left hand was a wall of rock, and on his right hand a cliff sinking
sheer and steep to the sea. But now he saw a light in front of him, a
red light flickering, as from a great fire, and he could not be content
till he knew why that fire was lighted. So he went on, slowly and
warily, till he came in full view of the fire which covered the whole of
a little platform of rock; on one side the blaze shone up the wall of
cliff on his left hand, on the other was the steep fall to the sea. In
front of this fire was a great black bulk; Theseus knew not what it
might be. He walked forward till he saw that the black bulk was that of
a monstrous man, who sat with his back to the fire. The man nodded his
heavy head, thick with red unshorn hair, and Theseus went up close to
him.
'Ho, sir,' he cried, 'this is my road, and on my road I must pass!'
The seated man opened his eyes sleepily.
'Not without my leave,' he said, 'for I keep this way, I and my club of
iron.'
'Get up and begone!' said Theseus.
'That were hard for me to do,' said the monstrous man, 'for my legs will
not bear the weight of my body, but my arms are strong enough.'
'That is to be seen!' said Theseus, and he drew his sword, and leaped
within the guard of the iron club that the monster, seated as he was,
swung lightly to this side and that, covering the whole width of the
path. The Maceman swung the club at Theseus, but Theseus sprang aside,
and in a moment, before the monster could recover his stroke, drove
through his throat the sword of Aegeus, and he fell back dead.
'He shall have his rights of fire, that his shadow may not wander
outside the House of Hades,' said Theseus to himself, and he toppled the
body of the Maceman into his own great fire. Then he went back some way,
and wrapping himself in his mantle, he slept till the sun was high in
heaven, while the fire had sunk into its embers, and Theseus lightly
sprang over them, carrying with him the Maceman's iron club. The path
now led downwards, and a burn that ran through a green forest kept him
company on the way, and brought him to pleasant farms and houses of men.
They marvelled to see him, a young man, carrying the club of the
Maceman. 'Did you find him asleep?' they asked, and Theseus smiled and
said, 'No, I found him awake. But now he sleeps an iron sleep, from
which he will never waken, and his body had due burning in his own
watchfire.' Then the men and women praised Theseus, and wove for him a
crown of leaves and flowers, and sacrificed sheep to the gods in heaven,
and on the meat they dined, rejoicing that now they could go to Troezene
by the hill path, for they did not love ships and the sea.
When they had eaten and drunk, and poured out the last cup of wine on
the ground, in honour of Hermes, the God of Luck, the country people
asked Theseus where he was going? He said that he was going to walk to
Athens, and at this the people looked sad. 'No man may walk across the
neck of land where Ephyre is built,' they said, 'because above it Sinis
the Pine-Bender has his castle, and watches the way.'
'And who is Sinis, and why does he bend pine trees?' asked Theseus.
'He is the strongest of men, and when he catches a traveller, he binds
him hand and foot, and sets him between two pine trees. Then he bends
them down till they meet, and fastens the traveller to the boughs of
each tree, and lets them spring apart, so that the man is riven
asunder.'
'Two can play at that game,' said Theseus, smiling, and he bade farewell
to the kind country people, shouldered the iron club of Periphetes, and
went singing on his way. The path led him over moors, and past
farm-houses, and at last rose towards the crest of the hill whence he
would see the place where two seas would have met, had they not been
sundered by the neck of land which is now called the Isthmus of Corinth.
Here the path was very narrow, with thick forests of pine trees on each
hand, and 'here,' thought Theseus to himself, 'I am likely to meet the
Pine-Bender.'
Soon he knew that he was right, for he saw the ghastly remains of dead
men that the pine trees bore like horrible fruit, and presently the air
was darkened overhead by the waving of vultures and ravens that prey
upon the dead. 'I shall fight the better in the shade,' said Theseus,
and he loosened the blade of the sword in its sheath, and raised the
club of Periphetes aloft in his hand.
Well it was for him that he raised the iron club, for, just as he lifted
it, there flew out from the thicket something long, and slim, and black,
that fluttered above his head for a moment, and then a loop at the end
of it fell round the head of Theseus, and was drawn tight with a sudden
jerk. But the loop fell also above and round the club, which Theseus
held firm, pushing away the loop, and so pushed it off that it did not
grip his neck. Drawing with his left hand his bronze dagger, he cut
through the leather lasso with one stroke, and bounded into the bushes
from which it had flown. Here he found a huge man, clad in the skin of a
lion, with its head fitting to his own like a mask. The man lifted a
club made of the trunk of a young pine tree, with a sharp-edged stone
fastened into the head of it like an axe-head. But, as the monster
raised his long weapon it struck on a strong branch of a tree above him,
and was entangled in the boughs, so that Theseus had time to thrust the
head of the iron club full in his face, with all his force, and the
savage fell with a crash like a falling oak among the bracken. He was
one of the last of an ancient race of savage men, who dwelt in Greece
before the Greeks, and he fought as they had fought, with weapons of
wood and stone.
Theseus dropped with his knees on the breast of the Pine-Bender, and
grasped his hairy throat with both his hands, not to strangle him, but
to hold him sure and firm till he came to himself again. When at last
the monster opened his eyes, Theseus gripped his throat the harder, and
spoke, 'Pine-Bender, for thee shall pines be bent. But I am a man and
not a monster, and thou shalt die a clean death before thy body is torn
in twain to be the last feast of thy vultures.' Then, squeezing the
throat of the wretch with his left hand, he drew the sword of Aegeus, and
drove it into the heart of Sinis the Pine-Bender, and he gave a cry like
a bull's, and his soul fled from him. Then Theseus bound the body of the
savage with his own leather cord, and, bending down the tops of two pine
trees, he did to the corpse as Sinis had been wont to do to living men.
Lastly he cleaned the sword-blade carefully, wiping it with grass and
bracken, and thrusting it to the hilt through the soft fresh ground
under the trees, and so went on his way till he came to a little stream
that ran towards the sea from the crest of the hill above the town of
Ephyre, which is now called Corinth. But as he cleansed himself in the
clear water, he heard a rustle in the boughs of the wood, and running
with sword drawn to the place whence the sound seemed to come, he heard
the whisper of a woman. Then he saw a strange sight. A tall and very
beautiful girl was kneeling in a thicket, in a patch of asparagus thorn,
and was weeping, and praying, in a low voice, and in a childlike
innocent manner, to the thorns, begging them to shelter and defend her.
Theseus wondered at her, and, sheathing his sword, came softly up to
her, and bade her have no fear. Then she threw her arms about his knees,
and raised her face, all wet with tears, and bade him take pity upon
her, for she had done no harm.
'Who are you, maiden? You are safe with me,' said Theseus. 'Do you dread
the Pine-Bender?'
'Alas, sir,' answered the girl, 'I am his daughter, Perigyne, and his
blood is on your hands.'
'Yet I do not war with women,' said Theseus, 'though that has been done
which was decreed by the gods. If you follow with me, you shall be
kindly used, and marry, if you will, a man of a good house, being so
beautiful as you are.'