section>The Golden Fleece and The Heroes Who Lived Before Achilles by Padraic Colum
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Title: The Golden Fleece and The Heroes Who Lived Before Achilles
Author: Padraic Colum
Release Date: October 29, 2011 [Ebook #37881] Language: English
Character set encoding: UTF-8
***START OF THE PROJECT EBOOK THE GOLDEN FLEECE AND THE HEROES WHO LIVED BEFORE ACHIL-LES***
Jason and Medea
The Golden Fleece and the Heroes Who Lived before Achilles By Padraig Colum
Illustrations by Willy Pogany
1921
The Macmillan Company, New York to
the children of
Susan and Llewellyn Jones
Contents
Part I. The Voyage to Colchis
I. The Youth Jason
II. King Pelias
III. The Golden Fleece
IV. The Assembling of the Heroes and the Building of the Ship
V. The Argo
The Beginning of Things
VI. Polydeuces' Victory and Heracles' Loss
VII. King Phineus
VIII. King Phineus's Counsel; The Landing in Lemnos
IX. The Lemnian Maidens Demeter and Persephone Atalanta's Race
X. The Departure from Lemnos
The Golden Maid
XI. The Passage of the Symplegades XII. The Mountain Caucasus Prometheus
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Part II. The Return to Greece
I. King AEetes
II. Medea the Sorceress
III. The Winning of the Golden Fleece
IV. The Slaying of Apsyrtus
V. Medea Comes to Circe
VI. In the Land of the Phaeacians VII. They Come to the Desert Land VIII. The Carrying of the Argo
The Story of Perseus
IX. Near to Iolcus Again
Part III. The Heroes of the Quest
I. Atalanta the Huntress
II. Peleus and His Bride from the Sea
III. Theseus and the Minotaur
IV. The Life and Labors of Heracles
The Battle of the Frogs and Mice
V. Admetus
VI. How Orpheus the Minstrel Went Down to the World of the Dead
VII. Jason and Medea
Illustrations
Jason and Medea the Argo
Hylas
Persephone and Aidoneus Atalanta's Last Race Prometheus
The Field of the Dragon's Teeth
Perseus and Andromeda
[pg 1]
Part I. The Voyage to Colchis
[pg 3]
I. The Youth Jason
A MAN in the garb of a slave went up the side of that mountain that is all covered with forest, the Mountain Pelion. He carried in his arms a little child.
When it was full noon the slave came into a clearing of the forest so silent that it seemed empty of all life. He laid the child down on the soft moss, and then, trembling with the fear of what might come before him, he raised a horn to his lips and blew three blasts upon it.
Then he waited. The blue sky was above him, the great trees stood away from him, and the little child lay at his feet. He waited, and then he heard the thud-thud of great hooves. And then from between the trees he saw coming toward him the strangest of all beings, one who was half man and half horse; this was Chiron the centaur.
Chiron came toward the trembling slave. Greater than any horse was Chiron, taller than any man. The hair of his head flowed
back into his horse's mane, his great beard flowed over his horse's chest; in his man's hand he held a great spear.
[pg 4]
Not swiftly he came, but the slave could see that in those great limbs of his there was speed like to the wind's. The slave fell upon his knees. And with eyes that were full of majesty and wisdom and limbs that were full of strength and speed, the king-centaur stood above him. "O my lord," the slave said, "I have come before thee sent by AEson, my master, who told me where to come and what blasts to blow upon the horn. And AEson, once King of Iolcus, bade me say to thee that if thou dost remember his ancient friendship with thee thou wilt, perchance, take this child and guard and foster him, and, as he grows, instruct him with thy wisdom."
"For AEson's sake I will rear and foster this child," said Chiron the king-centaur in a deep voice.
The child lying on the moss had been looking up at the four-footed and two-handed centaur. Now the slave lifted him up and placed him in the centaur's arms. He said:
2
"AEson bade me tell thee that the child's name is Jason. He bade me give thee this ring with the great ruby in it that thou mayst give it to the child when he is grown. By this ring with its ruby and the images engraved on it AEson may know his son when they meet after many years and many changes. And another thing AEson bade me say to thee, O my lord Chiron: not presumptuous is he, but he knows that this child has the regard of the immortal Goddess Hera, the wife of Zeus."
Chiron held AEson's son in his arms, and the little child put hands into his great beard. Then the centaur said, "Let AEson [pg 5] know that his son will be reared and fostered by me, and that, when they meet again, there will be ways by which they will be known to each other."
Saying this Chiron the centaur, holding the child in his arms, went swiftly toward the forest arches; then the slave took up the horn
and went down the side of the Mountain Pelion. He came to where a horse was hidden, and he mounted and rode, first to a city, and
then to a village that was beyond the city.
