My Young Alcides | Page 4

going on, as the notion grew deeper and more engrossing.
For, whether the origin of the myth be, or be not, founded on solar phenomena, the yearning Greek mind formed on it an unconscious allegory of the course of the Victor, of whom the Sun, rejoicing as a giant to run his course, is another type, like Samson of old, since the facts of nature and of history are Divine parables.
And as each one's conquest is, in the track of his Leader, the only true Conqueror, so Hercules, in spite of all the grotesque adjuncts that the lower inventions of the heathen hung round him, is a far closer likeness of manhood--as, indeed, the proverbial use of some of his tasks testifies--and of repentant man conquering himself. The great crime, after which his life was a bondage of expiation; the choice between Virtue and Vice; the slain passion; the hundred-headed sin for ever cropping up again; the winning of the sacred emblem of purity;--then the subduing of greed; the cleansing of long-neglected uncleanness; the silencing of foul tongues; the remarkable contest with the creature which had become a foe, because, after being devoted for sacrifice, it was spared; the obtaining the girdle of strength; the recovery of the spoil from the three-fold enemy; the gaining of the fruit of life; immediately followed by the victory over the hell-hound of death; and lastly, the attainment of immortality--all seem no fortuitous imagination, but one of those when "thoughts beyond their thoughts to those old bards were given."
I have not followed all these meanings, for this is not an allegory, but a mere distant following rather of the spirit than the letter of the old Greek tale of the Twelve Tasks. Neither have I adhered to every incident of Hercules' life; and the most touching and beautiful of all--the rescue of Alcestis, would hardly bear to come in merely as an episode, in this weak and presumptuous endeavour to show that the half-divine, patient conqueror is not merely a classic invention, but that he and his labours belong in some form or other to all times and all surroundings.
C. M. YONGE. Nov. 8, 1875.

CONTENTS
CHAPTER I.
THE ARGHOUSE INHERITANCE
CHAPTER II.
THE LION OF NEME HEATH
CHAPTER III.
THE "DRAGON'S HEAD"
CHAPTER IV.
THE WRATH OF DIANA
CHAPTER V.
THE CAPTURE IN THE SNOW
CHAPTER VI.
OGDEN'S BUILDINGS
CHAPTER VII.
THE BIRDS OF ILL OMEN
CHAPTER VIII.
BULLOCK'S CHASTISEMENT
CHAPTER IX.
THE CHAMPION'S BELT
CHAPTER X.
DERMOT'S MARK
CHAPTER XI.
THE RED VALLEY CATTLE STEALERS
CHAPTER XII.
THE GOLDEN FRUIT
CHAPTER XIII.
THE BLOODHOUND
CHAPTER XIV.
SUNSET GOLD AND PURPLE
CHAPTER XV.
THE FATAL TOKEN
CHAPTER XVI.
CONCLUSION

MY YOUNG ALCIDES
A FADED PHOTOGRAPH
CHAPTER I.
THE ARGHOUSE INHERITANCE.

One of the children brought me a photograph album, long ago finished and closed, and showed me a faded and blurred figure over which there had been a little dispute. Was it Hercules with club and lion-skin, or was it a gentleman I had known?
Ah me! how soon a man's place knoweth him no more! What fresh recollections that majestic form awoke in me--the massive features, with the steadfast eye, and low, square brow, curled over with short rings of hair; the mouth, that, through the thick, short beard, still invited trust and reliance, even while there was a look of fire and determination that inspired dread.
The thing seemed to us hideous and absurd when it was taken by Miss Horsman. I hated it, and hid it away as a caricature. But now those pale, vanishing tints bring the very presence before me; and before the remembrance can become equally obscure in my own mind, let me record for others the years that I spent with my young Alcides as he now stands before me in memory.
Our family history is a strange one. I, Lucy Alison, never even saw my twin brothers--nor, indeed, knew of their existence--during my childhood. I had one brother a year younger than myself, and as long as he lived he was treated as the eldest son, and neither he nor I ever dreamed that my father had had a first wife and two sons. He was a feeble, broken man, who seemed to my young fancy so old that in after times it was always a shock to me to read on his tablet, "Percy Alison, aged fifty-seven;" and I was but seven years old when he died under the final blow of the loss of my little brother Percy from measles.
The dear old place--house with five gables on the garden front, black timbered, and with white plaster between, and oh! such flowers in the garden--was left to my mother for her life; and she was a great deal younger than my father, so we went on living there, and it was only when I was almost a woman that I came to the knowledge that the property would never be mine, but would go in the male line to the son of one of my disinherited