Myths That Every Child Should Know | Page 4

wonderful universe, and each great myth was a
chapter in a story which endowed day and night, summer and winter,
sun, moon, stars, winds, clouds, fire, with life, and made them actors in
the mysterious drama of the world. Our Norse forefathers thought of
themselves always as looking on at a terrible fight between the gods,
who were light and heat and fruitfulness, revealed in the beauty of day
and the splendour of summer, and the giants, who were darkness, cold
and barrenness, revealed in the gloom of night and the desolation of
winter. To the Norseman, as to the Greek, the Roman, the Hindu and
other primitive peoples, the world was the scene of a great struggle, the
stage on which gods, demons, and heroes were contending for
supremacy; and they told that story in a thousand different ways. Every
myth is a chapter in that story, and differs from other stories and
legends because it is an explanation of something that happened in
earth, sea, or sky.
If the men who created the myths had set to work to make wonder tales
as stories are sometimes made to instruct while they entertain children,
they would have left a mass of very dull tales which few people would

have cared to read. They had no idea of doing anything so artificial and
mechanical; they made these old stories because all life was a story to
them, full of splendid or terrible figures moving across the sky or
through the sea and in the depths of the woods, and whichever way
they looked they saw or thought they saw mysterious and wonderful
things going on. They were as much interested in their world as we are
in ours; we write hundreds of scientific books every year to explain our
world; they told hundreds of stories every year to explain theirs.
This selection represents the work of several authors, and does not,
therefore, preserve uniformity of style. It is probably better for the
young reader that the Greek Myths should come from one hand, and the
Norse Myths from another. The classical work of Hawthorne has been
generously drawn upon. No change of any kind has been made in the
text, but the introductions connecting one myth with another have been
omitted.
HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE.

Myths That Every Child Should Know

CHAPTER I
THE THREE GOLDEN APPLES
Did you ever hear of the golden apples that grew in the garden of the
Hesperides? Ah, those were such apples as would bring a great price,
by the bushel, if any of them could be found growing in the orchards of
nowadays! But there is not, I suppose, a graft of that wonderful fruit on
a single tree in the wide world. Not so much as a seed of those apples
exists any longer.
And, even in the old, old, half-forgotten times, before the garden of the
Hesperides was overrun with weeds, a great many people doubted

whether there could be real trees that bore apples of solid gold upon
their branches. All had heard of them, but nobody remembered to have
seen any. Children, nevertheless, used to listen, open-mouthed, to
stories of the golden apple tree, and resolved to discover it, when they
should be big enough. Adventurous young men, who desired to do a
braver thing than any of their fellows, set out in quest of this fruit.
Many of them returned no more; none of them brought back the apples.
No wonder that they found it impossible to gather them! It is said that
there was a dragon beneath the tree, with a hundred terrible heads, fifty
of which were always on the watch, while the other fifty slept.
In my opinion it was hardly worth running so much risk for the sake of
a solid golden apple. Had the apples been sweet, mellow, and juicy,
indeed that would be another matter. There might then have been some
sense in trying to get at them, in spite of the hundred-headed dragon.
But, as I have already told you, it was quite a common thing with
young persons, when tired of too much peace and rest, to go in search
of the garden of the Hesperides. And once the adventure was
undertaken by a hero who had enjoyed very little peace or rest since he
came into the world. At the time of which I am going to speak, he was
wandering through the pleasant land of Italy, with a mighty club in his
hand, and a bow and quiver slung across his shoulders. He was wrapt in
the skin of the biggest and fiercest lion that ever had been seen, and
which he himself had killed; and though, on the whole, he was kind,
and generous, and noble, there was