The Heroes | Page 4

towns, and therefore after they were dead, were honoured,
because they had left their country better than they found it. And we
call such a man a hero in English to this day, and call it a 'heroic' thing
to suffer pain and grief, that we may do good to our fellow-men. We
may all do that, my children, boys and girls alike; and we ought to do it,
for it is easier now than ever, and safer, and the path more clear. But
you shall hear how the Hellens said their heroes worked, three thousand
years ago. The stories are not all true, of course, nor half of them; you
are not simple enough to fancy that; but the meaning of them is true,
and true for ever, and that is--Do right, and God will help you.'
FARLEY COURT,
Advent, 1855.

[I owe an apology to the few scholars who may happen to read this
hasty jeu d'esprit, for the inconsistent method in which I have spelt
Greek names. The rule which I have tried to follow has been this: when
the word has been hopelessly Latinised, as 'Phoebus' has been, I have
left it as it usually stands; but in other cases I have tried to keep the
plain Greek spelling, except when it would have seemed pedantic, or
when, as in the word 'Tiphus,' I should have given an altogether wrong
notion of the sound of the word. It has been a choice of difficulties,
which has been forced on me by our strange habit of introducing boys
to the Greek myths, not in their original shape, but in a Roman
disguise.]

STORY I.--PERSEUS

PART I--HOW PERSEUS AND HIS
MOTHER CAME TO SERIPHOS

Once upon a time there were two princes who were twins. Their names
were Acrisius and Proetus, and they lived in the pleasant vale of Argos,
far away in Hellas. They had fruitful meadows and vineyards, sheep
and oxen, great herds of horses feeding down in Lerna Fen, and all that
men could need to make them blest: and yet they were wretched,
because they were jealous of each other. From the moment they were
born they began to quarrel; and when they grew up each tried to take
away the other's share of the kingdom, and keep all for himself. So first
Acrisius drove out Proetus; and he went across the seas, and brought
home a foreign princess for his wife, and foreign warriors to help him,
who were called Cyclopes; and drove out Acrisius in his turn; and then
they fought a long while up and down the land, till the quarrel was
settled, and Acrisius took Argos and one half the land, and Proetus took
Tiryns and the other half. And Proetus and his Cyclopes built around
Tiryns great walls of unhewn stone, which are standing to this day.
But there came a prophet to that hard-hearted Acrisius and prophesied
against him, and said, 'Because you have risen up against your own
blood, your own blood shall rise up against you; because you have
sinned against your kindred, by your kindred you shall be punished.
Your daughter Danae shall bear a son, and by that son's hands you shall
die. So the Gods have ordained, and it will surely come to pass.'
And at that Acrisius was very much afraid; but he did not mend his
ways. He had been cruel to his own family, and, instead of repenting
and being kind to them, he went on to be more cruel than ever: for he
shut up his fair daughter Danae in a cavern underground, lined with
brass, that no one might come near her. So he fancied himself more
cunning than the Gods: but you will see presently whether he was able
to escape them.
Now it came to pass that in time Danae bore a son; so beautiful a babe
that any but King Acrisius would have had pity on it. But he had no
pity; for he took Danae and her babe down to the seashore, and put
them into a great chest and thrust them out to sea, for the winds and the
waves to carry them whithersoever they would.
The north-west wind blew freshly out of the blue mountains, and down
the pleasant vale of Argos, and away and out to sea. And away and out
to sea before it floated the mother and her babe, while all who watched

them wept, save that cruel father, King Acrisius.
So they floated on and on, and the chest danced up and down upon the
billows, and the baby slept upon its mother's breast: but the poor
mother could not sleep, but watched and wept, and she sang to her baby
as they floated; and the song