Half a Hundred Hero Tales of Ulysses and The Men of Old
General
Half a Hundred Hero Tales of Ulysses and The Men of Old
Mythology, Classical -- Juvenile literature
Dædalus was winging his careful way lower down, below the scattered
clouds, close above the golden islets, and shouted to his son to
return. But Icarus, drunk with the delights of flight, mounted ever
higher, up into the fierce rays of Phoebus, the Sun-god, who held out
burning arms to the adventurous youth, beckoning him to race his fiery
car across the heavens.
The horrified father, floating on outspread wings over the Ægean Sea,
looked up to see his boy like a tiny speck in the sun's rays. He knew
the fierce heat of those rays; he knew that the wings were only
fastened on by wax that could not hold against that scorching heat.
And lo! as he looked, the speck grew larger and larger, and headlong
down the sky he beheld Icarus falling, falling, his limp wings sagging
from his shoulders, his frantic arms struggling to spread them and
stay his fall. The drooping wings could not uphold him; he came
whirling down the hissing air, and his agonized father watched his
helpless boy fall into the blue waves beneath. For a moment he saw him
struggle feebly, and then, like a bubble, he sank, and the unruffled
waters lay calm and smiling as before.
By the sad sea shore of the Ægean, where he landed after that
disastrous flight, Dædalus raised a cenotaph to his lost son, and
thereon he laid the wings, once the artist's pride, and now the
father's bane. "Icarus, O my Icarus!" he cried; and still those waters
echo the name of Icarus.
SCYLLA, THE DAUGHTER OF NISUS
BY MRS. GUY E. LLOYD
In Crete, the greatest and most powerful of the isles of Greece and
the cradle of Jupiter, there once stood a splendid palace where lived
the wealthy King Minos. To this palace came as guests one day Nisus,
King of Megara, and his fair daughter Scylla; and there they abode
many days, with every day fresh delights sought out by King Minos to
give them pleasure. And Scylla, like a fond and foolish maiden, was
dazzled by the pomp and by the flattery of King Minos, and he seemed
to her the greatest and wisest of living men, and she would fain have
tarried there forever, hearkening to his words and admiring all his
riches.
But King Nisus would not longer stay, and they departed, bearing with
them rich gifts from the generous king, and returned to their own
castle at Megara. Very small and mean did her home seem to Scylla now,
and often would she climb to the top of a turret that looked over the
sea, and thence she would gaze and gaze towards the south, and her
thoughts would fly back to the fair island of Crete with its cities
and its palaces, and its strong and noble king, till she envied the
birds that skimmed past her turret on swift, light wings. They could
fly to Crete whenever they would, and settle on the palace eaves; but
the princess must sit still in her high turret, and hide even her
longing away within her heart.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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