The other hunter was a girl, ATALANTA. Tall and bright-haired was
Atalanta, swift and good with the bow. She had dedicated herself to
Artemis, the guardian of the wild things, and she had vowed that she would
remain unwedded. All the heroes welcomed Atalanta as a comrade, and the
maiden did all the things that the young men did.
There came a hero who was less youthful than Castor or Polydeuces; he
was a man good in council named NESTOR. Afterward Nestor went to the war
against Troy, and then he was the oldest of the heroes in the camp of
Agamemnon.
Two brothers came who were to be special friends of Jason’s—PELEUS and
TELAMON. Both were still youthful and neither had yet achieved any notable
deed. Afterward they were to be famous, but their sons were to be even
more famous, for the son of Telamon was strong Aias, and the son of Peleus
was great Achilles.
Another who came was ADMETUS; afterward he became a famous king. The God
Apollo once made himself a shepherd and he kept the flocks of King
Admetus.
And there came two brothers, twins, who were a wonder to all who beheld
them. ZETES and CALAIS they were named; their mother was Oreithyia, the
daughter of Erechtheus, King of Athens, and their father was Boreas, the
North Wind. These two brothers had on their ankles wings that gleamed with
golden scales; their black hair was thick upon their shoulders, and it was
always being shaken by the wind.
With Zetes and Calais there came a youth armed with a great sword whose
name was THESEUS. Theseus’s father was an unknown king; he had bidden the
mother show their son where his sword was hidden. Under a great stone the
king had hidden it before Theseus was born. Before he had grown out of his
boyhood Theseus had been able to raise the stone and draw forth his
father’s sword. As yet he had done no great deed, but he was resolved to
win fame and to find his unknown father.
On the day that the messengers had set out to bring through Greece the
word of Jason’s going forth in quest of the Golden Fleece the woodcutters
made their way up into the forests of Mount Pelion; they began to fell
trees for the timbers of the ship that was to make the voyage to far
Colchis.
[Illustration]
Great timbers were cut and brought down to Pagasæ, the harbor of Iolcus.
On the night of the day he had helped to bring them down Jason had a
dream. He dreamt that She whom he had seen in the forest ways and
afterward by the River Anaurus appeared to him. And in his dream the
goddess bade him rise early in the morning and welcome a man whom he would
meet at the city’s gate—a tall and gray-haired man who would have on his
shoulders tools for the building of a ship.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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