Tales of the Greek Heroes

by Unknown

  Presently, when he had finished with Typhon, Zeus sent a storm which blew Cadmus’s ship out of its course, away to the eastward, until on the tenth day it came to the enchanted island of Samothrace.

  On this island stood a palace made of gold, with marble pillars and floors of precious stones. It was surrounded by the loveliest garden in the world, filled all the year round with every sort of flower and fruit, always in season.

  Hephaestus, the Immortal Smith, had built this palace by the command of Zeus as a home for Harmonia, the daughter of Ares and Aphrodite; and there this fairy princess lived, with the nymph Electra to look after her, and Electra’s children to guard her from all enemies. And the eldest of these children was Dardanus who later became the first king of Troy.

  Electra welcomed Cadmus to her beautiful home and entertained him and his companions for many days. The lovely Harmonia walked in the fragrant gardens with the handsome young prince, and very soon they fell in love with one another, just as Zeus had intended.

  Then one day Hermes came to Samothrace and said to Electra:

  ‘Cadmus and Harmonia love one another, and Father Zeus, remembering his promise to the brave prince who did him such notable service in his battle with Typhon, has decreed that they be man and wife. So bid them set sail in the swift ship, with all their followers and attendants, and pass over the sea to Delphi as Zeus bids: for there the oracle of Apollo will tell Cadmus where to found his city.’

  Electra did as she was told, and very soon the ship with white sails set was dancing over the blue waves, leaving behind an island which was no longer enchanted, now that Harmonia had left it.

  They sailed over the summer seas among the jewel-like islands of the Aegean. They passed round stormy Cape Malea at the south of Greece – but the kind sea-nymphs guided them past all the treacherous rocks, and a gentle wind wafted them speedily on their way.

  At last they came up the lovely Gulf of Corinth, anchored the ship in a land-locked bay, and went up to Delphi the beautiful on its green and grey hillside beneath the yellow cliffs of Parnassus.

  There Apollo spoke the will of Zeus through his oracle:

  ‘Cadmus!’ said the voice out of the streaming shadows of the dark cleft beneath the temple. ‘Cadmus! You left your distant home to search for the White Bull of Zeus. Seek it no longer, but follow where a Cow shall lead; and where that Cow sinks to rest, build a city with seven gates and call it Thebes!’

  Cadmus did as he was told; and down in the valley below Delphi he found the Cow grazing. As soon as it saw him coming it raised its head, lowed gently, and set off up the valley. Up the steep pass at the top it went, past the dark junction of three roads, and down the hillside beyond into the most fertile plain in all Greece.

  When it came to the place appointed, it sank down to rest, and Cadmus knew that his quest was accomplished. It had stopped on a low ridge of land with a little valley on either side; and there Cadmus built his citadel, with walls and a palace and temples.

  When the palace and the walls round the citadel were complete; and Cadmus had killed the dragon which lived below the hill, and had marked out fields and rich corn lands for his followers, he held his wedding to Harmonia.

  To that Wedding Feast came all the Immortals from Olympus. Zeus himself sat at the head of the table, with Hera beside him; Ares and Aphrodite were there, of course, to give away their daughter as bride to the brave prince who had won her. Hermes and Pan were there, and Apollo to make music with his heavenly lyre while the Nine Muses sang the marriage hymn, and Immortals made merry with mortal men and women.

  When the feast was ended the Immortals returned to Olympus, and only once again, as shall be told, did they come to the wedding of a mortal man.

  Cadmus and Harmonia lived happily all their lives; and when the time came for them to die, Zeus carried them away to the Elysian Fields where it is always spring. There they dwell for ever unchanging, with the shades of those men and women whom Zeus has chosen for this immortality.

  CHAPTER SIX

  THE ADVENTURES OF DIONYSUS

  Semele dared a wish, – to see;

  That her eyes might equal be

  With her heart and lips and ears:

  Night on perfect night she pled.

  Sudden lightning drank her tears,

  Life and sweetness: she lay dead.

  T. STURGE MOORE

  Semele

  6

  After the struggle with Typhon, Zeus began to look out more and more anxiously for the Hero who was to help him defeat the Giants. If Earth could still produce a monster like Typhon, the war with the Giants might be much nearer than he thought!

  It may have been due to something which Prometheus had said, or to some half-knowledge of his own, but Zeus became certain that the Hero would be born at Thebes.

  So when Cadmus and Harmonia had built their city of the seven gates, with the aid of the musicians Amphion and Zethus (at the sound of whose lyre the stones moved of themselves to make the walls) Zeus took good note of their children.

  The eldest of these was Autonoe; but when she married, her only son, Actaeon, came to a tragic end. He insulted Artemis, the Immortal Huntress, boasting one day when he found her bathing in a lonely pool on Mount Cithaeron that he was a better huntsman than she would ever be. In her anger she turned him into a stag, and he was hunted by his own hounds, who caught him and tore him to pieces without knowing what they did.

  Next came Ino, who married Athamas, king of a city not far from Thebes, who already had two children, Phrixus and Helle. Their mother was Nephele the Cloud Maiden; and after they were born, she flew back to heaven, and Athamas never saw her again. When Ino had children of her own she hated these two who were not quite as other mortals, and soon showed herself to be a cruel and wicked stepmother. She dared not kill them herself, but by parching the seed-corn secretly she caused a famine, and then bribed the messenger who was sent to Delphi to ask the oracle why no crops grew that summer. She told him to bring back word that the land was under a curse which would only be lifted if Phrixus was sacrificed by his father.

  Athamas was very sad when he heard this, but dared not disobey the oracle, which he believed was the voice of Apollo. So on the appointed day all the people gathered round the altar of Zeus on which Phrixus was to die by his father’s hand.

  But Nephele the Cloud Maiden would not desert her children like this. At her request kindly Pan gave her a magic ram with a fleece of pure gold; and as Athamas raised his sword to perform the sacrifice, it flew down and took Phrixus and his sister Helle on its back, and carried them away.

  Over land and sea it went, bearing them in safety, but as it crossed from Europe into Asia it swooped down suddenly, and Helle tumbled off and was drowned in the narrow sea which, after her, is called Hellespont to this very day.

  The ram flew on with Phrixus until it came to the land of Colchis near the world’s eastern end where Aeetes the Wizard was king. There he lived in safety, and when the ram died, its Golden Fleece was hung up in a magic grove with a watchful dragon to guard it until the day when the Argonauts should come for it.

  In Thebes only Ino was sorry that the two children had been saved, and punishment came to her before long.

  Her next sister, the third daughter of Cadmus, was the lovely Semele; and her Zeus decided to marry himself. As her mother Harmonia had been the daughter of two Immortals, Ares and Aphrodite, he felt that their son should be a being of more than mortal powers.

  Now when Hera, the Queen of Olympus, discovered what Zeus was about, she became very angry, and her jealousy knew no bounds. She was also afraid that if Zeus and Semele had a son, he might be made an Immortal of greater power and glory than her own sons Ares and Hephaestus.

  She made up her mind to destroy Semele, and the child. So one day she disguised herself as an old woman and went to call on her. She spoke kindly at first, and after a while asked who her husband was. But when Semele told her that it was Zeus himself the old woman l
aughed.

  ‘Are you sure of that?’ she asked. ‘May it not be some ordinary mortal man who is deceiving you by pretending to be Zeus? I’m sure he does not visit you clad in the shining glory that Zeus wears on Olympus when he sits at the golden table beside his Immortal wife, Queen Hera!’

  Semele was troubled by this, and next time Zeus came, she said:

  ‘You made me a promise when we were married, that you would grant me one wish, whatever it might be.’

  ‘I did,’ answered Zeus, ‘and I swear by Styx that you shall have it!’

  ‘Then come to me in the same glory that you wear among the Immortals,’ begged foolish Semele. ‘Then I will know that you are Zeus indeed, and that you are not ashamed of having a mortal wife.’

  Zeus sorrowed bitterly; but he could not break his oath, though he realized that it was Hera who had tricked him like this.

  He rose to his feet, raised his hand, and in a moment was transfigured with light so shining and so fierce that, being mortal, Semele could not bear it, she fell back with a shriek, and died – shrivelled up by the shining glory of Zeus.

  But he took the child, whom he named Dionysus, and after caring for him for a little while, he told Hermes to look after him and guard him from Hera’s jealousy.

  At first Hermes entrusted him to Ino and her youngest sister Argave, telling them something of the truth, and commanding them to keep secret who he was, and for greater security to pretend that he was a girl.

  So Dionysus grew safely to boyhood in Thebes, unknown to Hera. But at length he was betrayed by Ino and Argave, and Zeus only just saved him by turning him into a little goat which Hermes carried off to Mount Nysa in Thrace, where the kindly water-nymphs, daughters of the river Lamos, took care of him.

  Ino was punished for this and for her earlier wickedness. She went mad and leapt into the sea, carrying her own son in her arms; but the sea-nymphs took them, and they lived ever after among the waves, and atoned for the evil which Ino had done during her life on earth, by bringing help to storm-tossed sailors.

  Meanwhile Dionysus grew to manhood in the cave on Mount Nysa, and made friends with Silenus and the Satyrs, who vowed to follow him wherever he went. For Dionysus discovered how to make wine out of the grapes which grew on Mount Nysa, and the Satyrs were the first creatures to taste this new and wonderful drink, and to grow intoxicated by it.

  It was after his first drunken feast that Silenus fell asleep in the garden of King Midas, who treated him so kindly that Dionysus promised him any gift he might ask.

  ‘Let everything I touch turn into gold!’ cried greedy Midas eagerly, and Dionysus granted the wish with a merry twinkle in his eye.

  Home went Midas and had very soon turned his house into gold, and his garden also with all its trees and flowers. But when he found that even food and drink turned to gold as soon as he touched them with his lips, he realized what a fool he had been, and he sought out Dionysus and begged him to take back his magic gift.

  Midas did not learn wisdom by this experience, and not long afterwards he angered Apollo, who gave him ass’s ears for refusing to recognize good music when he heard it.

  Meanwhile Dionysus had gone out into the world to teach mankind how to grow grape-vines, and how to make the grapes into wine. He had many adventures on the way, travelling even as far as India, whence he returned in a chariot drawn by tigers. On one occasion, for example, he only escaped from his enemies by turning a river into wine, which sent them all to sleep after they had attempted to quench their thirst at it.

  When at length he came to Greece, Dionysus found several kings who were anxious to prevent him from teaching their people how to make wine. The reason they gave was that, like the Satyrs, many women, who were called Maenads, followed Dionysus, and these often deserted their husbands and children to go dancing away on the lonely hillsides.

  One of these kings was called Lycurgus, and he drove Dionysus into the sea, where the sea-nymphs rescued him and the loveliest of them all, Thetis, entertained him in her coral caves.

  Lycurgus suffered for what he had done, since when he tried to cut down the vine which Dionysus had planted, he cut off one of his own feet instead.

  Meanwhile Dionysus came up again out of the caves of Thetis, but on the wrong side of the sea, and hired a ship to carry him across. Now it chanced that the sailors were wicked pirates from Tyre who were in search of handsome young men to sell as slaves, and to them Dionysus seemed a fine prize indeed. For he was tall and shapely, with a fair skin and rich, dark hair falling upon his strong shoulders and over his cloak of deep purple.

  When they were well out to sea, the Pirate Captain told his men to bind Dionysus with ropes and put him down in the dark hold of the ship. But when they tried to do so, the ropes fell again and again from his hands and feet as soon as they had been tied.

  Then the helmsman cried: ‘We are mad to do this! It must be one of the Immortals whom we are carrying in our ship – it may be Apollo, or Poseidon, or great Zeus himself. Let us set him free and bear him with all honour over the waves to Greece, lest he grows angry and is fearfully avenged upon us.’

  The Captain was furious: ‘Madman yourself!’ he shouted. ‘You look after your own job, and we’ll attend to this fellow. He’ll fetch us a fine price in Egypt or in Sidon, depend upon it!’

  Then they hoisted the sails and sped away over the dancing waves with a fair wind behind them.

  But soon strange things began to happen: first a sweet smell of wine rose from the hold of the ship, and a stream of it coursed across the deck. Then, while the sailors stood still in amazement, the mast and spars of the ship began to put forth leaves and long, waving tendrils. Grapes grew in great, dark bunches down either side of the sails, and the thole-pins between which the long oars rested grew up into vines clustered with flowers.

  When the pirates saw all this, they cried out to the helmsman to turn the ship and steer for Greece with all the speed he could. But their remorse came too late, for even as they turned towards Dionysus to beg his mercy, he changed into a fierce lion and came bounding along the deck towards them.

  With shrieks of terror, they sprang over the sides into the sea – and were changed immediately into dolphins. All except Achaetes the helmsman, who sat rooted to his seat with terror. Then Dionysus returned to his usual shape, and spoke to him kindly:

  ‘Do not be afraid, good Achaetes, you counselled your evil companions to treat me as they should, and you have found favour in my heart. Know that I am Dionysus, son of Immortal Zeus, and that I travel to the land of Greece bearing the gift of wine to be a comfort and a joy to all mankind.’

  So Achaetes steered the ship, and the winds blew it over the waves until they came to Athens. There Dionysus was kindly received and his gift was welcomed, though his host Icarius suffered a sad fate by mistake. For he offered wine to his friends and they, having drunk too much of it and feeling its strange effects for the first time, cried out that Icarius had poisoned them.

  In their fear and anger they killed him and threw his body into a well, where his daughter Erigone found it with the help of his faithful dog – and hanged herself for grief. Zeus saw what had happened, and set all three among the stars, where you may see them to this day as the constellations of Virgo, Arcturus, and Procyon the Little Dog.

  But Dionysus continued on his way, and came at length to Thebes where he had been born. There no one knew him, and Pentheus, son of Argave, who was now king instead of his grandfather Cadmus, shut him up in a stone prison and swore that he would kill him.

  Once again, however, the power of Dionysus triumphed. Vines grew up between the stones of the prison walls so that they fell to the ground, and Dionysus went free; while Pentheus was mistaken for a lion by a wild band of Maenads, amongst whom was his mother Argave, and they caught him and tore him to pieces.

  All these and many more deeds as strange and wonderful were told of Dionysus; and men honoured him and said that he must be one of the Immortals. Yet
he had one more adventure to face before he could take his seat on Olympus, and this was the strangest and one which befell no other Immortal. For he came to the land of Argos towards the south of Greece, and there King Perseus came against him fully armed and they fought.

  Perseus was also a son of Zeus, and the greatest of the heroes of Greece except one, and for a little while Zeus had thought him the Hero for whom he sought.

  So when Perseus drew his sword against Dionysus, all the Immortals gathered in the clouds to watch so terrible and fateful a battle. The end of it was that Perseus smote Dionysus a mortal blow: for thus only could the anger of Hera be appeased. But whether Dionysus also killed Perseus at the same time is not known for certain, since some say that Perseus was murdered shortly afterwards by Megapenthes whose father, Proteus, he had turned to stone with the Gorgon’s head.

  As he died Dionysus leapt into the lake of Lerna by which they had fought: for this lake had no bottom, and led to the Realm of the Dead where Hades ruled over the souls of mortals. In this way Dionysus shared the fate of all mankind, though Zeus had decreed that he should become an Immortal and sit on Olympus.

  In the Realm of Hades, Dionysus made his way to the throne where that dread king sits with pale, sad Persephone beside him.

  ‘Lord of the dead!’ cried Dionysus, ‘by the will of Zeus, who is my father, I do not remain here as your subject, but rise presently through the earth and take my place with the other Immortals. But it is my desire to take my mother Semele with me: and I beg of you to release her from death so that she may accompany me.’

  ‘That cannot be,’ answered Hades in his slow, solemn tones, ‘unless you give me in exchange for your mother, your best beloved who now lives upon the earth.’

  ‘I will certainly do that,’ said Dionysus, and he swore it by the River Styx, the oath which no Immortal may break.