At the eventide hour. And thou, if thou bring such deeds to pass,
That day shalt win this Fleece, as thy king’s commandment was.
But I give it thee not ere then; neither hope it; for shame should it be
That a mighty champion should yield to a man that is worser than he.”
So spake he: but silent the hero sat, with his eyes on the ground.
Speechless he sat: no help for the desperate evil he found.
Long time he communed with his heart; no way through the darkness gleamed
To take on him stoutly the task, for a mighty deed it seemed.
But late and at last he spake, and he answered warily:
“Full straitly, Aiêtes, within thy right art thou shutting me.
Yet this will I dare, this emprise mighty beyond all thought;
Yea, though my doom be to die: for a man may light upon nought
More dread to encounter than ruthless fate’s overmastering hand,
Which hitherward also constrained me to come at a king’s command.”
So spake he, filled with despair; but the king made answer to him,
Sore troubled there as he sat, with words exceeding grim:
“Come then to the gathering, thou who art fain this toil to essay.
But if thou shalt fear on the necks of the oxen the yoke to lay,
Or if from the deadly harvesting backward thou shrink in dismay,
Then will I look unto this, that another, taught by thee,
May shudder to come in such malapert sort to a mightier than he.”
Roundly he spake, and he ceased; and Jason uprose from his seat,
And Augeias and Telamon with him; but followed them only the feet
Of Argus; for even at the moment a sign to his brethren he cast
There in their place to tarry: so forth of the hall they passed.
But the son of Aison outshone all there in wondrous wise
In goodlihead and in grace: ever wandered the maiden’s eyes
Askance unto him, as she stealthily parted her veil’s soft gleam.
And her heart was a smouldering fire of pain; and her soul, as a dream,
Stole after her love, flitting still in his track as his feet fared on.
So they from the halls in exceeding vexation of spirit are gone.
But Chalkiopê, from the wrath of Aiêtes shrinking in dread,
Hastily unto her bower with those her sons had fled.
And Medea thereafter followed; and surged like a rushing river
The thoughts through her breast—the thoughts that Love awakeneth ever.
And before her eyes the vision of all evermore she had—
Himself, even like as he was, and the vesture wherein he was clad,
How he spake, how he sat on his seat, how forth of the doors he strode,
And she dreamed as she mused that all the world beside had showed
None other such man. In her ears evermore the music rung
Of his voice, and the words that in sweetness of honey had dropped from his tongue.
And she trembled for him, lest the bulls or Aiêtes himself might slay
Her beloved, and took up a mourning for him, as though he lay
Dead even now; and adown her cheeks soft-stealing tears
Flowed, of her measureless pity, her burden of haunting fears.
And she mourned, and the low lamentation wailed from her tortured breast:
“Why, wretch that I am, is this anguish upon me?—or be he the best
Of heroes, who now is to perish, or be he the vilest of all,
Let him go to his doom!—yet O that on him no scathe might fall!
Oh might it be so, thou Daughter of Perseus, Goddess revered!
Oh might he but win home, ’scaping his doom!—but if this be his weird,
By the bulls to be overmastered, or ever it be too late
Might he know it, that I be not forced to exult o’er the thing that I hate!”
So was the maiden distraught by the cares that racked her mind.
But when those others had left the folk and the city behind,
On the path whereby at the first from the river-plain they had gone,
Even then, and with these words, Argus spake unto Aison’s son:
“This counsel of mine, O Aison’s son, thou wilt haply despise:
Yet in desperate strait to forbear from the trial seemeth not wise.
Thou hast heard me tell of a maiden that practiseth sorcery
Under the teaching of Perseus’ daughter Hekatê.
Now if we might win her to help us, thou needest not fear any more
To be vanquished in this thine endeavour:—howbeit my fear is sore
Lest haply my mother will take not upon her to move her thereto.
Yet in any wise back will I wend to essay what entreaty may do;
For over us all alike is destruction hanging this day.”
So spake he in kindness of heart, and in answer did Jason say:
“Dear friend, if this seemeth good in thy sight, I say not nay.
Hasten thou then, and with words of weight to thy mother pray
Till thou stir her to help us:—howbeit a pitiful hope is the best
For our home-return, if this in the keeping of women must rest.”
So spake he; and soon to the backwater came he: with hearts full fain
Did their comrades greet them, and question, beholding them again.
But unto them Aison’s son in heaviness spake the word:
“O friends, the heart of Aiêtes the ruthless is wholly stirred
With anger against us: of all those things whereof ye inquire
Nor for me nor for you appeareth the goal of our desire.
Two brazen-footed bulls on the War-god’s plain, he saith,
Pasture; in flames of fire from the mouths of them streameth the breath:
And with these must I plough him ploughgates four of a fallow field;
And seed of a serpent’s jaws will he give, and for crop shall it yield
Earth-born warriors in harness of brass. In the selfsame day
These must I slay. And of this—for I found no better way,
In mine heart as I pondered—I promised outright to make essay.”
He spake, and it seemed unto all an impossible task. For a space
Silent they sat, and each man gazed in his fellow’s face,
By despair bowed down, by calamity crushed, till Peleus at last
With stout words spake to hearten the heroes all aghast:
“Full time is it now to be counselling what we shall do. In rede
Small profit,
