The Hydra frequently came out of the water and swallowed up herds of cattle, laying waste the surrounding country. Eurystheus ordered Herakles to kill the snake, so he put on his lion’s skin, and taking his club, started out. He mounted his chariot and took his faithful friend Iolaos, who acted as charioteer.
Every warrior had to have a charioteer to drive the horses, leaving him free to use both of his hands. But driving was by no means the charioteer’s only duty; he had also to look out for danger and protect the warrior with his shield as well as to supply him with arrows from the quiver suspended at the side of every chariot, and with reserve spears when his own was broken in the fray.
It is clear, therefore, that the warrior’s life was entirely in the hands of his charioteer, so it is no wonder that only the hero’s dearest and most trusted friends were allowed to serve him in this way.
After driving along for a while through groves of olive-trees and past pleasant vineyards, they came to wild places and saw Lake Lerna gleaming through the trees. Having reached the lake, Herakles descended from the chariot, left the horses in care of Iolaos, and went to hunt for the snake.
He found it in a swampy place where it was hiding. Herakles shot some burning arrows at the Hydra and forced it to come out. It darted furiously at him, but he met it fearlessly, put his foot upon its tail, and with his club began to strike off its heads. He could not accomplish anything in this way, for as fast as he knocked off one head two others grew in its place.
The snake coiled itself so firmly around one of Herakles’ legs that he was no longer able to stir from the place. Added to all this there came a huge crab to the assistance of the snake. It crept up to Herakles’ foot, and seizing it with its sharp claws, inflicted painful wounds. Herakles killed the crab with his club and called Iolaos to help him.
Under Herakles’ directions Iolaos produced a fire-brand which he applied to the neck as fast as Herakles cut off one of the snake’s heads, in this way preventing them from growing again. Finally it came the turn of the head which could not die. Cutting it off Herakles buried it in the ground, placing a heavy stone over it.
Then he dipped some arrows into the Hydra’s blood, which was poisonous, so that whoever was wounded by one of them could not be healed. The least scratch inflicted by such an arrow was incurable.
Eurystheus, of course, had no word of praise for his great bondsman, but the people, knowing that the place was now safe, flocked to the land in great numbers and drained the lake, which was really not much more than a big marshy pond, and in their new homes they blessed the hero’s name forever. That was the prize for which Herakles cared the most.
If you should go to-day to that old battle-field of Herakles you would still find the spring flowing from the rocks, but Lake Lerna exists only in story.
CHAPTER V
THE THIRD LABOR – THE GOLDEN-HORNED HIND
The lower part of Greece is a most peculiar-looking bit of country. You would think it had been torn off from the bulk of the land but kept hanging on to it by a small narrow strip. Then, too, its shape is so queer that it has been compared to all sorts of things; sometimes to a mulberry leaf, sometimes to an open hand.
If we keep to the latter comparison, we will find that the part which answers to the palm of the hand is a large and intricate knot of high wooded mountains which shoot out spurs in all directions. These spurs with the land attached to them stretch out into the sea as so many small peninsulas and not badly represent the fingers of the hand. The central knot of mountains is even now different from the country all around.
The people there are wilder, very much given to robbery and violence and very slow to accept new ways of life or improvements of any kind. In the old heroic times of several thousand years ago that country was simply an impassable wilderness.
It was overcrowded with wild beasts, among which the bear must have been the most plentiful since the land was named after him, Arcadia – the land of Bears. Wolves were known also to abound.
The men who had their villages in the narrow valleys by the mountain-streams were fierce and lawless. There was nothing for them to do but to keep goats and hunt all day long. Arcadia was truly the paradise of hunters and therefore held as specially sacred to the beautiful huntress, the goddess, Artemis – the Lady of the Chase. She roamed over hills and valleys and through woods and groves by moonlight to protect the herds and flocks, this beautiful daughter of Zeus.
In these same mountains of Arcadia there roamed a lovely Hind sacred to Queen Artemis, who gave her golden horns so that she might be known from other deer by the huntsmen. Thus they might be saved from the crime of slaying what was sacred to the gods. Eurystheus ordered Herakles to bring him the Hind alive, for he did not dare to have her killed.
Herakles spent a whole year seeking her from the mountain-tops down to the valleys, through tangles of brush, over streams and in forests, but he was not able to catch her. After a long chase he forced her at last to take refuge on the side of a mountain and from that place to go down to a river to drink.
In order that he might prevent the deer from crossing the water, Herakles was obliged slightly to wound one of her legs. Not till then was he able to secure his game and carry it to Eurystheus.
On his way to Mykenæ Herakles was met by Artemis, who upbraided him for having captured the Hind belonging to her. Herakles made answer: “Great Goddess, if I have chased and caught thy deer, I did it out of necessity, not impiety; for thou well knowest that the gods ordered me to be a servant to Eurystheus and he commanded me to catch the Hind.”
With these words he soothed the anger of the goddess and brought the golden-horned Hind to Mykenæ.
CHAPTER VI
THE FOURTH LABOR – THE ERYMANTHIAN BOAR
Elis is a beautiful plain lying to the north and west of Arcadia. Here once in five years there was a great festival in honor of Zeus, when all the men and boys ran races, wrestled, boxed and played all sorts of games. Between Arcadia and Elis there is a high mountain-range, called Erymanthos. There a terrible Boar had its lair.
The Boar frequently left its den and came down into the plains and killed cattle, destroyed fields of grain and attacked people. Eurystheus, having heard of this Boar, made up his mind that he wanted the beast alive, and so ordered Herakles to bring it to him.
The hero put on his lion skin once more and started for the mountain. On his way he stopped at a little town where the Centaurs had their home. These strange people were half man and half horse. We have heard that they were really men, but such good riders that they seemed to be one with their mountain ponies.
Their home was just on the edge of a high plain, covered with oak-trees and looking down across a wild valley, through which flowed the Erymanthos River. There were many forests and little streams and dreadful gorges in the valley, where these horsemen used to hunt and fish.
The Centaur Chief, Pholos, received Herakles as a guest and gave him cooked meat to eat, while he ate it raw himself, after the Centaurs’ custom.
When Herakles had eaten his fill, he said to Pholos: “Thy food is indeed good and tasteful. But I should enjoy it still more if I could have a sip of wine, for I am very thirsty.” To which Pholos replied: “My dear guest, we have very fine and fragrant wine in this mountain, and I should like nothing better than to give thee some of it. But I am afraid to do so, because it has a strong aroma, and the other Centaurs, if they smelt it, might come to my cave and want some. They are very fierce and lawless, and might do thee great harm.”
“Let not that trouble thee,” said Herakles. “I am not afraid of the Centaurs.” So the wine was placed before him and he drank of it. In a little while a great noise was heard outside of the cave, a shouting of many wild voices and a stamping of many horses’ feet. What Pholos feared had come to pass.
The Centaurs had