Jason and the Argonauts by Apollonius of Rhodes Read Free Book Online Page B

as they wished to learn what lay beyond.
    So half the heroes set about ascending
    1320 (985) Dindymum at dawn to see firsthand
    what waters they would cross, and to this day
    the path they took is known asJason’s Way.
    The other half, however, stayed behind
    and rowed the
Argo
from her former mooring
    over to Chytus Haven.
    1325 All at once
    the Earthborn ones came down around the mountain
    and tried to block the exit from the harbor
    by dropping countless rocks into the water,
    the way men catch sea creatures in a pool.
    1330 Heracles and the younger men, however,
    had stayed back with the ship, and Heracles
    nocked arrows nimbly on his back-bent bow
    and dropped the giants freely one by one
    since they had focused all their strength on heaving
    1335 (995) and hurling jagged rocks into the sea.
    No doubt the goddess Hera, Zeus’ consort,
    had reared these horrid things as yet another
    labor for Heracles. The other heroes
    turned back before they reached the mountaintop
    1340 and joined their comrades, and they all got down
    to slaughtering the Earthborn Giants, routing
    by shaft and spear their reckless, headlong charges
    till each and every one of them was dead.
    As woodcutters, once they have finished felling
    1345 colossal old-growth trees, proceed to lay them
    side by side along the surf to soak
    and soften and receive the dowels, the heroes
    laid out the Earthborn Giants one by one
    along the shorefront of the choppy harbor—
    1350 (1008) some headfirst in the brine, their tops and torsos
    submerged, their legs protruding landward; others,
    conversely, had their feet out in the deep
    and heads out on the beach. Both groups were doomed
    to serve as meals for fish and birds alike.
    1355 After the men returned, unscathed, from battle,
    they loosed the hawsers, and the wind came up,
    and they pursued their quest across the swell.
    All day the
Argo
coasted under sail.
    At evening, though, the wind became unsteady.
    1360 Gusts from the opposite direction seized her
    and blew her back until she reached once more
    the island of the kindly Doliones.
    They disembarked at midnight, and the rock
    to which they hastily attached a line
    1365 (1019) is called the Sacred Outcrop to this day.
    But none among them was astute enough
    to notice they had stopped at the same island.
    Since it was night the Doliones failed
    as well to mark their friends come back again,
    1370 no, they assumed Pelasgian invaders,
    Macrian men, had breached their beach instead,
    and so they took up arms and started fighting.
    Their shields and ash-wood lances clashed as swiftly
    as fire that has sparked on arid brushwood
    1375 leaps aloft in crested conflagration.
    Battle, horrible and unforgiving,
    befell the Doliones. Cyzicus
    was not permitted to escape his doom
    or go home to enjoy his bridal bed.
    1380 (1032) Just as he joined the battle, Jason ran up
    and stabbed him in the center of the chest.
    Ribs shattered round the spear tip, and he crumpled
    upon the beach and met his destined end.
    Mortals can never sidestep fate; the cosmic
    1385 net is extended round us everywhere.
    And so it was that, on the very night
    Cyzicus had assumed that he was safe
    from bitter slaughter at the heroes’ hands,
    destiny snared him, and he joined the fray.
    1390 Many others on his side were slain:
    Heracles clubbed the life from Megabrontes
    and Telecles; Acastus slaughtered Sphodris;
    Peleus vanquished battle-keen Gephyrus
    and Zelys; and that mighty ash-wood spearman
    1395 (1043) Telamon triumphed over Basileus.
    Idas in turn disposed of Promeus; Clytius,
    Hyancinthus; and the brothers Castor
    and Polydeuces slew Megalossaces
    and Phlogius. Beside them Meleager
    1400 son of Oeneus dispatched Artaces
    leader of men and bold Itymoneus.
    Still today the locals venerate
    the men who perished in that fight as heroes.
    The remnants of the Doliones turned
    1405 and fled like doves pursued by swift-winged hawks.
    After they stumbled, hoarse and