e started up eager
to touch it and clasp it in his hands. But the son of Aeson restrained
them all, and threw over it a mantle newly-woven; and he led the maiden
to the stern and seated her there, and spake to them all as follows:

(ll. 190-205) "No longer now, my friends, forbear to return to your
fatherland. For now the task for which we dared this grievous voyage,
toiling with bitter sorrow of heart, has been lightly fulfilled by the
maiden's counsels. Her--for such is her will--I will bring home to be my
wedded wife; do ye preserve her, the glorious saviour of all Achaea and
of yourselves. For of a surety, I ween, will Aeetes come with his host
to bar our passage from the river into the sea. But do some of you toil
at the oars in turn, sitting man by man; and half of you raise your
shields of oxhide, a ready defence against the darts of the enemy, and
guard our return. And now in our hands we hold the fate of our children
and dear country and of our aged parents; and on our venture all Hellas
depends, to reap either the shame of failure or great renown."

(ll. 206-211) Thus he spake, and donned his armour of war; and they
cried aloud, wondrously eager. And he drew his sword from the sheath
and cut the hawsers at the stern. And near the maiden he took his stand
ready armed by the steersman Aneaeus, and with their rowing the ship
sped on as they strained desperately to drive her clear of the river.

(ll. 212-235) By this time Medea's love and deeds had become known
to haughty Aeetes and to all the Colchians. And they thronged to the
assembly in arms; and countless as the waves of the stormy sea when they
rise crested by the wind, or as the leaves that fall to the ground from
the wood with its myriad branches in the month when the leaves fall--who
could reckon their tale?--so they in countless number poured along the
banks of the river shouting in frenzy; and in his shapely chariot Aeetes
shone forth above all with his steeds, the gift of Helios, swift as the
blasts of the wind. In his left hand he raised his curved shield, and in
his right a huge pine-torch, and near him in front stood up his mighty
spear. And Apsyrtus held in his hands the reins of the steeds. But
already the ship was cleaving the sea before her, urged on by stalwart
oarsmen, and the stream of the mighty river rushing down. But the king
in grievous anguish lifted his hands and called on Helios and Zeus
to bear witness to their evil deeds; and terrib