her.

Medea did not struggle with them. She drew from the folds of her dress
one of the gleaming apples that she carried and she gave it to one of
the guards. "It is for King Pelias," she said. "Give the apple to him
and then do with me as the king would have you do."

The guards brought the gleaming apple to the king. When he had taken it
into his hand and had smelled its fragrance, old trembling Pelias asked
where the apple had come from. The guards told him it had been brought
by an ancient woman who was now outside seated on a stone in the
courtyard.

He looked on the shining apple and he felt its fragrance and he could
not help thinking, old trembling Pelias, that this apple might be the
means of bringing him back to the fullness of health and courage that
he had had before. He sent for the ancient woman who had brought it
that she might tell him where it had come from and who it was that had
sent it to him. Then the guards brought Medea before him.

She saw an old man, white-faced and trembling, with shaking hands and
eyes that looked on her fearfully. "Who are you," he asked, "and from
whence came the apple that you had them bring me?"

Medea, standing before him, looked a withered and shrunken beldame, a
woman bent with years, but yet with eyes that were bright and living.
She came near him and she said: "The apple, O King, came from the
garden that is watched over by the Daughters of the Evening Land. He
who eats it has a little of the weight of old age taken from him. But
things more wonderful even than the shining apples grow in that far
garden. There are plants there the juices of which make youthful again
all aged and failing things. The apple would bring you a little way
toward the vigor of your prime. But the juices I have can bring you to
a time more wonderful--back even to the strength and the glory of your
youth."

When the king heard her say this a light came into his heavy eyes, and
his hands caught Medea and drew her to him. "Who are you?" he cried,
"who speak of the garden watched over by the Daughters of the Evening
Land? Who are you who speak of juices that can bring back one to the
strength and glory of his youth?"

Medea answered: "I am a woman who has known many and great griefs, O
king. My griefs have brought me through the world. Many have searched
for the garden watched over by the Daughters of the Evening Land, but I
came to it unthinkingly, and without wanting them I gathered the