ptives were spent in the most dreadful
servitude.

Daedalus, on returning into Crete, built a labyrinth there, in which,
very probably, these games were celebrated. Palaephatus, however,
says that Theseus fought in a cavern, where the son of Taurus had
been confined. Plutarch and Catullus say, that Theseus voluntarily
offered to go to Crete with the other Athenians, while Diodorus
Siculus says that the lot fell on him to be of the number. His
delivery by Ariadne, through her giving him the thread, is probably
a poetical method of informing us that she gave her lover the plan
of the labyrinth where he was confined, that he might know its
windings and the passage out. Eustathius, indeed, says, that Ariadne
received a thread from Daedalus; but he must mean a plan of the
labyrinth, which he himself had designed. The story of Ariadne's
intercourse with Bacchus is most probably founded on the fact, that
on arriving at the Isle of Naxos, when she was deserted by Theseus,
she became the wife of a priest of Bacchus.

FABLE III. [VIII.183-259]

Daedalus, weary of his exile, finds means, by making himself wings,
to escape out of Crete. His son Icarus, forgetting the advice of his
father, and flying too high, the Sun melts his wings, and he
perishes in the sea, which afterwards bore his name. The sister of
Daedalus commits her son Perdix to his care, for the purpose of being
educated. Daedalus, being jealous of the talent of his nephew, throws
him from a tower, with the intention of killing him; but Minerva
supports him in his fall, and transforms him into a partridge.

In the meantime, Daedalus, abhorring Crete and his prolonged exile,[16]
and inflamed by the love of his native soil, was enclosed {there} by the
sea. "Although Minos," said he, "may beset the land and the sea, still
the skies, at least, are open. By that way will we go: let Minos possess
everything {besides}: he does not sway the air." {Thus} he spoke; and he
turned his thoughts to arts unknown {till then}; and varied {the course}
{of} nature. For he arranges feathers in order, beginning from the
least, the shorter one succeeding the longer; so that you might suppose
they grew on an incline. Thus does the rustic pipe sometimes rise by
degrees, with unequal straws. Then he binds those in the middle with
thread, and the lowermost ones with wax; and, thus ranged, with a gentle
curvature, he bends them, so as to imit