land?"

Theseus stood astonished, as he looked across the broad bright sea
and saw the fair Attic shore. His heart grew great within him, and he
said, "If I were king of such a land, I would rule it wisely and well,
in wisdom and in might."

And Aithra smiled and said, "Take, then, the sword and the sandals and
go to thy father AEgeus, King of Athens, and say to him, 'The stone is
lifted!' Then show him the sword and the sandals, and take what the
gods shall send."

But Theseus wept, "Shall I leave you, O my mother?"

She answered, "Weep not for me." Then she kissed Theseus and wept over
him, and went into the temple, and Theseus saw her no more.

II

HOW THESEUS SLEW THE CLUB-BEARER AND THE PINE-BENDER

So Theseus stood there alone, with his mind full of many hopes. And
first he thought of going down to the harbor and hiring a swift ship
and sailing across the bay to Athens. But even that seemed too slow
for him, and he longed for wings to fly across the sea and find his
father.

After a while his heart began to fail him, and he sighed and said
within himself, "What if my father have other sons around him, whom he
loves? What if he will not receive me? He has forgotten me ever since
I was born. Why should he welcome me now?"

Then he thought a long while sadly, but at last he cried aloud, "Yes,
I will make him love me. I will win honor, and do such deeds that
AEgeus shall be proud of me though he had fifty other sons."

"I will go by land and into the mountains, and so round to Athens.
Perhaps there I may hear of brave adventures, and do something which
shall win my father's love."

So Theseus went by land and away into the mountains, with his father's
sword upon his thigh. And he went up into the gloomy glens, up and up,
till the lowland grew blue beneath his feet, and the clouds drove damp
about his head. But he went up and up, ever toiling on through bog and
brake, till he came to a pile of stones.

On the stones a man was sitting wrapped in a cloak of bear-skin. When
he saw Theseus, he rose, and laughed till the glens rattled.

"Who art thou, fair fly, who hast walked into the spider's web?"

Theseus walked on steadily, and made no answer, but he thought, "Is
this some robber? Has an adventure come to me already?"

But the strange man laughed louder than ever and said, "Bold fly, know
thou not these glens are the web from which no fly ever finds his way
out again, and I am the spider who