wild
beasts that roam among those woods, he thought, would doubtless find
him, or, in any case, he could not live long without care and
nourishment; and thus the dangerous brand would be quenched while yet
it was scarcely a spark.

"The shepherd did as he was bidden, although it cost his heart many a
sharp pang thus to deal barbarously with the innocent. He laid the
smiling infant, wrapped in its broidered tunic, close by the foot of an
oak, and then hurried away that he might not hear its cries.

"But the nymphs who haunt the woods and groves, saw the babe, and
pitied its helplessness, and cared for it so that it did not die. Some
brought it yellow honey from the stores of the wild bees; some fed it
with milk from the white goats that pastured on the mountain side; and
others stood as sentinels around it, guarding it from the wolves and
bears.

"Thus five days passed, and then the shepherd, who could not forget the
babe, came cautiously to the spot to see if, mayhap, even its broidered
cloak had been spared by the beasts. Sorrowful and shuddering he
glanced toward the foot of the tree. To his surprise, the babe was
still there; it looked up and smiled, and stretched its fat hands
toward him. The shepherd's heart would not let him turn away the
second time. He took the child in his arms, and carried it to his own
humble home in the valley, where he cared for it and brought it up as
his own son.

"The boy grew to be very tall and very handsome; and he was so brave,
and so helpful to the shepherds around Mount Ida, that they called him
Alexandros, or the helper of men; but his foster-father named him
Paris. As he tended his sheep in the mountain dells, he met Oenone,
the fairest of the river maidens, guileless and pure as the waters of
the stream by whose banks she loved to wander. Day after day he sat
with her in the shadow of her woodland home, and talked of innocence
and beauty, and of a life of sweet contentment, and of love; and the
maiden listened to him with wide-open eyes and a heart full of
trustfulness and faith.

"By and by, Paris and Oenone were wedded; and their little cottage in
the mountain glen was the fairest and happiest spot in Ilios. The days
sped swiftly by, and neither of them dreamed that any sorrow was in
store for them; and to Oenone her shepherd husband was all the world,
because he was so noble and brave and handsome and gentle.

"One warm summer afternoon, Paris sat in the sha