t praises him, thou hast
never heard; the sweetest of all sights, when a man looks on his good
deeds, thou has never seen. They who bow down to thee are weak and
feeble in youth, and wretched and loathsome in old age. But I dwell
with the gods in heaven and with good men on earth; and without me
nothing good and pure may be thought and done. More than all others am
I honored by the gods, more than all others am I cherished by the men
who love me. In peace and in war, in health and in sickness, I am the
aid of all who seek me; and my help never fails. My children know the
purest of all pleasures, when the hour of rest comes after the toil of
day. In youth they are strong, and their limbs are quick with health;
in old age they look back upon a happy life; and when they lie down to
the sleep of death their name is cherished among men for their brave
and good deeds. Love me, therefore, Herakles, and obey my words, and
thou shalt dwell with me, when thy toil is ended, in the home of the
undying gods."

Then Herakles bowed down his head and sware to follow her counsels;
and when the two maidens passed away from his sight he went forth with
a good courage to his labor and suffering. In many a land he sojourned
and toiled to do the will of the false Eurystheus. Good deeds he did
for the sons of men; but he had no profit of all his labor, save the
love of the gentle Iole. Far away in Oechalia, where the sun rises
from the eastern sea, he saw the maiden in the halls of Eurytos, and
sought to win her love. But the word which Zeus spake to Here, the
Queen, gave him no rest; and Eurystheus sent him forth to other lands,
and he saw the maiden no more.

But Herakles toiled on with a good heart, and soon the glory of his
great deeds were spread abroad throughout all the earth. Minstrels
sang how he slew the monsters and savage beasts who vexed the sons of
men, how he smote the Hydra in the land of Lernai, and the wild boar,
which haunted the groves of Erymanthos, and the Harpies, who lurked in
the swamps of Stymphalos. They told how he wandered far away to the
land of the setting sun, when Eurystheus bade him pluck the golden
apples from the garden of the Hesperides--how, over hill and dale,
across marsh and river, through thicket and forest, he came to the
western sea, and crossed to the African land, where Atlas lifts up his
white head to the high heaven--how he smote the dragon which guarded
the brazen gates, and brought the apple