e and to all the other countries round the great
sea. As for the horse, he wandered away across the plains towards the
north and found a home at last in distant Thessaly beyond the River
Peneus. And I have heard it said that all the horses in the world have
descended from that one which Neptune brought out of the rock; but of
the truth of this story there may be some doubts.

[Illustration]

THE ADVENTURES OF THESEUS.

I. AEGEUS AND AETHRA.

There was once a king of Athens whose name was AEgeus. He had no son; but
he had fifty nephews, and they were waiting for him to die, so that one
of them might be king in his stead. They were wild, worthless fellows,
and the people of Athens looked forward with dread to the day when the
city should be in their power. Yet so long as AEgeus lived they could not
do much harm, but were content to spend their time in eating and
drinking at the king's table and in quarreling among themselves.

It so happened one summer that AEgeus left his kingdom in the care of the
elders of the city and went on a voyage across the Saronic Sea to the
old and famous city of Troezen, which lay nestled at the foot of the
mountains on the opposite shore. Troezen was not fifty miles by water
from Athens, and the purple-peaked island of AEgina lay between them;
but to the people of that early time the distance seemed very great, and
it was not often that ships passed from one place to the other. And as
for going by land round the great bend of the sea, that was a thing so
fraught with danger that no man had ever dared try it.

King Pittheus of Troezen was right glad to see AEgeus, for they had been
boys together, and he welcomed him to his city and did all that he could
to make his visit a pleasant one. So, day after day, there was feasting
and merriment and music in the marble halls of old Troezen, and the two
kings spent many a happy hour in talking of the deeds of their youth and
of the mighty heroes whom both had known. And when the time came for the
ship to sail back to Athens, AEgeus was not ready to go. He said he would
stay yet a little longer in Troezen, for that the elders of the city
would manage things well at home; and so the ship returned without him.

But AEgeus tarried, not so much for the rest and enjoyment which he was
having in the home of his old friend, as for the sake of AEthra, his old
friend's daughter. For AEthra was as fair as a summer morning, and she
was the joy and p