The Story of Hercules Read online

  “No,” I replied, “I succeeded, as usual. This donkey was the payment I received from Augeas for my amazing feat of cleaning his stables.”

  Cunning Eurystheus smiled with an unbecoming humor and said, “Dear me, Hercules. You have accepted payment for a task I assigned you. That can hardly count as a labor, then. Just as with the hydra, you have not satisfied the terms of our contract. You still owe me seven more labors. But, believe me, you shall not live through them all! For your next task, go chase away the Stymphalian birds. You’ll have your hands full with them, I tell you!”

  I choked off my hot anger at his cheating ways and departed.

  7. The Birds and the Bull

  I ARRIVED SEVERAL days later at Lake Stymphalos. The birds had made themselves a menace by flocking in enormous numbers, arranging themselves so densely on the edges of the lake that no men from the neighboring city could fish or could even protect themselves should the birds attack. These tall, leggy birds had long, sharp beaks that could stab a man through his chest and claws that could pierce his limbs. Even with a bow and arrows there were too many thousands for me to kill. While I was surveying this strange scene from a hilltop, good, wise Athene, disguised as a boy, fishing pole over his shoulder, a cap on his head, came and sat down at my left, and said, “My father says thunder, though it causes no harm, is the most frightful weapon of all.”

  “The most frightful weapon?” I said, wondering what riddle the boy was posing to me.

  He handed me a pair of bronze castanets. And then I understood! “Thank you, lad,” I said, offering him my hand. “So handsome are you, so gleaming are your eyes I feel you must be a divine god or goddess.”

  The boy turned his head away, smiling, and then in the form of an owl flew off toward the heavens. Owlish Athene!

  I hiked down the hilltop, pulled my shield close over me to prevent the birds’ sharp beaks from piercing me, and then waded into the shallows of the lake. Like a dancer at a feast, I clicked those castanets. What a clanging din I raised! A stony silence, however, followed the first few thunderous knocks—a moment later, as I again clicked the castanets in rhythm, the birds screeched in fright and flapped their wings hastily and flew in droves up and away. So many were there that they shut out the sunlight for several minutes. I roared with laughter all the while, but kept up the terrible brass din until they were all gone.

  I prayed thankfulness to Athene and then returned to Tiryns.

  “What cannot you do?” wondered Eurystheus. For once he seemed not my enemy but almost my admirer, marvelling at my strength and cleverness.

  “I do not know,” I replied, “since I have never failed.”

  “I’ll see what I can do about that,” he said. He thought for several minutes and then said, “Perhaps your saving grace is that these previous labors have kept you in the friendly confines of the Peloponnesian peninsula. Go and bring me the savage Cretan bull alive. You might already know, Hercules, that his monstrous offspring, the Minotaur, half-bull, half-human, ate up all who visited its pen within the winding, confusing labyrinth.”

  “You shall have the Cretan bull to do with as you will,” I answered. I fetched dear Iolaos, who was now a hearty young man, and with him sailed across the sea to the vast island of Crete.

  This bull had mated with Pasiphae, wife of King Minos, producing the Minotaur, a creature more stubborn than any bull and more fiercesome than any man. The father bull now spent his days wandering the hills above the city, and then rushing down into the fields of farmers, goring their cattle and destroying with powerful kicks their lovely walled fields.

  I expected the aid of Minos, considering this bull was hardly his friend or the friend of his people, but when Iolaos and I appeared at his court, Minos glared at us, stroking his bearded chin, and seemed to begrudge us even a piece of bread or cup of water.

  “We shall capture the bull, with your permission,” I said.

  “My permission?” he said. “Kill him, dance with him, I don’t care what you do with him. I do not think of him, and I will lend you no help. I washed my hands of that beast many years ago.”

  Angry at his words, I thought about challenging him to fight. But Iolaos, acting as my Athene, whispered that we neither needed nor desired Minos’ aid, and that to fight him would only bring down on us the splendid armies of Crete.

  We stalked out of the palace and began our plan. We would carry no weapons but my club, to keep us from accidentally killing the savage beast. We climbed a mountain trail to the bull’s usual pasturage and passed a crude signboard depicting a fire-breathing, bloody-horned bull. I told Iolaos to wait by the sign and that I would return shortly.

  To my surprise the bull was asleep at the top of the trail, but at first I mistook it for a tremendous black boulder. Then, recognizing it for what it was, instead of turning and running as most men would do, or sneaking up on it and lassoing its feet, as only the bravest men would think of doing, I walked up to the heaving, sighing, dozing bull and grabbed it by its fly-swishing tail.

  The bull leaped as if it had been stung. But buck as it would, it could not shake me away. He bucked for the good part of an afternoon, until the sweat poured off him in streams. Finally, however, he was humbled, and the Cretan bull followed me and Iolaos down the mountainside, through the city, where we jeered at Minos watching us from his palace, and then finally climbed aboard our ship. With gentle winds, we sailed for Tiryns.

  The Cretan bull bucked until the sweat poured off him in streams.

  The Cretan bull was twice the size of the largest bull anyone had ever seen. When we led it into the courtyard of Eurystheus’ palace, the king screamed in fright.

  “Are you satisfied?” I asked.

  “No! Get it out of here!” said Eurystheus.

  I bowed and released the bull. He bucked and stormed, kicking over pedestals and statues within the palace before running crazily through the countryside.

  Eurystheus was angry and for my next labor sent me on my longest quest so far, to distant Thrace for King Diomedes’ mares, horses about whose nature I knew nothing.

  8. I Wrestle with Death and Meet the Man-eating Horses

  I WAS far along in the routine of my labors. Sure of myself and of the successful outcome of my tasks, I told Iolaos to stay at home while I went on the long road to Thrace, in northern Greece.

  While crossing Thessaly, I decided to visit Admetus, king of Pherae, in eastern Thessaly. Admetus, a fine sailor, was a friend I had made on my short journey with the Argonauts. When I came to the trail entrance that would take me down into the valley where Admetus’ palace lay, a stocky, wide-shouldered marauder, cloaked and holding a spear, leapt down from a boulder before me.

  “Hand over your possessions, traveler,” he said, threatening to poke the spear at me.

  I laughed! What did he take me for, chopped oats?

  “Don’t laugh!” he shrieked. “What makes you too tough for my sharp spear?”

  “Tell me your name, bold robber. Then, when I have finished laughing, I will kill you and keep your name alive in my memory, a fool for my tales.”

  “I didn’t catch but a bit of that,” said the slow-witted man, “but, all right, they call me One-armed Burly.”

  Out from his cloak came his right arm cut off at the elbow.

  Seeing my glance, he said quickly, “I had an accident.”

  “You’re about to have another,” I said.

  “I was left-handed to begin with! My right arm was only in the way. Now don’t stare, and tell me your name and then prepare to meet your fallen friends in Hades.”

  “Very well, Burly. My name is Hercules, and my father is Zeus.”

  In confusion Burly dropped his spear. “Even so!” he cried, his voice quivering, “I’ll kill you and live for ever as the man who slayed mighty, mighty, mighty Hercules.”

  “Give up your robbing, and make way, or your life’s soon complete.”

  This daredevil thought about that; I could almost hea
r the stones tumble in his head. Then he answered, “Should I kill you, I’d own your fine cloak of lion skin, your gleaming shield so beautifully worked I am hardly able to look away from it. Your bow is taller than I am; in itself it must be worth a king’s riches.” He picked up his spear and poised it, but his gaze was taking in my form, for I had stood up from my fit of laughing.

  He was terrified. My muscles shone with the warmth of my body. Just as a small animal is fixed in place by the eyes of a snake, so Burly fell into my gaze.

  He shook his head to clear the spell and cried out, “Give—give—give up your shield, Hercules, and I’ll not kill-kill you.”

  Terrified by his own threat, he launched his spear. Puny little man, his spear missed by several feet to the left. He cowered, awaiting, it seemed, the fatal blow from my sword or shot from my bow. Instead I stamped my foot at him, and he fell over, backward, into the dust. He got up and ran down the trail, screaming, “Help! Help!”

  Fool! The citizens of Pherae, recognizing him for the robber who had been harassing them, caught him and soon put him on trial for his crimes.

  When I reached the palace, however, there was a strange quiet, and the guards at the city walls hung their heads as I approached, hardly seeming to care, it seemed, whether I were friend or foe. I, on the other hand, was giddy with my good fortune, my recent successes with the labors and, finally, with the thought of seeing my friend Admetus.

  I entered the hall where I expected we would share many feasts. A sullen servant went to announce my arrival to him. After a long wait, which was not flattering to me, his friend and the hero of great fame, Admetus entered the hall and, with head lowered, greeted me, saying, “Hercules, dearest friend, welcome.”

  “Admetus!” I answered. “Why so gloomy?”

  “I do not wish to spoil your visit with my troubles,” he said. “Let us talk of something else.”

  But the gloom was a dark cloud over his head, and there was no pleasure in talk.

  “Tell me,” I finally asked, “are your noble parents dead or alive?”

  “Alive!” he said.

  “Then why so downcast? Is it a relative of yours that has left this world?”

  He said, after a moment, “No, certainly not a relative, but Death has come for someone else.”

  “Death comes for us all!” I said, shaking him by the shoulder. “As you know, I am not a philosophical or ponderous man, yet I try to be sensible, and I do not like needless mournfulness. So come now, if it’s not a relative, then how does it affect us? I’ve been so eager to see you, my dear friend, but now I am here, you seem hardly fit for company or joyous feasting.”

  “I am not, indeed, fit for company or feasting, dear Hercules.”

  I became angry. Alas, why did Zeus bless me with his heavy-browed temper? I reasoned that since no relative of his had died, that the mourning was for show.

  “I am your guest!” I shouted. “And I demand the service any guest, least of all a friend and hero, deserves—I want a feast!” I thought I could provoke him into a return to our old ways.

  Admetus, scarcely able to speak, said, “As you wish.”

  He ordered a feast, but I have never shared such a dull table. He was not interested in hearing of my great deeds, nor in my adventures. He did not laugh when I told him of Burly, the one-armed bandit. When I finished my drinking and eating, I rose and told him that he had made it plain he no longer considered me a friend.

  “You are my friend, and that is why I spare you my pain,” he replied.

  I left the hall and decided to go on to Thrace, to my labor of capturing Diomedes’ horses. As I stood at the city’s gates, disgusted with Admetus and his treatment of me, shouting out, in fact, my bitter disappointment in the king’s poor reception, I overheard a brave guard mutter, “It’s a wretch who curses his mourning friend.”

  “What’s that you say!” I thundered. I ran up to the guard, and he leaned away in dread. He did not answer, so I said, “Admetus grieves no relative! Why should he mourn!”

  “So would you mourn in the evening, cold Hercules, if your wife was led away by Death in the morning.”

  “Wife!” I was struck by the word. “Wife! But Admetus never told me of his marriage! How did she die? Who is she?” Yes, a wife is not a relative by blood, but there is a bond of love between them, stronger than blood, bonds forged by the fire god Hephaestos at the request of his wife, goddess of love Aphrodite. I struck myself on the head, nearly knocking myself out. The guard was now too frightened of me to speak. I shook him. “Tell me what happened!”

  “Alcestis—whom he wed on his journey with Jason—is his wife—the most noble, good wife who ever lived! And she lived until today—when Death came for her husband. God Apollo protects Admetus in return for an earlier favor, and came to a bargain with Death that would allow someone else to take the king’s place. Alcestis’ love was so great for her husband that she offered herself as Admetus’ substitute. Death saw gold where he would have taken silver and gladly accepted Alcestis’ offer.”

  I cursed myself, turning my terrible temper on myself. But Athene, it must have been—because who gives us wisdom when we seem at our wits’ end?—whispered in my ear, “If you’ve wrestled the Nemean lion, you can wrestle Death.”

  “Quick,” I said to the guard, “where is the queen’s tomb?”

  “Yonder,” he said, pointing to a grove nearby.

  I ran off in that direction. It was evening. I found Alcestis’ tomb; it was within the future tomb of Admetus, and on its threshold lay an offering to Death of food and flowers. I sampled a pinch of the food and spat it out—too salty for anyone but Death! In any event, he had not passed this way, and I still had a chance to fight him. I crept behind the tomb and waited. It was night before he came, but the moon was out and bright.

  He was cloaked, as grim Death should be, hidden from mortal eyes, but beside him walked a beautiful, dark-haired maiden; her gaze through her funeral veil was calm, proud, almost happy that she had sacrificed herself for her husband. Though Admetus was my friend, I confessed to myself that she was too good for him, that he should not have allowed her to be taken by Death in his place.

  Just as Death stooped to take a bite of his salty dish, I leapt out, grasped his strong arms and pulled them behind his back. “Let her go!” I spoke into his ear, keeping my eyes from his depthless face.

  He struggled, and I could see the confusion in his movements—wondering what beast in human form could have pinned his arms. He hissed out, “Despicable Hercules?”

  “Yes,” I replied.

  Death struggled, groaning, trying to thrash about, but he could not free himself from my muscular grasp. “Very well,” cried Death, “you have won, son of Zeus. Take her back to Admetus. But some day I shall return for her—and for you!”

  “Indeed,” I answered, “but not for many years—when Alcestis is old, bent and gray. As for me, I am on my way to Immortality and will avoid your chilling, neverending grip.” On impulse, I yanked away his cloak, and there I saw—no, it is too monstrous, too frightening to tell. I gave him back the cloak, and an instant later, in an explosion of darkness, the starlight and moonlight momentarily disappearing, he was gone.

  I was left now with Alcestis, who remained for a time under Death’s spell. I took her chilled hand and nodded to her. “We return to your husband, my friend Admetus.”

  She nodded from behind her veil, for Death had robbed her temporarily of her voice, and we walked slowly back from the grove toward the city gates, where the sleepy, mourning guards, not noticing the identity of my companion, waved me through.

  I had a plan that would, I hoped, surprise and then amuse Admetus. When I came to his chambers, I stopped and whispered to-Alcestis that I wanted her to wait back in the shadows and to stay there till I called her closer. She nodded.

  At the door to Admetus’ bedroom I called, “Wake up, old friend, I have a surprise for you!”

  He rushed to the door, surprise
d in the first place by my return after my bad-natured leave-taking earlier.

  “Hercules!” he said.

  “I found out your secret, my friend. Why hadn’t you told me of your marriage? Jason’s voyage proved good for you and brought you a loving wife. Why did you not tell me that while no relative of yours had died, your wife, your good, sacrificing Alcestis had? Why should your friend Hercules find out second-hand?”

  He burst into tears.

  I gripped his shoulder and said, “Being that I am your true friend, and hearing of your loss, I went and found you a woman to replace her.”

  Poor Admetus! This was, I admit, a cruel joke. But I cannot help myself, my sense of humor is a rough-and-tumble sort. He cringed under my hand, convulsed in tears.

  He was astounded at my cruelty, but he did not know the great favor, the astounding favor, I had done him which would make right all my teasing. “Come along,” I said. “Out here, over there in the shadows, I have brought you a woman just as good as Alcestis ever was.”

  Admetus, king and warrior, crumpled to the floor in grief. “Please, Hercules,” he whimpered, “take her away. You do not understand the love a husband has for his wife.”

  “Ah,” I laughed, “but I do!” I beckoned to Alcestis, and she came forward, but Admetus looked away in agony, thinking I was taunting him with a strange woman. I lifted her veil.

  I beckoned to Alcestis, and she came forward, but Admetus looked away in agony.

  “She’s every bit the woman Alcestis was,” I declared.

  And now my friend Admetus would have struck me, fed up with my teasing, had not he glanced through his tears at the lovely face of his wife.

  He cried out in joy and embraced her, then me, then her again. When his tears of joy had ceased to flow, I told him, “Next time you’ll tell me right away and clearly what your troubles are. I have wrestled Death for you, to retrieve your loving wife. Always know that I am your friend.”