The Junior Classics, Volume 2: Folk Tales and Myths

by Unknown

So Œdipus sat in the market-place and talked with merchants and travellers, and he went down to the ships in the harbor and learned many strange things of strange lands—the wisdom of the Egyptians, who were the wisest of all men in the south, and the cunning of the Phœnicians, who were the greatest merchants and sailors in all the world. But in the evening, when the sun was low in the west, and the hills all turned to amethyst and sapphire, and the snow mountains blushed ruby red beneath his parting kiss, then along the smooth, gold sands of the Isthmus, by the side of the sounding sea, he would box and wrestle and run, till all the ways were darkened and the stars stood out in the sky. For he was a true son of Hellas, and knew that nine times out of every ten a slack body and a slack mind go together.

So he grew up in his beauty, a very god for wisdom and might, and there was no question he could not answer nor riddle he could not solve, so that all the land looked up to him, and the king and queen loved him as their own son.

Now one day there was a great banquet in the palace, to which all the noblest of the land were bidden, and the minstrels played and the tumblers danced and the wine flowed freely round the board, so that men’s hearts were opened, and they talked of great deeds and heroes, and boasted what they themselves could do. And Œdipus boasted as loud as any, and challenged one and all to meet him in fair fight. But the youth who had grown up with him in rivalry, and nourished jealousy and hatred in his heart, taunted him to his face, and said: “Base born that thou art, and son of slave, thinkest thou that free men will fight with thee? Lions fight not with curs, and though thou clothe thyself with purple and gold, all men know that thou art no true son to him thou callest thy sire.”

And this he said being flushed with wine, and because myriad-mouthed Rumor had spread abroad the tale that Œdipus was a foundling, though he himself knew naught thereof.

Then Œdipus flushed red with rage, and swift as a gale that sweeps down from the mountains he fell upon the other, and seizing him by the throat, he shook him till he had not a breath to beg for mercy. “What sayest thou now, thou whelp? Begone with thy lying taunt, now that thou hast licked the dust for thy falsehood.”

And he flung him out from the hall. But Merope leant pale and sad against a pillar, and veiled her face in her mantle to hide her tears. And when they were alone, Œdipus took her hand and stroked it, and said: “Grieve not for my fiery spirit, mother, but call me thine own son, and say that I was right to silence the liar who would cast dishonor upon my father’s name and upon thee.”

But she looked at him sadly and longingly through her tears, and spoke in riddling words: “The gods, my child, sent thee to thy father and to me in answer to our prayers. A gift of God thou art, and a gift of God thou shalt be, living and dead, to them that love thee. The flesh groweth old and withereth away as a leaf, but the spirit liveth on forever, and those are the truest of kin who are kin in the spirit of goodness and of love.”

But Œdipus was troubled, for she would say no more, but only held his hand, and when he drew it away it was wet with her tears. Then he thought in his heart: “Verily my mother would not weep for naught. What if, after all, there be something in the tale? I will go to the central shrine of Hellas and ask the god of Truth, golden-haired Apollo. If he say it is a lie, verily I will thrust it back down that coward’s throat, and the whole land shall ring with his infamy. And if it be true—the gods will guide me how to act.”

So he set forth alone upon his pilgrimage. He drew near to the sacred place and made due sacrifice, and washed in the great stone basin, and put away all uncleanness from his heart, and went through the portals of rock to the awful shrine within, where the undying fire burns night and day and the sacred laurel stands. And he put his question to the god and waited for an answer.

Through the dim darkness of the shrine he saw the priestess on her tripod, veiled in a mist of incense and vapor, and as the power of the god came upon her she beheld the things of the future and the hidden secrets of Fate. And she raised her hand toward Œdipus, and with pale lips spoke the words of doom: “Œdipus ill-fated, thine own sire shalt thou slay.”