"I can never be happy," he said, "until I have won the love of the Queen-mother. To do that I must show her that I have gifts quite as valuable as beauty; but I have no one to plead my cause, and I, alas! do not know the way to Olympus."
"If that is all your trouble," answered the merry man of the woods, "set your heart at rest, for I myself will present you at court."
With these words, the good-natured Bacchus threw the skin of a wild beast over his shoulders, and the two travellers became the best of friends as they journeyed together along the road which lies between the wooded heights where the satyrs dance, to the hill where the Olympian palace hides half its rosy towers among the clouds.
The Queen at first would not recognize her son; the unhappy Prince hung his head, and the assembled courtiers laughed long and loud at the awkward silence of the youth.
Bacchus, however, was not to be frightened by laughter, however inextinguishable, and he pleaded his brother's cause so well that the Queen finally consented to overlook his ugliness, and ordered that a palace be built for him.
"All I ask," said the Prince, "is a workshop, a pair of bellows, and a forge."
"Then you are not my son, after all," exclaimed the Queen. "You are nothing but a poor blacksmith."
"'Tis true I am a blacksmith," he answered, "but I will show you that I am no common workman."
Concealing her astonishment, the Queen ordered his request to be granted, and Hephæstus, glad but silent, limped away.
Day after day found him at his work; and at length one morning, when the King and Queen were sitting in their banqueting hall, the doors were thrown open, and there appeared at each entrance a golden table laden with nectar and ambrosia.