Myths and Legends from Around the World by Robin Brockman

Author:Robin Brockman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Arcturus Digital Limited

At last, only the immortal head remained and this Hercules, with one supreme final swing of his club, knocked senseless. He then jumped upon the prostrate neck and, drawing a dagger, cut off the head. This he buried beneath an enormous rock. With Iolaus’ help he set about making a large stock of good true arrows whose points he dipped in the poisonous blood of the Hydra.

Hercules returned too soon for Eurystheus’ liking. While he was away the king had been pleasantly distracted and had not had the inclination to think up any really good labours. One did spring into his mind, however, after a bit of pondering. Knowing it would take ages, even if it could be accomplished, he sent the hero off to capture the Cerynitian Hind.

Eurystheus was quite right. It took Hercules a whole year to finally catch this beautiful Hind with golden antlers and hooves of bronze. The animal was sacred to the goddess Artemis and perfectly harmless, though highly elusive. In netting the creature finally, on the banks of the river Ladon, Hercules hurt it slightly. For this he incurred the wrath of Artemis. Outraged, she accosted him on his way back to Tiryns, with the poor helpless Hind over his shoulder. When he rightly put the blame entirely on Eurystheus, she forgave him.

The lengthy absence of Hercules had given Eurystheus time to examine all possibilities at his leisure, and gather knowledge of every monster in the known world. He had come up with what he considered his best labour yet. Given how long the Hind business had taken, relative to the other labours, it was obvious that Hercules was rather better at killing things than catching them. What if the two kinds of task were combined? What if he sent the damn heroic fool after something really dangerous, but to bring it back alive?

Eurystheus congratulated himself roundly as he packed Hercules off on the day of his return, as was his habit now. The object of the chase this time was the Erymanthian Boar. It was winter and up on Mount Erymanthus, where the Boar lived, Hercules would soon be freezing his great biceps off, Eurystheus chuckled to himself.

The joke turned out to be on Eurystheus. Hercules pursued the Boar into deep snow where it could not easily run away and netted it without too much difficulty. A sharp tap on its ugly head and that was that. Other than a nasty incident while sharing some special wine with a centaur acquaintance on the return journey, it was all straightforward enough.

By the time he got back to Tiryns, Hercules had tamed the boar and trained it a little. On entering Eurystheus’ palace he pretended to be still struggling mightily with it as he presented it to the king. At one point Hercules pretended the boar had escaped him and so frightened Eurystheus that he hid inside a large urn while the animal snorted around it with Hercules desperately trying not to laugh out loud.

Later,

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