e-glance the irresistible
pitiless Fury beheld the deadly deed they had done. And the hero,
Aeson's son, cut off the extremities of the dead man, and thrice licked
up some blood and thrice spat the pollution from his teeth, as it is
right for the slayer to do, to atone for a treacherous murder. And the
clammy corpse he hid in the ground where even now those bones lie among
the Apsyrtians.

Now as soon as the heroes saw the blaze of a torch, which the maiden
raised for them as a sign to pursue, they laid their own ship near the
Colchian ship, and they slaughtered the Colchian host, as kites slay the
tribes of wood-pigeons, or as lions of the wold, when they have leapt
amid the steading, drive a great flock of sheep huddled together. Nor
did one of them escape death, but the heroes rushed upon the whole crew,
destroying them like a flame; and at last Jason met them, and was eager
to give aid where none was needed; but already they were taking thought
for him too. Thereupon they sat to devise some prudent counsel for their
voyage, and the maiden came upon them as they pondered, but Peleus spake
his word first:

"I now bid you embark while it is still night, and take with your oars
the passage opposite to that which the enemy guards, for at dawn when
they see their plight I deem that no word urging to further pursuit of
us will prevail with them; but as people bereft of their king, they will
be scattered in grievous dissension. And easy, when the people are
scattered, will this path be for us on our return."

Thus he spake; and the youths assented to the words of Aeacus' son. And
quickly they entered the ship, and toiled at their oars unceasingly
until they reached the sacred isle of Electra, the highest of them all,
near the river Eridanus.

But when the Colchians learnt the death of their prince, verily they
were eager to pursue Argo and the Minyans through all the Cronian sea.
But Hera restrained them by terrible lightnings from the sky. And at
last they loathed their own homes in the Cytaean land, quailing before
Aeetes' fierce wrath; so they landed and made abiding homes there,
scattered far and wide. Some set foot on those very islands where the
heroes had stayed, and they still dwell there, bearing a name derived
from Apsyrtus; and others built a fenced city by the dark deep Illyrian
river, where is the tomb of Harmonia and Cadmus, dwelling among the
Encheleans; and others live amid the mountains which are called