dear mother, and his childhood, and his many boyish efforts to lift the
ponderous stone. Theseus, however, was much too brave and active a young
man to be willing to spend all his time in relating things which had
already happened. His ambition was to perform other and more heroic
deeds, which should be better worth telling in prose and verse. Nor had
he been long in Athens before he caught and chained a terrible mad bull,
and made a public show of him, greatly to the wonder and admiration
of good King Aegeus and his subjects. But pretty soon, he undertook an
affair that made all his foregone adventures seem like mere boy's play.
The occasion of it was as follows:

One morning, when Prince Theseus awoke, he fancied that he must have had
a very sorrowful dream, and that it was still running in his mind, even
now that his eyes were opened. For it appeared as if the air was full of
a melancholy wail; and when he listened more attentively, he could hear
sobs, and groans, and screams of woe, mingled with deep, quiet sighs,
which came from the king's palace, and from the streets, and from the
temples, and from every habitation in the city. And all these mournful
noises, issuing out of thousands of separate hearts, united themselves
into one great sound of affliction, which had startled Theseus from
slumber. He put on his clothes as quickly as he could (not forgetting
his sandals and gold-hilted sword), and, hastening to the king, inquired
what it all meant.

"Alas! my son," quoth King Aegeus, heaving a long sigh, "here is a very
lamentable matter in hand! This is the wofulest anniversary in the
whole year. It is the day when we annually draw lots to see which of
the youths and maids of Athens shall go to be devoured by the horrible
Minotaur!"

"The Minotaur!" exclaimed Prince Theseus; and like a brave young prince
as he was, he put his hand to the hilt of his sword. "What kind of a
monster may that be? Is it not possible, at the risk of one's life, to
slay him?"

But King Aegeus shook his venerable head, and to convince Theseus that
it was quite a hopeless case, he gave him an explanation of the whole
affair. It seems that in the island of Crete there lived a certain
dreadful monster, called a Minotaur, which was shaped partly like a
man and partly like a bull, and was altogether such a hideous sort of
a creature that it is really disagreeable to think of him. If he were
suffered to exist at all, it should have been on s