s, "but never one
that would need to drink his wine out of a cup like this!"

And, true enough, what a cup it must have been! It was as large--as
large--but, in short, I am afraid to say how immeasurably large it was.
To speak within bounds, it was ten times larger than a great mill wheel;
and, all of metal as it was, it floated over the heaving surges more
lightly than an acorn cup adown the brook. The waves tumbled it onward,
until it grazed against the shore, within a short distance of the spot
where Hercules was standing.

As soon as this happened, he knew what was to be done; for he had not
gone through so many remarkable adventures without learning pretty well
how to conduct himself, whenever anything came to pass a little out of
the common rule. It was just as clear as daylight that this marvellous
cup had been set adrift by some unseen power, and guided hitherward, in
order to carry Hercules across the sea, on his way to the garden of the
Hesperides. Accordingly, without a moment's delay, he clambered over the
brim, and slid down on the inside, where, spreading out his lion's skin,
he proceeded to take a little repose. He had scarcely rested, until now,
since he bade farewell to the damsels on the margin of the river. The
waves dashed, with a pleasant and ringing sound, against the
circumference of the hollow cup; it rocked lightly to and fro, and the
motion was so soothing that it speedily rocked Hercules into an
agreeable slumber.

His nap had probably lasted a good while, when the cup chanced to graze
against a rock, and, in consequence, immediately resounded and
reverberated through its golden or brazen substance, a hundred times as
loudly as ever you heard a church bell. The noise awoke Hercules, who
instantly started up and gazed around him, wondering whereabouts he was.
He was not long in discovering that the cup had floated across a great
part of the sea, and was approaching the shore of what seemed to be an
island. And, on that island, what do you think he saw?

No; you will never guess it, not if you were to try fifty thousand
times! It positively appears to me that this was the most marvellous
spectacle that had ever been seen by Hercules in the whole course of his
wonderful travels and adventures. It was a greater marvel than the hydra
with nine heads, which kept growing twice as fast as they were cut off;
greater than the six-legged man monster; greater than Antaeus; greater
than anything that w