there and eat the fruits of the island. But
Orpheus would not have them land. The island, he said, was Thrinacia.
Upon that island the Cattle of the Sun pastured, and if one of the
cattle perished through them their return home might not be won. They
heard the lowing of the cattle through the mist, and a deep longing for
the sight of their own fields, with a white house near, and flocks and
herds at pasture, came over the heroes. They came near the Island of
Thrinacia, and they saw the Cattle of the Sun feeding by the meadow
streams; not one of them was black; all were white as milk, and the
horns upon their heads were golden. They saw the two nymphs who herded
the kine--Phaethusa and Lampetia, one with a staff of silver and the
other with a staff of gold.

Driven by the breeze that came over the Thrinacian Sea the Argonauts
came to the land of the Phaeacians. It was a good land as they saw when
they drew near; a land of orchards and fresh pastures, with a white and
sun-lit city upon the height. Their spirits came back to them as they
drew into the harbor; they made fast the hawsers, and they went upon
the ways of the city.

And then they saw everywhere around them the dark faces of Colchian
soldiers. These were the men of King AEetes, and they had come overland
to the Phaeacian city, hoping to cut off the Argonauts. Jason, when he
saw the soldiers, shouted to those who had been left on the Argo, and
they drew out of the harbor, fearful lest the Colchians should grapple
with the ship and wrest from them the Fleece of Gold. Then Jason made
an encampment upon the shore, and the captain of the Colchians went
here and there, gathering together his men.

Medea left Jason's side and hastened through the city. To the palace of
Alcinous, king of the Phaeacians, she went. Within the palace she found
Arete, the queen. And Arete was sitting by her hearth, spinning golden
and silver threads.

Arete was young at that time, as young as Medea, and as yet no child
had been born to her. But she had the clear eyes of one who
understands, and who knows how to order things well. Stately, too, was
Arete, for she had been reared in the house of a great king. Medea came
to her, and fell upon her knees before her, and told her how she had
fled from the house of her father, King AEetes.

She told Arete, too, how she had helped Jason to win the Golden Fleece,
and she told her how through her her brother had been led to his death.
As she t