d glanced upward and pierced the heart of a
warrior on the other side. The boar was getting the best of the fight.

Atalanta now ran forward and threw her spear. It struck the boar in the
back, and a great stream of blood gushed out. A warrior let fly an arrow
which put out one of the beast's eyes. Then Meleager rushed up and
pierced his heart with his spear. The boar could no longer stand up; but
he fought fiercely for some moments, and then rolled over, dead.

The heroes then cut off the beast's head. It was as much as six of them
could carry. Then they took the skin from his great body and offered it
to Meleager as a prize, because he had given the death wound to the wild
boar. But Meleager said:

"It belongs to Atalanta, because it was she who gave him the very first
wound." And he gave it to her as the prize of honor.

You ought to have seen the tall huntress maiden then, as she stood among
the trees with the boar's skin thrown over her left shoulder and
reaching down to her feet. She had never looked so much like the queen
of the woods. But the rude brothers of Queen Althea were vexed to think
that a maiden should win the prize, and they began to make trouble. One
of them snatched Atalanta's spear from her hand, and dragged the prize
from her shoulders, and the other pushed her rudely and bade her go back
to Arcadia and live again with the she-bears on the mountain side. All
this vexed Meleager, and he tried to make his uncles give back the spear
and the prize, and stop their unmannerly talk. But they grew worse and
worse, and at last set upon Meleager, and would have killed him if he
had not drawn his sword to defend himself. A fight followed, and the
rude fellows struck right and left as though they were blind. Soon both
were stretched dead upon the ground. Some who did not see the fight said
that Meleager killed them, but I would rather believe that they killed
each other in their drunken fury.

And now all the company started back to the city. Some carried the
boar's huge head, and some the different parts of his body, while others
had made biers of the green branches, and bore upon them the dead bodies
of those who had been slain. It was indeed a strange procession.

A young man who did not like Meleager, had run on in front and had
reached the city before the rest of the company had fairly started.
Queen Althea was standing at the door of the palace, and when she saw
him she asked what had happened in t