60 



HISTOIIY OF THE SEA. 



The Argonauts supplied the place of the assassinated relatives, 

 and Jason had two sons by one of the bereaved Lemnians. 

 When the vessel arrived at the entrance to the Euxine, — the 

 narrow strait now called the Bosphorus, — they built a temple, 

 and implored the protection of the gods against the Symplegades, 

 or Whirling Rocks, which guarded the passage. A seer named 

 Phineas was consulted upon the probability of their sailing 

 through unharmed. The rocks were imagined to float upon the 

 waves, and, when any thing attempted to pass through, to seize 

 and crush it. According to Homer, — 



" No bird of air, no dove of swiftest wing, 

 That bears ambrosia to th' ethereal king, 

 Shuns the dire rocks : in vain she cuts the skies : 

 The dire rocks meet, and crush her as she flies." 



Phineas advised them to loose a dove, to mark its flight, and to 

 judge from its fate of the destiny reserved for them. They 

 did so, determined to push boldly on if the bird got through in 

 safety. The pigeon escaped with the loss of some of its tail- 

 feathers. The Argo dashed onward, and cleared the formidable 

 rocks with the loss of a few of its stern ornaments. From this 

 time forward, the legend adds, the Symplegades remained fixed, 

 and were no longer a terror to navigators. 



The Argonauts, after entering the Black Sea, sailed due east, 

 to the mouth of the river Phasis, now the Rione. iEetes, the 

 king, promised to give Jason the fleece upon certain conditions. 

 These he was enabled to fulfil by the aid of Medea, a sorceress, 

 and daughter of iEetes. They then fled together to Greece. 

 The route followed by the Argonauts upon their return is differ- 

 ently given by the various poets who have told the story and 

 the commentators who have illustrated it. By one they are 

 represented as sailing up some river across the continent to 

 the Baltic, and thence homeward along the coasts of France 

 and Spain, and through the Straits of Gibraltar. It is needless 

 to say that there is no river which flows between the Euxine 



