Jason and the Argonauts went from Hypsipyle's hall. The maidens who were left behind wept together. All but Hypsipyle. She sat on the throne of King Thoas and she had Polyxo, her nurse, tell her of the ways of Jason's voyage as he had told of them, and of all that he would have to pass through. When the other Lemnian women slept she put her head upon her nurse's, knees and wept; bitterly Hypsipyle wept, but softly, for she would not have the others hear her weeping.

By the coming of the morning's light the Argonauts had made all ready for their sailing. They were standing on the deck when the light came, and they saw the Lemnian women come to the shore. Each looked at her friend aboard the Argo, and spoke, and went away. And last, Hypsipyle, the queen, came. "Farewell, Hypsipyle," Jason said to her, and she, in her strange way of speaking, said:

"What you told us I have remembered--how you will come to the dangerous passage that leads into the Sea of Pontus, and how by the flight of a pigeon you will know whether or not you may go that way. 0 Jason, let the dove you fly when you come to that dangerous place be Hypsipyle's."

She showed a pigeon held in her hands. She loosed it, and the pigeon alighted on the ship, and stayed there on pink feet, a white-feathered pigeon. Jason took up the pigeon and held it in his hands, and the Argo drew swiftly away from the Lemnian land.

Next Page - The Passage Of The Symplegades

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