The Collected Works of William Morris :: :: University of Virginia Library

Three days with good hap and fair wind they went,
That ever at their backs Queen Juno sent,
But on the fourth day, about noon, they drew
Unto a new-built city no man knew;
No, not the pilot; so they thought it good
To arm themselves, and thus in doubtful mood
Brought Argo to the port, and being come nigh,
A clear-voiced herald from the land did cry:
“Whoso ye be, if that ye come in peace,
King Lycus bids you hail, but if from Greece
Ye come, and are the folk of whom we hear
Who make for Colchis free from any fear,
Then doubly welcome are ye; here take land,
For everything shall be at your command.”

So without fear they landed at that word,
And told him who they were, which when he heard,
Through the fair streets he brought them to the king,
Who feasted them at night with everything
That man could wish; but when on the next day

They gathered at the port to go away,
The wind was foul and boisterous, so perforce
There must they bide, lest they should come to worse.

And there for fourteen days did they abide,
And for their pastime oft would wander wide
About the woods, for slaying of the beasts
Whereby to furnish forth the royal feasts;
But on a day, a closely-hunted boar,
Turning to bay, smote Idmon very sore
So that he died; poor wretch, who could foresee
Full many an unknown thing that was to be,
And yet not this; whose corpse they burnt with fire
Upon a purple-covered spice-strewn pyre,
And set his ashes in a marble tomb.
Neither could Tiphys there escape his doom,
Who, after suffering many a bitter storm,
Died bitten of a hidden crawling worm,
As through the woods he wandered all alone.
Now he being burned, and laid beneath a stone,
The wind grew fair for sailing, and the rest
Bade farewell to the king, and on their quest
Once more were busied, and began to plough
The unsteady plain; for whom Erginus now,
Great Neptune's son, the brass-bound tiller swayed.