Golden Fleece

“ Our country is the land of "the golden fleece," and wherever you may be in its vast domain, you are the one who must answer for yourself the stupendous question--"To what height shall I attain?" You are like the man in the "Arabian Nights" dropped into a valley filled with diamonds. It is within your power to select that which is most valuable for your enrichment. There are splendid opportunities on every hand, and whether you shall grasp them or let them go, remains alone for you to determine. ”

“ Note.—When a more simple dish is required, fat may be substituted for the butter, and the turnip and carrot cut into dice.
The Golden Fleece.—The beautiful classic legend of the Golden Fleece may be briefly told as follows: Phrixus, a son of Athamus, King of Thebes, to escape from the persecutions of Ino, his stepmother, paid a visit to the court of his friend Æetes, King of Colchis. A ram, whose fleece was pure gold, carried the youth through the air. On his safe arrival at Colchis, Phrixus offered the ram on the Altar of Ares, but kept the golden fleece. ”

“ After entering the pasture, the princess paused and looked around.
"There they are," said she, "reposing them. selves and chewing their fiery cuds in that farthest corner of the field. It will be excellent sport, I assure you, when they catch a glimpse of your figure. My father and all his court delight in nothing so much as to see a stranger trying to yoke them, in order to come at the Golden Fleece. It makes a holiday in Colchis whenever such a thing happens. ”

“ Mercury provides a ram with a golden fleece, on which the boy and girl are placed. The shining creature springs into the air, bearing its precious burden across the sea. Unfortunately, the girl falls from the ram's back and is drowned, but the boy is landed safely on the other shore in the kingdom of Colchis. Here he sacrifices the ram to Jupiter and presents the golden fleece to the king, who places it in a consecrated grove under the care of a sleepless dragon. ”

“ Hanging before man's gaze in the consecrated borders of his existence, it has inspired him to greater usefulness. He has built ships and traversed the seas, invented machines, reared cities, and established laws. In science and art and literature he has vied with his fellow-man and given a mighty impulse to civilization, all for the Fleece of Gold--success. ”

“ The vessels they used in their households, the ornaments in their churches, the gifts they presented to their friends, and the loot that was taken away by the Persians, Russians, and other invaders, testify that there must have been much profitable mining in ancient times: and the story of the Golden Fleece is not a mere legend, because even to-day the mountaineers are in the habit of anchoring fleeces of wool from their sheep in the streams, as traps to catch the grains of gold that float down in the water. ”

“ The finely attired custodian of a money bag too often is regarded as an exponent of success. On this point we should guard ourselves, first ascertaining if the gorgeous equipage is the "genuine fleece," or only a sham intended to deceive. A mansion on a valuable corner lot does not constitute the "golden quality," nor does a million dollars in bank epitomize its character. ”

“ Repeatedly, the storms of iron and lead swept the ship, until her handlines were frozen red, until blood sloshed and froze about her gun-carriages. Yet the voice of Iberville lifted clear and calm, while Bess Adams relayed his orders, one arm useless and her eyes like burning stars in a white face.
Roundshot and musketry and grape poured into the doomed frigate; but ever she gave back shot for shot. If a helmsman was hit, another man took his place at the reddened tiller. Her gunners died, and staggering sick men came reeling from below to man the cannon with scarecrow hands. ”

“ Like dream sounds through the thunder of the bell he heard the running of men, their shouts and oaths and the clop of their feet as they assembled in the churchyard and on the porch of the church. The whinnying and stamping of excited horses mingled faintly with the booming of the bell, and dancing fingers of lanternlight, probing between the belfry grilles, sent crazy gleams and shadows spinning and swerving before Black Jem's eyes. ”

“ If it will make the men of Flanders rich, as it does, to buy our wool, and weave it, and send it back as cloth, why should we not learn to do it for ourselves, and so do away with something of the bitter poverty with which all are now afflicted. It was taught and practised here in England in the time of Wickliffe, I have read, and if our people would take to it again we might rightly and truly be called 'Merry England' once more. ”

“ Into the squadron piled the Canadians and a few redskin allies, mostly on Iberville's ship. Without losing a moment, despite scurvy-smitten crews, the impetuous le Moynes were off.
To Bess Adams, it was like a wild fantastic dream, as the shores of Newfoundland faded away and the four ships hauled northward along the Labrador coast. One might say that she was utterly mad, struck silly by an insensate infatuation for an older man; perhaps! Yet cold stark sanity has condemned many a person to a lifetime of hell. To pitch sanity overboard and follow a dream takes courage and a great heart. ”

“ Headquarters of the bushranger, Paxton Trenholm!
Taking his rifle, making sure that his revolver was loaded with six cartridges and the hammer lowered, he tossed aside his hat and bellied a way toward the crest of the dune. Just one good bead on Trenholm, and—
"Stick 'em in front of yuh, palms down!" came a low, savage voice from the rear.
Out of the scrub unseen by Sam Varney, had stalked a grotesque apparition. A white man whose graying beard was eight inches in length and blowing in all directions. A white man clad in horrible rags of indescribable filthiness. ”

“ But here, in the rude log tavern where the Canadians roared their drinking songs, Iberville was no stranger.
A slender man, all fire and flame. To the French, he was a puzzle. To the Canadians, a demigod. To the Indians, a great war-chief. To the English, a devil let loose. But to Bess Adams, he was a hero; and she was closer right than any of them.
There was no logic in her worship; he was a married man, and a great man. She might better have set her heart upon young Bienville, or any of the gay, roistering Canadians, half Indian in talk and dress ”

“ The youth's eyes, pain-widened, stared upward into Black Jem's night-shrouded countenance.
"You have killed me, tinker," he coughed, then, through blood flecked lips, "yet I will venture a prophecy. You have killed me for my gold, and my gold shall betray you. More, you will not live, tinker, to spend one piece of gold from that pouch, and you will die for this crime, dancing at the end of a rope. Though I die now, Justice yet lives. ”

“ Golden Hour of Guchee
Kara Yussuf, khan of the Black Sheep Turkomans, was feasting hugely in the mountains of Kopet. The feast of the bakshi, he called it.
In the evergreen gloom of a lofty gorge thousands of campfires licked off the twilight. Around each of the campfires were men. They disposed themselves busily, sewing boots, whetting spears, picking flints from the frogs of their horses. ”

“ This small inn, huddled so close beside the Boston Pike, did, Black Jem enviously saw, a good business. Six or seven men, travelers like himself, were eating and drinking, prepatory to a night's slumber in the rooms overhead; the sounds of rigs in the yard outside and of men ahorseback were frequent and brisk. Black Jem, through a rosy, rum-induced mist, wondered savagely if he would ever have the gold with which to buy a place like this and settle down. ”

“ Coming toward him through the thicket, hurrying like gaunt black specters of silence, came a scattered line of blackfellows spaced from one another like skirmishers.
With a yell of surprise, Sam dodged a spear as one of the black phantoms rushed at him and hurled a death shaft. A second later that aborigine sprawled on his face, one of Sam's rifle bullets through his bony chest.
Sam found himself facing three more—one of whom carried a limp, unconscious bundle in his arms. A white woman! Of course it had to be Claire. ”

“ A huge sea burst, sweeping the deck with spray and flood. Bess Adams looked up to see young Bienville before her, his hand outstretched, his voice ringing heartily.
"Come along, comrade! Pierre sent me to get you. Can you walk?"
Free of the lashing, she could stagger, at least; she was numb and frozen. With every moment the wreck was going to pieces under their very feet. Cries of despair went up on all sides as she began to split in two.
Somehow, Bess Adams got aboard the raft, clinging frantically beside Bienville. At the broken bulwarks stood Iberville, passing the other men aboard. ”

“ She would, unhindered, develop to a brilliant, sumptuous womanhood; proud, conquering, full-blooded, and deep bosomed—a passionate mother of men. Herein lay all her early wildness and strangeness. Herein lay, as yet half hidden, dimly sensed and all unspoken, the power of a mighty all-compelling love for one human soul, and, through it, for all the souls of men. All this lay growing and developing; but as yet she was still a girl, with a new shyness and comeliness and a bold, searching heart.
In the field of the Silver Fleece all her possibilities were beginning to find expression. ”

“ Drink it yourself with us, brave eyes; we're all comrades here, and if success comes, then we owe it to you and your charts! Drink!"
"Then I'll drink to you, M. d'Iberville, and those who love you!" exclaimed Bess Adams, her deep dark eyes all aglow. More laughter, hearty cheers, eyes flashing through the tobacco smoke, and the girl's heart leaping. Comrades! And he had saved her life, that day on the ice. ”

“ At the height of perhaps one hundred fifty feet it mushroomed in a threatening club like the head of a waddy!
"Smith's house!" cried Goelitz bitterly. "Those poor women! It can't be anything but the house. That's built of darrah wood—pitchy. That's why the smoke is so black."
"Claire Smith!" whispered Sam to himself. His face had blanched beneath the dirt and tan. This was what they had feared. Yet the arrogant optimism of youth had said all along to the rider that this thing might happen to others, but not to him. Not to the girl he loved! Oh yes, it might not be love. ”

“ A lesser man would have been content; not he! Once more the guns began to crash, as the wounded frigate swept around and Iberville held her straight for the Hudson Bay. The Englishman headed up into the wind; his flag and foresail came fluttering down—surrender! The guns ceased. While the men yelled in mad exultation on her splintered icy decks, the Pelican drove on, hurtling straight for the third enemy. ”

“ Out of the shadows and hesitations of childhood they had stepped suddenly into manhood and womanhood, with firm feet and uplifted heads. All the day that was theirs they worked, picking the Silver Fleece—picking it tenderly and lovingly from off the brown and spent bodies which had so utterly yielded life and beauty to the full fruition of this long and silken tendril, this white beauty of the cotton. ”

“ It would help a lot to have this lazybones report that Trenholm had crossed the fence line, and gone east. If they started looking for him over in South Australia, he would have time to seek refuge with the giant blackfellows—the Aruntas, Parrabarras, or Kimberleys, among whom he was regarded as a demi-god, or more. He had riches enough for this year. He wanted a chance to lie low and foment trouble for the police and for other white men. He hated all of his own color skin.
In early dawn Sam awoke, shivering, to blink in wonder at a strange world. The first object he beheld was the fence. ”

“ Half an hour later, topping a dune like a small hill, Sam suddenly whirled his camel, made the beast kneel, then lie down as he leapt off to take cover. Just beyond, in a shallow valley, stretched the huts of a large native village. And Sam's first glance had caught one triple-sized, high-roofed wurley, surely more commodious than any Parrabarra or Arunta aborigine ever built. ”

“ But the skeleton-striped blackfellows, when they came, evidently had been fired with Trenholm's frenzy to a point where the threat of guns and determined white men could not scare. Howling, flourishing their waddies, spears, and hurling boomerangs, they swarmed to attack the whites between them and the wire.
The latter, just finished with the aduous fence repair, were merciless. The repeating rifles and small arms kept thundering, and fully twenty-five of the attackers died without ever getting close enough to kill a single white. ”

“ Out through the lofty valley, among the odorous fires and the black felt tents of the flat-nosed Turkomans, Mangali set forth again. His hunting falcon was on his shoulder. The falcon's eyes were not more keen than the eyes of the tawny warrior. Ten thousand sheep could be shepherded in those dark bristling ravines; four or five thousand ponies.
"Ha! feast of the bakshi!" he rumbled. "They sing better, they do, without women!"
They were passing the campfire where Guchee stood, a gourd of mare's milk in his hand. Mangali checked his horse sharply. ”

“ For, as Iberville came alongside the ship, he halted suddenly. Every voice ceased, and laughter died, as a sound came dully through the fog.
"Guns!" said somebody.
Guns, indeed. A distant thunder of gunfire rolling along the towering iron cliffs. What it meant, they could only conjecture. Later, they learned that the Profound had been carried by the ice-drift slap into the midst of the English squadron; she fought them until the drift carried her away again into the fog.
The Pelican remained alone, under curtains of mist, but drifted at last into the mouth of the straits. ”