Chapter 7 - Page 2

huge stone and
threw it with all his force at the serpent. Such a block would
have shaken the wall of a fortress, but it made no impression on
the monster. Cadmus next threw his javelin, which met with
better success, for it penetrated the serpent's scales, and
pierced through to his entrails. Fierce with pain the monster
turned back his head to view the wound, and attempted to draw out
the weapon with his mouth, but broke it off, leaving the iron
point rankling in his flesh. His neck swelled with rage, bloody
foam covered his jaws, and the breath of his nostrils poisoned
the air around. Now he twisted himself into a circle, then
stretched himself out on the ground like the trunk of a fallen
tree. As he moved onward, Cadmus retreated before him, holding
his spear opposite to the monster's opened jaws. The serpent
snapped at the weapon and attempted to bite its iron point. At
last Cadmus, watching his chance, thrust the spear at a moment
when the animal's thrown back came against the trunk of a tree,
and so succeeded in pinning him to its side. His weight bent the
tree as he struggled in the agonies of death. While Cadmus stood over his conquered foe, contemplating its vast
size, a voice was heard (from whence he knew not, but he heard it
distinctly), commanding him to take the dragon's teeth and sow
them in the earth. He obeyed. He made a furrow in the ground,
and planted the teeth, destined to produce a crop of men. Scarce
had he done so when the clods began to move, and the points of
spears to appear above the surface. Next helmets, with their
nodding plumes, came up, and next, the shoulders and breasts and
limbs of men with weapons, and in time a harvest of armed
warriors. Cadmus, alarmed, prepared to encounter a new enemy,
but one of them said to him, "Meddle not with our civil war."
With that he who had spoken smote one of his earth-born brothers
with a sword, and he himself fell pierced with an arrow from
another. The latter fell victim to a fourth, and in like manner
the whole crowd dealt with each other till all fell slain with
mutual wounds except five survivors. One of these cast away his
weapons and said, "Brothers, let us live in peace!" These five
joined with Cadmus in building his city, to which they gave the
name of Thebes. Cadmus obtained in marriage Harmonia, the daughter of Venus. The
gods left Olympus to honor the occasion with their presence, and
Vulcan presented the bride with a necklace of surpassing
brilliancy, his own workmanship. But a fatality hung over the
family of Cadmus in consequence of his killing the serpent sacred
to Mars. Semele and Ino, his daughters, and Actaeon and
Pentheius, his grandchildren, all perished unhappily; and Cadmus
and Harmonia quitted