[250] Apollodôr. i. 9, 15; Eustath. ad Iliad. ii. 711.
[251] Euripid. Alkêst. init. Welcker; Griechisch. Tragœd. (p. 344) on the lost play of Sophoklês called Admêtus or Alkêstis; Hom. Iliad., ii. 766; Hygin. Fab. 50-51 (Sophoklês, Fr. Inc. 730; Dind. ap. Plutarch. Defect. Orac. p. 417). This tale of the temporary servitude of particular gods, by order of Zeus as a punishment for misbehavior, recurs not unfrequently among the incidents of the mythical world. The poet Panyasis (ap. Clem. Alexand. Adm. ad Gent. p. 23)—
Τλῆ μὲν Δημήτηρ, τλῆ δὲ κλυτὸς Ἀμφιγυήεις, Τλῆ δὲ Ποσειδάων, τλῆ δ᾽ ἀργυρότοξος Ἀπολλὼν Ἀνδρὶ παρὰ θνητῷ θητεύσεμεν εἰς ἐνιαυτόν· Τλῆ δὲ καὶ ὀβριμόθυμος Ἄρης ὑπὸ πατρὸς ἀνάγκης.
The old legend followed out the fundamental idea with remarkable consistency: Laômedôn, as the temporary master of Poseidôn and Apollo, threatens to bind them hand and foot, to sell them in the distant islands, and to cut off the ears of both, when they come to ask for their stipulated wages (Iliad, xxi. 455). It was a new turn given to the story by the Alexandrine poets, when they introduced the motive of love, and made the servitude voluntary on the part of Apollo (Kallimachus, Hymn. Apoll. 49; Tibullus, Elegii. 3, 11-30).
[252] Eurip. Alkêstis, Arg.; Apollod. i. 9, 15. To bring this beautiful legend more into the color of history, a new version of it was subsequently framed: Hêraklês was eminently skilled in medicine, and saved the life of Alkêstis when she was about to perish from a desperate malady (Plutarch. Amator c. 17. vol. iv. p. 53, Wytt.).
The son of Pelias, Akastus, had received and sheltered Pêleus when obliged to fly his country in consequence of the involuntary murder of Eurytiôn. Krêthêis, the wife of Akastus, becoming enamored of Pêleus, made to him advances which he repudiated. Exasperated at his refusal, and determined to procure his destruction, she persuaded her husband that Pêleus had attempted her chastity: upon which Akastus conducted Pêleus out upon a hunting excursion among the woody regions of Mount Pêlion, contrived to steal from him the sword fabricated and given by Hêphæstos, and then left him, alone and unarmed, to perish by the hands of the Centaurs or by the wild beasts. By the friendly aid of the Centaur Cheirôn, however, Pêleus was preserved, and his sword restored to him: returning to the city, he avenged himself by putting to death both Akastus and his perfidious wife.[253]