This is a chapter of Once Upon A Time: Children’s Stories From The Classics by Blanche Winder.
You have heard how Troy fell, and no doubt felt you wanted to know what all the fighting was about. Well, it is a story that began with another golden apple.
There was a wedding, one day, of a sea nymph to a mortal king, and a very grand feast was going on in the caves of the sea — a feast to which all the immortals had come down from Olympus. Suddenly, at the banqueting table, appeared a being whom nobody loved, whose hair was snaky, and whose eyes were cruel and hard. She was the spirit of Discord, and she had, naturally, not been invited to the wedding, which was the last place where anyone wished to see her. With angry looks, she threw a golden apple upon the table and then vanished. When one of the guests picked up the fruit, everybody saw that on it were written the words: “For the fairest!”
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Now this set the immortal ladies quarreling very hotly indeed. Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite were all equally determined to have the apple. They carried the quarrel up from the sea caves to the slopes of the mountains, but still, they could not settle it. And settled it might never have been if a handsome shepherd boy had not come, singing, along one of the mountain paths, and walked right by the three Shining Ladies, just when they were disputing more hotly than ever, with Hermes standing near, holding the apple.
The immortals stared at the shepherd boy, and the shepherd boy stared back at the immortals. Then they all called upon him to be the judge, and Hermes handed him the apple. Holding it in his hand, the young man looked the Shining Ladies shyly up and down while they showed themselves off like so many pretty peacocks. In the end, he made a step forward and gave the apple to Aphrodite.
After all, Aphrodite was really the most beautiful spirit on Olympus, so nobody need have been surprised. Besides that, she had softly whispered to the shepherd that, if he would give her the apple, she would give him the loveliest woman in the world for his bride. Now that she had won the glittering fruit, she set to work to keep her promise; and she began by telling him to go to Troy and introduce himself to the king and queen.
The young shepherd, whose name was Paris, set out for Troy, leaving his mountain flocks and his sweet, musical pipe behind. And when he reached Troy, he was recognized by the king’s daughter as her own brother, left long ago to die on a distant hillside, because his parents had been told that through him the whole royal family would one day perish. However, when the king and queen saw how handsome and graceful their long-lost son now was, they felt sorry for their cruelty to him as a little baby. They took him back to his home in the palace, dressed him in magnificent clothes of purple and gold, and proclaimed him to be a prince of their own blood, who must be treated like royalty, and take his place beside his brothers. They hoped that the evil prophecy would never be fulfilled; but their hopes were vain, for what do you think that foolish, handsome, young Paris did?
He stole the queen Helen of Sparta and carried her away in a big ship to his own country! Queen Helen had been hatched with Castor and Pollux out of a swan’s egg, and she had grown up into the loveliest woman in the world. It was to rescue her that the king of Sparta, and Odysseus, and many another, spent ten long years in trying to break down the walls of Troy, and might have spent another twenty if Athena (who, you may be sure, had never forgotten about the apple) had not given Odysseus the clever idea of the horse. So the magicians of those days, who knew the things that were going to happen in the future, might well say it would be through Paris that the king and queen and the princes and princesses of Troy would all perish in the most unhappy manner.
Meanwhile, the sea nymph and the mortal king at whose wedding the whole trouble of the apple began had a beautiful little baby. The sea nymph, Thetis, thought such a baby had never been born, either in the dim, pearly sea caves or in the palace nurseries with their pillars of ivory and gold. She wanted to make him a fairy-like being, as she was herself, so she carried him one day to the river Styx, where the eagle had filled the crystal bottle for Psyche, and dipped him in its strange, dark waters, which flowed away into the underworld, and watered Persephone’s garden of sad fruits and purple poppies. But, as Thetis dipped the child, she held him by one heel; and that heel was not touched by the magical water, but remained just like the heel of an ordinary human being. So the baby grew up into a man, whom no spear nor sword nor arrow could hurt in any way unless it pierced him in the heel that had been grasped in his mother’s fingers when she dipped him in the magical stream.
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This baby was named Achilles, and he went, like nearly every other royal youth, to old Chiron’s school in the deep, green woods. He became a fine, manly prince, but his mother was always dreadfully afraid of anything happening to him. So when the great war broke out, because Paris had stolen the beautiful queen Helen, Thetis was so nervous lest Achilles should be called upon to go and fight, that she sent him away to another king’s court, dressed in the disguise of a lady-in-waiting, where he had to serve the king’s daughters among their other attendants. How unhappy and foolish Achilles, who was really so brave and strong, must have felt! Everybody was asking for him and wondering why he did not join the armies of the Greeks. Even Odysseus, who, as you know, tried his very best to stay at home, was now among the kings who were ready to start. But what had happened to Achilles? And why could no messenger who went to his father’s court ever catch a glimpse of him or hear the faintest whisper of where he was hiding?
At last Odysseus, always shrewd and clever, began to suspect the truth. He said he believed he could find Achilles. He dressed himself up as a merchant and went off to the very court where Achilles was pretending to be lady-in-waiting to the princesses. When he arrived, he asked to be allowed to show his fine things to the palace ladies; and, before their delighted eyes, he unrolled his silks and displayed his rich embroideries and his delicate, spangled veils. While the excited damsels handled and admired these lovely wares, Achilles stood by, rather bored. No jeweled belt for his waist; no gossamer covering for his thick, yellow hair!
Suddenly, his face lit up. He made a step forward and snatched at something his eye had caught sight of among the gleaming fabrics. It was a warrior’s spear, with a warrior’s sword lying alongside. Achilles seized both triumphantly; and Odysseus knew then that, under the robes of the only maiden indifferent to his waxes, was concealed the form of the young prince he had come to seek.
How gladly Achilles went with Odysseus! How bravely he fought among his friends before the walls of Troy! But, after long, long fighting, an arrow, shot by Paris, one day struck him in the heel by which Thetis had held him when dipping him into the magical river. Then, as it seemed, he passed from among men, and the Greek soldiers said that Achilles was dead. But there were others who knew better and they told how Thetis, his mother, had come, soft and silent as moonlight, over the waves of the sea, had taken her wounded son in her loving arms and carried him away to the Isles of the West. There, Hesperus lifted his bright lantern in greeting, and in a fragrant valley apples grew that were even brighter and sweeter than the fruit that had been hidden in the African garden by the daughter of the Evening Star.
But Paris himself died from a poisoned arrow, and I really think everyone will agree that he deserved no better fate. Philoctetes, the armor bearer of Heracles, a brave and valiant man, had set sail with all the other Greek heroes to conquer Troy. With him, he carried those wonderful arrows which had been dipped in the dark blood of the many-headed serpent of the swamps, and which, long ago, had been given to him by Heracles. Everybody thought that the arrows would help their side to victory; but, in spite of this, the sailors insisted on leaving Philoctetes alone on an island, arrows and all, because a snake had bitten him, and the wound was so poisonous that nobody would have Philoctetes near him.
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So poor Philoctetes was left for ten years, living in a cave and shooting stags and birds with the poisoned arrows of Heracles. But at last, as the walls of Troy still stood proudly, and as the beautiful queen whom Paris had stolen was still shut up inside, Odysseus and the son of Achilles set off together to find Philoctetes, and to bring him and his wonderful arrows to the fight. When Philoctetes saw them arrive, he was at first very angry and refused to go back with them to Troy. They had managed without him and his arrows for ten years, said he; they could manage without them for another twenty! But Odysseus —who, as you know by this time, always had his own way— in the end persuaded the indignant armor bearer to join them. So Philoctetes came along with the arrows, and, although he did not bring down the walls of Troy, he managed to shoot Paris and to kill him with the poison of the serpent’s blood.
That was the end of the foolish prince, who had far better have stayed piping to his flocks on the mountains, instead of going to Troy and making all that mischief. How Troy fell in the end you have already read in an earlier story. But the whole sad business began with the golden apple that the spirit of Discord threw down on the banqueting table when the pretty sea nymph, mother of Achilles, was married in a cave under the sea to the mortal king.