[Jason and Argonauts are en route to Colchis in order to retrieve the golden fleece. Pelias ordered Jason on this mission in an effort to give him an impossible labor that would result in his death and prevent him from laying claim to the throne in Iolcus. The golden fleece is the legendary hide of the ram that Phrixus and Helle rode to Colchis, though only Phrixus survived the venture.]

There on the coast was the home of Phineus, Agenor's son,
who above all men endured most terrible misery
through the prophetic gift that earlier Apollo
had bestowed on him: he had no scruples about revealing
to men, precisely, the divine will of Zeus himself.
So Zeus afflicted him with interminable old age,
and took the sweet light from his eyes, and would not let him
enjoy the countless dishes that his neighbors always
brought to his house, when they'd come to learn the will of heaven;
instead, there swooped down on him, through the clouds, suddenly,
Harpies, forever snatching the food from mouth or hands
with their crooked beaks. Sometimes not a crumb was left him,
at others just enough to let him live and suffer;
but then they spread over it all a putrid stench, that no one
could bear when filling his gullet, or even when keeping
their distance, so foul the smell of his dinner's remnants.
The moment he heard the company's voices and footsteps,
he sensed that these passers-by were the ones at whose coming,
so Zeus's oracle said, he would get joy of his victuals.
He struggled up from his bed, dreamlike, spiritless,
and tapped his way to the door on bony feet,
huddling over a stick, feeling the walls, joints shaking
from weakness and age: his parchment skin was cured
with dirt, only the skin cobbled his bones together.
Out of the house he came, knees buckling, and collapsed
on the courtyard threshold. Blood rushed to his head, the ground
seemed to swim under his feet. He lay there speechless,
swooning, unstrung. When they saw him, the heroes gathered
and stood round in wonderment. Then he, with labored
shallow breathing, made this prophetic utterance:
"Listen, you foremost of all the Greeks, if truly
you are they whom, by a king's chill ordinance, Jason
is leading, aboard the ship Argo, after the Fleece yes,
it's you for certain: my mind by its prophetic
insight still knows all matters-ah, Lord Apollo,
even in harsh affliction I give you thanks for that!-
by Zeus of the suppliants, that icy foe to human
transgressors, for Phoibos's sake, for Hera's, in whose care
above that of all other gods you travel, I beseech you,
help me-save an ill-fated man from outrage,
don't sail away and abandon me with indifference
in the state you see! For not only has some Fury
kicked out my sight, while I drag on a weary old age
whose end eludes me, but another most bitter trouble,
worse than the rest, hangs above me: Harpies, swooping from somewhere
unknown and deathly, snatch the food from my lips;
I have no wise plan for my rescue; no, more easily
could I escape my own thought, when I long for dinner,
than them, so swift their flight through the air. And even
supposing they leave me some morsel of food, it breathes
the stench of decay, its smell is too strong to be borne:
no mortal could stand coming near it, even for a little,
though his heart were forged of adamant. But a bitter
necessity, never satisfied, forces me to remain,
and remaining, to put the filth in my accursed belly.
Them it is heaven's decree that the sons of Boreas
shall restrain; and not as strangers will they drive them off me,
if I am that Phineus once renowned among men,
for wealth and prophetic skill, and my father was Agenor,
and when I ruled the Thrakians I brought their sister
Kleopatra home as my bride, and paid well for her."
So Agenor's son spoke, and deep grief seized each one of
the heroes, and, more than any, the two sons of Boreas.
Wiping away their tears they approached him, and now thus spoke
Zetes, grasping the hand of the distressed old man:
"Poor wretch! I'll swear there's no other soul alive
more god-hated than you! Why are so many griefs laid on you?
Sure, you offended the gods, damned by your thoughtlessness
and your knowledge of prophecy: hence their great anger. Yet
our mind is distraught within us, eager though we are
to help you-if indeed some divinity's granted us this honor for
all too plain to mere earthlings are the stern reproofs
of the immortals. Therefore we will not avert the coming
of the Harpies, much though we long to, until you take an oath
that we shall not, because of this act, lose heaven's favor."
So he spoke, and the old man fixed on him his vacant staring
eyeballs, and made response with the following words:
"Hush, now, don't get such ideas in your head, my child.
Witness the son of Leto, who with good will taught me
the mantic art; witness, too, the ill-starred fate that's mine,
and this dark cloud over my eyes, and the underworld
gods-should I die thus perjured, may I forfeit their favor-
that this aid will bring down on you no wrath from heaven."
So after this oath the two were eager to defend him.
At once the younger heroes prepared the old man a feast,
a final prey for the Harpies; and the two stood by,
ready to swing their swords at them as they swooped down.
And indeed, the very moment the old man touched his victuals,
at once, like bitter blasts or lightning flashes,
suddenly out of the clouds the Harpies sprang, with a raucous
scream, dove greedily down on the food. The heroes
shouted at them in mid-flight; but they, after gobbling
the whole lot down, sped away into the distance
over the sea, still screaming. An unbearable odor
was left there. And behind them the two sons of Boreas,
swords drawn, raced in pursuit, for Zeus had implanted in them
inexhaustible strength. Without Zeus, though, they'd never have come
remotely near the Harpies, who regularly outstripped
the west wind's blasts on their way to Phineus, and back again.
As when, on some mountain range, trained hunting dogs,
on the track of horned goats or deer, run at full tilt,
straining hard, but always a little behind them,
vainly snapping their jaws, reaching out with their teeth,
so Zetes and Kalais, crowding fast on their heels,
reached out for them, in vain, with the tips of their fingers.
And indeed, against the gods' will, they'd have torn them to pieces,
overtaking them far off, above the Floating Islands,
had not swift Iris seen them, and, darting down from heaven
out of a clear sky, restrained them with these words:
"It is not ordained, sons of Boreas, that you should harry
the Harpies, great Zeus's hounds, with your swords; but I myself
will swear to you that they'll never come back to touch this man."
So saying she took an oath, over a poured libation
of Styx water, to all the gods the chillest and most awful,
that never again would these creatures come near the dwelling
of Phineus, Agenor's son, since thus it was fated."
So they yielded before the oath, and turned to hasten
back to the ship; which is why men now call those islands
"Turning", instead of, as they once did, "Floating".
Then the Harpies and Iris parted: the Harpies flew back to
their lair in Minoan Krete, but Iris went winging
up to Olympos, soaring high on her swift wings.
Meanwhile the heroes cleaned off the old man's dirt-encrusted
skin, and sacrificed sheep, all carefully chosen,
that they'd brought away with the plunder taken from Amykos.
Now when they'd set a great dinner in the palace,
they sat down and feasted; and Phineus feasted with them
as he'd dreamed of doing, harpy-ravenous, cheering his spirit.
Then after they'd taken their fill of drink and dinner,
they stayed up all night awaiting the sons of Boreas;
and the old man sat in the midst of them, by the hearthstone,
and told them the ends of their voyage, their quest's accomplishment:

[Some time later, the Argonauts have safely arrived at Colchis. Aietes, king of Colchis and father of Medeia, has agreed to hand over the golden fleece if Jason is able to yoke two fire-breathing bulls, plow the land with them, sow dragon's teeth in the plowed land, and defeat the armed men that spring up from these teeth.

Medeia, stricken with love for Jason (Aphrodite's doing), comes to his aid with a magical ointment that makes him impervious to the bulls' fire. She also gives him advice as to how he might defeat the sown men that arise from the teeth-sown soil.]

But when Aison's son once more rejoined his comrades
in the spot where he'd left them to make his solitary venture,
they set off back together, he recounting to the other
heroes all that had happened. They arrived in a body
at the ship, where the rest of the crew, as they came in sight,
welcomed and quizzed them. Jason told them all Medeia's
wily plans, and showed them the fearful drug: but Idas
sat aloof, alone of his comrades, biting back fury. The others,
happily for the moment, since night's darkness restrained them,
now went about their own business. But at daybreak
they dispatched two envoys, to go and ask Aietes
for the seed: first Telamon himself, beloved of Ares,
and with him Aithalides, Hermes' illustrious son.
Off they went, and on no vain mission: at their coming
lord Aietes gave them, for the ordeal, the perilous
teeth of Aonias dragon, that in Thebes,
Kadmos, when he arrived there on his quest for Europa,
slew, as it kept watch over the spring of Ares
(and there too he settled, by the guidance of the heifer
that Apollo's oracle gave him to lead him on his way).
But its teeth the Tritonian goddess dashed from the dragon's jaws
and gave, half as a gift to Aietes, half to its slayer.
So after sowing his share in the Aonian plainland
Agenor's son Kadmos founded an earthborn people
of all that were left by the spear after Ares' harvesting:
but Aietes now handed out his, to be taken to the ship quite
readily, being convinced that Jason would never
accomplish the full task, even were he to yoke the oxen.

[Once all the preparations have been made, Jason and the Argonauts head to the field where Jason will attempt the great feat.]

There they found Aietes and the rest of the Kolchians:
these latter standing to watch from the mountainside,
while the king paced up and down along the riverbank.
Now Jason, the moment his comrades had made the stern cables fast,
sprang forth from the ship, and bearing shield and spear
advanced to the contest; and with him he took the gleaming
bronze helmet brimful of sharp-pointed teeth
and his sword slung from a baldric: stripped to the waist,
in ways he resembled Ares, in ways Apollo
of the golden saber. Eyeing the field, he spotted
the brazen yokes for the bulls, and the plough beside them,
adamant-strong, in one piece. Up he came, and fixed his massive
spear by its butt end, and against it propped his helmet.
Then, with only his shield, he went forward to examine
the countless tracks of the bulls. They from some hidden
underground cave, where stood their strong-built stalls
all wreathed about with dark smoke, lurid and thick,
both burst forth together, snorting gouts of fire.
At that sight the heroes all shuddered; but Jason, planting
feet firmly apart, faced their charge, as in the sea a rockbound
reef faces the waves whipped up by endless gales.
His shield he thrust out in their path, and both came charging
against it with mighty horns, and bellowing; yet they failed
to move it so much as an inch, for all their onset.
As through the holes pierced in a furnace the bronze-smith's bellows,
made from tough leather, now strike out showers of sparks
while they heat up a deadly blaze, now pause in their blowing,
and a fearful roar comes from the fire as it surges upward
from the furnace grate-so the bulls, their mouths exhaling
quick blasts of flame, roared, and a murderous fireball
engulfed Jason, hit him like lightning, but the girl's drugs saved him.
Then seizing the bull to his right by the tip of its horn
he dragged it masterfully, with all his might, till he brought it
under the yoke of bronze, and forced it down on its knees
with a sudden kick, foot against brazen foot. The other
he laid low likewise, felled by a single blow,
and tossing his broad shield aside, with feet set firmly
right and left, he held them both down where they'd dropped
to their foreknees, one on each side. He stooped straight through
the flames, and Aietes gaped at Jason's heroic prowess.
Meanwhile Tyndareus's sons, briefed earlier for this service,
picked the yokes up, and brought them to him for the harnessing.
On the bulls' hump necks he firm-set them; then between the pair
he ran out the bronze pole and made fast its tapering
end to the yokes. While his two helpers now backed off
from the flames and went back to the ship, he recovered his shield,
shouldered it behind him, and took the strong helmet, full
of sharp teeth, along with his irresistible spear. Employing
this as a goad, he jabbed at their flanks, as Thessalian
peasants will goad their oxen, while firmly he guided
the well-wrought plough-handle, fashioned of adamant.

All this time the bulls raged on in monstrous fury, breathing
their fierce fire against him; the blast came surging up
like the roar of a blustering wind, worst of all terrors
to seafaring men, who strike their great sail at its coming.
But soon enough after, forced to move by the spear's urging,
the bulls started off, and behind them the rock-hard ground
was broken up, sheared by strong bulls and sturdy ploughman;
and a terrible crunching noise arose from the plough's furrow
as the mansize clods were split; and Jason followed,
one strong foot pressing the plow blade, and far behind him
kept scattering teeth along the line of new-broken clods,
with many a backward glance, lest that deadly harvest
of earthborn men should rush him too soon; and the bulls
slogged on forward, treading heavy with brazen hooves.

But when the day's last third was still remaining
as it dwindles away from dawn, at the time when weary
peasants wish aloud for the sweet hour of unyoking,
then all the fallow was ploughed by that unwearied ploughman,
four acres though it spread; and he loosed the plough from the oxen.
The beasts he scared off, sent them running across the plain;
he himself went back to the ship, while he yet saw
the furrows empty of earthborn men, and his comrades
pressed round him with heartening shouts. He strode to the river,
filled up his helmet with water and slaked his thirst,
flexed his knees to keep them supple, flooded his great heart
with valiance, raging like a boar that sharpens its tusks
against the men who are hunting it, while from its jaws
the abundant slaver of fury drips groundward. By this time
the earthborn men were sprouting all over the ploughed acres,
and from end to end the precinct of man-slaying Ares
was abristle with stout shields, two-handed spears,
and shining helmets: the gleam reached up from the ground
to high Olympus, cut through the air like lightning.
And as when the earth has had a heavy snowfall,
and gales have then scoured away the clouds of winter
on a moonless night, and all the galaxies in heaven
glint bright through the darkness: so did these warriors shine
as they sprang up out of the earth. But Jason remembered
the counseling he'd been given by guileful Medeia.

He seized from the plain a boulder, enormous, rounded,
a terrible shot-weight of Ares the War God: not even
four sturdy men could have got it up an inch;
but Jason hefted it easily, made a run and hurled it
far into the thick of them, then crouched down behind his shield
unseen, full of daring. The Kolchians shouted aloud
while Aietes was struck dumb with amazement by the cast
of the huge shot-weight. The warriors, like eager hounds, now sprang at
each other, roaring for slaughter, and tumbled on the earth,
their mother, skewered by spear thrusts. They looked like pines
or oaks that are shaken down by some fierce gale.
And just as a fiery meteor flashes across the heavens
trailing its furrow of light, a marvel to those
who see it shoot gleaming through the airy darkness,
such was the son of Aison as he charged the earthborn
warriors, bare sword drawn from the scabbard, slashing
at random into the thick of them, mowing them down
with cuts to belly or flanks, some waist-clear, some out as far as
the knees, some that had just completely emerged,
some on their feet already and hurrying to the fray.
And as, when a war breaks out between neighboring peoples,
the husbandman-scared lest the enemy reap his harvest
before him-takes in his hand a curved sickle, freshly sharpened,
and hurriedly cuts the crop while it's still unripe, not waiting
for the sun to parch it out in its proper season,
so now Jason reaped his earthborn crop, the furrows
filling with blood as field channels with springwater.
They fell, some biting the harsh clods with their teeth,
stretched prone, some on their backs, some on an elbow
or side, in appearance like beached dead sea monsters;
and many, struck down before taking one step on earth,
slumped groundward with what torso they'd reached up to heaven,
bowed down by the weight of their weak and heavy heads-- a
scene, you might say, like that when Zeus has sent heavy
rain, and nurslings new-set in the vineyard are battered
flat, broken off at the roots, sad toil for the husbandmen;
but dejection and deadly sorrow comes upon the estate's
owner, who planted the slips. Such, at that time,
was the heavy grief that entered King Aietes' heart,
and he made his way back to the city with all his Kolchians,
brooding on how he might soonest confound the heroes.

So the day went down, and Jason's ordeal was ended.