One day when the men were hunting in the woods, they found a strange youth whose face was so fair and who was dressed so beautifully that they could hardly believe him to be a man like themselves.  His body was so slender and lithe, and he moved so nimbly among the trees, that they fancied him to be a serpent in the guise of a human being; and they stood still in wonder and alarm.  The young man spoke to them, but they could not understand a word that he said; then he made signs to them that he was hungry, and they gave him something to eat and were no longer afraid.  Had they been like the wild men of the woods, they might have killed him at once.  But they wanted their women and children to see the serpent man, as they called him, and hear him talk; and so they took him home with them to the top of the hill.  They thought that after they had made a show of him for a few days, they would kill him and offer his body as a sacrifice to the unknown being whom they dimly fancied to have some sort of control over their lives.

But the young man was so fair and gentle that, after they had all taken a look at him, they began to think it would be a great pity to harm him.  So they gave him food and treated him kindly; and he sang songs to them and played with their children, and made them happier than they had been for many a day.  In a short time he learned to talk in their language; and he told them that his name was Cecrops, and that he had been shipwrecked on the seacoast not far away; and then he told them many strange things about the land from which he had come and to which he would never be able to return.  The poor people listened and wondered; and it was not long until they began to love him and to look up to him as one wiser than themselves.  Then they came to ask him about everything that was to be done, and there was not one of them who refused to do his bidding.

So Cecrops—­the serpent man, as they still called him—­became the king of the poor people on the hill.  He taught them how to make bows and arrows, and how to set nets for birds, and how to take fish with hooks.  He led them against the savage wild men of the woods, and helped them kill the fierce beasts that had been so great a terror to them.  He showed them how to build houses of wood and to thatch them with the reeds which grew in the marshes.  He taught them how to live in families instead of herding together like senseless beasts as they had always done before.  And he told them about great Jupiter and the Mighty Folk who lived amid the clouds on the mountain top.

II.  CHOOSING A NAME.

By and by, instead of the wretched caves among the rocks, there was a little town on the top of the hill, with neat houses and a market place; and around it was a strong wall with a single narrow gate just where the footpath began to descend to the plain.  But as yet the place had no name.