The very next morning, AEgeus sent out his heralds, to make it known through all the city that Theseus was his son, and that he would in time be king in his stead.  When the fifty nephews heard this, they were angry and alarmed.

“Shall this upstart cheat us out of our heritage?” they cried; and they made a plot to waylay and kill Theseus in a grove close by the city gate.

Right cunningly did the wicked fellows lay their trap to catch the young hero; and one morning, as he was passing that way alone, several of them fell suddenly upon him, with swords and lances, and tried to slay him outright.  They were thirty to one, but he faced them boldly and held them at bay, while he shouted for help.  The men of Athens, who had borne so many wrongs from the hands of the nephews, came running out from the streets; and in the fight which followed, every one of the plotters, who had lain in ambush was slain; and the other nephews, when they heard about it, fled from the city in haste and never came back again.

THE WONDERFUL ARTISAN.

I. Perdix.

While Athens was still only a small city there lived within its walls a man named Daedalus who was the most skillful worker in wood and stone and metal that had ever been known.  It was he who taught the people how to build better houses and how to hang their doors on hinges and how to support the roofs with pillars and posts.  He was the first to fasten things together with glue; he invented the plumb-line and the auger; and he showed seamen how to put up masts in their ships and how to rig the sails to them with ropes.  He built a stone palace for AEgeus, the young king of Athens, and beautified the Temple of Athena which stood on the great rocky hill in the middle of the city.

Daedalus had a nephew named Perdix whom he had taken when a boy to teach the trade of builder.  But Perdix was a very apt learner, and soon surpassed his master in the knowledge of many things.  His eyes were ever open to see what was going on about him, and he learned the lore of the fields and the woods.  Walking one day by the sea, he picked up the backbone of a great fish, and from it he invented the saw.  Seeing how a certain bird carved holes in the trunks of trees, he learned how to make and use the chisel.  Then he invented the wheel which potters use in molding clay; and he made of a forked stick the first pair of compasses for drawing circles; and he studied out many other curious and useful things.

Daedalus was not pleased when he saw that the lad was so apt and wise, so ready to learn, and so eager to do.

“If he keeps on in this way,” he murmured, “he will be a greater man than I; his name will be remembered, and mine will be forgotten.”

Day after day, while at his work, Daedalus pondered over this matter, and soon his heart was filled with hatred towards young Perdix.  One morning when the two were putting up an ornament on the outer wall of Athena’s temple, Daedalus bade his nephew go out on a narrow scaffold which hung high over the edge of the rocky cliff whereon the temple stood.  Then, when the lad obeyed, it was easy enough, with a blow of a hammer, to knock the scaffold from its fastenings.