In Lybia there was, in those days, a city called Silena, near whose walls lay a great lake, inhabited by a monstrous and fearsome dragon.  Many a redoubted knight had fallen in conflict with this terrible beast; none had obtained the least advantage over it; and now for a long time it had laid waste and ravaged all the country round, no man daring to attack or hinder it.  Every day for many a long year past the miserable inhabitants of Silena had delivered up to the dragon a certain number of sheep or kine from their herds, so that at least the monster might be appeased without the sacrifice of human life.  At last all the flocks and the kine were devoured, and the townspeople found themselves reduced to a terrible strait.  The dragon besieged the walls of the city, and infected all the air with his poisonous breath, so that many persons died, as though smitten by a pestilence.  Then, in order to save the people, lots were cast among all those who had children, and he to whom the die fell was forced to give a son or daughter to the monster.  This terrible state of things had already continued for some time, when one day the fatal lot fell to the king, none being exempted from the tax.

Now the king had an only child, a fair and virgin daughter.  To save her from so horrible a doom he offered to any man who would redeem the tax, his crown, his kingdom, and all his wealth.  But the people would hear of no exchange.  They demanded that the king should bear the stroke of fate in common with the meanest citizen.  Then the king asked for a reprieve of eight days to lament his child and prepare her for her death.  Meanwhile the dragon, infuriated at the unusual delay, hung continually about the city gates, expecting his victim, and poisoned all the sentinels and men-at-arms who guarded the walls.  Wherefore the people sent messengers to the king and reproached him with his faint-heartedness.  “Why,” said they, “do you suffer your subjects to die for your daughter’s sake?  Why doom us to perish daily by the poisonous breath of the dragon?”

Then the king, perceiving that he could put off the evil hour no longer, clad his daughter in royal apparel, embraced her tenderly, and said, “Alas! dear child, I thought to see my race perpetuated in thine heirs; I hoped to have welcomed princes to thy nuptials; but now thou must perish in the flower of thy youth, a sacrifice to this accursed monster!  Why did not the Gods decree my death before I brought thee into the world?”

When the princess heard these sorrowful words she fell at her father’s feet, and, with tears, besought his blessing.  Weeping, he gave it, and folded her a last time in his arms.  Then, followed by her afflicted women and a great concourse of people, she was led like a lamb to the gates of the city.  Here she parted from her companions, the drawbridge was lowered across the deep moat, and alone she passed forth and went towards the lake to meet her destroyer.