The Ploughman Who Brought Famine

Erisichthon had made up his mind to kill the Dryad who lived in the oak tree. He was one of the strongest ploughmen in all Greece, and he knew Ceres, the goddess of the fields, and her favorite Dryad of the oak tree very well. The oak tree had stood for centuries in a grove where Ceres loved to rest, and it was almost a forest in itself. It overtopped the other trees as far as they stretched above the shrubs. Its trunk measured fifteen cubits around, and it was supported by roots that were almost as strong as iron cables.

In those old days of Greece, the oak was believed to be a tree of wonders. It guarded the wide agricultural domain of Ceres, and the Dryad who lived inside was one of the goddess's messengers through the farms and orchards. She was a slender, fair young creature who would never grow old and carried sunbeams in her hands that brought new growth wherever she spilled them.

When the grove was empty and still, all the other Dryads would step softly from their dwelling places in the cypress, the olive, and the pine trees and join hands as they danced lightly around the oak, singing their praises of the great Ceres who fed with her bounty the whole of Greece. The country people, and even those from the cities, came to pay homage to Ceres' oak, bringing garlands of roses and laurel that they hung on its boughs, and carving messages of thanks and love for the Dryad on its bark.

Erisichthon knew all this, but he wanted a quantity of wood for his farm without the trouble of earning it. He decided the property of Ceres was his by right because he had ploughed her fields at planting time. So Erisichthon saw no reason why he should spare the wonderful oak tree, even if it did shelter a Dryad. He called his servants together, armed them with freshly sharpened axes, and they set out for the forest.

When they reached the oak tree, Erisichthon's men hesitated. The tree looked like a temple, its wide spreading branches sheltering the other trees, and its great trunk towering toward the sky like a bronze pillar. Each man remembered Ceres' bounty toward him—her gifts of apples and corn, grapes and wheat, and best of all her offering of land that would bring plenty for the ploughing and planting. "We cannot cut it. This is a tree well beloved of Ceres," the men said to their master. "I care not whether it be a tree beloved of the goddess or not," Erisichthon shouted angrily. "If I cut it down I shall have no more need of Ceres, for its wood will make me rich beyond the need of planting. She owes me a living on account of the past seasons in which I have worked for her. If Ceres herself were in my way I would cut her down also!"

With this terrible threat, the lawless ploughman seized an axe from one of his trembling servants and began chopping the trunk of the mighty tree. He had great strength, and each blow cut a deep gash. As Erisichthon cut toward the heart of the oak, which held the Dryad, the oak began to shiver and groan, but he showed it no mercy. He ordered his men to tie ropes to the branches and pull, and he continued to cut until the tree fell with a crash like a thunderbolt, bringing down with it a great part of the surrounding forest. As the giant trunk lay on the ground at Erisichthon's feet, the branches sighed like a summer breeze, and the leaves fluttered as if stirred by a bird's flight. It was the spirit of the Dryad whom Erisichthon had hurt, making her way to her family of gods on Mount Olympus.

Those Dryads who were left in the grove hastened to Ceres with the news. "This man must be punished!" they cried.

Ceres bowed her head in assent, and the fields of grain bowed also, and the branches of the fruit trees drooped. It was the ripe time of harvest, but there were no crops on the farm of Erisichthon, and Ceres decreed that no neighbor should share with him.

In the northern part of Greece lay the ice-topped mountains of Scythia, a bleak, infertile region without fruit or grain. Cold, Fear, and Shuddering lived there, and one other, more dreaded than all three: Famine, with unkempt hair and sunken eyes, blanched lips, and skin tightly drawn over her sharp bones. She made her home in a hard, stony field where she pulled up the scanty herbage with her claw-like fingers and tried to survive. After Erisichthon cut down the old oak, Ceres sent to Scythia for Famine.

Erisichthon found that it would take a month to cut up his wood and carry it to his farm, so he went home to rest overnight, planning to start work in the morning. He felt hungry after his hard work, but he had not even a pomegranate for supper. All his food had strangely disappeared. He decided to go to bed and try to forget his hunger in sleep. "I will sell a load of wood in the morning for many gold coins," he thought, "and buy food in plenty." So he lay down on his couch and was soon fast asleep.

Then Famine sped in through the window and hovered over where he lay. She folded her wings around him and breathed her poison into his veins. Then she hastened back to Scythia, for she had no other errand in a land of plenty. Erisichthon did not wake, but he stirred in his sleep and moved his jaws as if eating, for he was very hungry in his dreams. In the morning he woke with a raging hunger a hundred times worse than the day before.

He sold his load of wood and spent all the money on whatever food the earth, the air, and the sea produced. He consumed vast quantities of fish, fowl, lamb, fruit, and vegetables; but the more he ate, the greater his hunger. The amount of food that would have fed all of Athens was not enough for this man. He continually craved more.

Erisichthon sold the wood from the entire oak tree, and then began selling pieces of his farmland to get food for his terrible hunger. At last his fields were gone, and he had to sell his furniture, tools, books, and all his vases. Still he could not get enough food, so he sold his house and lived in a tent by the roadside. But his hunger remained unsatisfied, and in his madness he sold his only daughter to be the slave of a fisherman casting his nets beside the Aegean Sea.

The girl loved her father dearly, and her grief as she gathered seaweed along the shore for her master touched the heart of Neptune, the god of the sea. He changed her into the form of a horse, and she went home to Erisichthon, hoping he would look upon so fine an animal with favor and give it a home. But her father sold the horse to a chariot racer. She escaped and went again to the shore, where Neptune changed her in turn into a stag, an ox, and a rare bird. Each time she made her way home, and each time her father sold her to buy food. So the bird flew away to Mount Olympus and was never seen again.

At last there came a day when Erisichthon could feed himself no longer. There was nothing left in the world that he could sell, and his hunger was so great that he went, like a raving beast, up and down the bountiful fields of Ceres demanding that food be given to him. But those whom Famine touches because they break Ceres' laws and destroy life and property find no help unless they try to restore the order they have hurt. Erisichthon was too weak to work, and he could never raise another oak tree like that one which had been growing for centuries. So he went, at last, to live with Famine in Scythia, a long way from the Mount of the gods.