very angry, and resolved to punish Psyche, so as to make her a
wonder and a shame for ever. So Aphrodite sent for her son Eros,
the God of Love, and took him to the city where Psyche lived,
and showed the maiden to him, and bade him afflict her with love
for a man who should be the most wicked and most miserable of
mankind, an outcast, a beggar, one who had done some great
wrong, and had fallen so low that no man in the whole world
could be so wretched. Eros agreed that he would do what his
mother wished; but this was only a pretence, for when he saw
Psyche he fell in love with her himself, and made up his mind
that she should be his own wife. The first thing to do was to
get the maiden into his own care and to hide her from the
vengeance of Aphrodite. So he put it into the mind of her father
to go to the shrine of Phoebus, at Miletus, and ask the god what
should be done with Psyche. The king did so, and he was bidden
by an oracle to dress Psyche as a bride, to take her to the brow
of a high mountain, and to leave her there, and that after a
time a great monster would come and take her away and make her
his wife. So Psyche was decked in bridal garments, was taken to
a rock on the top of a mountain, and was left there as a
sacrifice to turn away the wrath of Aphrodite. But Eros took
care that she came to no harm. He went to Zephyrus, the God of
the West Wind, and told him to carry Psyche gently down into a
beautiful valley, and to lay her softly on the turf, amidst
lovely flowers. So Zephyrus lulled Psyche to sleep, and then
carried her safely down, and laid her in the place where Eros
had bidden him. When Psyche awoke from sleep she saw a thick
grove, with a crystal fountain in it, and close to the fountain
there was a stately palace, fit for the dwelling of a king or a
god. She went into the palace, and found it very wonderful. The