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He said that if he were to yield, and attempt to save the child from its doom, Harpagus would most certainly know that his orders had been disobeyed, and then their own lives would be forfeited, and the child itself sacrificed after all, in the end. The thought then occurred to Spaco that her own dead child might be substituted for the living one, and be exposed in the mountains in its stead.
Astyages' second dream. Its interpretation. Birth of Cyrus. Astyages determines to destroy him. Harpagus. The king's command to him. Distress of Harpagus. His consultation with his wife. The herdsman. He conveys the child to his hut. The herdsman's wife. Conversation in the hut. Entreaties of the herdsman's wife to save the child's life. Spaco substitutes her dead child for Cyrus.
They who know any thing of the feelings of a mother under the circumstances in which Spaco was placed, can imagine with what emotions she received the little sufferer, now nearly exhausted by abstinence, fatigue, and fear, from her husband's hands, and the heartfelt pleasure with which she drew him to her bosom, to comfort and relieve him.
The king then, with an appearance of great satisfaction and pleasure, informed Harpagus that the child had not been destroyed after all, and he related to him the circumstances of its having been exchanged for the dead child of Spaco, and brought up in the herdsman's hut.
Spaco, instead of being convinced by her husband's reasoning, only became more and more earnest in her desires that the child might be saved. She rose from her couch and clasped her husband's knees, and begged him with the most earnest entreaties and with many tears to grant her request. Her husband was, however, inexorable.
Harpagus gave the astonished herdsman his charge. He, afraid, as Harpagus had been in the presence of Astyages, to evince any hesitation in respect to obeying the orders of his superior, whatever they might be, took up the child and bore it away. He carried it to his hut. It so happened that his wife, whose name was Spaco, had at that very time a new-born child, but it was dead.
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