At length, time moderating his grief, resolving to undergo all the difficulties that were enjoined him, he went to Eurystheus, who in the first place commanded him to kill the lion in the forest of Nemaea4, which was of a monstrous bigness, not to be pierced or wounded by sword, spear, or stones, and therefore not to be dealt with but by mere force and strength of hand. His walks were commonly between Mycenae and Nemaea, near the mountain (from what happened to it) called Tretos5. For at the foot of this hill there was a den, in which this monster used to lurk. Hercules here meeting with him, laid hold of him, whereupon the beast beginning to fly to his den, he resolutely pursued him, (having before stopped up one of the mouths of the den), and so both closed, where he got the lion by the throat, and strangled him with his arms. Then he clothed himself with his skin, (which was big enough to cover his whole body, and ever after wore it as a defence in all conflicts.

His second task was to kill the hydra of Lerna. This monster had a hundred necks rising out of one body, and upon every neck a serpentine head, and when one of these was cut off, two others grew up in its stead; and therefore this monster was accounted invincible, and not without good reason, for, from the part that was lost, arose a double assistance in its room. Against this difficulty he invented this stratagem; he commanded Iolaus to sear the part that was cut off with a firebrand, that thereby the blood might be stopped, by which means the beast was killed, and he dipped the points of his darts in the monster’s gall, that wherever they struck, the wound might be incurable.

The third command was, that he should bring the Erymanthean boar (which roved about in the plains of Arcadia) to him alive. This seemed to be a most difficult task: for he that fought with this beast ought to be so subtle as diligently to watch the exact time and fittest opportunity in the management of the conflict; for if he should let him go while he was in his full strength, the champion was in danger to be rent in pieces with his tushes; and if he wounded him too sore, and so killed him, his labour was lost, and his victory imperfect. However, he so prudently managed the combat, that he brought the boar alive to Eurystheus, who was so terrified to see him come hurrying with the boar upon his shoulders, that he hid himself in a brazen hogshead.