For long ere now the seer himself had said that a band of chieftains, faring from Hellas to the city of Aeetes, would make fast their hawsers to the Thynian land, and by Zeus' will would check the approach of the Harpies.
The rest the old man pleased with words of wisdom and let them go; Paraebius only he bade remain there with the chiefs; and straightway he sent him and bade him bring back the choicest of his sheep.

And when he had left the hall Phineus spake gently amid the throng of oarsmen: "O my friends, not all men are arrogant, it seems, nor unmindful of benefits.

Even as this man, loyal as he is, came hither to learn his fate.

For when he laboured the most and toiled the most, then the needs of life, ever growing more and more, would waste him, and day after day ever dawned more wretched, nor was there any respite to his toil.

But he was paying the sad penalty of his father's sin.