Euripides — Plays I

Contents — 17 sections

1. Part 1
2. Part 2
3. Part 3
4. Part 4
5. Part 5
6. Part 6
7. Part 7
8. Part 8
9. Part 9
10. Part 10
11. Part 11
12. Part 12
13. Part 13
14. Part 14
15. Part 15
16. Part 16
17. Part 17

Part 1

APOLLO: Halls of Admetus, wherein I steeled my heart to be content with a servant’s board, god though I was. Zeus was to blame; he slew my son Asclepius, piercing his bosom with a thunderbolt; whereat I was enraged and smote his Cyclopes, forgers of the heavenly fire; so my sire in recompense for this forced me to become a slave in a mortal’s home. Then came I to this land and kept a stranger’s flocks, and to this day have been the saviour of this house. For in Pheres’ son I found a man as holy as myself, and him I saved from death by cheating Destiny, for they promised me, those goddesses of fate, that Admetus should escape the impending doom, if he found a substitute for the powers below. So he went through all his list of friends, made trial of each, his father and the aged mother that bare him, but none he found save his wife alone that was willing to die for him and forego the light of life; she now within the house is upheld in his arms, gasping out her life; for to-day is she doomed to die and pass from life to death. But I, for fear pollution overtake me in the house, am leaving the shelter of this roof I love so well, for already I see Death hard by, the priest of souls departed, who is on his way to lead her to the halls of Hades; true to time he comes, watching this day that calls her to her doom.

DEATH: Ha! What dost thou at this house? why is it thou art ranging here, Phoebus? Once again thou wrongest me, circumscribing and limiting the honours of the nether world. Wert thou not content to hinder the death of Admetus, by thy knavish cunning baulking Destiny? but now again hast thou armed thee with thy bow and art keeping guard o’er her, this daughter of Pelias, who undertook, of her free will, to die for her lord and set him free.

APOLLO: Never fear; I have, be sure, justice and fair pleas to urge.

DEATH: What has that bow to do, if thou hast justice on thy side?

APOLLO: ’Tis my habit ever to carry it.

DEATH: Ay, and to help this house more than is right.

APOLLO: The reason is, I cannot bear a friend’s distress.

DEATH: Wilt rob me of this second corpse likewise?

APOLLO: Come! I did not take the other from thee by violence.

DEATH: Then how is it he lives above the earth and not beneath?

APOLLO: He gave his wife instead, her whom now thou art come to fetch.

DEATH: Yea, and I will bear her hence to the nether world.

APOLLO: Take her and go, for I do not suppose I can persuade thee.

DEATH: To slay my rightful victim? Why, that is my appointed task.

APOLLO: Nay, but to lay thy deadly hand on those who soon would die.

DEATH: I see thy drift, thy eager plea.

APOLLO: Is it then possible that Alcestis should attain old age?

DEATH: It is not possible; I too, methinks, find a pleasure in my rights.

APOLLO: Thou canst not anyhow take more than one life.

DEATH: When young lives die I reap a higher honour.

Part 2

APOLLO: Should she die old, a sumptuous funeral will she have.

DEATH: Phoebus, the law thou layest down is all in favour of the rich.

APOLLO: What mean’st thou? art so wise, and I never knew it?

DEATH: Those who have wealth would buy the chance of their dying old.

APOLLO: It seems then thou wilt not grant me this favour.

DEATH: Not I; my customs well thou knowest.

APOLLO: That I do, customs men detest and gods abhor.

DEATH: Thou canst not realise every lawless wish.

APOLLO: Mark me, thou shalt have a check for all thy excessive fierceness; such a hero shall there come to Pheres’ halls, by Eurystheus sent to fetch a team of steeds from the wintry world of Thrace; he, a guest awhile in these halls of Admetus, will wrest this woman from thee by sheer force. So wilt thou get no thanks from me but yet wilt do this all the same, and earn my hatred too.

DEATH: Thou wilt not gain thy purpose any the more for all thy many words; that woman shall to Hades’ halls go down, I tell thee. Lo! I am going for her, that with the sword I may begin my rites, for he whose hair this sword doth hallow is sacred to the gods below.

FIRST SEMICHORUS: What means this silence in front of the palace? why is the house of Admetus stricken dumb?

SECOND SEMICHORUS: Not one friend near to say if we must mourn our queen as dead, or if she liveth yet and sees the sun, Alcestis, daughter of Pelias, by me and all esteemed the best of wives to her husband.

FIRST SEMICHORUS: Doth any of you hear a groan, or sound of hands that smite together, or the voice of lamentation, telling all is over and done? Yet is there no servant stationed about the gate, no, not one. O come, thou saving god, to smooth the swelling waves of woe!

SECOND SEMICHORUS: Surely, were she dead, they would not be so still.

FIRST SEMICHORUS: Maybe her corpse is not yet from the house borne forth.

SECOND SEMICHORUS: Whence that inference? I am not so sanguine. What gives thee confidence?

FIRST SEMICHORUS: How could Admetus let his noble wife go unattended to the grave?

SECOND SEMICHORUS: Before the gates I see no lustral water from the spring, as custom doth ordain should be at the gates of the dead, no shorn lock lies on the threshold, which, as thou knowest, falls in mourning for the dead, no choir of maidens smites its youthful palms together.

FIRST SEMICHORUS: And yet this is the appointed day.

SECOND SEMICHORUS: What meanest thou by this?

Part 3

FIRST SEMICHORUS: The day appointed for the journey to the world below.

SECOND SEMICHORUS: Thou hast touched me to the heart, e’en to the soul.

CHORUS: Whoso from his youth up has been accounted virtuous, needs must weep to see the good suddenly cut off.

CHORUS: ’Tis done; no single spot in all the world remains whither one might steer a course, either to Lycia or to the parched abodes of Ammon to release the hapless lady’s soul; on comes death with step abrupt, nor know I to whom I should go of all who at the gods’ altars offer sacrifice.

CHORUS: Only the son of Phoebus, if he yet saw this light of day— Ah! then then might she have left the dark abode and gates of Hades and have come again, for he would raise the dead to life, till that the thunderbolt’s forked flame, hurled by Zeus, smote him. But now what further hope of life can I welcome to me?

CHORUS: Our lords have ere this done all they could; on every altar streams the blood of abundant sacrifice; yet our sorrows find no cure.

CHORUS: Lo! from the house cometh a handmaid weeping; what shall I be told hath chanced? Grief may well be pardoned, if aught happeneth to one’s master; yet I fain would learn whether our lady still is living or haply is no more.

MAID: Alive, yet dead thou may’st call her.

CHORUS: Why, how can the same person be alive, yet dead?

MAID: She is sinking even now, and at her last gasp.

CHORUS: My poor master! how sad thy lot to lose so good a wife!

MAID: He did not know his loss, until the blow fell on him.

CHORUS: Is there then no more a hope of saving her?

MAID: None; the fated day comes on so fast.

CHORUS: Are then the fitting rites already taking place o’er her body?

MAID: Death’s garniture is ready, wherewith her lord will bury her.

CHORUS: Well let her know, though die she must, her fame ranks far above any other wife’s beneath the sun.

MAID: Far above! of course it does; who will gainsay it? What must the woman be who hath surpassed her? For how could any wife have shown a clearer regard for her lord than by offering in his stead to die? Thus much the whole city knows right well; but thou shalt hear with wonder what she did within the house. For when she knew the fatal day was come, she washed her fair white skin with water from the stream, then from her cedar chests drew forth vesture and ornaments and robed herself becomingly; next, standing before the altar-hearth, she prayed, Mistress mine, behold! I pass beneath the earth; to thee in suppliant wise will I my latest prayer address; be mother to my orphans, and to my boy unite a loving bride, to my daughter a noble husband. Let them not die, as I, their mother, perish now, untimely in their youth, but let them live their glad lives out, happy in their native land. To every altar in Admetus’ halls she went and crowned them and prayed, plucking from myrtle boughs their foliage, with never a tear or groan, nor did her coming trouble change the colour of her comely face. Anon into her bridal bower she burst, and then her tears brake forth and thus she cried, O couch, whereon I loosed my maiden state for the man in whose cause I die, farewell! no hate I feel for thee; for me alone hast thou undone, dying as I die from fear of betraying thee and my lord. Some other wife will make thee hers, more blest maybe than me, but not more chaste. And she fell upon her knees and kissed it, till with her gushing tears the whole bed was wet. At last, when she had had her fill of weeping, she tore herself from the bed and hurried headlong forth, and oft as she was leaving the chamber turned she back and cast herself once more upon the couch; while her children were weeping as they clung to their mother’s robes; but she took them each in turn in her arms and kissed them fondly, as a dying mother might. And all the servants in the house fell a-crying in sorrow for their mistress; but she held out her hand to each, nor was there one so mean but she gave him a word and took his answer back. Such are the sorrows in the halls of Admetus. Dying he had died once for all, but by avoiding death he hath a legacy of grief that he will ne’er forget.

CHORUS: Doubtless Admetus sorrows in this calamity, if he must lose so good a wife.

MAID: Ah yes! he weeps, holding in his arms his darling wife, and prays her not to leave him, impossible request! for she is worn and wasted with illness, and lies exhausted, a sad burden in his arms. Still, though her breath comes short and scant, she yearns to gaze yet on the sunshine, for nevermore, but now the last and latest time her eye shall see his radiant orb. But I will go, thy presence to announce, for ’tis not all who have the goodwill to stand by their masters with kindly hearts in adversity. But thou of old hast been my master’s friend.

Part 4

CHORUS: O Zeus, what way out of these sorrows can be found? how can we loose the bonds of fate that bind our lord? Comes some one forth? Am I at once to cut my hair, and cast the sable robe about me? Too plainly, ay too plainly, friends; still let us to heaven pray; for the gods’ power is very great. O king Paean, devise for Admetus some means of escape from his sorrows. Yes, yes, contrive it; for thou in days gone by didst find salvation for him, so now be thou a saviour from the toils of death and stay bloodthirsty Hades.

CHORUS: Woe! woe! alas! Thou son of Pheres, woe! Ah, thy fate in losing thy wife! Is not this enough to make thee slay thyself, ah! more than cause enough to tie the noose aloft and fit it to the neck? Yea, for to-day wilt thou witness the death of her that was not merely dear, but dearest of the dear. Look, look! she cometh even now, her husband with her, from the house. Cry aloud and wail, O land of Pherae, wail for the best of women, as with sickness worn she passes ’neath the earth to Hades, lord below.

CHORUS: Never, never will I say that marriage brings more joy than grief, as I conjecture by the past and witness these misfortunes of our king, for he when widowed of this noble wife will for the future lead a life that is no life at all.

ALCESTIS: O sun-god, lamp of day! O scudding clouds that dance along the sky!

ADMETUS: He sees us both with anguish bowed, albeit guiltless of any crime against the gods, for the which thy death is due.

ALCESTIS: O earth, O sheltering roof, and ye my maiden chambers in my native land Iolcos!

ADMETUS: Lift thyself, unhappy wife, forsake me not; entreat the mighty gods to pity us.

ALCESTIS: I see the two-oared skiff, I see it; and Charon, death’s ferryman, his hand upon the boatman’s pole, is calling me e’en now, Why lingerest thou? Hasten. Thou art keeping me. Thus in his eager haste he hurries me.

ADMETUS: Ah me! bitter to me is this voyage thou speakest of. Unhappy wife, what woes are ours!

ALCESTIS: One draws me, draws me hence, seest thou not? to the courts of death, winged Hades glaring from beneath his dark brows. What wilt thou with me? Unhand me. On what a journey am I setting out, most wretched woman I!

ADMETUS: Bitter journey to thy friends, yet most of all to me and to thy babes, the partners in this sorrow.

ALCESTIS: Hands off! hands off at once! Lay me down, I cannot stand. Hades standeth near; and with its gloom steals night upon my eyes. O my children, my children, ye have no mother now. Fare ye well, my babes, live on beneath the light!

ADMETUS: Woe is me! this is a message of sorrow to me, worse than aught that death can do. Steel not thy heart to leave me, I implore, by heaven, by thy babes whom thou wilt make orphans; nay, raise thyself, have courage. For if thou die I can no longer live; my life, my death are in thy hands; thy love is what I worship.

ALCESTIS: Admetus, lo! thou seest how it is with me; to thee I fain would tell my wishes ere I die. Thee I set before myself, and instead of living have ensured thy life, and so I die, though I need not have died for thee, but might have taken for my husband whom I would of the Thessalians, and have had a home blest with royal power; reft of thee, with my children orphans, I cared not to live, nor, though crowned with youth’s fair gifts, wherein I used to joy, did I grudge them. Yet the father that begat thee, the mother that bare thee, gave thee up, though they had reached a time of life when to die were well, so saving thee their child, and winning noble death. For thou wert their only son, nor had they any hope, when thou wert dead, of other offspring. And I should have lived and thou the remnant of our days, nor wouldst thou have wept thy wife’s loss, nor have had an orphan family. But some god hath caused these things to be even as they are. Enough! Remember thou the gratitude due to me for this; yea, for I shall never ask thee for an adequate return, for naught is prized more highly than our life; but just is my request, as thou thyself must say, since thou no less than I dost love these children, if so be thou think’st aright. Be content to let them rule my house, and do not marry a new wife to be a stepmother to these children, for she from jealousy, if so she be a woman worse than me, will stretch out her hand against the children of our union. Then do not this, I do beseech thee. For the stepmother that succeeds, hateth children of a former match, cruel as the viper’s are her tender mercies. A son, ’tis true, hath in his sire a tower of strength, ; but thou, my daughter, how shall thy maidenhood be passed in honour? What shall thy experience be of thy father’s wife? She may fasten on thee some foul report in thy youthful bloom, and frustrate thy marriage. Never shall thy mother lead thee to the bridal bed, nor by her presence in thy travail hearten thee, my child, when a mother’s kindness triumphs over all. No, for I must die; and lo! this evil cometh to me not to-morrow nor yet on the third day of the month, but in a moment shall I be counted among the souls that are no more. Fare ye well, be happy; and thou, husband, canst boast thou hadst a peerless wife, and you, children, that you had such an one for mother.

CHORUS: Take heart; I do not hesitate to answer for him; he will perform all this, unless his mind should go astray.

ADMETUS: It shall be so, fear not, it shall; alive thou wert the only wife I had, and dead shalt thou, none else, be called mine; no Thessalian maid shall ever take thy place and call me lord; not though she spring from lineage high nor though besides she be the fairest of her sex. Of children I have enough; god grant I may in them be blessed! for in thee has it been otherwise. No year-long mourning will I keep for thee, but all my life through, lady: loathing the mother that bare me, and hating my father, for they were friends in word but not in deed. But thou didst give thy dearest for my life and save it. May I not then mourn to lose a wife like thee? And I will put an end to revelry, to social gatherings o’er the wine, forego the festal crown and music which once reigned in my halls. For nevermore will I touch the lyre nor lift my soul in song to the Libyan flute, for thou hast taken with thee all my joy in life. But in my bed thy figure shall be laid full length, by cunning artists fashioned; thereon will I throw myself and, folding my arms about thee, call upon thy name, and think I hold my dear wife in my embrace, although I do not; chill comfort this, no doubt, but still I shall relieve my soul of its sad weight; and thou wilt come to me in dreams and gladden me. For sweet it is to see our friends, come they when they will, e’en by night. Had I the tongue, the tuneful voice of Orpheus to charm Demeter’s daughter or her husband by my lay and bring thee back from Hades, I had gone down, nor Pluto’s hound, nor Charon, ferryman of souls, whose hand is on the oar, had held me back, till to the light I had restored thee alive. At least do thou await me there, against the hour I die, prepare a home for me to be my true wife still. For in this same cedar coffin I will bid these children lay me with thee and stretch my limbs by thine; for never even in death may I be severed from thee, alone found faithful of them all.

CHORUS: Lo! I too will share with thee thy mourning for her, friend with friend; for this is but her due.

ALCESTIS: My children, ye with your own ears have heard your father’s promise, that he will never wed another wife to set her over you, nor e’er dishonour me.

ADMETUS: Yea, so I promise now, and accomplish it I will.

ALCESTIS: On these conditions receive the children from my hand.

Part 5

ADMETUS: I receive them, dear pledges by a dear hapd given.

ALCESTIS: Take thou my place and be a mother to these babes.

ADMETUS: Sore will be their need when they are reft of thee.

ALCESTIS: O my children, I am passing to that world below, when my life was needed most.

ADMETUS: Ah me, what can I do bereft of thee?

ALCESTIS: Thy sorrow Time will soothe; ’tis the dead who are as naught.

ADMETUS: Take me, O take me, I beseech, with thee ’neath the earth.

ALCESTIS: Enough that I in thy stead am dying.

ADMETUS: O Destiny! of what a wife art thou despoiling me!

ALCESTIS: Lo! the darkness deepens on my drooping eyes.

ADMETUS: Lost indeed am I, if thou, dear wife, wilt really leave me.

ALCESTIS: Thou mayst speak of me as naught, as one whose life is o’er.

ADMETUS: Lift up thy face, leave not thy children.

ALCESTIS: ’Tis not my own free will; O my babes, farewell!

ADMETUS: Look, look on them but once.

ALCESTIS: My end is come.

ADMETUS: What mean’st thou? art leaving us?

ALCESTIS: Farewell!

ADMETUS: Lost! lost! woe is me!

CHORUS: She is gone, the wife of Admetus is no more.

Part 6

EUMELUS: O my hard fate! My mother has passed to the realms below; she lives no more, dear father, ’neath the sun. Alas for her! she leaves us ere her time and to me bequeaths an orphan’s life. Behold that staring eye, those nerveless hands! Hear me, mother, hear me, I implore! ’tis I who call thee now, I thy tender chick, printing my kisses on thy lips.

ADMETUS: She cannot hear, she cannot see; a heavy blow hath fortune dealt us, you children and me.

EUMELUS: O father, I am but a child to have my loving mother leave me here alone; O cruel my fate, alas! and thine, my sister, sharer in my cup of woe. Woe to thee, father! in vain, in vain didst thou take a wife and hast not reached the goal of eld with her; for she is gone before, and now that thou art dead, my mother, our house is all undone.

CHORUS: Admetus, these misfortunes thou must bear. Thou art by no means the first nor yet shalt be the last of men to lose a wife of worth; know this, we all of us are debtors unto death.

ADMETUS: I understand; this is no sudden flight of ill hither; I was ware of it and long have pined. But since I am to. carry the dead forth to her burial, stay here with me and to that inexorable god in Hades raise your antiphone. While raise your antiphone. While to all Thessalians in my realm I do proclaim a general mourning for this lady, with hair shorn off and robes of sable hue; all ye who harness steeds for cars, or single horses ride, cut off their manes with the sharp steel. Hush’d be every pipe, silent every lyre throughout the city till twelve full moons are past; for never again shall I bury one whom I love more, no! nor one more loyal to me; honour from me is her due, for she for me hath died, she and she alone. [Exeunt ADMETUS and EUMELUS, with the other children.

CHORUS: Daughter of Pelias, be thine a happy life in that sunless home in Hades’ halls! Let Hades know, that swarthy god, and that old man who sits to row and steer alike at his death-ferry, that he hath carried o’er the lake of Acheron in his two-oared skiff a woman peerless amidst her sex.

CHORUS: Oft of thee the Muses’ votaries shall sing on the seven-stringed mountain shell and in hymns that need no harp, glorifying thee, oft as the season in his cycle cometh round at Sparta in that Carnean month when all night long the moon sails high o’erhead, yea, and in splendid Athens, happy town. So glorious a theme has thy death bequeathed to tuneful bards.

CHORUS: Would it were in my power and range to bring thee to the light from the chambers of Hades and the streams of Cocytus with the oar that sweeps yon nether flood! For thou, and thou alone, most dear of women, hadst the courage to redeem thy husband from Hades in exchange for thy own life. Light lie the earth above thee, lady! And if ever thy lord take to him a new wife, I vow he will earn my hatred and thy children’s too.

CHORUS: His mother had no heart to plunge into the darkness of the tomb for her son, no! nor his aged sire. Their own child they had not the courage to rescue, the wretches! albeit they were grey-headed. But thou in thy youth and beauty hast died for thy lord and gone thy way. O be it mine to have for partner such a loving wife! for this lot is rare in life. Surely she should be my help-meet all my life and never cause one tear.

HERACLES: Mine hosts, dwellers on this Phersean soil! say, shall I find Admetus in the house?

CHORUS: The son of Pheres is within, Heracles. Tell me what need is bringing thee to the Thessalian land, to visit this city of the Pheraeans?

HERACLES: I am performing a labour for Tirynthian Eurystheus.

CHORUS: And whither art thou journeying? on what wandering art thou forced to go?

HERACLES: To fetch the chariot-steeds of Thracian Diomedes.

CHORUS: How canst thou? art a stranger to the ways of thy host?

HERACLES: I am; for never yet have I gone to the land of the Bistones.

CHORUS: Thou canst not master his horses without fighting.

HERACLES: Still I cannot refuse these labours.

CHORUS: Then shalt thou slay them and return, or thyself be slain and stay there.

HERACLES: It will not be the first hard course that I have run.

Part 7

CHORUS: And what will be thy gain, suppose thou master their lord?

HERACLES: The steeds will I drive away to the Tirynthian king.

CHORUS: No easy task to bit their jaws.

HERACLES: Easy enough, unless their nostrils vomit fire.

CHORUS: With ravening jaws they rend the limbs of men.

HERACLES: Thou speakest of the food of mountain beasts, not of horses.

CHORUS: Their mangers blood-bedabbled thou shalt see.

HERACLES: Whose son doth he who feeds them boast to be?

CHORUS: Ares’ son, king of the golden targe of Thrace.

HERACLES: This toil again is but a piece of my ill-luck; hard it ever is and still is growing steeper, if I with Ares’ own-begotten sons must fight, first with Lycaon, next with Cycnus, while now I am bound on this third contest to engage the horses and their master. Yet shall no man ever see Alcmena’s son trembling at his foemen’s prowess.

CHORUS: See where Admetus, lord of this land, comes in person from the palace forth.

ADMETUS: Hail! son of Zeus, from Perseus sprung.

HERACLES: Joy to thee also, Admetus, king of Thessaly.

ADMETUS: Would there were! yet thy kindly heart I know full well.

HERACLES: Why dost thou appear with head shorn thus in mourning?

ADMETUS: To-day I am to bury one who is dead.

HERACLES: Heaven avert calamity from thy children!

ADMETUS: The children I have begotten are alive within my house.

HERACLES: Thy father maybe is gone; well, he was ripe to go.

ADMETUS: No, Heracles, he lives; my mother too.

Part 8

HERACLES: It cannot be thy wife is dead, thy Alcestis?

ADMETUS: I can a twofold tale tell about her.

HERACLES: Dost mean that she is dead, or living still?

ADMETUS: She lives, yet lives no more; that is my grief.

HERACLES: I am no wiser yet; thy words are riddles to me.

ADMETUS: Knowest thou not the doom she must undergo?

HERACLES: I know she did submit to die in thy stead.

ADMETUS: How then is she still alive, if so she promised?

HERACLES: Ah! weep not thy wife before the day, put that off till then.

ADMETUS: The doomed is dead; the dead no more exists.

HERACLES: Men count to be and not to be something apart.

ADMETUS: Thy verdict this, O Heracles, mine another.

HERACLES: Why weepest then? which of thy dear ones is the dead?

ADMETUS: ’Tis a woman; I spoke of a woman just now.

HERACLES: A stranger, or one of thine own kin?

ADMETUS: A stranger, yet in another sense related to my house.

HERACLES: How then came she by her death in house of thine?

ADMETUS: Her father dead, she lived here as an orphan.

HERACLES: Ah! would I had found thee free from grief, Admetus!

ADMETUS: With what intent dost thou devise this speech?

Part 9

HERACLES: I will seek some other friendly hearth.

ADMETUS: Never, O prince! Heaven forefend such dire disgrace!

HERACLES: A guest is a burden to sorrowing friends, if come he should.

ADMETUS: The dead are dead. Come in.

HERACLES: To feast in a friend’s house of sorrow is shameful.

ADMETUS: The guest chambers lie apart, whereto we will conduct thee.

HERACLES: Let me go; ten thousandfold shall be my thanks to thee.

ADMETUS: Thou must not go to any other hearth. (To a Servant.) Go before, open the guest-rooms that face not these chambers, and bid my stewards see there is plenty of food; then shut the doors that lead into the courtyard; for ’tis not seemly that guests when at their meat should hear the voice of weeping or be made sad. [Exit HERACLES.

CHORUS: What doest thou? With such calamity before thee, hast thou the heart, Admetus, to welcome visitors? What means this folly?

ADMETUS: Well, and if I had driven him from my house and city when he came to be my guest, wouldst thou have praised me more? No indeed! for my calamity would have been no whit less, while I should have been more churlish. And this would have been another woe to add to mine, that my house should be called no friend to guests. Yea, and I find him myself the best of hosts whene’er to Argos’ thirsty land I come.

CHORUS: Why then didst thou conceal thy present misfortune, if, as thy own lips declare, it was a friend that came?

ADMETUS: He would never have entered my house, had he known aught of my distress. Maybe there are who think me but a fool for acting thus, and these will blame me; but my halls have never learnt to drive away or treat with scorn my guests.

CHORUS: O home of hospitality, thrown open by thy lord to all now and ever! In thee it was that Pythian Apollo, the sweet harper, deigned to make his home, and in thy halls was content to lead a shepherd’s life, piping o’er the sloping downs shepherd’s madrigals to thy flocks.

CHORUS: And spotted lynxes couched amid his sheep in joy to hear his melody, and the lions’ tawny troop left the glen of Othrys and came; came too the dappled fawn on nimble foot from beyond the crested pines and frisked about thy lyre, O Phoebus, for very joy at thy gladsome minstrelsy.

CHORUS: And so it is thy lord inhabits a home rich in countless flocks by Boebe’s lovely mere, bounding his tilled corn-land and his level pastures with the clime of the Molossi near the sun’s dark stable, and holding sway as far as the harbourless strand of the Aegean ’neath Pelion’s shadow.

CHORUS: Now too hath he opened wide his house and welcomed a guest although his eye is wet with tears in mourning for his wife so dear but lately dead within his halls; yea, for noble birth to noble feeling is inclined. And in the good completest wisdom dwells; and at my heart sits the bold belief that heaven’s servant will be blesedblessed.

ADMETUS: Men of Pherae, kindly gathered here, lo! even now my servants are bearing the corpse with all its trappings shoulder-high to the funeral pyre for burial; do ye, as custom bids, salute the dead on her last journey starting.

CHORUS: Look! I see thy father advancing with aged step, and servants too bearing in their arms adornment for thy wife, offerings for the dead.

PHERES: My son, I come to share thy sorrow, for thou hast lost a noble, peerless wife; that no man will deny. Yet must thou needs bear this blow, hard though it be. Accept this garniture, and let it go beneath the earth, for rightly is her body honoured, since she died to save thy life, my son, and gave me back my child, suffering me not to lose thee and pine away in an old age of sorrow. Thus by the generous deed she dared, hath she made her life a noble example for all her sex. Farewell to thee, who hast saved this son of mine and raised me up when falling; be thine a happy lot even in Hades’ halls! Such marriages I declare are gain to man, else to wed is not worth while.

ADMETUS: Thou hast come uncalled by me to this burial, nor do I count thy presence as a friendly act. Never shall she be clad in any garniture of thine, nor in her burial will she need aught of thine. Thou shouldst have shewn thy sympathy at the time my doom was sealed. But thou didst stand aloof and let another die, though thou wert old, the victim young; shalt thou then mourn the dead? Methinks thou wert no real sire of mine nor was she my true mother who calls herself and is called so, but I was sprung of slave’s blood and privily substituted at thy wife’s breast. Brought to the test thou hast shewn thy nature; I cannot think I am thy child by birth. By heaven, thou art the very pattern of cowards, who at thy age, on the borderland of life, wouldst not, nay! couldst not find the heart to die for thy own son; but ye, my parents, left to this stranger, whom I henceforth shall justly hold e’en as mother and as father too, and none but her. And yet ’twas a noble exploit to achieve, to die to save thy son, and in any case the remnant of thy time to live was but short; and I and she would have lived the days that were to be, nor had I lost my wife and mourned my evil fate. Moreover thou hast had all treatment that a happy man should have; in princely pomp thy youth was spent, thou hadst a son, myself, to be the heir of this thy home, so thou hadst no fear of dying childless and leaving thy house desolate, for strangers to pillage. Nor yet canst thou say I did dishonour thy old age and give thee up to die, seeing I have ever been to thee most dutiful, and for this thou, my sire, and she, my mother, have made me this return. Go then, get other sons to tend thy closing years, prepare thy body for the grave, and lay out thy corpse. For I will never bury thee with hand of mine; for I am dead for all thou didst for me; but if I found a saviour in another and still live, his son I say I am, and his fond nurse in old age will be. ’Tis vain, I see, the old man’s prayer for death, his plaints at age and life’s long weariness. For if death do but draw near, not one doth wish to die; old age no more they count so burdensome.

Part 10

CHORUS: Peace! enough the present sorrow, O my son; goad not thy father’s soul to fury.

PHERES: Child, whom think’st thou art reviling? some Lydian or Phrygian bought with thy money? Art not aware I am a freebom Thessalian, son of a Thessalian sire? Thou art too insolent; yet from hence thou shalt not go as thou earnest, after shooting out thy braggart tongue at me. To rule my house I begat and bred thee up; I own no debt of dying in thy stead; this is not the law that I received from my ancestors that fathers should die for children, nor is it a custom in Hellas. For weal or woe, thy life must be thine own; whate’er was due from me to thee, thou hast. Dominion wide is thine, and acres broad I will leave to thee, for from my father did I inherit them. How, pray, have I wronged thee? of what am I robbing thee? Die not thou for me, nor I for thee. Thy joy is in the light; think’st thou thy sire’s is not? By Heaven! ’tis a weary while, I trow, that time beneath the earth, and life, though short, is sweet. Thou at least didst struggle hard to ’scape thy death, lost to shame, and by her death dost live beyond thy destined term. Dost thou then speak of cowardice in me, thou craven heart! no match for thy wife, who hath died for thee, her fine young lord? A clever scheme hast thou devised to stave off death for ever, if thou canst persuade each new wife to die instead of thee; and dost thou then taunt thy friends, who will not do the like, coward as thou art thyself? Hold thy peace; reflect, if thou dost love thy life so well, this love by all is shared; yet if thou wilt speak ill of me, thyself shalt hear a full and truthful list of thy own crimes.

CHORUS: Too long that list both now and heretofore; cease, father, to revile thy son.

ADMETUS: Say on, for I have said my say; but if it vexes thee to hear the truth, thou shouldst not have sinned against me.

PHERES: My sin had been the deeper, had I died for thee.

ADMETUS: What! is it all one for young or old to die?

PHERES: To live one life, not twain, is all our due.

ADMETUS: Outlive then Zeus himself!

PHERES: Dost curse thy parents, though unharmed by them?

ADMETUS: Yea, for I see thy heart is set on length of days.

PHERES: Is it not to save thyself thou art carrying to the tomb this corpse?

ADMETUS: A proof of thy cowardice, thou craven heart!

PHERES: At any rate her death was not due to me; this thou canst not say.

ADMETUS: Ah! mayst thou some day come to need my aid!

PHERES: Woo many wives, that there may be the more to die.

ADMETUS: That is thy reproach, for thou didst refuse to die.

PHERES: Dear is the light of the sun-god, dear to all.

ADMETUS: A coward soul is thine, not to be reckoned among men.

PHERES: No laughing now for thee at bearing forth my aged corpse.

ADMETUS: Thy death will surely be a death of shame, come when it will.

Part 11

PHERES: Once dead I little reck of foul report.

ADMETUS: Alas! how void of shame the old can be!

PHERES: Hers was no want of shame; ’twas want of sense in her that thou didst find.

ADMETUS: Begone! and leave me to bury my dead.

PHERES: I go; bury thy victim, thyself her murderer. Her kinsmen yet will call for an account. Else surely has Acastus ceased to be a man, if he avenge not on thee his sister’s blood.

ADMETUS: Perdition seize thee and that wife of thine! grow old, as ye deserve, childless, though your son yet lives, for ye shall never enter the same abode with me; nay! were it needful I should disown thy paternal hearth by heralds’ voice, I had disowned it. (Exit PHERES). Now, since we must bear our present woe, let us go and lay the dead upon the pyre. [Exit ADMETUS.

CHORUS: Woe, woe for thee! Alas, for thy hardihood! Noble spirit, good beyond compare, farewell! May Hermes in the nether world, and Hades, too, give thee a kindly welcome! and if even in that other life the good are rewarded, mayst thou have thy share therein and take thy seat by Hades’ bride!

ATTENDANT: Many the guests ere now from every comer of the world I have seen come to the halls of Admetus, for whom I have spread the board, but never yet have I welcomed to this hearth a guest so shameless as this; a man who, in the first place, though he saw my master’s grief, yet entered and presumed to pass the gates, then took what cheer we had in no sober spirit, though he knew our sorrow; no! was there aught we failed to bring? he called for it. Next in his hands he took a goblet of ivy-wood and drank the pure juice of the black grape, till the mounting fumes of wine heated him, and he crowned his head with myrtle-sprays, howling discordantly, while two-fold strains were there to hear, for he would sing without a thought for the troubles in Admetus’ halls, while we servants mourned our mistress, though we did not let the stranger see our streaming eyes, for such was the bidding of Admetus. So now here am I entertaining as a guest some miscreant thief maybe, or robber, while she is gone forth from the house, nor did I follow her nor stretch my hand towards her bier, in mourning for my lady, who, to me, and all her servants, was a mother, for she would save us from countless trouble, appeasing her husband’s angry mood. Have I not good cause then to loathe this guest who cometh in our hour of woe?

HERACLES: Ho! sirrah, why that solemn, thoughtful look? ’Tis not the way for servants to scowl on guests, but with courteous soul to welcome them. But thou, seeing a friend of thy master arrive, receivest him with sullen, lowering brow, though ’tis but a stranger that is the object of thy mourning. Come hither, that thou too mayst learn more wisdom. Dost know the nature of this mortal state? I trow not; how shouldst thou? Well, lend an ear to me. Death is the common debt of man; no mortal really knows if he will live to see the morrow’s light; for Fortune’s issues are not in our ken, beyond the teacher’s rule they lie, no art can master them. Hearken then to this and learn of me, be merry, drink thy cup, and count the present day thine own, the rest to Fortune yield. And to Cypris too, sweetest of the gods by far to man, thy tribute pay, for kindly is her mood. Let be those other cares, and heed my counsel if thou think’st I speak aright; methinks I do. Come, banish this excessive grief, and drink a cup with me when thou hast passed beyond these doors and wreathed thy brow; and I feel sure the plash of wine within the cup will bring thee to a better haven from this crabbed mood, this cabined state of mind. Mortals we are, and mortals’ thoughts should have; for all they who frown and scowl do miss,—leastways I think so,—the true life and get themselves misfortune.

ATTENDANT: I know all that, but our present state has little claim on revelry or laughter.

HERACLES: The dead was a stranger woman; grieve not to excess; for the rulers of thy house are living.

ATTENDANT: How, living? Thou knowest not the trouble in the house.

HERACLES: I do, unless thy master did in aught deceive me.

ATTENDANT: Too hospitable is he.

HERACLES: Was I to miss good cheer because a stranger had died?

ATTENDANT: A stranger surely! quite a stranger she!

HERACLES: Is there some trouble that he withheld from me?

ATTENDANT: Farewell, go thy way! my master’s troubles are my care.

HERACLES: This word of thine heralds not a grief for strangers felt.

ATTENDANT: Had it been, the sight of thy merriment had not grieved me so.

Part 12

HERACLES: Can it be mine host hath strangely wronged me?

ATTENDANT: Thou earnest at no proper time for our house to welcome thee, for sorrow is come upon us; lo! thou seest our shorn heads and robes of sable hue.

HERACLES: Who is it that is dead? Is it a child or his aged sire that hat hath passed away?

ATTENDANT: Nay, sir guest, ’tis Admetus’ wife that is no more.

HERACLES: What sayest thou? and did ye then in spite of that admit me to your cheer?

ATTENDANT: Yes, for his regard would not let him send thee from his door.

HERACLES: Unhappy husband, what a wife hast thou lost!

ATTENDANT: We are all undone, not she alone.

HERACLES: I knew it when I saw his streaming eye, shorn head and downcast look, yet did he persuade me, saying it was a stranger he was bearing to burial. So I did constrain myself and passed his gates and sat drinking in his hospitable halls, when he was suffering thus. And have I wreathed my head and do I revel still? But—thou to hold thy peace when such a crushing sorrow lay upon the house! Where is he burying her? Whither shall I go to find her?

ATTENDANT: Beside the road that leadeth straight to Larissa, shalt thou see her carved tomb outside the suburb.

HERACLES: O heart, O soul, both sufferers oft, now show the mettle of that son Tirynthian Alcmena, daughter of Electryon, bare to Zeus. For I must save this woman, dead but now, setting Alcestis once again within this house, and to Admetus this kind service render. So I will go and watch for death the black-robed monarch of the dead, and him methinks I shall find as he drinks of the blood-offering near the tomb. And if, from ambush rushing, once I catch and fold him in my arms’ embrace, none shall ever wrest him thence with smarting ribs, ere he give up the woman unto me. But should I fail to find my prey and he come not to the clotted blood, I will go to the sunless home of those beneath the earth, to Persephone and her king, and make to them my prayer, sure that I shall bring Alcestis up again, to place her in the hands of him, my host, who welcomed me to his house nor drove me thence, though fortune smote him hard, but this his noble spirit strove to hide out of regard for me. What host more kind than him in Thessaly? or in in the homes of Hellas? Wherefore shall he never say his generous deeds were lavished on a worthless wretch. [Exeunt HERACLES and Servant.

ADMETUS: Ah me! I loathe this entering in, and loathe to see my widowed home. Woe, woe is me! Whither shall I go? Where stand? what say? or what suppress? Would God that I were dead! Surely in an evil hour my mother gave me birth. The dead I envy, and would fain be as they, and long to dwell within their courts. No joy to me to see the light, no joy to tread the earth; such a hostage death hath reft me of and handed o’er to Hades.

CHORUS: Move forward, go within the shelter of thy house.

ADMETUS: Woe is me!

CHORUS: Thy sufferings claim these cries of woe.

ADMETUS: Ah me!

CHORUS: Through anguish hast thou gone, full well I know.

ADMETUS: Alas! alas!

CHORUS: Thou wilt not help the dead one whit.

ADMETUS: O misery!

Part 13

CHORUS: Nevermore to see thy dear wife face to face is grief indeed.

ADMETUS: Thy words have probed the sore place in my heart. What greater grief can come to man than the loss of a faithful wife? Would I had never married or shared with her my home! I envy those ’mongst men who have nor wife nor child. Theirs is but one life; to grieve for that is no excessive burden; but to see children fall ill and bridal beds emptied by death’s ravages is too much to bear, when one might go through life without wife or child.

CHORUS: A fate we cannot cope with is come upon us.

ADMETUS: Woe is me!

CHORUS: But thou to sorrow settest no limit.

ADMETUS: Ah! ah!

CHORUS: ’Tis hard to bear, but still—

ADMETUS: Woe is me!

CHORUS: Thou art not the first to lose—

ADMETUS: O! woe is me!

CHORUS: A wife; misfortune takes a different shape for every man she plagues.

ADMETUS: O the weary sorrow! O the grief for dear ones dead and gone! Why didst thou hinder me from plung-ing into the gaping grave, there to lay me down and die with her, my peerless bride? Then would Hades for that one have gotten these two faithful souls at once, crossing the nether lake together.

CHORUS: I had a kinsman once, within whose home died his only son, worthy of a father’s tears; yet in spite of that he bore his grief resignedly, childless though he was, his hair already turning grey, himself far on in years, upon life’s downward track.

ADMETUS: O house of mine, how can I enter thee? how can I live here, now that fortune turns against me? Ah me! How wide the gulf ’twixt then and now! Then with torches cut from Pelion’s pines, with marriage hymns I entered in, holding my dear wife’s hand; and at our back a crowd of friends with cheerful cries, singing the happy lot of my dead wife and me, calling us a noble pair made one, children both of highborn lineage; but now the voice of woe instead of wedding hymns, and robes of black instead of snowy white usher me into my house to my deserted couch.

CHORUS: Hard upon prosperous fortune came this sorrow to thee, a stranger to adversity; yet hast thou saved thy soul alive. Thy wife is dead and gone; her love she leaves with thee. What new thing is here? Death ere now from many a man hath torn a wife.

ADMETUS: My friends, I count my dead wife’s lot more blest than mine, for all it seems not so; for nevermore can sorrow touch her for ever; all her toil is over, and glorious is her fame. While I, who had no right to live, have passed the bounds of fate only to live a life of misery; I know it now. For how shall I endure to enter this my house? Whom shall I address, by whom be answered back, to find aught joyful in my entering in? Whither shall I turn? Within, the desolation will drive me forth, whensoe’er I see my widowed couch, the seat whereon she sat, the floor ail dusty in the house, and my babes falling at my knees with piteous tears for their mother, while my servants mourn the good mistress their house hath lost. These are the sorrows in my home, while abroad the marriages among Thessalians and the thronging crowds of women will drive me mad, for I can never bear to gaze upon the compeers of my wife. And whoso is my foe will taunt me thus, Behold him living in his shame, a wretch who quailed at death himself, but of his coward heart gave up his wedded wife instead, and escaped from Hades; doth he deem himself a man after that? And he loathes his parents, though himself refused to die. Such ill report shall I to my evils add. What profit, then, my friends, for me to live, in fame and fortune ruined.

CHORUS: Myself have traced the Muses’ path, have soared amid the stars, have laid my hold on many a theme, and yet have found naught stronger than necessity, no spell inscribed on Thracian tablets written there by Orpheus, the sweet singer, no! nor aught among the simples culled by Phoebus for the toiling race of men, and given to Asclepius’ sons.

CHORUS: The only goddess she, whose altar or whose image man cannot approach; victims she heedeth not. O come not to me, dread goddess, in greater might than heretofore in my career. Even Zeus requires thy aid to bring to pass whatso he wills. Thou too it is that by sheer force dost bend the steel among the Chalybes; nor is there any pity in thy relentless nature.

CHORUS: This is the goddess that hath gripped thee too in chains thou canst not ’scape; yet steel thy heart, for all thy weeping ne’er will bring to light again the dead from the realms below. Even sons of gods perish in darkness in the hour of death. We loved her while she was with us, we love her still though dead; noblest of her sex was she, the wife thou tookest to thy bed.

CHORUS: Her tomb let none regard as the graves of those who die and are no more, but let her have honours equal with the gods, revered by every traveller; and many a one will cross the road and read this verse aloud, This is she that died in days gone by to save her lord; now is she a spirit blest. Hail, lady revered; be kind to us! Such glad greeting shall she have.

Part 14

CHORUS: But see, Admetus! yonder, I believe, comes Alcmena’s son toward thy hearth.

HERACLES: Admetus, to a friend we should speak freely, not hold our peace and harbour in our hearts complaints. I came to thee in thy hour of sorrow and claimed the right to prove myself thy friend, but thou wouldst not tell me that she, thy wife, lay stretched in death; but didst make me a welcome guest in thy halls, as though thy whole concern was centred on a stranger’s loss. So I crowned my head and poured drink-offerings to the gods in that thy house of sorrow. Wherefore I do blame thee for this treatment of me, yet would not grieve thee in thy trouble. So now the reason I have turned my steps and come hither again, I will tell. This lady take and keep for me until I come bringing hither the steeds of Thrace, after I have slain the lord of the Bistones. But should I fare as fare I fain would not, I give her to thee to serve within thy halls. With no small toil she came into my hands. ’Twas thus: I found folk just appointing an open contest for athletes, well worth a struggle, and there I won her as a prize and brought her thence; now those who were successful in the lighter contests had horses for their prize, but those who conquered in severer feats, in boxing and wrestling, won herds of oxen, and this woman was to be added thereto; with such a chance ’twere shame indeed to pass so fair a guerdon by. So thou must take her in thy charge, as I said; for not by theft but honest toil I won the prize I bring; and maybe e’en thou in time wilt thank me.

ADMETUS: ’Twas not because of any slight or unkind thought of thee that I concealed my wife’s sad fate; but this were adding grief to grief if thou hadst gone from hence to the halls of some other friend; and it sufficed that I should mourn my sorrow. But I do beseech thee, prince, if ’tis possible, bid some other Thessalian, one who hath not suffered as I have, keep the maiden for thee,—and thou hast many friends in Pherae; remind me not of my misfortune. For I could not see her in my house and stay my tears. Oh! add not new affliction to my stricken heart, for sure by sorrow am I bowed enough. And where within my halls could a tender maiden live? for such she is, as her dress and vesture show. Is she to dwell where men consort? Then how shall she retain her maiden purity, if ’mid our youths she come and go? O Heracles, it is no easy task to check a young man’s fancy, and I am anxious for thy sake. Or am I to take her to my dead wife’s bower and care for her? How can I bring her there to fill the other’s bed? Twofold reproach I fear; first, some fellow-townsman may taunt me with betraying my benefactress in eagerness to wed a new young bride; next, there is my dead wife, whom I should much regard, for she doth merit all my reverence. Thou too, lady, whosoe’er thou art, believe me, art the very counterfeit presentment of Alcestis, the picture of her form, ah me! O take this maiden, I conjure thee, from my sight; slay me not already slain. For in her I seem once more to see my wife; and my heart is darkly troubled, and the fountains of my eyes are loosed. Ah, woe is me! Now do I taste the bitterness of this my grief.

CHORUS: Indeed I cannot call thy fortune blest, yet heaven’s gift must thou endure, whoe’er the god that comes to bring it.

HERACLES: Would I had the power to bring thy wife up to the light from the halls of death, and confer this kindness on thee!

ADMETUS: Right well I know thou wouldst. But what of that? The dead can never come to life again.

HERACLES: Do not exceed the mark, but bear thy grief with moderation.

ADMETUS: ’Tis easier to advise than to suffer and endure.

HERACLES: Yet what thy gain, if thou for aye wilt mourn?

ADMETUS: I too know that myself, but some strange yearning leads me on.

HERACLES: Love for the dead compels a tear.

ADMETUS: Her death was mine, more than any words of mine can tell.

HERACLES: Thou hast lost a noble wife; who shall gainsay it?

ADMETUS: Life henceforth hath lost all charm for me.

HERACLES: Time will soothe the smart; as yet thy grief is young.

ADMETUS: Time! use that word, if death and time are one.

HERACLES: A new wife and a longing for a fresh marriage will stay thy sorrow.

ADMETUS: Peace! What words are thine? I ne’er of thee had thought it.

HERACLES: What! wilt never wed, but preserve thy widowed state?

ADMETUS: There is no woman living that shall share my couch.

Part 15

HERACLES: Dost think that this will help the dead at all?

ADMETUS: My reverence she deserves, where’er she is.

HERACLES: I praise thee, yes; but still thou bringest on thyself the charge of folly.

ADMETUS: So that thou never call’st me bridegroom, praise me if thou wilt.

HERACLES: I praise thee for thy loyalty to thy wife.

ADMETUS: Come death! if ever I betray her, dead though she be.

HERACLES: Well, take this maiden to the shelter of thy noble house.

ADMETUS: Spare me, I entreat thee by Zeus, thy sire.

HERACLES: Be sure, if thou refuse, ’twill be a sad mistake.

ADMETUS: If I comply, remorse will gnaw my heart.

HERACLES: Yield; for in god’s good time maybe thou wilt give me thanks.

ADMETUS: Ah! would thou hadst never won her in the games!

HERACLES: Yet thou too sharest in my victory.

ADMETUS: True; still let this maiden go away.

HERACLES: Go she shall, if go she must; but first see if this is needful.

ADMETUS: I needs must, else wilt thou be wroth with me.

HERACLES: I have a reason good to press the matter thus.

ADMETUS: Have thy way then. Yet know well thy deed I disapprove.

HERACLES: A day will come that thou wilt praise me; only yield.

ADMETUS: (to his servants). Take her in, if I needs must give her welcome in my house.

Part 16

HERACLES: To thy servants will I not hand her over.

ADMETUS: Conduct her then thyself within, if so thou thinkest good.

HERACLES: Nay, but into thy hands shall mine consign her.

ADMETUS: I will not touch her, though she is free to go within my halls.

HERACLES: To thy hand, and thine alone I her entrust.

ADMETUS: Prince, against my will thou dost constrain me to this deed.

HERACLES: Boldly stretch out thy hand and touch the stranger maid.

ADMETUS: There, then, I stretch it out as toward the Gorgon’s severed head.

HERACLES: Hast hold of her?

ADMETUS: I have.

HERACLES: (removes the veil). So; keep her safely then, and in days to come thou wilt confess the son of Zeus proved himself a noble guest. Look well at her, if haply to thy gaze she have a semblance of thy wife; and now that thou art blest, cease from sorrowing.

ADMETUS: Great gods, what shall I say? a marvel past all hope is here! My wife, my own true wife I see, or is some mocking rapture sent by heaven to drive me mad?

HERACLES: No, no; ’tis thy own wife thou seest here.

ADMETUS: Beware it be not a phantom from that nether world.

HERACLES: No necromancer was this guest whom thou didst welcome.

ADMETUS: Do I behold my wife, her whom I buried?

HERACLES: Be well assured thereof; still I marvel not thou dost distrust thy luck.

ADMETUS: May I touch her, may I speak to her as my living wife?

HERACLES: Speak to her. For thou hast all thy heart’s desire.

ADMETUS: O form and features of my well-loved wife! past all hope I hold thee, never expecting to see thee again.

Part 17

HERACLES: So thou dost; may no jealous god rise against thee!

ADMETUS: O noble son of almighty Zeus, good luck to thee! may the father that begat thee hold thee in his keeping; for thou and none else hast raised my fallen fortunes. How didst thou bring her from the world below to this light of day?

HERACLES: By encountering the god who had her in his power.

ADMETUS: Where didst thou engage with Death? tell me this.

HERACLES: Just by the tomb I from my ambush sprang and caught him in my grip.

ADMETUS: But why thus speechless stands my wife?

HERACLES: ’Tis not lawful yet for thee to hear her speak, ere she be purified from the gods below and the third day be come. So lead her in; and hereafter, e’en as now, be just and kind to guests, Admetus. Now farewell! for I must go to perform my appointed task for the lordly son of Sthenelus.

ADMETUS: Abide with us and be our welcome guest.

HERACLES: Another time; now must I use all haste.

ADMETUS: Good luck to thee! and mayst thou come again! To the citizens and ail my realm I make this proclamation, that they institute dances in honour of the glad event, and make the altars steam with sacrifice, and offer prayers; for now have I moored my bark of life in a happier haven than before, and so will own myself a happy man.

CHORUS: Many are the shapes that fortune takes, and oft the gods bring things to pass beyond our expectation. That which we deemed so sure is not fulfilled, while for that we never thought would be, God finds out a way. And such hath been the issue in the present case.

Contents — 13 sections

1. Part 1
2. Part 2
3. Part 3
4. Part 4
5. Part 5
6. Part 6
7. Part 7
8. Part 8
9. Part 9
10. Part 10
11. Part 11
12. Part 12
13. Part 13

Part 1

NURSE: Ah! would to Heaven the good ship Argo ne’er had sped its course to the Colchian land through the misty blue Symplegades, nor ever in the glens of Pelion the pine been felled to furnish with oars the chieftain’s hands, who went to fetch the golden fleece for Pelias; for then would my own mistress Medea never have sailed to the turrets of Iolcos, her soul with love for Jason smitten, nor would she have beguiled the daughters of Pelias to slay their father and come to live here in the land of Corinth with her husband and children, where her exile found favour with the citizens to whose land she had come, and in all things of her own accord was she at one with Jason, the greatest safeguard this when wife and husband do agree; but now their love is all turned to hate, and tenderest ties are weak. For Jason hath betrayed his own children and my mistress dear for the love of a royal bride, for he hath wedded the daughter of Creon, lord of this land. While Medea his hapless wife, thus scorned, appeals to the oaths he swore, recalls the strong pledge his right hand gave, and bids heaven be witness what requital she is finding from Jason. And here she lies fasting, yielding her body to her grief, wasting away in tears ever since she learnt that she was wronged by her husband, never lifting her eye nor raising her face from off the ground; and she lends as deaf an ear to her friend’s warning as if she were a rock or ocean billow, save when she turns her snow-white neck aside and softly to herself bemoans her father dear, her country and her home, which she gave up to come hither with the man who now holds her in dishonour. She, poor lady, hath by sad experience learnt how good a thing it is never to quit one’s native land. And she hates her children now and feels no joy at seeing them; I am afeard she may contrive some untoward scheme; for her mood is dangerous nor will she brook her cruel treatment; full well I know her, and I much do dread that she will plunge the keen sword through their heart, stealing without a word into the chamber where their marriage couch is spread, or else that she will slay the prince and bridegroom too, and so find some calamity still more grievous than the present; for dreadful is her wrath; verily the man that doth incur her hate will have no easy task to raise o’er her a song of triumph. Lo! where her sons come hither from their childish sports; little they reck of their mother’s woes, for the soul of the young is no inend to sorrow.

ATTENDANT: Why dost thou, so long my lady’s own handmaid, stand here at the gate alone, loudly lamenting to thyself the piteous tale? how comes it that Medea will have thee leave her to herself?

NURSE: Old man, attendant on the sons of Jason, our masters’ fortunes when they go awry make good slaves grieve and touch their hearts. Oh! I have come to such a pitch of grief that there stole a yearning wish upon me to come forth hither and proclaim to heaven and earth my mistress’s hard fate.

ATTENDANT: What! has not the poor lady ceased yet from her lamentation?

NURSE: Would I were as thou art! the mischief is but now beginning; it has not reached its climax yet.

ATTENDANT: O foolish one, if I may call my mistress such a name; how little she recks of evils yet more recent!

NURSE: What mean’st, old man? grudge not to tell me.

ATTENDANT: ’Tis naught; I do repent me even of the words I have spoken.

NURSE: Nay, by thy beard I conjure thee, hide it not from thy fellow-slave; I will be silent, if need be, on that text.

ATTENDANT: I heard one say, pretending not to listen as I approached the place where our greybeards sit playing draughts near Pirene’s sacred spring, that Creon, the ruler of this land, is bent on driving these children and their mother from the boundaries of Corinth; but I know not whether the news is to be relied upon, and would fain it were not.

NURSE: What! will Jason brook such treatment of his sons, even though he be at variance with their mother?

ATTENDANT: Old ties give way to new; he bears no longer any love to this family.

NURSE: Undone, it seems, are we, if to old woes fresh ones we add, ere we have drained the former to the dregs.

ATTENDANT: Hold thou thy peace, say not a word of this; ’tis no time for our mistress to learn hereof.

NURSE: O children, do ye hear how your father feels towards you? Perdition catch him, but no! he is my master still; yet is he proved a veiy traitor to his nearest and dearest.

ATTENDANT: And who ’mongst men is not? Art learning only now, that every single man cares for himself more than for his neighbour, some from honest, motives, others for mere gain’s sake? seeing that to indulge his passion their father has ceased to love these children.

NURSE: Go, children, within the house; all will be well. Do thou keep them as far away as may be, and bring them not near their mother in her evil hour. For ere this have I seen her eyeing them savagely, as though she were minded to do them some hurt, and well I know she will not cease from her fury till she have pounced on some victim. At least may she turn her hand against her foes, and not against her friends.

MEDEA: (within). Ah, me! a wretched suffering woman I! O would that I could die!

NURSE: ’Tis as I said, my dear children; wild fancies stir your mother’s heart, wild fury goads her on. Into the house without delay, come not near her eye, approach her not, beware her savage mood, the fell tempest of her reckless heart. In, in with what speed ye may. For ’tis plain she will soon redouble her fury; that cry is but the herald of the gathering storm-cloud whose lightning soon will flash; what will her proud restless soul, in the anguish of despair, be guilty of? [Exit Attendant with the children.

MEDEA: (within). Ah, me! the agony I have suffered, deep enough to call for these laments! Curse you and your father too, ye children damned, sons of a doomed mother! Ruin seize the whole family!

Part 2

NURSE: Ah me! ah me! the pity of it! Why, pray, do thy children share their father’s crime? Why hatest thou them? Woe is you, poor children, how do I grieve for you lest ye suffer some outrage! Strange are the tempers of princes, and maybe because they seldom have to obey, and mostly lord it over others, change they their moods with difficulty. ’Tis better then to have been trained to live on equal terms. Be it mine to reach old age, not in proud pomp, but in security! Moderation wins the day first as a better word for men to use, and likewise it is far the best course for them to pursue; but greatness that doth o’erreach itself, brings no blessing to mortal men; but pays a penalty of greater ruin whenever fortune is wroth with a family.

CHORUS: I heard the voice, uplifted loud, of our poor Colchian lady, nor yet is she quiet; speak, aged dame, for as I stood by the house with double gates I heard a voice of weeping from within, and I do grieve, lady, for the sorrows of this house, for it hath won my love.

NURSE: ’Tis a house no more; all that is passed away long since; a royal bride keeps Jason at her side, while our mistress pines away in her bower, finding no comfort for her soul in aught her friends can say.

MEDEA: (within). Oh, oh! Would that Heaven’s levin bolt would cleave this head in twain! What gain is life to me? Woe, woe is me! O, to die and win release, quitting this loathed existence!

CHORUS: Didst hear, O Zeus, thou earth, and thou, O light, the piteous note of woe the hapless wife is uttering? How shall a yearning for that insatiate resting-place ever hasten for thee, poor reckless one, the end that death alone can bring? Never pray for that. And if thy lord prefers a fresh love, be not angered with him for that; Zeus will judge ’twixt thee and him herein. Then mourn not for thy husband’s loss too much, nor waste thyself away.

MEDEA: (within). Great Themis, and husband of Themis, behold what I am suffering now, though I did bind that accursed one, my husband, by strong oaths to me? O, to see him and his bride some day brought to utter destruction, they and their house with them, for that they presume to wrong me thus unprovoked. O my father, my country, that I have left to my shame, after slaying my own brother.

NURSE: Do ye hear her words, how loudly she adjures Themis, oft invoked, and Zeus, whom men regard as keeper of their oaths? On no mere trifle surely will our mistress spend her rage.

CHORUS: Would that she would come forth for us to see, and listen to the words of counsel we might give, if haply she might lay aside the fierce fury of her wrath, and her temper stern. Never be my zeal at any rate denied my friends! But go thou and bring her hither outside the house, and tell her this our friendly thought; haste thee ere she do some mischief to those inside the house, for this sorrow of hers is mounting high.

NURSE: This will I do; but I have my doubts whether I shall persuade my mistress; still willingly will I undertake this trouble for you; albeit, she glares upon her servants with the look of a lioness with cubs, whenso anyone draws nigh to speak to her. Wert thou to call the men of old time rude uncultured boors thou wouldst not err, seeing that they devised their hymns for festive occasions, for banquets, and to grace the board, a pleasure to catch the ear, shed o’er our life, but no man hath found a way to allay hated grief by music and the minstrel’s varied strain, whence arise slaughters and fell strokes of fate to o’erthrow the homes of men. And yet this were surely a gain, to heal men’s wounds by music’s spell, but why tune they their idle song where rich banquets are spread? for of itself doth the rich banquet, set before them, afford to men delight.

CHORUS: I heard a bitter cry of lamentation! loudly, bitterly she calls on the traitor of her marriage bed, her perfidious spouse; by grievous wrongs oppressed she invokes Themis, bride of Zeus, witness of oaths, who brought her unto Hellas, the land that fronts the strand of Asia, o’er the sea by night through ocean’s boundless gate.

MEDEA: From the house I have come forth, Corinthian ladies, for fear lest you be blaming me; for well I know that amongst men many by showing pride have gotten them an ill name and a reputation for indifference, both those who shun men’s gaze and those who move amid the stranger crowd, and likewise they who choose a quiet walk in life. For there is no just discernment in the eyes of men, for they, or ever they have surely learnt their neighbour’s heart, loathe him at first sight, though never wronged by him; and so a stranger most of all should adopt a city’s views; nor do I commend that citizen, who, in the stubbornness of his heart, from churlishness resents the city’s will. But on me hath fallen this unforeseen disaster, and sapped my life; ruined I am, and long to resign the boon of existence, kind friends, and die. For he who was all the world to me, as well thou knowest, hath turned out the veriest villain, my own husband. Of all things that have life and sense we women are the most hapless creatures; first must we buy a husband at an exorbitant price, and o’er ourselves a tyrant set which is an evil worse than the first; and herein lies the most important issue, whether our choice be good or bad. For divorce is discreditable to women, nor can we disown our lords. Next must the wife, coming as she does to ways and customs new, since she hath not learnt the lesson in her home, have a diviner’s eye to see how best to treat the partner of her life. If haply we perform these tasks with thoroughness and tact, and the husband live with us, without resenting the yoke, our life is a happy one; if not, ’twere best to die. But when a man is vexed with what he finds indoors, he goeth forth and rids his soul of its disgust, betaking him to some friend or comrade of like age; whilst we must needs regard his single self. And yet they say we live secure at home, while they are at the wars, with their sorry reasoning, for I would gladly take my stand in battle array three times o’er, than once give birth. But enough! this language suits not thee as it does me; thou hast a city here, a father’s house, some joy in life, and friends to share thy thoughts, but I am destitute, without a city, and therefore scorned by my husband, a captive I from a foreign shore, with no mother, brother, or kinsman in whom to find a new haven of refuge from this calamity. Wherefore this one boon and only this I wish to win from thee,— thy silence, if haply I can some way or means devise to avenge me on my husband for this cruel treatment, and on the man who gave to him his daughter, and on her who is his wife. For though a woman be timorous enough in all else, and as regards courage, a coward at the mere sight of steel, yet in the moment she finds her honour wronged, no heart is filled with deadlier thoughts than hers.

CHORUS: This will I do; for thou wilt be taking a just vengeance on thy husband, Medea. That thou shouldst mourn thy lot surprises me not. But lo! I see Creon, king of this land coming hither, to announce some new resolve.

CREON: Hark thee, Medea, I bid thee take those sullen looks and angry thoughts against thy husband forth from this land in exile, and with thee take both thy children and that without delay, for I am judge in this sentence, and I will not return unto my house till I banish thee beyond the borders of the land.

MEDEA: Ah, me! now is utter destruction come upon me, unhappy that I am! For my enemies are bearing down on me full sail, nor have I any landing-place to come at in my trouble. Yet for all my wretched plight I will ask thee, Creon, wherefore dost thou drive me from the land?

CREON: I fear thee,—no longer need I veil my dread ’neath words,—lest thou devise against my child some cureless ill. Many things contribute to this fear of mine; thou art a witch by nature, expert in countless sorceries, and thou art chafing for the loss of thy husband’s affection. I hear, too, so they tell me, that thou dost threaten the father of the bride, her husband, and herself with some mischief; wherefore I will take precautions ere our troubles come. For ’tis better for me to incur thy hatred now, lady, than to soften my heart and bitterly repent it hereafter.

MEDEA: Alas! this is not now the first time, but oft before, O Creon, hath my reputation injured me and caused sore mischief. Wherefore whoso is wise in his generation ought never to have his children taught to be too clever; for besides the reputation they get for idleness, they purchase bitter odium from the citizens. For if thou shouldst import new learning amongst dullards, thou will be thought a useless trifler, void of knowledge; while if thy fame in the city o’ertops that of the pretenders to cunning knowledge, thou wilt win their dislike. I too myself share in this ill-luck. Some think me clever and hate me, ; others find me hard to please and not so very clever after all. Be that as it may, thou dost fear me lest I bring on thee something to mar thy harmony. Fear me not, Creon, ray position scarce is such that I should seek to quarrel with princes. Why should I, for how hast thou injured me? Thou hast betrothed thy daughter where thy fancy prompted thee. No, ’tis my husband I hate, though I doubt not thou hast acted wisely herein. And now I grudge not thy prosperity; betroth thy child, good luck to thee, but let me abide in this land, for though I have been wronged I will be still and yield to my superiors.

CREON: Thy words are soft to hear, but much I dread lest thou art devising some mischief in thy heart, and less than ever do I trust thee now; for a cunning woman, and man likewise, is easier to guard against when quick-tempered than when taciturn. Nay, begone at once! speak me no speeches, for this is decreed, nor hast thou any art whereby thou shalt abide amongst us, since thou hatest me.

MEDEA: O, say not so! by thy knees and by thy daughter newly-wed, I do implore!

CREON: Thou wastest words; thou wilt never persuade me.

MEDEA: What, wilt thou banish me, and to my prayers no pity yield?

Part 3

CREON: I will, for I love not thee above my own family.

MEDEA: O my country! what fond memories I have of thee in this hour!

CREON: Yea, for I myself love my city best of all things save my children.

MEDEA: Ah me! ah me! to mortal man how dread a scourge is love!

CREON: That, I deem, is according to the turn our fortunes take.

MEDEA: O Zeus! let not the author of these my troubles escape thee.

CREON: Begone, thou silly woman, and free me from my toil.

MEDEA: The toil is mine, no lack of it.

CREON: Soon wilt thou be thrust out forcibly by the hand of servants.

MEDEA: Not that, not that, I do entreat thee, Creon!

CREON: Thou wilt cause disturbance yet, it seems.

MEDEA: I will begone; I ask thee not this boon to grant.

CREON: Why then this violence? why dost thou not depart?

MEDEA: Suffer me to abide this single day and devise some plan for the manner of my exile, and means of living for my children, since their father cares not to provide his babes therewith. Then pity them; thou too hast children of thine own; thou needs must have a kindly heart. For my own lot I care naught, though I an exile am, but for those babes I weep, that they should learn what sorrow means.

CREON: Mine is a nature anything but harsh; full oft by showing pity have I suffered shipwreck; and now albeit I clearly see my error, yet shalt thou gain this request, lady; but I do forewarn thee, if to-morrow’s rising sun shall find thee and thy children within the borders of this land, thou diest; my word is spoken and it will not lie. So now, if abide thou must, stay this one day only, for in it thou canst not do any of the fearful deeds I dread.

CHORUS: Ah! poor lady, woe is thee! Alas, for thy sorrows! Whither wilt thou turn? What protection, what home or country to save thee from thy troubles wilt thou find? O Medea, in what a hopeless sea of misery heaven hath plunged thee!

MEDEA: On all sides sorrow pens me in. Who shall gainsay this? But all is not yet lost! think not so. Still are there troubles in store for the new bride, and for her bridegroom no light toil. Dost think I would ever have fawned on yonder man, unless to gain some end or form some scheme? Nay, I would not so much as have spoken to him or touched him with my hand. But he has in folly so far stepped in that, though he might have checked my plot by banishing me from the land, he hath allowed me to abide this day, in which I will lay low in death three of my enemies— a father and his daughter and my husband too. Now, though I have many ways to compass their death, I am not sure, friends, which I am to try first. Shall I set fire to the bridal mansion, or plunge the whetted sword through their hearts, softly stealing into the chamber where their couch is spread? One thing stands in my way. If I am caught making my way into the chamber, intent on my design, I shall be put to death and cause my foes to mock. ’Twere best to take the shortest way—the way we women are most skilled in—by poison to destroy them. Well, well, suppose them dead; what city will receive me? What friendly host will give me a shelter in his land, a home secure, and save my soul alive? None. So I will wait yet a little while in case some tower of defence rise up for me; then will I proceed to this bloody deed in crafty silence; but if some unexpected mischance drive me forth, I will with mine own hand seize the sword, e’en though I die for it, and slay them, and go forth on my bold path of daring. By that dread queen whom I revere before all others and have chosen to share my task, by Hecate who dwells within my inmost chamber, not one of them shall wound my heart and rue it not. Bitter and sad will I make their marriage for them; bitter shall be the wooing of it, bitter my exile from the land. Up, then, Medea, spare not the secrets of thy art in plotting and devising; on to the danger. Now comes a struggle needing courage. Dost see what thou art suffering? ’Tis not for thee to be a laughing-stock to the race of Sisyphus by reason of this wedding of Jason, sprung, as thou art, from a noble sire, and of the Sun-god’s race. Thou hast cunning; and, more than this, we women, though by nature little apt for virtuous deeds, are most expert to fashion any mischief.

CHORUS: Back to their source the holy rivers turn their tide. Order and the universe are being reversed. ’Tis men whose counsels are treacherous, whose oath by heaven is no longer sure. Rumour shall bring a change o’er my life, bringing it into good repute. Honour’s dawn is breaking for woman’s sex; no more shall the foul tongue of slander fix upon us.

CHORUS: The songs of the poets of old shall cease to make our faithlessness their theme. Phoebus, lord of minstrelsy, hath not implanted in our mind the gift of heavenly song, else had I sung an answering strain to the race of males, for time’s long chapter affords many a theme on their sex as well as ours.

CHORUS: With mind distraught didst thou thy father’s house desert on thy voyage betwixt ocean’s twin rocks, and on a foreign strand thou dwellest, thy bed left husbandless, poor lady and thou an exile from the land, dishonoured, persecuted.

Part 4

CHORUS: Gone is the grace that oaths once had. Through all the breadth of Hellas honour is found no more; to heaven hath it sped away. For thee no father’s house is open, woe is thee! to be a haven from the troublous storm, while o’er thy home is set another queen, the bride that is preferred to thee.

JASON: It is not now I first remark, but oft ere this, how unruly a pest is a harsh temper. For instance, thou, hadst thou but patiently endured the will of thy superiors, mightest have remained here in this land and house, but now for thy idle words wilt thou be banished. Thy words are naught to roe. Cease not to call Jason basest of men; but for those words thou hast spoken against our rulers, count it all gain that exile is thy only punishment. I ever tried to check the outbursts of the angry monarch, and would have had thee stay, but thou wouldst not forego thy silly rage, always reviling our rulers, and so thou wilt be banished. Yet even after all this I weary not of my goodwill, but am come with thus much forethought, lady, that thou mayst not be destitute nor want for aught, when, with thy sons, thou art cast out. Many an evil doth exile bring in its train with it; for even though thou hatest me, never will I harbour hard thoughts of thee.

MEDEA: Thou craven villain (for that is the only name my tongue can find for thee, a foul reproach on thy unmanliness)! comest thou to me, thou, most hated foe of gods, of me, and of all mankind? Tis no proof of courage or hardihood to confront thy friends after injuring them, but that worst of all human diseases—loss of shame. Yet hast thou done well to come; for I shall ease ray soul by reviling thee, and thou wilt be vexed at my recital. I will begin at the very beginning. I saved thy life, as every Hellene knows who sailed with thee aboard the good ship Argo, when thou wert sent to tame and yoke fire-breathing bulls, and to sow the deadly tilth. Yea, and I slew the dragon which guarded the golden fleece, keeping sleepless watch o’er it with many a wreathed coil, and I raised for thee a beacon of deliver arice. Father and home of my free will I left and came with thee to Iolcos, ’neath Pelion’s hills, for my love was stronger than my prudence. Next I caused the death of Pelias by a doom most grievous, even by his own children’s hand, beguiling them of all their fear. All this have I done for thee, thou traitor! and thou hast cast me over, taking to thyself another wife, though children have been bom to us. Hadst thou been childless still, I could have pardoned thy desire for this new union. Gone is now the trust I put in oaths. I cannot even understand whether thou thinkest that the gods of old no longer rule, or that fresh decrees are now in vogue amongst mankind, for thy conscience must tell thee thou hast not kept faith with me. Ah! poor right hand, which thou didst often grasp. These knees thou didst embrace! All in vain, I suffered a traitor to touch me! How short of my hopes I am fallen! But come, I will deal with thee as though thou wert my friend. Yet what kindness can I expect from one so base as thee? but yet I will do it, for my questioning will show thee yet more base. Whither can I turn me now? to my father’s house, to my own country, which I for thee deserted to come hither? to the hapless daughters of Pelias? A glad welcome, I trow, would they give me in their home, whose father’s death I compassed! My case stands even thus: I am become the bitter foe to those of mine own home, and those whom I need ne’er have wronged I have made mine enemies to pleasure thee. Wherefore to reward me for this thou hast made me doubly blest in the eyes of many a wife in Hellas; and in thee I own a peerless, trusty lord. O woe is me, if indeed I am to be cast forth an exile from the land, without one friend; one lone woman with her babes forlorn! Yea, a fine reproach to thee in thy bridal hour, that thy children and the wife who saved thy life are beggars and vagabonds! O Zeus! why hast thou granted unto man clear signs to know the sham in gold, white on man’s brow no brand is stamped whereby to gauge the villain’s heart?

CHORUS: There is a something terrible and past all cure, when quarrels arise ’twixt those who are near and dear.

JASON: Needs must I now, it seems, turn orator, and, like a good helmsman on a ship with close-reefed sails, weather that wearisome tongue of thine. Now, I believe, since thou wilt exaggerate thy favours, that to Cypris alone of gods or men I owe the safety of my voyage. Thou hast a subtle wit enough; yet were it a hateful thing for me to say that the Love-god constrained thee by his resistless shaft to save my life. However, I will not reckon this too nicely; ’twas kindly done, however thou didst serve me. Yet for my safety hast thou received more than ever thou gavest, as I will show. First, thou dwellest in Hellas, instead of thy barbarian land, and hast learnt what justice means find how to live by law, not by the dictates of brute force; and all the Hellenes recognize thy cleverness, and thou hast gained a name; whereas, if thou hadst dwelt upon the confines of the earth, no tongue had mentioned thee. Give me no gold within my halls; nor skill to sing a fairer strain than ever Orpheus sang, unless therewith my fame be spread abroad! So much I say to thee about my own toils, for ’twas thou didst challenge me to this retort. As for the taunts thou urgest against my marriage with the princess, I will prove to thee, first, that I am prudent herein, next chastened in my love, and last a powerful friend to thee and to thy sons; only hold thy peace. Since I have here withdrawn from Iolcos with many a hopeless trouble at my back, what happier device could I, an exile, frame than marriage with the daughter of the king? ’Tis not because I loathe thee for my wife—the thought that rankles in thy heart; ’tis not because I am smitten with desire fot a new bride, nor yet that I am eager to vie with others in begetting many children, for those we have are quite enough, and I do not complain. Nay, ’tis that we—and this is most important— may dwell in comfort, instead of suffering want (for well I know that every whilom friend avoids the poor), and that I might rear my sons as doth befit my house; further, that I might be the father of brothers for the children thou hast born, and raise these to the same high rank, uniting the family in one,— to my lasting bliss. Thou, indeed, hast no need of more children, but me it profits to help my present family by that which is to be. Have I miscarried here? Not even thou wouldest say so unless a rival’s charms rankled in thy bosom. No, but you women have such strange ideas, that you think all is well so long as your married life runs smooth; but if some mischance occur to ruffle your love, all that was good and lovely erst you reckon as your foes. Yea, men should have begotten children from some other source, no female race existing; thus would no evil ever have fallen on mankind.

CHORUS: This speech, O Jason, hast thou with specious art arranged; but yet I think—albeit in saying so I betray indiscretion—that thou hast sinned in casting over thy wife.

MEDEA: No doubt I differ from the mass of men on many points; for, to my mind, whoso hath skill to fence with words in an unjust cause, incurs the heaviest penalty; for such an one, confident that he can cast a decent veil of words o’er his injustice, dares to practise it; and yet he is not so very clever after all. So do not thou put forth thy specious pleas and clever words to me now, for one word of mine will lay thee low. Hadst thou not had a villain’s heart, thou shouldst have gained my consent, then made this match, instead of hiding it from those who loved thee.

JASON: Thou wouldest have lent me ready aid, no doubt, in this proposal, if I had told thee of my marriage, seeing that not even now canst thou restrain thy soul’s hot fury.

MEDEA: This was not what restrained thee; but thine eye was turned towards old age, and a foreign wife began to appear discreditable to thee.

JASON: Be well assured of this: ’twas not for the woman’s sake I wedded the king’s daughter, my present wife; but, as I have already told thee, I wished to insure thy safety and to be the father of royal sons bound by blood to my own children—a bulwark to our house.

MEDEA: May that prosperity, whose end is woe, ne’er be mine, nor such wealth as would ever sting my heart!

JASON: Change that prayer as I will teach thee, and thou wilt show more wisdom. Never let happiness appear in sorrow’s guise, nor, when thy fortune smiles, pretend she frowns!

MEDEA: Mock on; thou hast a place of refuge; I am alone, an exile soon to be.

JASON: Thy own free choice was this; blame no one else.

MEDEA: What did I do? Marry, then betray thee?

JASON: Against the king thou didst invoke an impious curse.

MEDEA: On thy house too maybe I bring the curse.

JASON: Know this, I will no further dispute this point with thee. But, if thou wilt of my fortune somewhat take for the children or thyself to help thy exile, say on; for I am ready to grant it with ungrudging hand, yea and to send tokens to my friends elsewhere who shall treat thee well. If thou refuse this offer, thou wilt do a foolish deed, but if thou cease from anger the greater will be thy gain.

MEDEA: I will have naught to do with friends of thine, naught will I receive of thee, offer it not to me; a villain’s gifts can bring no blessing.

JASON: At least I call the gods to witness, that I am ready in all things to serve thee and thy children, but thou dost scorn my favours and thrustest thy friends stubbornly away; wherefore thy lot will be more bitter still.

Part 5

MEDEA: Away! By love for thy young bride entrapped, too long thou lingerest outside her chamber; go wed, for, if God will, thou shalt have such a marriage as thou wouldst fain refuse.

CHORUS: When in excess and past all limits Love doth come, he brings not glory or repute to man; but if the Cyprian queen in moderate might approach, no goddess is so full of charm as she. Never, O never, lady mine, discharge at me from thy golden bow a shaft invincible, in passion’s venom dipped.

CHORUS: On me may chastity, heaven’s fairest gift, look with a favouring eye; never may Cypris, goddess dread, fasten on me a temper to dispute, or restless jealousy, smiting my soul with mad desire for unlawful love, but may she hallow peaceful married life and shrewdly decide whom each of us shall wed.

CHORUS: O my country, O my own dear home! God grant I may never be an outcast from my city, leading that cruel helpless life, whose every day is misery. Ere that may I this life complete and yield to death, ay, death; for there is no misery that doth surpass the loss of fatherland.

CHORUS: I have seen with mine eyes, nor from the lips of others have I the lesson learnt; no city, not one friend doth pity thee in this thine awful woe. May he perish and find no favour, whoso hath not in him honour for his friends, freely unlocking his heart to them. Never shall he be friend of mine.

AEGEUS: All hail, Medea! no man knoweth fairer prelude to the greeting of friends than this.

MEDEA: All hail to thee likewise, Aegeus, son of wise Pandion. Whence comest thou to this land?

AEGEUS: From Phoebus’ ancient oracle.

MEDEA: What took thee on thy travels to the prophetic centre of the earth?

AEGEUS: The wish to ask how I might raise up seed unto myself.

MEDEA: Pray tell me, hast thou till now dragged on a childless life?

AEGEUS: I have no child owing to the visitation of some god.

MEDEA: Hast thou a wife, or hast thou never known the married state?

AEGEUS: I have a wife joined to me in wedlock’s bond.

MEDEA: What said Phoebus to thee as to children?

AEGEUS: Words too subtle for man to comprehend.

MEDEA: Surely I may learn the god’s answer?

AEGEUS: Most assuredly, for it is just thy subtle wit it needs.

MEDEA: What said the god? speak, if I may hear it.

AEGEUS: He bade me not loose the wineskin’s pendent neck.

Part 6

MEDEA: Till when? what must thou do first, what country visit?

AEGEUS: Till I to my native home return.

MEDEA: What object hast thou in sailing to this land?

AEGEUS: O’er Troezen’s realm is Pittheus king.

MEDEA: Pelops’ son, a man devout they say.

AEGEUS: To him I fain would impart the oracle of the god.

MEDEA: The man is shrewd and versed in such-like lore.

AEGEUS: Aye, and to me the dearest of all my warrior friends.

MEDEA: Good luck to thee! success to all thy wishes!

AEGEUS: But why that downcast eye, that wasted cheek?

MEDEA: O Aegeus, my husband has proved a monster of iniquity.

AEGEUS: What meanest thou? explain to me clearly the cause of thy despondency.

MEDEA: Jason is wronging me though I have given him no cause.

AEGEUS: What hath he done? tell me more clearly.

MEDEA: He is taking another wife to succeed me as mistress of his house.

AEGEUS: Can he have brought himself to such a dastard deed?

MEDEA: Be assured thereof; I, whom he loved of yore, am in dishonour now.

AEGEUS: Hath he found a new love? or does he loathe thy bed?

MEDEA: Much in love is he! A traitor to his friend is he become.

AEGEUS: Enough! if he is a villain as thou sayest.

Part 7

MEDEA: The alliance he is so much enamoured of is with a princess.

AEGEUS: Who gives his daughter to him? go on, I pray.

MEDEA: Creon, who is lord of this land of Corinth.

AEGEUS: Lady, I can well pardon thy grief.

MEDEA: I am undone, and more than that, am banished from the land.

AEGEUS: By whom? fresh woe this word of thine unfolds.

MEDEA: Creon drives me forth in exile from Corinth.

AEGEUS: Doth Jason allow it? This too I blame him for.

MEDEA: Not in words, but he will not stand out against it. Ο, I implore thee by this beard and by thy knees, in suppliant posture, pity, O pity my sorrows; do not see me cast forth forlorn, but receive me in thy country, to a seat within thy halls. So may thy wish by heaven’s grace be crowned with a full harvest of offspring, and may thy life close in happiness! Thou knowest not the rare good luck thou findest here, for I will make thy childlessness to cease and cause thee to beget fair issue; so potent are the spells I know.

AEGEUS: Lady, on many grounds I am most fain to grant thee this thy boon, first for the gods’ sake, next for the children whom thou dost promise I shall beget; for in respect of this I am completely lost. ’Tis thus with me; if e’er thou reach my land, I will attempt to champion thee as I am bound to do. Only one warning I do give thee first, lady; I will not from this land bear thee away, yet if of thyself thou reach my halls, there shalt thou bide in safety and I will never yield thee up to any man. But from this land escape without my aid, for I have no wish to incur the blame of my allies as well.

MEDEA: It shall be even so; but wouldst thou pledge thy word to this, I should in all be well content with thee.

AEGEUS: Surely thou dost trust me? or is there aught that troubles thee?

MEDEA: Thee I trust; but Pelias’ house and Creon are my foes. Wherefore, if thou art bound by an oath, thou wilt not give me up to them when they come to drag me from the land, but, having entered into a compact and sworn by heaven as well, thou wilt become my friend and disregard their overtures. Weak is any aid of mine, whilst they have wealth and a princely house.

AEGEUS: Lady, thy words show much foresight, so if this is thy will, I do not refuse. For I shall feel secure and safe if I have some pretext to offer to thy foes, and thy case too the firmer stands. Now name thy gods.

MEDEA: Swear by the plain of Earth, by Helios my father’s sire, and, in one comprehensive oath, by all the race of gods.

AEGEUS: What shall I swear to do, from what refrain? tell me that.

MEDEA: Swear that thou wilt never of thyself expel me from thy land, nor, whilst life is thine, permit any other, one of my foes maybe, to hale me thence if so he will.

AEGEUS: By earth I swear, by the sun-god’s holy beam and by all the host of heaven that I will stand fast to the terms, I hear thee make.

MEDEA: ’Tis enough. If thou shouldst break this oath, what curse dost thou invoke upon thyself?

AEGEUS: Whate’er betides the impious.

Part 8

MEDEA: Go in peace; all is well, and I with what speed I may, will to thy city come, when I have wrought my purpose and obtained my wish.

CHORUS: May Maia’s princely son go with thee on thy way to bring thee to thy home, and mayest thou attain that on which thy soul is set so firmly, for to my mind thou seemest a generous man, O Aegeus.

MEDEA: O Zeus, and Justice, child of Zeus, and sun-god’s light, now will I triumph o’er my foes, kind friends; on victory’s road have I set forth; good hope have I of wreaking vengeance on those I hate. For where we were in most distress this stranger hath appeared, to be a haven in my counsels; to him will we make fast the cables of our ship when we come to the town and citadel of Pallas. But now will I explain to thee my plans in full; do not expect to hear a pleasant tale. A servant of mine will I to Jason send and crave an interview; then when he comes I will address him with soft words, say, this pleases me, and, that is well, ; then will I entreat that here my children may abide, not that I mean to leave them in a hostile land for foes to flout, but that I may slay the king’s daughter by guile. For I will send them with gifts in their hands, carrying them unto the bride to save them from banishment, a robe of finest woof and a chaplet of gold. And if these ornaments she take and put them on, miserably shall she die, and likewise everyone who touches her; with such fell poisons will I smear my gifts. And here I quit this theme; but I shudder at the deed I must do next; for I will slay the children I have borne; there is none shall take them from my toils; and when I have utterly confounded Jason’s house I will leave the land, escaping punishment for my dear children’s murder, after my most unholy deed. For I cannot endure the taunts of enemies, kind friends; enough! what gain is life to me? I have no country, home, or refuge left. Ο, I did wrong, that hour I left my father’s home, persuaded by that Hellene’s words, who now shall pay the penalty, so help me God. Never shall he see again alive the children I bore to him, nor from his new bride shall he beget issue, for she must die a hideous death, slain by my drugs. Let no one deem me a poor weak woman who sits with folded hands, but of another mould, dangerous to foes and well-disposed to friends; for they win the fairest fame who live their life like me.

CHORUS: Since thou hast imparted this design to me, I bid thee hold thy hand, both from a wish to serve thee and because I would uphold the laws men make.

MEDEA: It cannot but be so; thy words I pardon since thou art not in the same sorry plight that I am.

CHORUS: O lady, wilt thou steel thyself to slay thy children twain?

MEDEA: I will, for that will stab my husband to the heart.

CHORUS: It may, but thou wilt be the saddest wife alive.

MEDEA: No matter; wasted is every word that comes ’twixt now and then. (To the Nurse.) Ho! thou, go call me Jason hither, for thee I do employ on every mission of trust. No word divulge of all my purpose, as thou art to thy mistress loyal and likewise of my sex.

CHORUS: Sons of Erechtheus, heroes happy from of yore, children of the blessed gods, fed on wisdom’s glorious food in a holy land ne’er pillaged by its foes, ye who move with sprightly step through a climate ever bright and clear, where, as legend tells, the Muses nine, Pieria’s holy maids, were brought to birth by Harmonia with the golden hair;

CHORUS: and poets sing how Cypris drawing water from the streams of fair-flowing Cephissus breathes o’er the land a gentle breeze of balmy winds, and ever as she crowns her tresses with a garland of sweet rose-buds sends forth the Loves to sit by wisdom’s side, to take a part in every excellence.

CHORUS: How then shall the city of sacred streams, the land that welcomes those it loves, receive thee, the murderess of thy children, thee whose presence with others is a pollution? Think on the murder of thy children, consider the bloody deed thou takest on thee. Nay, by thy knees we, one and all, implore thee, slay not thy babes.

CHORUS: Where shall hand or heart find hardihood enough in wreaking such a fearsome deed upon thy sons? How wilt thou look upon thy babes, and still without a tear retain thy bloody purpose? Thou canst not, when they fall at thy feet for mercy, steel thy heart and dip in their blood thy hand.

JASON: I am come at thy bidding, for e’en though thy hate for me is bitter thou shalt not fail in this small boon, but I will hear what new request thou hast to make of me, lady.

MEDEA: Jason, I crave thy pardon for the words I spoke, and well thou mayest brook my burst of passion, for ere now we twain have shared much love. For I have reasoned with my soul and railed upon me thus, Ah! poor heart 1 why am I thus distraught, why so angered ’gainst all good advice, why have I come to hate the rulers of the land, my husband too, who does the best for me he can, in wedding with a princess and rearing for my children noble brothers? Shall I not cease to fret? What possesses me, when heaven its best doth offer? Have I not my children to consider? do I forget that we are fugitives, in need of friends? When I had thought all this I saw how foolish I had been, how senselessly enraged. So now I do commend thee and think thee most wise in forming this connexion for us; but I was mad, I who should have shared in these designs, helped on thy plans, and lent my aid to bring about the match, only too pleased to wait upon thy bride. But what we are, we are, we women, evil I will not say; wherefore thou shouldst not sink to our sorry level nor with our weapons meet our childishness. I yield and do confess that I was wrong then, but now have I come to a better mind. Come hither, my children, come, leave the house, step forth, and with me greet and bid farewell to your father, be reconciled from all past bitterness unto your friends, as now your mother is; for we have made a truce and anger is no more. Enter the Children. Take his right hand; ah me! my sad fate! when I reflect, as now, upon the hidden future. O my children, since there awaits you even thus a long, long life, stretch forth the hand to take a fond farewell. Ah me! how new to tears am I, how full of fear! For now that I have at last released me from my quarrel with your father, I let the tear-drops stream adown my tender cheek.

CHORUS: From my eyes too bursts forth the copious tear; O, may no greater ill than the present e’er befall!

JASON: Lady, I praise this conduct, not that I blame what is past; for it is but natural to the female sex to vent their spleen against a husband when he trafficks in other marriages besides his own. But thy heart is changed to wiser schemes and thou art determined on the better course, late though it be; this is acting like a woman of sober sense. And for you, my sons, hath your father provided with all good heed a sure refuge, by God’s grace; for ye, I trow, shall with your brothers share hereafter the foremost rank in this Corinthian realm. Only grow up, for all the rest your sire and whoso of the gods is kind to us is bringing to pass. May I see you reach man’s full estate, high o’er the heads of those I hate! But thou, lady, why with fresh tears dost thou thine eyelids wet, turning away thy wan cheek, with no welcome for these my happy tidings?

MEDEA: ’Tis naught; upon these children my thoughts were turned.

JASON: Then take heart; for I will see that it is well with them.

MEDEA: I will do so; nor will I doubt thy word; woman is a weak creature, ever given to tears.

Part 9

JASON: Why prithee, unhappy one, dost moan o’er these children?

MEDEA: I gave them birth; and when thou didst pray long life for them, pity entered into my soul to think that these things must be. But the reason of thy coming hither to speak with me is partly told, the rest will I now mention. Since it is the pleasure of the rulers of the land to banish me, and well I know ’twere best for me to stand not in the way of thee or of the rulers by dwelling here, enemy as I am thought unto their house, forth from this land in exile am I going, but these children,—that they may know thy fostering hand, beg Creon to remit their banishment

JASON: I doubt whether I can persuade him, yet must I attempt it.

MEDEA: At least do thou bid thy wife ask her sire this boon, to remit the exile of the children from this land.

JASON: Yea, that will I; and her methinks I shall persuade, since she is a woman like the rest.

MEDEA: I too will aid thee in this task, for by the children’s hand I will send to her gifts that far surpass in beauty, I well know, aught that now is seen ’mongst men, a robe of finest tissue and a chaplet of chased gold. But one of my attendants must haste and bring the ornaments hither. Happy shall she be not once alone but ten thousandfold, for in thee she wins the noblest soul to share her love, and gets these gifts as well which on a day my father’s sire, the Sun-god, bestowed on his descendants. My children, take in your hands these wedding gifts, and bear them as an offering to the royal maid, the happy bride; for verily the gifts she shall receive are not to be scorned.

JASON: But why so rashly rob thyself of these gifts? Dost think a royal palace wants for robes or gold? Keep them, nor give them to another. For well I know that if my lady hold me in esteem, she will set my price above all wealth.

MEDEA: Say not so; ’tis said that gifts tempt even gods; and o’er men’s minds gold holds more potent sway than countless words. Fortune smiles upon thy bride, and heaven now doth swell her triumph; youth is hers and princely power; yet to save my children from exile I would barter life, not dross alone. Children, when ye are come to the rich palace, pray your father’s new bride, my mistress, with suppliant voice to save you from exile, offering her these ornaments the while; for it is most needful that she receive the gifts in her own hand. Now go and linger not; may ye succeed and to your mother bring back the glad tidings she fain would hear!

CHORUS: Gone, gone is every hope I had that the children yet might live; forth to their doom they now proceed. The hapless bride will take, ay, take the golden crown that is to be her ruin; with her own hand will she lift and place upon her golden locks the garniture of death.

CHORUS: Its grace and sheen divine will tempt her to put on the robe and crown of gold, and in that act will she deck herself to be a bride amid the dead. Such is the snare whereinto she will fall, such is the deadly doom that waits the hapless maid, nor shall she from the curse escape.

CHORUS: And thou, poor wretch, who to thy sorrow art wedding a king’s daughter, little thinkest of the doom thou art bringing on thy children’s life, or of the cruel death that waits thy bride. Woe is thee! how art thou fallen from thy high estate!

CHORUS: Next do I bewail thy sorrows, O mother hapless in thy children, thou who wilt slay thy babes because thou hast a rival, the babes thy husband hath deserted impiously to join him to another bride.

ATTENDANT: Thy children, lady, are from exile freed, and gladly did the royal bride accept thy gifts in her own hands, and so thy children made their peace with her.

MEDEA: Ah!

ATTENDANT: Why art so disquieted in thy prosperous hour? Why turnest thou thy cheek away, and hast no welcome for my glad news?

MEDEA: Ah me!

ATTENDANT: These groans but ill accord with the news I bring.

MEDEA: Ah me! once more I say.

ATTENDANT: Have I unwittingly announced some evil tidings? Have I erred in thinking my news was good?

MEDEA: Thy news is as it is; I blame thee not.

Part 10

ATTENDANT: Then why this downcast eye, these floods of tears?

MEDEA: Old friend, needs must I weep; for the gods and I with fell intent devised these schemes.

ATTENDANT: Be of good cheer; thou too of a surety shalt by thy sons yet be brought home again.

MEDEA: Ere that shall I bring others to their home, ah! woe is me!

ATTENDANT: Thou art not the only mother from thy children reft. Bear patiently thy troubles as a mortal must.

MEDEA: I will obey; go thou within the house and make the day’s provision for the children. O my babes, my babes, ye have still a city and a home, where far from me and my sad lot you will live your lives, reft of your mother for ever; while I must to another land in banishment, or ever I have had my joy of you, or lived to see you happy, or ever I have graced your marriage couch, your bride, your bridal bower, or lifted high the wedding torch. Ah me! a victim of my own self-will. So it was all in vain I reared you, O my sons; in vain did suffer, racked with anguish, enduring the cruel pangs of childbirth. ’Fore Heaven I once had hope, poor me! high hope of ye that you would nurse me in my age and deck my corpse with loving hands, a boon we mortals covet; but now is my sweet fancy dead and gone; for I must lose you both and in bitterness and sorrow drag through life. And ye shall never with fond eyes see your mother more, for o’er your life there comes a change. Ah me! ah me! why do ye look at me so, my children? why smile that last sweet smile? Ah me! what am I to do? My heart gives way when I behold my children’s laughing eyes. Ο, I cannot; farewell to all my former schemes; I will take the children from the land, the babes I bore. Why should I wound their sire by wounding them, and get me a twofold measure of sorrow? No, no, I will not do it. Farewell my scheming! And yet what am I coming to? Can I consent to let those foes of mine escape from punishment, and incur their mockery? I must face this deed. Out upon my craven heart! to think that I should even have let the soft words escape my soul. Into the house, children! and whoso feels he must not be present at my sacrifice, must see to it himself; I will not spoil my handiwork. Ah! ah! do not, my heart, O do not do this deed! Let the children go, unhappy one, spare the babes! For if they live, they will cheer thee in our exile there. Nay, by the fiends of hell’s abyss, never, never will I hand my children over to their foes to mock and flout. Die they must in any case, and since ’tis so, why I, the mother who bore them, will give the fatal blow. In any case their doom is fixed and there is no escape. Already the crown is on her head, the robe is round her, and she is dying, the royal bride; that do I know full well. But now since I have a piteous path to tread, and yet more piteous still the path I send my children on, fain would I say farewell to them. O my babes, my babes, let your mother kiss your hands. Ah! hands I love so well, O lips most dear to me! O noble form and features of my children, I wish ye joy, but in that other land, for here your father robs you of your home. O the sweet embrace, the soft young cheek, the fragrant breath! my children! Go, leave me; I cannot bear to longer look upon ye; my sorrow wins the day. At last I understand the awful deed I am to do; but passion, that cause of direst woes to mortal man, hath triumphed o’er my sober thoughts.

CHORUS: Oft ere now have I pursued subtler themes and have faced graver issues than woman’s sex should seek to probe; but then e’en we aspire to culture, which dwells with us to teach us wisdom; I say not all; for small is the class amongst women—(one maybe shalt thou find ’mid many)— that is not incapable of culture. And amongst mortals I do assert that they who are wholly without experience and have never had children far surpass in happiness those who are parents. The childless, because they have never proved whether children grow up to be a blessing or curse to men are removed from all share in many troubles; whilst those who have a sweet race of children growing up in their houses do wear away, as I perceive, their whole life through; first with the thought how they may train them up in virtue, next how they shall leave their sons the means to live; and after all this ’tis far from clear whether on good or bad children they bestow their toil. But one last crowning woe for every mortal man I now will name; suppose that they have found sufficient means to live, and seen their children grow to man’s estate and walk in virtue’s path, still if fortune so befall, comes Death and bears the children’s bodies off to Hades. Can it be any profit to the gods to heap upon us mortal men beside our other woes this further grief for children lost, a grief surpassing all?

MEDEA: Kind friends, long have I waited expectantly to know how things would at the palace chance. And lo! I see one of Jason’s servants coming hither, whose hurried gasps for breath proclaim him the bearer of some fresh tidings.

MESSENGER: Fly, fly, Medea! who hast wrought an awful deed, transgressing every law; nor leave behind or sea-borne bark or car that scours the plain.

MEDEA: Why, what hath chanced that calls for such a flight of mine?

MESSENGER: The princess is dead, a moment gone, and Creon too, her sire, slain by those drugs of thine.

MEDEA: Tidings most fair are thine! Henceforth shalt thou be ranked amongst my friends and benefactors.

MESSENGER: Ha! What? Art sane? Art not distraught, lady, who hearest with joy the outrage to our royal house done, and art not at the horrid tale afraid?

MEDEA: Somewhat have I, too, to say in answer to thy words. Be not so hasty, friend, but tell the manner of their death, for thou wouldst give me double joy, if so they perished miserably.

MESSENGER: When the children twain whom thou didst bear came with their father and entered the palace of the bride, right glad were we thralls who had shared thy griefs, for instantly from ear to ear a rumour spread that thou and thy lord had made up your former quarrel. One kissed thy children’s hands, another their golden hair, while I for very joy went with them in person to the women’s chambers. Our mistress, whom now we do revere in thy room, cast a longing glance at Jason, ere she saw thy children twain; but then she veiled her eyes and turned her blanching cheek away, disgusted at their coming; but thy husband tried to check his young bride’s angry humour with these words: O, be not angered ’gainst thy friends; cease from wrath and turn once more thy face this way, counting as friends whomso thy husband counts, and accept these gifts, and for my sake crave thy sire to remit these children’s exile. Soon as she saw the ornaments, no longer she held out, but yielded to her lord in all; and ere the father and his sons were far from the palace gone, she took the broidered robe and put it on, and set the golden crown about her tresses, arranging her hair at her bright mirror, with many a happy smile at her breathless counterfeit. Then rising from her seat she passed across the chamber, tripping lightly on her fair white foot, exulting in the gift, with many a glance at her uplifted ankle. When lo! a scene of awful horror did ensue. In a moment she turned pale, reeled backwards, trembling in every limb, and sinks upon a seat scarce soon enough to save herself from falling to the ground. An aged dame, one of her company, thinking belike it was a fit from Pan or some god sent, raised a cry of prayer, till from her mouth she saw the foam-flakes issue, her eyeballs rolling in their sockets, and all the blood her face desert; then did she raise a loud scream far different fiom her former cry. Forthwith one handmaid rushed to her father’s house, another to her new bridegroom to tell his bride’s sad fate, and the whole house echoed with their running to and fro. By this time would a quick walker have made the turn in a course of six plethra and reached the goal, when she with one awful shriek awoke, poor sufferer, from her speechless trance and oped her closed eyes, for against her a twofold anguish was warring. The chaplet of gold about her head was sending forth a wondrous stream of ravening flame, while the fine raiment, thy children’s gift, was preying on the hapless maiden’s fair white flesh; and she starts from her seat in a blaze and seeks to fly, shaking her hair and head this way and that, to cast the crown therefrom; but the gold held firm to its fastenings, and the flame, as she shook her locks, blazed forth the more with double fury. Then to the earth she sinks, by the cruel blow o’ercome, past all recognition now save to a father’s eye; for her eyes had lost their tranquil gaze, her face no more its natural look preserved, and from the crown of her head blood and fire in mingled stream ran down; and from her bones the flesh kept peeling off beneath the gnawing of those secret drugs, e’en as when the pine-tree weeps its tears of pitch, a fearsome sight to see. And all were afraid to touch the corpse, for we were warned by what had chanced. Anon came her hapless father unto the house, all unwitting of her doom, and stumbles o’er the dead, and loud he cried, and folding his arms about her kissed her, with words like these the while, O my poor, poor child, which of the gods hath destroyed thee thus foully? Who is robbing me of thee, old as I am and ripe for death? O my child, alas! would I could die with thee! He ceased his sad lament, and would have raised his aged frame, but found himself held fast by the finespun robe as ivy that clings to the branches of the bay, and then ensued a fearful struggle. He strove to rise, but she still held him back; and if ever he pulled with all his might, from off his bones his aged flesh he tore. At last he gave it up, and breathed forth his soul in awful suffering; for he could no longer master the pain. So there they lie, daughter and aged sire, dead side by side, a grievous sight that calls for tears. And as for thee, I leave thee out of my consideration, for thyself must discover a means to escape punishment. Not now for the first time I think this human life a shadow; yea, and without shrinking I will say that they amongst men who pretend to wisdom and expend deep thought on words do incur a serious charge of folly; for amongst mortals no man is happy; wealth may pour in and make one luckier than another, but none can happy be.

CHORUS: This day the deity, it seems, will mass on Jason, as he well deserves, a heavy load of evils. Woe is thee, daughter of Creon! We pity thy sad fate, gone as thou art to Hades’ halls as the price of thy marriage with Jason.

MEDEA: My friends, I am resolved upon the deed; at once will I slay my children and then leave this land, without delaying long enough to hand them over to some more savage hand to butcher. Needs must they die in any case; and since they must, I will slay them—I, the mother that bare them. O heart of mine, steel thyself! Why do I hesitate to do the awful deed that must be done? Come, take the sword, thou wretched hand of mine! Take it, and advance to the post whence starts thy life of sorrow! Away with cowardice! Give not one thought to thy babes, how dear they are or how thou art their mother This one brief day forget thy children dear, and after that lament; for though thou wilt slay them yet they were thy darlings still, and am a lady of sorrows.

CHORUS: O earth, O sun whose beam illumines all, look, look upon this lost woman, ere she stretch forth, her murderous hand upon her sons for blood; for lo! these are scions of thy own golden seed, and the blood of gods is in danger of being shed by man. O light, from Zeus proceeding, stay her, hold her hand, forth from the house chase this fell bloody fiend by demons led.

CHORUS: Vainly wasted were the throes thy children cost thee; vainly hast thou born, it seems, sweet babes, O thou who hast left behind thee that passage through the blue Symplegades, that strangers justly hate. Ah! hapless one, why doth fierce anger thy soul assail? Why in its place is fell murder growing up? For grievous unto mortal men are pollutions that come of kindred blood poured on the earth, woes to suit each crime hurled from heaven on the murderer’s house.

SONS: Ah!

Part 11

CHORUS: Didst hear, didst hear the children’s cry? O lady, born to sorrow, victim of an evil fate!

1ST SON: (within). Ah, me; what can I do? Whither fly to escape my mother’s blows?

2ND SON: (within). I know not, sweet brother mine; we are undone.

CHORUS: Shall I enter the house? For the children’s sake I am resolved to ward off the murder.

1ST SON: (within). Yea, by heaven I adjure you; help, your aid is needed.

2ND SON: (within). Even now the toils of the sword are closing round us.

CHORUS: O hapless mother, surely thou hast a heart of stone or steel to slay the offspring of thy womb by such a murderous doom.

CHORUS: Of all the wives of yore I know but one who laid her hand upon her children dear, even Ino, whom the gods did madden in the day that the wife of Zeus drove her wandering from her home. But she, poor sufferer, flung herself into the sea because of the foul murder of her children, leaping o’er the wave-beat cliff, and in her death was she united to her children twain. Can there be any deed of horror left to follow this? Woe for the wooing of women fraught with disaster! What sorrows hast thou caused for men ere now!

JASON: Ladies, stationed near this house, pray tell me is the author of these hideous deeds, Medea, still within, or hath she fled from hence? For she must hide beneath the earth or soar on wings towards heaven’s vault, if she would avoid the vengeance of the royal house. Is she so sure she will escape herself unpunished from this house, when she hath slain the rulers of the land? But enough of this! I am forgetting her children. As for her, those whom she hath wronged will do the like by her; but I am come to save the children’s life, lest the victim’s kin visit their wrath on me, in vengeance for the murder foul, wrought by my children’s mother.

CHORUS: Unhappy man, thou knowest not the full extent of thy misery, else had thou never said those words.

JASON: How now? Can she want to kill me too?

CHORUS: Thy sons are dead; slain by their own mother’s hand.

JASON: O God! what sayest thou? Woman, thou hast sealed my doom.

CHORUS: Thy children are no more; be sure of this.

JASON: Where slew she them; within the palace or outside?

CHORUS: Throw wide the doors and see thy children’s murdered corpses.

JASON: Haste, ye slaves, loose the bolts, undo the fastenings, that I may see the sight of twofold woe, my murdered sons and her, whose blood in vengeance I will shed. [Medea in mid air, on a chariot drawn by dragons; the children’s corpses by her.

MEDEA: Why shake those doors and attempt to loose their bolts, in quest of the dead and me their murderess? From such toil desist. If thou wouldst aught with me, say on, if so thou wilt; but never shalt thou lay hand on me, so swift the steeds the sun, my father’s sire, to me doth give to save me from the hand of my foes.

JASON: Accursed woman! by gods, by me and all mankind abhorred as never woman was, who hadst the heart to stab thy babes, thou their mother, leaving me undone and childless; this hast thou done and still dost gaze upon the sun and earth after this deed most impious. Curses on thee! I now perceive what then I missed in the day I brought thee, fraught with doom, from thy home in a barbarian land to dwell in Hellas, traitress to thy sire and to the land that nurtured thee. On me the gods have hurled the curse that dogged thy steps, for thou didst slay thy brother at his hearth ere thou cam’st aboard our fair ship Argo. Such was the outset of thy life of crime; then didst thou wed with me, and having born me sons to glut thy passion’s lust, thou now hast slain them. Not one amongst the wives of Hellas e’er had dared this deed; yet before them all I chose thee for my wife, wedding a foe to be my doom, no woman, but a lioness fiercer than Tyrrhene Scylla in nature. But with reproaches heaped a thousandfold I cannot wound thee, so brazen is thy nature. Perish, vile sorceress, murderess of thy babes! Whilst I must mourn my luckless fate, for I shall ne’er enjoy my new-found bride, nor shall I have the children, whom I bred and reared, alive to say the last farewell to me; nay, I have lost them.

MEDEA: To this thy speech I could have made a long retort, but Father Zeus knows well all I have done for thee, and the treatment thou hast given me. Yet thou wert not ordained to scorn my love and lead a life of joy in mockery of me, nor was thy royal bride nor Creon, who gave thee a second wife, to thrust me from this land and rue it not. Wherefore, if thou wilt, call me e’en a lioness, and Scylla, whose home is in the Tyrrhene land; for I in turn have wrung thy heart, as well I might.

Part 12

JASON: Thou, too, art grieved thyself, and sharest in my sorrow.

MEDEA: Be well assured I am; but it relieves my pain to know thou canst not mock at me.

JASON: O my children, how vile a mother ye have found!

MEDEA: My sons, your father’s feeble lust has been your ruin!

JASON: ’Twas not my hand, at any rate, that slew them.

MEDEA: No, but thy foul treatment of me, and thy new marriage.

JASON: Didst think that marriage cause enough to murder them?

MEDEA: Dost think a woman counts this a trifling injury?

JASON: So she be self-restrained; but in thy eyes all is evil.

MEDEA: Thy sons are dead and gone. That will stab thy heart.

JASON: They live, methinks, to bring a curse upon thy head.

MEDEA: The gods know, whoso of them began this troublous coil.

JASON: Indeed, they know that hateful heart of thine.

MEDEA: Thou art as hateful. I am aweary of thy bitter tongue.

JASON: And I likewise of thine. But parting is easy.

MEDEA: Say how; what am I to do? for I am fain as thou to go.

JASON: Give up to me those dead, to bury and lament

MEDEA: No, never! I will bury them myself, bearing them to Hera’s sacred field, who watches o’er the Cape, that none of their foes may insult them by pulling down their tombs; and in this land of Sisyphus I will ordain hereafter a solemn feast and mystic rites to atone for this impious murder. Myself will now to the land of Erechtheus, to dwell with Aegeus, Pandion’s son. But thou, as well thou mayest, shalt die a caitiff’s death, thy head crushed ’neath a shattered relic of Argo, when thou hast seen the bitter ending of my marriage.

JASON: The curse of our sons’ avenging spirit and of Justice, that calls for blood, be on thee!

MEDEA: What god or power divine hears thee, breaker of oaths and every law of hospitality?

Part 13

JASON: Fie upon thee! cursed witch! child-murderess!

MEDEA: To thy house! go, bury thy wife.

JASON: I go, bereft of both my sons.

MEDEA: Thy grief is yet to come; wait till old age is with thee too.

JASON: O my dear, dear children!

MEDEA: Dear to their mother, not to thee.

JASON: And yet thou didst slay them?

MEDEA: Yea, to vex thy heart.

JASON: One last fond kiss, ah me! I fain would on their lips imprint.

MEDEA: Embraces now, and fond farewells for them; but then a cold repulse!

JASON: By heaven I do adjure thee, let me touch their tender skin.

MEDEA: No, no! in vain this word has sped its flight.

JASON: O Zeus, dost hear how I am driven hence; dost mark the treatment I receive from this she-lion, fell murderess of her young? Yet so far as I may and can, I raise for them a dirge, and do adjure the gods to witness how thou hast slain my sons, and wilt not suffer me to embrace or bury their dead bodies. Would I had never begotten them to see thee slay them after all!

CHORUS: Many a fate doth Zeus dispense, high on his Olympian throne; oft do the gods bring things to pass beyond man’s expectation; that, which we thought would be, is not fulfilled, while for the unlooked-for god finds out a way; and such hath been the issue of this matter.

Contents — 16 sections

1. Part 1
2. Part 2
3. Part 3
4. Part 4
5. Part 5
6. Part 6
7. Part 7
8. Part 8
9. Part 9
10. Part 10
11. Part 11
12. Part 12
13. Part 13
14. Part 14
15. Part 15
16. Part 16

Part 1

APHRODITE: Wide o’er man my realm extends, and proud the name that I, the goddess Cypris, bear, both in heaven’s courts and ’mongst all those who dwell within the limits of the sea and the bounds of Atlas, beholding the sun-god’s light; those that respect my power I advance to honour, but bring to ruin all who vaunt themselves at me. For even in the race of gods this feeling finds a home, even pleasure at the honour men pay them. And the truth of this I soon will show; for that son of Theseus, born of the Amazon, Hippolytus, whom holy Pittheus taught, alone of all the dwellers in this land of Troezen, calls me vilest of the deities. Love he scorns, and, as for marriage, will none of it; but Artemis, daughter of Zeus, sister of Phoebus, he doth honour, counting her the chief of goddesses, and ever through the greenwood, attendant on his virgin goddess, he dears the earth of wild beasts with his fleet hounds, enjoying the comradeship of one too high for mortal ken. ’Tis not this I grudge him, no! why should I? But for his sins against me, I will this very day take vengeance on Hippolytus; for long ago I cleared the ground of many obstacles, so it needs but trifling toil. For as he came one day from the home of Pittheus to witness the solemn mystic rites and be initiated therein in Pandion’s land, Phaedra, his father’s noble wife, caught sight of him, and by my designs she found her heart was seized with wild desire. And ere she came to this Troezenian realm, a temple did she rear to Cypris hard by the rock of Pallas where it o’erlooks this country, for love of the youth in another land; and to win his love in days to come she called after his name the temple she had founded for the goddess. Now, when Theseus left the land of Cecrops, flying the pollution of the blood of Pallas’ sons, and with his wife sailed to this shore, content to suffer exile for a year, then began the wretched wife to pine away in silence, moaning ’neath love’s cruel scourge, and none of her servants knows what ails her. But this passion of hers must not fail thus. No, I will discover the matter to Theseus, and all shall be laid bare. Then will the father slay his child, my bitter foe, by curses, for the lord Poseidon granted this boon to Theseus; three wishes of the god to ask, nor ever ask in vain. So Phaedra is to die, an honoured death ’tis true, but still to die; for I will not let her suffering outweigh the payment of such forfeit by my foes as shall satisfy my honour. But lo! I see the son of Theseus coming hither—Hippolytus, fresh from the labours of the chase. I will get me hence. At his back follows a long train of retainers, in joyous cries of revelry uniting and hymns of praise to Artemis, his goddess; for little he recks that Death hath oped his gates for him, and that this is his last look upon the light.

HIPPOLYTUS: Come follow, friends, singing to Artemis, daughter of Zeus, throned in the sky, whose votaries we are.

ATTENDANTS OF HIPPOLYTUS: Lady goddess, awful queen, daughter of Zeus, all hail! hail! child of Latona and of Zeus, peerless mid the virgin choir, who hast thy dwelling in heaven’s wide mansions at thy noble father’s court, in the golden house of Zeus. All hail! most beauteous Artemis, lovelier far than all the daughters of Olympus!

HIPPOLYTUS: For thee, O mistress mine, I bring this woven wreath, culled from a virgin meadow, where nor shepherd dares to herd his flock nor ever scythe hath mown, but o’er the mead unshorn the bee doth wing its way in spring; and with the dew from rivers drawn purity that garden tends. Such as know no cunning lore, yet in whose nature self-control, made perfect, hath a home, these may pluck the flowers, but not the wicked world. Accept, I pray, dear mistress, mine this chaplet from my holy hand to crown thy locks of gold; for I, and none other of mortals, have this high guerdon, to be with thee, with thee converse, hearing thy voice, though not thy face beholding. So be it mine to end my life as I began.

ATTENDANTS: My prince! we needs must call upon the gods, our lords, so wilt thou listen to a friendly word from me?

HIPPOLYTUS: Why, that will I! else were I proved a fool.

ATTENDANTS: Dost know, then, the way of the world?

HIPPOLYTUS: Not I; but wherefore such a question?

ATTENDANTS: It hates reserve which careth not for all men’s love.

HIPPOLYTUS: And rightly too; reserve in man is ever galling.

ATTENDANTS: But there’s a charm in courteous affability?

HIPPOLYTUS: The greatest surely; aye, and profit, too, at trifling cost.

ATTENDANTS: Dost think the same law holds in heaven as well?

HIPPOLYTUS: I trow it doth, since all our laws we men from heaven draw.

ATTENDANTS: Why, then, dost thou neglect to greet an august goddess?

HIPPOLYTUS: Whom speak’st thou of? Keep watch upon thy tongue lest it some mischief cause.

ATTENDANTS: Cypris I mean, whose image is stationed o’er thy gate.

HIPPOLYTUS: I greet her from afar, preserving still my chastity.

ATT: Yet is she an august goddess, far renowned on earth.

HIPPOLYTUS: ’Mongst gods as well as men we have our several preferences.

Part 2

ATTENDANTS: I wish thee luck, and wisdom too, so far as thou dost need it.

HIPPOLYTUS: No god, whose worship craves the night, hath charms for me.

ATTENDANTS: My son, we should avail us of the gifts that gods confer.

HIPPOLYTUS: Go in, my faithful followers, and make ready food within the house; a well-filled board hath charms after the chase is o’er. Rub down my steeds ye must, that when I have had my all I may yoke them to the chariot and give them proper exercise. As for thy Queen of Love, a long farewell to her.

ATTENDANTS: Meantime I with sober mind, for I must not copy my young master, do offer up my prayer to thy image, lady Cypris, in such words as it becomes a slave to use. But thou should’st pardon all, who, in youth’s impetuous heat, speak idle words of thee; make as though thou hearest not, for gods must needs be wiser than the sons of men.

CHORUS: A rock there is, where, as they say, the ocean dew distils, and from its beetling brow it pours a copious stream for pitchers to be dipped therein; ’twas here I had a friend washing robes of purple in the trickling stream, and she was spreading them out on the face of a warm sunny rock; from her I had the tidings, first of all, that my mistress

CHORUS: she was wasting on the bed of sickness, pent within her house, a thin veil o’ershadowing her head of golden hair. And this is the third day I hear that she hath closed her lovely lips and denied her chaste body all sustenance, eager to hide her suffering and reach death’s cheerless bourn.

CHORUS: Maiden, thou must be possessed, by Pan made frantic or by Hecate, or by the Corybantes dread, and Cybele the mountain mother. Or maybe thou hast sinned against Dictynna, huntress-queen, and art wasting for thy guilt in sacrifice unoffered. For she doth range o’er lakes’ expanse and past the bounds of earth upon the ocean’s tossing billows.

CHORUS: Or doth some rival in thy house beguile thy lord, the captain of Erechtheus’ sons, that hero nobly bom, to secret amours hid from thee? Or hath some mariner sailing hither from Crete reached this port that sailors love, with evil tidings for our queen, and she with sorrow for her grievous fate is to her bed confined?

CHORUS: Yea, and oft o’er woman’s wayward nature settles a feeling of miserable perplexity, arising from labour-pains or passionate desire. I, too, have felt at times this sharp thrill shoot through me, but I would cry to Artemis, queen of archery, who comes from heaven to aid us in our travail, and thanks to heaven’s grace she ever comes at my call with welcome help.

CHORUS: Look! where the aged nurse is bringing her forth from the house before the door, while on her brow the cloud of gloom is deepening. My soul longs to learn what is her grief, the canker that is wasting our queen’s fading charms.

NURSE: O, the ills of mortal men! the cruel diseases they endure! What can I do for thee? from what refrain? Here is the bright sun-light, here the azure sky; lo! we have brought thee on thy bed of sickness without the palace; for all thy talk was of coming hither, but soon back to thy chamber wilt thou hurry. Disappointment follows fast with thee, thou hast no joy in aught for long; the present has no power to please; on something absent next thy heart is set. Better be sick than tend the sick; the first is but a single ill, the last unites mental grief with manual toil. Man’s whole life is full of anguish; no respite from his woes he finds; but if there is aught to love beyond this life, night’s dark pall doth wrap it round. And so we show our mad love of this life because its light is shed on earth, and because we know no other, and have naught revealed to us of all our earth may hide; and trusting to fables we drift at random.

PHAEDRA: Lift my body, raise my head! My limbs are all unstrung, kind friends. O handmaids, lift my arms, my shapely arms. The tire on my head is too heavy for me to wear; away with it, and let my tresses o’er my shoulders fall.

NURSE: Be of good heart, dear child; toss not so wildly to and fro. Lie still, be brave, so wilt thou find thy sickness easier to bear; suffering for mortals is nature’s iron law.

PHAEDRA: Ah! would I could draw a draught of water pure from some dew-fed spring, and lay me down to rest in the grassy meadow ’neath the poplar’s shade!

NURSE: My child, what wild speech is this? O say not such things in public, wild whirling words of frenzy bred!

PHAEDRA: Away to the mountain take me! to the wood, to the pine-trees I will go, where hounds pursue the prey, hard on the scent of dappled fawns. Ye gods! what joy to hark them on, to grasp the barbed dart, to poise Thessalian hunting-spears close to my golden hair, then let them fly.

NURSE: Why, why, my child, these anxious cares? What hast thou to do with the chase? Why so eager for the flowing spring, when hard by these towers stands a hill well watered, whence thou may’st freely draw?

PHAEDRA: O Artemis, who watchest o’er sea-beat Limna and the race-course thundering to the horse’s hoofs, would I were upon thy plains curbing Venetian steeds!

NURSE: Why betray thy frenzy in these wild whirling words? Now thou wert for hasting hence to the hills away to hunt wild beasts, and now thy yearning is to drive the steed over the waveless sands. This needs a cunning seer to say what god it is that reins thee from the course, distracting thy senses, child.

Part 3

PHAEDRA: Ah me! alas! what have I done? Whither have I strayed, my senses leaving? Mad, mad! stricken by some demon’s curse! Woe is me! Cover my head again, nurse. Shame fills me for the words I have spoken. Hide me then; from my eyes the tear-drops stream, and for very shame I turn them away. Tis painful coming to one’s senses again, and madness, evil though it be, has this advantage, that one has no knowledge of reason’s overthrow.

NURSE: There then I cover thee; but when will death hide my body in the grave? Many a lesson length of days is teaching me. Yea, mortal men should pledge themselves to moderate friendships only, not to such as reach the very heart’s core; affection’s ties should be light upon them to let them slip or draw them tight. For one poor heart to grieve for twain, as I do for my mistress, is a burden sore to bear. Men say that too engrossing pursuits in life more oft cause disappointment than pleasure, and too oft are foes to health. Wherefore I do not praise excess so much as moderation, and with me wise men will agree.

CHORUS: O aged dame, faithful nurse of Phaedra, our queen, we see her sorry plight; but what it is that ails her we cannot discern, so fain would learn of thee and hear thy opinion.

NURSE: I question her, but am no wiser, for she will not answer.

CHORUS: Nor tell what source these sorrows have?

NURSE: The same answer thou must take, for she is dumb on every point.

CHORUS: How weak and wasted is her body!

NURSE: What marvel? ’tis three days now since she has tasted food.

CHORUS: Is this infatuation, or an attempt to die?

NURSE: ’Tis death she courts; such fasting aims at ending life.

CHORUS: A strange story! is her husband satisfied?

NURSE: She hides from him her sorrow, and vows she is not ill.

CHORUS: Can he not guess it from her face?

NURSE: He is not now in his own country.

CHORUS: But dost not thou insist in thy endeavour to find out her complaint, her crazy mind?

NURSE: I have tried every plan, and all in vain; yet not even now will I relax my zeal, that thou too, if thou stayest, mayst witness my devotion to my unhappy mistress. Come, come, my darling child, let us forget, the twain of us, our former words; be thou more mild, smoothing that sullen brow and changing the current of thy thought, and I, if in aught before I failed in humouring thee, will let that be and find some better course. If thou art sick with ills thou canst not name, there be women here to help to set thee right; but if thy trouble can to men’s ears be divulged, speak, that physicians may pronounce on it. Come, then, why so dumb? Thou shouldst not so remain, my child, but scold me if I speak amiss, or, if I give good counsel, yield assent. One word, one look this way! Ah me! Friends, we waste our toil to no purpose; we are as far away as ever; she would not relent to my arguments then, nor is she yielding now. Well, grow more stubborn than the sea, yet be assured of this, that if thou diest thou art a traitress to thy children, for they will ne’er inherit their father’s halls, nay, by that knightly queen the Amazon who bore a son to lord it over thine, a bastard born but not a bastard bred, whom well thou knowest, e’en Hippolytus.

PHAEDRA: Oh! oh!

NURSE: Ha! doth that touch the quick?

PHAEDRA: Thou hast undone me, nurse; I do adjure by the gods, mention that man no more.

NURSE: There now! thou art thyself again, but e’en yet refusest to aid thy children and preserve thy life.

Part 4

PHAEDRA: My babes I love, but there is another storm that buffets me.

NURSE: Daughter, are thy hands from bloodshed pure?

PHAEDRA: My hands are pure, but on my soul there rests a stain.

NURSE: The issue of some enemy’s secret witchery?

PHAEDRA: A friend is my destroyer, one unwilling as myself.

NURSE: Hath Theseus wronged thee in any wise?

PHAEDRA: Never may I prove untrue to him

NURSE: Then what strange mystery is there that drives thee on to die?

PHAEDRA: O, let my sin and me alone! ’tis not ’gainst thee I sin.

NURSE: Never willingly! and, if I fail, ’twill rest at thy door.

PHAEDRA: How now? thou usest force in clinging to my hand.

NURSE: Yea, and I will never loose my hold upon thy knees.

PHAEDRA: Alas for thee! my sorrows, shouldst thou learn them, would recoil on thee.

NURSE: What keener grief for me than failing to win thee?

PHAEDRA: ’Twill be death to thee; though to me that brings renown.

NURSE: And dost thou then conceal this boon despite my prayers?

PHAEDRA: I do, for ’tis out of shame I am planning an honourable escape.

NURSE: Tell it, and thine honour shall the brighter shine.

PHAEDRA: Away, I do conjure thee; loose my hand.

NURSE: I will not, for the boon thou shouldst have granted me is denied.

Part 5

PHAEDRA: I will grant it out of reverence for thy holy sup- pliant touch.

NURSE: Henceforth I hold my peace; ’tis thine to speak from now.

PHAEDRA: Ah! hapless mother, what a love was thine!

NURSE: Her love for the bull? daughter, or what meanest thou?

PHAEDRA: And woe to thee! my sister, bride of Dionysus.

NURSE: What ails thee, child? speaking ill of kith and kin.

PHAEDRA: Myself the third to suffer! how am I undone!

NURSE: Thou strik’st me dumb! Where will this history end?

PHAEDRA: That love has been our curse from time long past.

NURSE: I know no more of what I fain would learn.

PHAEDRA: Ah! would thou couldst say for me what I have to tell.

NURSE: I am no prophetess to unriddle secrets.

PHAEDRA: What is it they mean when they talk of people being in love?

NURSE: At once the sweetest and the bitterest thing, my child.

PHAEDRA: I shall only find the latter half.

NURSE: Ha! my child, art thou in love?

PHAEDRA: The Amazon’s son, whoever he may be,—

NURSE: Mean’st thou Hippolytus?

PHAEDRA: ’Twas thou, not I, that spoke his name.

NURSE: O heavens! what is this, my child? Thou hast ruined me. Outrageous! friends; I will not live and bear it; hateful is life, hateful to mine eyes the light. This body I resign, will cast it off, and rid me of existence by my death. Farewell, my life is o’er. Yea, for the chaste have wicked passions, ’gainst their will maybe, but still they have. Cypris, it seems, is not a goddess after all, but something greater far, for she hath been the ruin of my lady and of me and our whole family.

Part 6

CHORUS: O, too clearly didst thou hear our queen uplift her voice to tell her startling tale of piteous suffering. Come death ere I reach thy state of feeling, loved mistress. O horrible! woe, for these miseries! woe, for the sorrows on which mortals feed! Thou art undone! thou hast disclosed thy sin to heaven’s light. What hath each passing day and every hour in store for thee? Some strange event will come to pass in this house. For it is no longer uncertain where the star of thy love is setting, thou hapless daughter of Crete.

PHAEDRA: Ladies of Troezen, who dwell here upon the frontier edge of Pelops’ land, oft ere now in heedless mood through the long hours of night have I wondered why man’s life is spoiled; and it seems to me their evil case is not due to any natural fault of judgment, for there be many dowered with sense, but we must view the matter in this light; by teaching and experience we learn the right but neglect it in practice, some from sloth, others from preferring pleasure of some kind or other to duty. Now life has many pleasures, protracted talk, and leisure, that seductive evil; likewise there is shame which is of two kinds, one a noble quality, the other a curse to families; but if for each its proper time were clearly known, these twain could not have had the selfsame letters to denote them. So then since I had made up my mind on these points, ’twas not likely any drug would alter it and make me think the contrary. And I will tell thee too the way my judgment went. When love wounded me, I bethought me how I best might bear the smart. So from that day forth I began to hide in silence what I suffered. For I put no faith in counsellors, who know well to lecture others for presumption, yet themselves have countless troubles of their own. Next I did devise noble endurance of these wanton thoughts, striving by continence for victory. And last when I could not succeed in mastering love hereby, methought it best to die; and none can gainsay my purpose. For fain I would my virtue should to all appear, my shame have few to witness it. I knew my sickly passion now; to yield to it I saw how infamous; and more, I learnt to know so well that I was but a woman, a thing the world detests. Curses, hideous curses on that wife, who first did shame her marriage-vow for lovers other than her lord! ’Twas from noble families this curse began to spread among our sex. For when the noble countenance disgrace, poor folk of course will think that it is right. Those too I hate who make profession of purity, though in secret reckless sinners. How can these, queen Cypris, ocean’s child, e’er look their husbands in the face? do they never feel one guilty thrill that their accomplice, night, or the chambers of their house will find a voice and speak? This it is that calls on me to die, kind friends, that so I may ne’er be found to have disgraced my lord, or the children I have born; no! may they grow up and dwell in glorious Athens, free to speak and act, heirs to such fair fame as a mother can bequeath. For to know that father or mother have sinned doth turn the stoutest heart to slavishness. This alone, men say, can stand the buffets of life’s battle, a just and virtuous soul in whomsoever found. For time unmasks the villain sooner or later, holding up to them a mirror as to some blooming maid. ’Mongst such may I be never seen!

CHORUS: Now look! how fair is chastity however viewed, whose fruit is good repute amongst men.

NURSE: My queen, ’tis true thy tale of woe, but lately told, did for the moment strike me with wild alarm, but now I do reflect upon my foolishness; second thoughts are often best even with men. Thy fate is no uncommon one nor past one’s calculations; thou art stricken by the passion Cypris sends. Thou art in love; what wonder? so are many more. Wilt thou, because thou lov’st, destroy thyself? ’Tis little gain, I trow, for those who love or yet may love their fellows, if death must be their end; for though the Love-Queen’s onset in her might is more than man can bear, yet doth she gently visit yielding hearts, and only when she finds a proud unnatural spirit, doth she take and mock it past belief. Her path is in the sky, and mid the ocean’s surge she rides; from her all nature springs; she sows the seeds of love, inspires the warm desire to which we sons of earth all owe our being. They who have aught to do with books of ancient scribes, or themselves engage in studious pursuits, know how Zeus of Semele was enamoured, how the bright-eyed goddess of the Dawn once stole Cephalus to dwell in heaven for the love she bore him; yet these in heaven abide nor shun the gods’ approach, content, I trow, to yield to their misfortune. Wilt thou refuse to yield? thy sire, it seems, should have begotten thee on special terms or with different gods for masters, if in these laws thou wilt not acquiesce. How many, prithee, men of sterling sense, when they see their wives unfaithful, make as though they saw it not? How many fathers, when their sons have gone astray, assist them in their amours? ’tis part of human wisdom to conceal the deed of shame. Nor should man aim at excessive refinement in his life; for they cannot with exactness finish e’en the roof that covers in a house; and how dost thou, after falling into so deep a pit, think to escape? Nay, if thou hast more of good than bad, thou wilt fare exceeding well, thy human nature considered. O cease, my darling child, from evil thoughts, let wanton pride be gone, for this is naught else, this wish to rival gods in perfectness. Face thy love; ’tis heaven’s will thou shouldst. Sick thou art, yet turn thy sickness to some happy issue. For there are charms and spells to soothe the soul; surely some cure for thy disease will be found. Men, no doubt, might seek it long and late if our women’s minds no scheme devise.

CHORUS: Although she gives thee at thy present need the wiser counsel, Phaedra, yet do I praise thee. Still my praise may sound more harsh and jar more cruelly on thy ear than her advice.

PHAEDRA: ’Tis even this, too plausible a tongue, that overthrows good governments and homes of men. We should not speak to please the ear but point the path that leads to noble fame.

NURSE: What means this solemn speech? No need of rounded phrases; but at once must we sound the prince, telling him frankly how it is with thee. Had not thy life to such a crisis come, or wert thou with self-control endowed, ne’er would I to gratify thy passions have urged thee to this course; but now ’tis a struggle fierce to save thy life, and therefore less to blame.

PHAEDRA: Accursed proposal! peace, woman! never utter those shameful words again!

NURSE: Shameful, maybe, yet for thee better than honour’s code. Better this deed, if it shall save thy life, than that name thy pride will kill thee to retain.

PHAEDRA: I conjure thee, go no further! for thy words are plausible but infamous; for though as yet love has not undermined my soul, yet, if in specious words thou dress thy foul suggestion, I shall be beguiled into the snare from which I am now escaping.

NURSE: If thou art of this mind, ’twere well thou ne’er hadst sinned; but as it is, hear me; for that is the next best course; I in my house have charms to soothe thy love,—’twas but now I thought of them;—these shall cure thee of thy sickness on no disgraceful terms, thy mind unhurt, if thou wilt be but brave.

PHAEDRA: Is thy drug a salve or potion?

NURSE: I cannot tell; be content, my child, to profit by it and ask no questions.

PHAEDRA: I fear me thou wilt prove too wise for me.

NURSE: If thou fear this, confess thyself afraid of all; but why thy terror?

PHAEDRA: Lest thou shouldst breathe a word of this to Theseus’ son.

NURSE: Peace, my child! I will do all things well; only be thou, queen Cypris, ocean’s child, my partner in the work! And for the rest of my purpose, it will be enough for me to tell it to Our friends within the house. [Exit Nurse.

CHORUS: O Love, Love, that from the eyes diffusest soft desire, bringing on the souls of those, whom thou dost camp against, sweet grace, O never in evil mood appear to me, nor out of time and tune approach! Nor fire nor meteor hurls a mightier bolt than Aphrodite’s shaft shot by the hands of Love, the child of Zeus.

CHORUS: Idly, idly by the streams of Alpheus and in the Pythian shrines of Phoebus, Hellas heaps the slaughtered steers; while Love we worship not, Love, the king of men, who holds the key to Aphrodite’s sweetest bower,—worship not him who, when he comes, lays waste and marks his path to mortal hearts by wide-spread woe.

CHORUS: There was that maiden in Oechalia, a girl unwed, that knew no wooer yet nor married joys; her did the queen of Love snatch from her home across the sea and gave unto Alcmena’s son, mid blood and smoke and murderous marriage-hymns, to be to him a frantic fiend of hell; woe! woe for his wooing!

Part 7

CHORUS: Ah! holy walls of Thebes, ah! fount of Dirce, ye could testify what course the love-queen follows. For with the blazing levin-bolt did she cut short the fatal marriage of Semele, mother of Zeus-bom Bacchus. All things she doth inspire, dread goddess, winging her flight hither and thither like a bee.

PHAEDRA: Peace, ladies, peace! I am undone.

CHORUS: What, Phaedra, is this dread event within thy house?

PHAEDRA: Hush! let me hear what those within are saying.

CHORUS: I am silent; this is surely the prelude to mischief.

PHAEDRA: Great gods! how awful are my sufferings!

CHORUS: What a cry was there! what loud alarm! say what sudden terror, lady, doth thy soul dismay.

PHAEDRA: I am undone. Stand here at the door and hear the noise arising in the house.

CHORUS: Thou art already by the bolted door; ’tis for thee to note the sounds that issue from within. And tell me, O tell me what mischief can be on foot.

PHAEDRA: ’Tis the son of the horse-loving Amazon who calls, Hippolytus, uttering foul curses on my servant.

CHORUS: I hear a noise, but cannot clearly tell which way it comes. Ah! ’tis through the door the sound reached thee.

PHAEDRA: Yes, yes, he is calling her plainly enough a go-between in vice, traitress to her master’s honour.

CHORUS: Woe, woe is me! thou art betrayed, dear mistress! What counsel shall I give thee? thy secret is out; thou art utterly undone.

PHAEDRA: Ah me! ah me!

CHORUS: Betrayed by friends!

PHAEDRA: She hath ruined me by speaking of my misfortune; ’twas kindly meant, but an ill way to cure my malady.

CHORUS: O what wilt thou do now in thy cruel dilemma?

PHAEDRA: I only know one way, one cure for these my woes and that is instant death.

HIPPOLYTUS: O mother earth! O sun’s unclouded orb! What words, unfit for any lips, have reached my ears!

NURSE: Peace, my son, lest some one hear thy outcry.

Part 8

HIPPOLYTUS: I cannot hear such awful words and hold my peace.

NURSE: I do implore thee by thy fair right hand.

HIPPOLYTUS: Let go my hand, touch not my robe.

NURSE: O by thy knees I pray, destroy me not utterly.

HIPPOLYTUS: Why say this, if, as thou pretendest, thy lips are free from blame?

NURSE: My son, this is no story to be noised abroad.

HIPPOLYTUS: A virtuous tale grows fairer told to many.

NURSE: Never dishonour thy oath, thy son.

HIPPOLYTUS: My tongue an oath did take, but not my heart.

NURSE: My son, what wilt thou do? destroy thy friends?

HIPPOLYTUS: Friends indeed! the wicked are no friends of mine.

NURSE: O pardon me; to err is only human, child.

HIPPOLYTUS: Great Zeus, why didst thou, to man’s sorrow, put woman, evil counterfeit, to dwell where shines the sun? If thou wert minded that the human race should multiply, it was not from women they should have drawn their stock, but in thy temples they should have paid gold or iron or ponderous bronze and bought a family, each man proportioned to his offering, and so in independence dwelt, from women free. 1 ’Tis clear from this how great a curse a woman is; the very father, that begot and nurtured her, to rid him of the mischief gives her a dower and packs her off; while the husband, who takes the noxious weed into his home, fondly decks his sorry idol in fine raiment and tricks her out in robes, squandering by degrees, unhappy wight! his house’s wealth. For he is in this dilemma; say his marriage has brought him good connections, he is glad then to keep the wife he loathes; or, if he gets a good wife but useless relations, he tries to stifle the bad luck with the good. But it is easiest for him who has settled in his house as wife a mere nobody, incapable from simplicity. I hate a clever woman; never may she set foot in my house who aims at knowing more than women need; for in these clever women Cypris implants a larger store of villainy, while the artless woman is by her shallow wit from levity debarred. No servant should ever have had access to a wife, but men should put to live with them beasts, which bite, not talk, in which case they could not speak to any one nor be answered back by them. But, as it is, the wicked in their chambers plot wickedness, and their servants carry it abroad. Even thus, vile wretch, thou cam’st to make me partner in an outrage on my father’s honour; wherefore I must wash that stain away in running streams, dashing the water into my ears. How could I commit so foul a crime when by the very mention of it I feel myself polluted? Be well assured, woman, ’tis only my religious scruple saves thee. For had not I unawares been caught by an oath, ’fore heaven! I would not have refrained from telling all unto my father. But now I will from the house away, so long as Theseus is abroad, and will maintain strict silence. But, when my father comes, I will return and see how thou and thy mistress face him, and so shall I learn by experience the extent of thy audacity. Perdition seize you both! (To the audience). I can never satisfy my hate for women, no! not even though some say this is ever my theme, for of a truth they always are evil. So either let some one prove them chaste, or let me still trample on them for ever.

PHAEDRA: O the cruel, unhappy fate of women! What arts, what arguments have we, once we have made a slip, to loose by craft the tight-drawn knot? I have met my deserts. O earth, O light of day! How can I escape the stroke of fate? How my pangs conceal, kind friends? What god will appear to help me, what mortal to take my part or help me in unrighteousness? The present calamity of my life admits of no escape. Most hapless I of all my sex!

CHORUS: Alas, alas! the deed is done, thy servant’s schemes have gone awry, my queen, and all is lost.

PHAEDRA: Accursed woman! traitress to thy friends! How hast thou ruined me! May Zeus, my ancestor, smite thee with his fiery bolt and uproot thee from thy place. Did I not foresee thy purpose, did I not bid thee keep silence on the very matter which is now my shame? But thou wouldst not be still; wherefore my fair name will not go with me to the tomb. But now I must another scheme devise. Yon youth, in the keenness of his fury, will tell his father of my sin, and the aged Pittheus of my state, and fill the world with stories to my shame. Perdition seize thee and every meddling fool who by dishonest means would serve unwilling friends!

NURSE: Mistress, thou may’st condemn the mischief I have done, for sorrow’s sting o’ermasters thy judgment; yet can I answer thee in face of this, if thou wilt hear. ’Twas I who nurtured thee; I love thee still; but in my search for medicine to cure thy sickness I found what least I sought. Had I but succeeded, I had been counted wise, for the credit we get for wisdom is measured by our success.

PHAEDRA: Is it just, is it any satisfaction to me, that thou shouldst wound me first, then bandy words with me?

NURSE: We dwell on this too long; I was not wise, I own; but there are yet ways of escape from the trouble, my child.

PHAEDRA: Be dumb henceforth; evil was thy first advice to me, evil too thy attempted scheme. Begone and leave me, look to thyself; I will my own fortunes for the best arrange. (Exit Nurse). Ye noble daughters of Troezen, grant me the only boon I crave; in silence bury what ye here have heard.

Part 9

CHORUS: By majestic Artemis, child of Zeus, I swear I will never divulge aught of thy sorrows.

PHAEDRA: ’Tis well. But I, with all my thought, can but one way discover out of this calamity, that so I may secure my children’s honour, and find myself some help as matters stand. For never, never will I bring shame upon my Cretan home, nor will I, to save one poor life, face Theseus after my disgrace.

CHORUS: Art thou bent then on some cureless woe?

PHAEDRA: On death; the means thereto must I devise myself.

CHORUS: Hush!

PHAEDRA: Do thou at least advise me well. For this very day shall I gladden Cypris, my destroyer, by yielding up my life, and shall own myself vanquished by cruel love. Yet shall my dying be another’s curse, that he may learn not to exult at my misfortunes; but when he comes to share the self-same plague with me, he will take a lesson in wisdom.

CHORUS: O to be nestling ’neath some pathless cavern, there by god’s creating hand to grow into a bird amid the winged tribes! Away would I soar to Adrians wave-beat shore and to the waters of Eridanus; where a father’s hapless daughters in their grief for Phaethon distil into the glooming flood the amber brilliance of their tears.

CHORUS: And to the apple-bearing strand of those minstrels in the west I then would come, where ocean’s lord no more to sailors grants a passage o’er the deep dark main, finding there the heaven’s holy bound, upheld by Atlas, where water from ambrosial founts wells up beside the couch of Zeus inside his halls, and holy earth, the bounteous mother, causes joy to spring in heavenly breasts.

CHORUS: O white-winged bark, that o’er the booming ocean-wave didst bring my royal mistress from her happy home, to crown her queen ’mongst sorrow’s brides! Surely evil omens from either port, at least from Crete, were with that ship, what time to glorious Athens it sped its way, and the crew made fast its twisted cable-ends upon the beach of Munychus, and on the land stept out.

CHORUS: Whence comes it that her heart is crushed, cruelly afflicted by Aphrodite with unholy love; so she by bitter grief o’erwhelmed will tie a noose within her bridal bower to fit it to her fair white neck, too modest for this hateful lot in life, prizing o’er all her name and fame, and striving thus to rid her soul of passion’s sting.

MESSENGER: Help! ho! To the rescue all who near the palace stand! She hath hung herself, our queen, the wife of Theseus.

CHORUS: Woe worth the day! the deed is done; our royal mistress is no more, dead she hangs in the dangling noose.

MESSENGER: Haste! some one bring a two-edged knife wherewith to cut the knot about her neck!

1ST HALF CHORUS: Friends, what shall we do? think you we should enter the house, and loose the queen from the tight-drawn noose?

2ND HALF CHORUS: Why should we? Are there not young servants here? To do too much is not a safe course in life.

MESSENGER: Lay out the hapless corpse, straighten the limbs. This was a bitter way to sit at home and keep my master’s house! [Exit Messenger.

CHORUS: She is dead, poor lady, so I hear. Already are they laying out the corpse.

THESEUS: Ladies, can ye tell me what the uproar in the palace means? There came the sound of servants weeping bitterly to mine ear. None of my household deign to open wide the gates and give me glad welcome as a traveller from prophetic shrines. Hath aught befallen old Pittheus? No. Though he be well advanced in years, yet should I mourn, were he to quit this house.

CHORUS: ’Tis not against the old, Theseus, that fate, to strike thee, aims this blow; prepare thy sorrow for a younger corpse.

THESEUS: Woe is me! is it a child’s life death robs me of?

Part 10

CHORUS: They live; but, cruellest news of all for thee, their mother is no more.

THESEUS: What! my wife dead? By what cruel mischance?

CHORUS: About her neck she tied the hangman’s knot.

THESEUS: Had grief so chilled her blood? or what had befallen her?

CHORUS: I know but this, for I am myself but now arrived at the house to mourn thy sorrows, O Theseus.

THESEUS: Woe is me! why have I crowned my head with woven garlands, when misfortune greets my embassage? Unbolt the doors, servants, loose their fastenings, that I may see the piteous sight, my wife, whose death is death to me. [The palace opens, disclosing the corpse.

CHORUS: Woe! woe is thee for thy piteous lot! thou hast done thyself a hurt deep enough to overthrow this family. Ah! ah! the daring of it! done to death by violence and unnatural means, the desperate effort of thy own poor hand! Who cast the shadow o’er thy life, poor lady?

THESEUS: Ah me, my cruel lot! sorrow hath done her worst on me. O fortune, how heavily hast thou set thy foot on me and on my house, by fiendish hands inflicting an unexpected stain? Nay, ’tis complete effacement of my life, making it impossible; for I see, alas! so wide an ocean of grief that I can never swim to shore again, nor breast the tide of this calamity. How shall I speak of thee, my poor wife, what tale of direst suffering tell? Thou art vanished like a bird from the covert of my hand, taking one headlong leap from me to Hades’ halls. Alas, and woe! this is a bitter, bitter sight! This must be a judgment sent by God for the sins of an ancestor, which from some far source I am bringing on myself.

CHORUS: My prince, ’tis not to thee alone such sorrows come; thou hast lost a noble wife, but so have many others.

THESEUS: Fain would I go hide me ’neath earth’s blackest depth, to dwell in darkness with the dead in misery, now that I am reft of thy dear presence! for thou hast slain me than thyself e’en more. Who can tell me what caused the fatal stroke that reached thy heart, dear wife? Will no one tell me what befell? doth my palace all in vain give shelter to a herd of menials? Woe, woe for thee, my wife! sorrows past speech, past bearing, I behold within my house; myself a ruined man, my home a solitude, my children orphans!

CHORUS: Gone and left us hast thou, fondest wife and noblest of all women ’neath the sun’s bright eye or night’s star-lit radiance.

CHORUS: Poor house, what sorrows are thy portion now! My eyes are wet with streams of tears to see thy fate; but the sequel to this tragedy has long with terror filled me.

THESEUS: Ha! what means this letter? clasped in her dear hand it hath some strange tale to tell. Hath she, poor lady, as a last request, written her bidding as to my marriage and her children? Take heart, poor ghost; no wife henceforth shall wed thy Theseus or invade his house. Ah! how yon seal of my dead wife stamped with her golden ring affects my sight! Come, I will unfold the sealed packet and read her letter’s message to me.

CHORUS: Woe unto us! Here is yet another evil in the train by heaven sent. Looking to what has happened, I should count my lot in life no longer worth one’s while to gain. My master’s house, alas! is ruined, brought to naught, I say. Spare it, O Heaven, if it may be. Hearken to my prayer, for I see, as with prophetic eye, an omen boding mischief.

THESEUS: O horror! woe on woe! and still they come, too deep for words, too heavy to bear. Ah me!

CHORUS: What is it? speak, if I may share in it.

THESEUS: This letter loudly tells a hideous tale! where can I escape my load of woe? For I am ruined and undone, so awful are the words I find here written clear as if she cried them to me; woe is me!

CHORUS: Alas! thy words declare themselves the harbingers of woe.

THESEUS: I can no longer keep the cursed tale within the portal of my lips, cruel though its utterance be. Ah me! Hippolytus hath dared by brutal force to violate my honour, recking naught of Zeus, whose awful eye is over all. O father Poseidon, once didst thou promise to fulfil three prayers of mine ; answer one of these and slay my son, let him not escape this single day, if the prayers thou gavest me were indeed with issue fraught.

CHORUS: O king, I do conjure thee, call back that prayer; hereafter thou wilt know thy error. Hear, I pray.

Part 11

THESEUS: Impossible! Moreover I will banish him from this land, and by one of two fates shall he be struck down; either Poseidon, out of respect to my prayer, will cast his dead body into the house of Hades; or exiled from this land, a wanderer to some foreign shore, shall he eke out a life of misery.

CHORUS: Lo! where himself doth come, thy son Hippolytus, in good time; dismiss thy hurtful rage, King Theseus, and bethink thee what is best for thy family.

HIPPOLYTUS: I heard thy voice, father, and hasted to come hither; yet know I not the cause of thy present sorrow, but would fain learn of thee. Ha! what is this? thy wife a corpse I see; this is passing strange; ’twas but now I left her; a moment since she looked upon the light. How came she thus? the manner of her death? this would I learn of thee, father. Art dumb? silence availeth not in trouble; nay, for the heart that fain would know all must show its curiosity even in sorrow’s hour. Be sure it is not right, father, to hide misfortunes from those who love, ay, more than love thee.

THESEUS: O ye sons of men, victims of a thousand idle errors, why teach your countless crafts, why scheme and seek to find a way for everything, while one thing ye know not nor ever yet have made your prize, a way to teach them wisdom whose souls are void of sense?

HIPPOLYTUS: A very master in his craft the man, who can force fools to be wise! But these ill-timed subtleties of thine, father, make me fear thy tongue is running riot through trouble.

THESEUS: Fie upon thee! man needs should have some certain test set up to try his friends, some touchstone of their hearts, to know each friend whether he be true or false; all men should have two voices, one the voice of honesty, expediency’s the other, so would honesty confute its knavish opposite, and then we could not be deceived.

HIPPOLYTUS: Say, hath some friend been slandering me and hath he still thine ear? am I, though guiltless, banned? I am amazed indeed; thy random, frantic words fill me with wild alarm.

THESEUS: O the mind of mortal man! to what lengths will it proceed? What limit will its bold assurance have? for if it goes on growing as man’s life advances, and each successor outdo the man before him in villainy, the gods will have to add another sphere unto the world, which shall take in the knaves and villains. Behold this man; he, my own son, hath outraged mine honour, his guilt most clearly proved by my dead wife. Now, since thou hast dared this loathly crime, come, look thy father in the face. Art thou the man who dost with gods consort, as one above the vulgar herd? art thou the chaste and sinless saint? Thy boasts will never persuade me to be guilty of attributing ignorance to gods. Go then, vaunt thyself, and drive1 thy petty trade in viands formed of lifeless food; take Orpheus for thy chief and go a-revelling, with all honour for the vapourings of many a written scroll, seeing thou now art caught. Let all beware, I say, of such hypocrites! who hunt their prey with fine words, and all the while are scheming villainy. She is dead; dost think that this will save thee? Why this convicts thee more than all, abandoned wretch! What oaths, what pleas can outweigh this letter, so that thou shouldst ’scape thy doom? Thou wilt assert she hated thee, that ’twixt the bastard and the true-born child nature has herself put war; it seems then by thy showing she made a sorry bargain with her life, if to gratify her hate of thee she lost what most she prized. ’Tis said, no doubt, that frailty finds no place in man but is innate in woman; my experience is, young men are no more secure than women, whenso the Queen of Love excites a youthful breast; although their sex comes in to help them. Yet why do I thus bandy words with thee, when before me lies the corpse, to be the clearest witness? Begone at once, an exile from this land, and ne’er set foot again in god-built Athens nor in the confines of my dominion. For if I am tamely to submit to this treatment from such as thee, no more will Sinis, robber of the Isthmus, bear me witness how I slew him, but say my boasts are idle, nor will those rocks Scironian, that fringe the sea, call me the miscreants’ scourge.

CHORUS: I know not how to call happy any child of man; for that which was first has turned and now is last.

HIPPOLYTUS: Father, thy wrath and the tension of thy mind are terrible; yet this charge, specious though its arguments appear, becomes a calumny, if one lay it bare. Small skill have I in speaking to a crowd, but have a readier wit for comrades of mine own age and small companies. Yea, and this is as it should be; for they, whom the wise despise, are better qualified to speak before a mob. Yet am I constrained under the present circumstances to break silence. And at the outset will I take the point which formed the basis of thy stealthy attack on me, designed to put me out of court unheard; dost see yon sun, this earth? These do not contain, for all thou dost deny it, chastity surpassing mine. To reverence God I count the highest knowledge, and to adopt as friends not those who attempt injustice, but such as would blush to propose to their companions aught disgraceful or pleasure them by shameful services; to mock at friends is not my way, father, but I am still the same behind their backs as to their face. The very crime thou thinkest to catch me in, is just the one I am untainted with, for to this day have I kept me pure from women. Nor know I aught thereof, save what I hear or see in pictures, for I have no wish to look even on these, so pure my virgin soul. I grant my claim to chastity may not convince thee; well, ’tis then for thee to show the way I was corrupted. Did this woman exceed in beauty all her sex? Did I aspire to fill the husband’s place after thee and succeed to thy house? One thing I have not said, the rest thou hast. Had I a witness to attest my purity, and were I pitted ’gainst her still alive, facts would show thee on enquiry who the culprit was. Now by Zeus, the god of oaths, and by the earth, whereon we stand, I swear to thee I never did lay hand upon thy wife nor would have wished to, or have harboured such a thought Slay me, ye gods! rob me of name and honour, from home and city cast me forth, a wandering exile o’er the earth! nor sea nor land receive my bones when I am dead, if I am such a miscreant! I cannot say if she through fear destroyed herself, for more than this am I forbid. With her discretion took the place of chastity, while I, though chaste, was not discreet in using this virtue.

CHORUS: Thy oath by heaven, strong security, sufficiently refutes the charge.

THESEUS: A wizard or magician must the fellow be, to think he can first flout me, his father, then by coolness master my resolve.

HIPPOLYTUS: Father, thy part in this doth fill me with amaze; wert thou my son and I thy sire, by heaven! I would have slain, not let thee off with banishment, hadst thou presumed to violate my honour.

THESEUS: A just remark! yet shalt thou not die by the sentence thine own lips pronounce upon thyself; for death, that cometh in a moment, is an easy end for wretchedness. Nay, thou shalt be exiled from thy fatherland,

HIPPOLYTUS: Oh! what wilt thou do? Wilt thou banish me, without so much as waiting for Time’s evidence on my case?

THESEUS: Ay, beyond the sea, beyond the bounds of Atlas, if I could, so deeply do I hate thee.

HIPPOLYTUS: What! banish me untried, without even testing my oath, the pledge I offer, or the voice of seers?

THESEUS: This letter here, though it bears no seers’ signs, arraigns thy pledges; as for birds that fly o’er our heads, a long farewell to them.

HIPPOLYTUS: (aside). Great gods! why do I not unlock my lips, seeing that I am ruined by you, the objects of my reverence? No, I will not; I should nowise persuade those whom I ought to, and in vain should break the oath I swore.

THESEUS: Fie upon thee! that solemn air of thine is more than I can bear. Begone from thy native land forthwith!

Part 12

HIPPOLYTUS: Whither shall I turn? Ah me! whose friendly house will take me in, an exile on so grave a charge?

THESEUS: Seek one who loves to entertain as guests and partners in his crimes corrupters of men’s wives.

HIPPOLYTUS: Ah me! this wounds my heart and brings me nigh to tears to think that I should appear so vile, and thou believe me so.

THESEUS: Thy tears and forethought had been more in season when thou didst presume to outrage thy father’s wife.

HIPPOLYTUS: O house, I would thou couldst speak for me and witness if I am so vile!

THESEUS: Dost fly to speechless witnesses? This deed, though it speaketh not, proves thy guilt clearly.

HIPPOLYTUS: Alas! Would I could stand and face myself, so should I weep to see the sorrows I endure.

THESEUS: Ay, ’tis thy character to honour thyself far more than reverence thy parents, as thou shouldst.

HIPPOLYTUS: Unhappy mother! son of sorrow! Heaven keep all friends of mine from bastard birth!

THESEUS: Ho! servants, drag him hence! You heard my proclamation long ago condemning him to exile.

HIPPOLYTUS: Whoso of them doth lay a hand on me shall rue it; thyself expel me, if thy spirit move thee, from the land.

THESEUS: I will, unless my word thou straight obey; no pity for thy exile steals into my heart. [Exit Theseus.

HIPPOLYTUS: The sentence then, it seems, is passed. Ah, misery I How well I know the truth herein, but know no way to tell it! O daughter of Latona, dearest to me of all deities, partner, comrade in the chase, far from glorious Athens must I fly. Farewell, city and land of Erechtheus; farewell, Troezen, most joyous home wherein to pass the spring of life; ’tis my last sight of thee, farewell! Come, my comrades in this land, young like me, greet me kindly and escort me forth, for never will ye behold a purer soul, for all my father’s doubts. [Exit Hippolytus.

CHORUS: In very deed the thoughts I have about the gods, whenso they come into my mind, do much to soothe its grief, but though I cherish secret hopes of some great guiding will, yet am I at fault when I survey the fate and doings of the sons of men; change succeeds to change, and man’s life veers and shifts in endless restlessness.

CHORUS: Fortune grant me this, I pray, at heaven’s hand,—a happy lot in life and a soul from sorrow free; opinions let me hold not too precise nor yet too hollow; but, lightly changing my habits to each morrow as it comes, may I thus attain a life of bliss!

CHORUS: For now no more is my mind free from doubts, unlooked-for sights greet my vision; for lo! I see the morning star of Athens, eye of Hellas, driven by his father’s fury to another land. Mourn, ye sands of my native shores, ye oak-groves on the hills, where with his fleet hounds he would hunt the quarry to the death, attending on Dictynna, awful queen.

CHORUS: No more will he mount his car drawn by Venetian steeds, filling the course round Limna with the prancing of his trained horses. Nevermore in his fathers house shall he wake the Muse that never slept beneath his lute-strings; no hand will crown the spots where rests the maiden Latona ’mid the boskage deep; nor evermore shall our virgins vie to win thy love, now thou art banished;

CHORUS: while I with tears at thy unhappy fate shall endure a lot all undeserved. Ah! hapless mother, in vain didst thou bring forth, it seems. I am angered with the gods; out upon them! O ye linked Graces, why are ye sending from his native land this poor youth, a guiltless sufferer, far from his home?

CHORUS: But lo! I see a servant of Hippolytus hasting with troubled looks towards the palace.

MESSENGER: Ladies, where may I find Theseus, king of the country? pray, tell me if ye know; is he within the palace here?

Part 13

CHORUS: Lo! himself approaches from the palace.

MESSENGER: Theseus, I am the bearer of troublous tidings to thee and all citizens who dwell in Athens or the bounds of Troezen.

THESEUS: How now? hath some strange calamity overtaken these two neighbouring cities?

MESSENGER: In one brief word, Hippolytus is dead. ’Tis true one slender thread still links him to the light of life.

THESEUS: Who slew him? Did some husband come to blows with him, one whose wife, like mine, had suffered brutal violence?

MESSENGER: He perished through those steeds that drew his chariot, and through the curses thou didst utter, praying to thy sire, the ocean-king, to slay thy son.

THESEUS: Ye gods and king Poseidon, thou hast proved my parentage by hearkening to my prayer! Say how he perished; how fell the uplifted hand of Justice to smite the villain who dishonoured me?

MESSENGER: Hard by the wave-beat shore were we combing out his horses’ manes, weeping the while, for one had come to say that Hippolytus was harshly exiled by thee and nevermore would return to set foot in this land. Then came he, telling the same doleful tale to us upon the beach, and with him was a countless throng of friends who followed after. At length he stayed his lamentation and spake: Why weakly rave on this wise? My father’s commands must be obeyed. Ho! servants, harness my horses to the chariot; this is no longer now city of mine. Thereupon each one of us bestirred himself, and, ere a man could say ’twas done, we had the horses standing ready at our master’s side. Then he caught up the reins from the chariot-rail, first fitting his feet exactly in the hollows made for them. But first with outspread palms he called upon the gods, O Zeus, now strike me dead, if I have sinned, and let my father learn how he is wronging me, in death at least, if not in life. Therewith he seized the whip and lashed each horse in turn; while we, close by his chariot, near the reins, kept up with him along the road that leads direct to Argos and Epidaurus. And just as we were coming to a desert spot, a strip of sand beyond the borders of this country, sloping right to the Saronic gulf, there issued thence a deep rumbling sound, as it were an earthquake, a fearsome noise, and the horses reared their heads and pricked their ears, while we were filled with wild alarm to know whence came the sound; when, as we gazed toward the wave-beat shore, a wave tremendous we beheld towering to the skies, so that from our view the cliffs of Scirori vanished, for it hid the isthmus and the rock of Asclepius; then swelling and frothing with a crest of foam, the sea discharged it toward the beach where stood the harnessed car, and in the moment that it broke, that mighty wall of waters, there issued from the wave a monstrous bull, whose bellowing filled the land with fearsome echoes, a sight too awful as it seemed to us who witnessed it. A panic seized the horses there and then, but our master, to horses’ ways quite used, gripped in both hands his reins, and tying them to his body pulled them backward as the sailor pulls his oar; but the horses gnashed the forged bits between their teeth and bore him wildly on, regardless of their master’s guiding hand or rein or jointed car. And oft as he would take the guiding rein and steer for softer ground, showed that bull in front to turn him back again, maddening his team with terror; but if in their frantic career they ran towards the rocks, he would draw nigh the chariot-rail, keeping up with them, until, suddenly dashing the wheel against a stone, he upset and wrecked the car; then was dire confusion, axle-boxes and linchpins springing into the air. While he, poor youth, entangled in the reins was dragged along, bound by a stubborn knot, his poor head dashed against the rocks, his flesh all torn, the while he cried out piteously, Stay, stay, my horses whom my own hand hath fed at the manger, destroy me not utterly. O luckless curse of a father! Will no one come and save me for all my virtue? Now we, though much we longed to help, were left far behind. At last, I know not how, he broke loose from the shapely reins that bound him, a faint breath of life still in him; but the horses disappeared, and that portentous bull, among the rocky ground, I know not where. I am but a slave in thy house, ’tis true, O king, yet will I never believe so monstrous a charge against thy son’s character, no! not though the whole race of womankind should hang itself, or one should fill with writing every pine-tree tablet grown on Ida, sure as I am of his uprightness.

CHORUS: Alas! new troubles come to plague us, nor is there any escape from fate and necessity.

THESEUS: My hatred for him who hath thus suffered made me glad at thy tidings, yet from regard for the gods and him, because he is my son, I feel neither joy nor sorrow at his sufferings.

MESSENGER: But say, are we to bring the victim hither, or how are we to fulfil thy wishes? Bethink thee; if by me thou wilt be schooled, thou wilt not harshly treat thy son in his sad plight.

THESEUS: Bring him hither, that when I see him face to face, who hath denied having polluted my wife’s honour, I may by words and heaven’s visitation convict him.

CHORUS: Ah! Cypris, thine the hand that guides the stubborn hearts of gods and men; thine, and that attendant boy’s, who, with painted plumage gay, flutters round his victims on lightning wing. O’er the land and booming deep on golden pinion borne flits the god of Love, maddening the heart and beguiling the senses of all whom he attacks, savage whelps on mountains bred, ocean’s monsters, creatures of this sun-warmed earth, and man; thine, O Cypris, thine alone the sovereign power to rule them all.

ARTEMIS: Hearken, I bid thee, noble son of Aegeus: lo! ’tis I Latona’s child, that speak, I, Artemis. Why, Theseus, to thy sorrow dost thou rejoice at these tidings, seeing that thou hast slain thy son most impiously, listening to a charge not clearly proved, but falsely sworn to by thy wife? though clearly has the curse therefrom upon thee fallen. Why dost thou not for very shame hide beneath the dark places of the earth, or change thy human life and soar on wings to escape this tribulation? ’Mongst men of honour thou hast now no share in life. Hearken, Theseus; I will put thy wretched case. Yet will it naught avail thee, if I do, but vex thy heart; still with this intent I came, to show thy son’s pure heart,—that he may die with honour,— as well the frenzy, and, in a sense, the nobleness of thy wife; for she was cruelly stung with a passion for thy son by that goddess whom all we, that joy in virgin purity, detest. And though she strove to conquer love by resolution, yet by no fault of hers she fell, thanks to her nurse’s strategy, who did reveal her malady unto thy son under oath. But he would none of her counsels, as indeed was right, nor yet, when thou didst revile him, would he break the oath he swore, from piety. She meantime, fearful of being found out, wrote a lying letter, destroying by guile thy son, but yet persuading thee.

THESEUS: Woe is me!

ARTEMIS: Doth my story wound thee, Theseus? Be still awhile; hear what follows, so wilt thou have more cause to groan. Dost remember those three prayers thy father granted thee, fraught with certain issue? ’Tis one of these thou hast misused, unnatural wretch, against thy son, instead of aiming it at an enemy. Thy sea-god sire, ’tis true, for all his kind intent, hath granted that boon he was compelled, by reason of his promise, to grant. But thou alike in his eyes and in mine hast shewn thy evil heart, in that thou hast forestalled all proof or voice prophetic, hast made no inquiry, nor taken time for consideration, but with undue haste cursed thy son even to the death.

THESEUS: Perdition seize me! Queen revered!

ARTEMIS: An awful deed was thine, but still even for this thou mayest obtain pardon; for it was Cypris that would have it so, sating the fury of her soul. For this is law amongst us gods; none of us will thwart his neighbour’s will, but ever we stand aloof. For be well assured, did I not fear Zeus, never would I have incurred the bitter shame of handing over to death a man of all his kind to me most dear. As for thy sin, first thy ignorance absolves thee from its villainy, next thy wife, who is dead, was lavish in her use of convincing arguments to influence thy mind. On thee in chief this storm of woe hath burst, yet is it some grief to me as well; for when the righteous die, there is no joy in heaven, albeit we try to destroy the wicked, house and home.

CHORUS: Lo! where he comes, this hapless youth, his fair young flesh and auburn locks most shamefully handled. Unhappy house! what twofold sorrow doth o’ertake its halls, through heaven’s ordinance!

HIPPOLYTUS: Ah! ah! woe is me! foully undone by an impious father’s impious imprecation! Undone, undone! woe is me! Through my head shoot fearful pains; my brain throbs convulsively. Stop, let me rest my worn-out frame.Oh, oh! Accursed steeds, that mine own hand did feed, ye have been my ruin and my death. O by the gods, good sirs, I beseech ye, softly touch my wounded limbs. Who stands there at my right side? Lift me tenderly; with slow and even step conduct a poor wretch cursed by his mistaken sire. Great Zeus, dost thou see this? Me thy reverent worshipper, me who left all men behind in purity, plunged thus into yawning Hades ’neath the earth, reft of life; in vain the toils I have endured through my piety towards mankind.

Part 14

HIPPOLYTUS: Ah me! ah me! O the thrill of anguish shooting through me! Set me down, poor wretch I am; come Death to set me free! Kill me, end my sufferings. O for a sword two-edged to hack my flesh, and close this mortal life! Ill-fated curse of my father! the crimes of bloody kinsmen. ancestors of old, now pass their boundaries and tarry not, and upon me are they come all guiltless as I am; ah! why? Alas, alas! what can I say? How from my life get rid of this relentless agony? O that the stern Death-god, night’s black visitant, would give my sufferings rest!

ARTEMIS: Poor sufferer! cruel the fate that links thee to it! Thy noble soul hath been thy ruin.

HIPPOLYTUS: Ah! the fragrance from my goddess wafted! Even in my agony I feel thee near and find relief; she is here in this very place, my goddess Artemis.

ARTEMIS: She is, poor sufferer! the goddess thou hast loved the best.

HIPPOLYTUS: Dost see me, mistress mine? dost see my present suffering?

ARTEMIS: I see thee, but mine eyes no tear may weep.

HIPPOLYTUS: Thou hast none now to lead the hunt or tend thy fane.

ARTEMIS: None now; yet e’en in death I love thee still.

HIPPOLYTUS: None to groom thy steeds, or guard thy shrines.

ARTEMIS: Twas Cypris, mistress of iniquity, devised this evil.

HIPPOLYTUS: Ah me! now know I the goddess who destroyed me.

ARTEMIS: She was jealous of her slighted honour, vexed at thy chaste life.

HIPPOLYTUS: Ah! then I see her single hand hath struck down three of us.

ARTEMIS: Thy sire and thee, and last thy father’s wife.

HIPPOLYTUS: My sire’s ill-luck as well as mine I mourn.

ART: He was deceived by a goddess’s design.

HIPPOLYTUS: Woe is thee, my father, in this sad mischance!

THESEUS: My son, I am a ruined man; life has no joys for me.

HIPPOLYTUS: For this mistake I mourn thee rather than myself.

THESEUS: O that I had died for thee, my son!

Part 15

HIPPOLYTUS: Ah! those fatal gifts thy sire Poseidon gave.

THESEUS: Would God these lips had never uttered that prayer!

HIPPOLYTUS: Why not? thou wouldst in any case have slain me in thy fury then.

THESEUS: Yes; Heaven had perverted my power to think.

HIPPOLYTUS: O that the race of men could bring a curse upon the gods!

ARTEMIS: Enough! for though thou pass to gloom beneath the earth, the wrath of Cypris shall not, at her will, fall on thee unrequited, because thou hadst a noble righteous soul. For I with mine own hand will with these unerring shafts avenge me on another, who is her votary, dearest to her of all the sons of men. And to thee, poor sufferer, for thy anguish now will I grant high honours in the city of Troezen; for thee shall maids unwed before their marriage cut off their hair, thy harvest through the long roll of time of countless bitter tears. Yea, and for ever shall the virgin choir hymn thy sad memory, nor shall Phaedra’s love for thee fall into oblivion and pass away unnoticed. But thou, O son of old Aegeus, take thy son in thine arms, draw him close to thee, for unwittingly thou slewest him, and men may well commit an error when gods put it in their way. And thee Hippolytus, I admonish; hate not thy sire, for in this death thou dost but meet thy destined fate. And now farewell! ’tis not for me to gaze upon the dead, or pollute my sight with death-scenes, and e’en now I see thee nigh that evil moment. [Exit Artemis.

HIPPOLYTUS: Farewell, blest virgin queen! leave me now! How easily thou resignest our long friendship! I am reconciled with my father at thy desire, yea, for ever before I would obey thy bidding. Ah me! the darkness is settling even now upon my eyes. Take me, father, in thy arms, lift me up.

THESEUS: Woe is me, my son! what art thou doing to me thy hapless sire!

HIPPOLYTUS: I am a broken man; yes, I see the gates that close upon the dead.

THESEUS: Canst leave me thus with murder on my soul!

HIPPOLYTUS: No, no; I set thee free from this bloodguiltiness.

THESEUS: What sayest thou? dost absolve me from bloodshed?

HIPPOLYTUS: Artemis, the archer-queen, is my witness that I do.

THESEUS: My own dear child, how generous dost thou show thyself to thy father!

HIPPOLYTUS: Pray to have children such as me bom in lawful wedlock.

THESEUS: O that holy, noble soul of thine!

HIPPOLYTUS: Farewell, dear father! a long farewell to thee!

THESEUS: O leave me not, my son; endure awhile.

HIPPOLYTUS: ’Tis finished, my endurance; I die, father; quickly cover my face with a mantle.

THESEUS: O glorious Athens, realm of Pallas, what a splendid hero ye have lost! Ah me, ah me! How oft shall I remember thy evil work, O Cypris!

Part 16

CHORUS: On all our citizens hath come this universal sorrow, unforeseen. Now shall the copious tear gush forth, for sad news about great men takes more than usual hold upon the heart.

Contents — 11 sections

1. Part 1
2. Part 2
3. Part 3
4. Part 4
5. Part 5
6. Part 6
7. Part 7
8. Part 8
9. Part 9
10. Part 10
11. Part 11

Part 1

ANDROMACHE: O city of Thebes, glory of Asia, whence on a day I came to Priam’s princely home with many a rich and costly thing in my dower, affianced unto Hector to be the mother of his children, I Andromache, envied name in days of yore, but now of all women the most unfortunate; for I have lived to see my husband Hector slain by Achilles, and the babe Astyanax, whom I bore my lord, hurled from the towering battlements, when the Hellenes sacked our Trojan home; and I myself am come to Hellas as a slave, though I was esteemed a daughter of a race most free, given to Neoptolemus that island-prince, and set apart for him as his special prize from the spoils of Troy. And here I dwell upon the boundaries of Phthia and Pharsalia’s town, where Thetis erst, the goddess of the sea, abode with Peleus apart from the world, avoiding the throng of men; wherefore the folk of Thessaly call it the sacred place of Thetis, in honour of the goddess’s marriage. Here dwells the son of Achilles and suffers Peleus still to rule Pharsalia, not wishing to assume the sceptre while the old man lives. Within these halls have I born a boy to the son of Achilles, my master. Now aforetime for all my misery I ever had a hope to lead me on, that, if my child were safe, I might find some help and protection from my woes; but since my lord hath wedded that Spartan Hermione in scorn of his bondmaid’s charms, I am tormented by her most cruelly; for she saith that I by secret enchantment am making her barren and distasteful to her husband, and that I design to take her place in this house, ousting her the rightful mistress by force; whereas I at first submitted against my will and now have resigned my place; be almighty Zeus my witness that it was not of my own free will I became her rival! But I cannot convince her, and she longs to kill me, and her father Menelaus is an accomplice in this. E’en now is he within, arrived from Sparta for this very purpose, while I in terror am come to take up a position here in the shrine of Thetis adjoining the house, if haply it may save me from death; for Peleus and his descendants hold it in honour as a symbol of his marriage with the Nereid. My only son am I secretly conveying to a neighbour’s house in fear for his life. For his sire stands not by my side to lend his aid and cannot avail his child at all, being absent in the land of Delphi, where he is offering recompense to Loxias for the madness he committed, when on a day he went to Pytho and demanded of Phoebus satisfaction for his father’s death, if haply his prayer might avert those past sins and win for him the god’s goodwill hereafter.

MAID: Mistress mine, be sure I do not hesitate to call thee by that name, seeing that I thought it thy right in thine own house also, when we dwelt in Troy-land: as I was ever thy friend and thy husband’s while yet he was alive, so now have I come with strange tidings, in terror lest any of our masters learn hereof but still out of pity for thee; for Menelaus and his daughter are forming dire plots against thee, whereof thou must beware.

ANDROMACHE: Ah! kind companion of my bondage, for such thou art to her, who, erst thy queen, is now sunk in misery; what are they doing? What new schemes are they devising in their eagerness to take away my wretched life?

MAID: Alas! poor lady, they intend to slay thy son, whom thou hast privily conveyed from out the house.

ANDROMACHE: Ah me! Has she heard that my babe was put out of her reach? Who told her? Woe is me! how utterly undone!

MAID: I know not, but thus much of their schemes I heard myself; and Menelaus has left the house to fetch him.

ANDROMACHE: Then am I lost; ah, my child! those vultures twain will take and slay thee; while he who is called thy father lingers still in Delphi.

MAID: True, for had he been here thou wouldst not have fared so hardly, I am sure; but, as it is, thou art friendless.

ANDROMACHE: Have no tidings come of the possible arrival of Peleus?

MAID: He is too old to help thee if he came.

ANDROMACHE: And yet I sent for him more than once.

MAID: Surely thou dost not suppose that any of thy messengers heed thee?

ANDROMACHE: Why should they? Wilt thou then go for me?

MAID: How shall I explain my long absence from the house?

ANDROMACHE: Thou art a woman; thou canst invent a hundred ways.

MAID: There is a risk, for Hermione keeps no careless guard.

ANDROMACHE: Dost look to that? Thou art disowning thy friends in distress.

MAID: Not so; never taunt me with that. I will go, for of a truth a woman and a slave is not of much account, e’en if aught befall, me.

ANDROMACHE: Go then, while I will tell to heaven the lengthy tale of lamentation, mourning, and weeping, that has ever been my hard lot; for ’tis woman’s way to delight in present misfortunes even to keeping them always on her tongue and lips. But I have many reasons, not merely one for tears,–my city’s fall, my Hector’s death, the hardness of the lot to which I am bound, since I fell on slavery’s evil days undeservedly. ’Tis never right to call a son of man happy, till thou hast seen his end, to judge from the way he passes it how he will descend to that other world.

ANDROMACHE: ’Twas no bride Paris took with him to the towers of Ilium, but a curse to his bed when he brought Helen to her bower. For her sake, O Troy, did eager warriors, sailing from Hellas in a thousand ships, capture and make thee a prey to fire and sword; and the son of sea-born Thetis mounted on his chariot dragged my husband Hector round the walls, ah woe is me! while I was hurried from my chamber to the beach, with slavery’s hateful pall upon me. And many a tear I shed as I left my city, my bridal bower, and my husband in the dust. Woe, woe is me! why should I prolong my life, to serve Hermione? Her cruelty it is that drives me hither to the image of the goddess to throw my suppliant arms about it, melting to tears as doth a spring that gushes from the rock.

Part 2

CHORUS: Lady, thus keeping thy weary station without pause upon the floor of Thetis’ shrine, Phthian though I am, to thee a daughter of Asia I come, to see if I can devise some remedy for these perplexing troubles, which have involved thee and Hermione in fell discord, because to thy sorrow thou sharest with her the love of Achilles’ son.

CHORUS: Recognize thy position, weigh the present evil into the which thou art come. Thou art a Trojan captive; thy rival is thy mistress, a true-born daughter of Sparta. Leave then this home of sacrifice, the shrine of our sea-goddess. How can it avail thee to waste thy comeliness and disfigure it by weeping by reason of a mistress’s harsh usage? Might will prevail against thee; why vainly toil in thy feebleness?

CHORUS: Come, quit the bright sanctuary of the Nereid divine. Recognize that thou art in bondage on a foreign soil, in a strange city, where thou seest none of all thy friends, luckless lady, cast on evil days.

CHORUS: Yea, I did pity thee most truly, Trojan dame, when thou earnest to this house; but from fear of my mistress I hold my peace, albeit I sympathize with thee, lest she, whom Zeus’s daughter bore, discover my good will toward thee.

HERMIONE: With a crown of golden workmanship upon my head and about my body this embroidered robe am I come hither; no presents these I wear from the palace of Achilles or Peleus, but gifts my father Menelaus gave me together with a sumptuous dower from Sparta in Laconia, to insure me freedom of speech. Such is my answer to you; but as for thee, slave and captive, thou wouldst fain oust me and secure this palace for thyself, and thanks to thy enchantment I am hated by my husband; thou it is that hast made my womb barren and cheated my hopes; for Asia’s daughters have clever heads for such villainy; yet will I check thee therefrom, nor shall this temple of the Nereid avail thee aught, no! neither its altar or shrine, but thou shalt die. But if or god or man should haply wish to save thee, thou must atone for thy proud thoughts of happier days now past by humbling thyself and crouching prostrate at my knees, by sweeping out my halls, and by learning, as thou sprinklest water from a golden ewer, where thou now art. Here is no Hector, no Priam with his gold, but a city of Hellas. Yet thou, miserable woman, hast gone so far in wantonness that thou canst lay thee down with the son of the very man that slew thy husband, and bear children to the murderer. Such is all the race of barbarians; father and daughter, mother and son, sister and brother mate together; the nearest and dearest stain their path with each others blood, and no law restrains such horrors. Bring not these crimes amongst us, for here we count it shame that one man should have the control of two wives, and men are content to turn their attention to one lawful love, that is, all who care to live an honourable life.

CHORUS: Women are by nature somewhat jealous, and do ever show the keenest hate to rivals in their love.

ANDROMACHE: Ah! well-a-day! Youth is a bane to mortals, in every case, that is, where a man embraces injustice in his early days. Now I am afraid that my being a slave will prevent thee listening to me in spite of many a just plea, or if I win my case, I fear I may be damaged on this very ground, for the high and mighty cannot brook refuting arguments from their inferiors; still I will not be convicted of betraying my own cause. Tell me, proud young wife, what assurance can make me confident of wresting from thee thy lawful lord? Is it that Laconias capital yields to Phrygia? is it that my fortune outstrips thine? or that in me thou seest a free woman? Am I so elated by my youth, my full healthy figure, the extent of my city, the number of my friends that I wish to supplant thee in thy home? Is my purpose to take thy place and rear myself a race of slaves, mere appendages to my misery? or, supposing thou bear no children, will any one endure that sons of mine should rule oer Phthia? Ah no! there is the love that Hellas bears me, both for Hectors sake and for my own humble rank forsooth, that never knew a queens estate in Troy. ’Tis not my sorcery that makes thy husband hate thee, nay, but thy own failure to prove thyself his help-meet. Herein lies love’s only charm tis not beauty, lady, but virtuous acts that win our husbands’ hearts. And though it gall thee to be told so, albeit thy city in Laconia is no doubt a mighty fact, yet thou findest no place for his Scyros, displaying wealth ’midst poverty and setting Menelaus above Achilles: and that is what alienates thy lord. Take heed; for a woman, though bestowed upon a worthless husband, must be with him content, and ne’er advance presumptuous claims. Suppose thou hadst wedded a prince of Thrace, the land of flood and melting snow, where one lord shares his affections with a host of wives, wouldst thou have slain them? If so, thou wouldst have set a stigma of insatiate lust on all our sex. A shameful charge! And yet herein we suffer more than men, though we make a good stand against it. Ah! my dear lord Hector, for thy sake would I e’en brook a rival, if ever Cypris led thee astray, and oft in days gone by I held thy bastard babes to my own breast, to spare thee any cause for grief. By this course I bound my husband to me by virtue’s chains, whereas thou wilt never so much as let the drops of dew from heaven above settle on thy lord, in thy jealous fear. Oh! seek not to surpass thy mother in hankering after men, for ’tis well that all wise children should avoid the habits of such evil mothers.

CHORUS: Mistress mine, be persuaded to come to terms with her, as far as readily comes within thy power.

HERMIONE: Why this haughty tone, this bandying of words, as if, forsooth, thou, not I, wert the virtuous wife?

ANDROMACHE: Thy present claims at any rate give thee small title thereto.

HERMIONE: Woman, may my bosom never harbour such ideas as thine!

ANDROMACHE: Thou art young to speak on so delicate a subject.

HERMIONE: As for thee, thou dost not speak thereof but, as thou canst, dost put it into action against me.

ANDROMACHE: Canst thou not conceal thy pangs of jealousy?

HERMIONE: What! doth not every woman put this first of all?

ANDROMACHE: Yes, if her experiences are happy; otherwise, there is no honour in speaking of them.

HERMIONE: Barbarians’ laws are not a standard for our city.

ANDROMACHE: Alike in Asia and in Hellas infamy attends base actions.

HERMIONE: Clever, clever quibbler! yet die thou must and shalt.

ANDROMACHE: Dost see the image of Thetis with her eye upon thee?

Part 3

HERMIONE: A bitter foe to thy country because of the death of Achilles.

ANDROMACHE: ’Twas not I that slew him, but Helen that mother of thine.

HERMIONE: Pray, is it thy intention to probe my wounds yet deeper?

ANDROMACHE: Behold, I am dumb, my lips are closed.

HERMIONE: Tell me that which was my only reason for coming hither.

ANDROMACHE: No! all I tell thee is, thou hast less wisdom than thou needest.

HERMIONE: Wilt thou leave these hallowed precincts of the sea-goddess?

ANDROMACHE: Yes, if I am not to die for it; otherwise, I never will.

HERMIONE: Since that is thy resolve, I shall not even wait my lord’s return.

ANDROMACHE: Nor yet will I, at any rate ere that, surrender to thee.

HERMIONE: I will bring fire to bear on thee, and pay no heed to thy entreaties.

ANDROMACHE: Kindle thy blaze then; the gods will witness it.

HERMIONE: And make thy flesh to writhe by cruel wounds.

ANDROMACHE: Begin thy butchery, stain the altar of the goddess with blood, for she will visit thy iniquity.

HERMIONE: Barbarian creature, hardened in impudence, wilt thou brave death itself? Still will I find speedy means to make thee quit this seat of thy free-will; such a bait have I to lure thee with. But I will hide my meaning, which the event itself shall soon declare. Yes, keep thy seat, for I will make thee rise, though molten lead is holding thee there, before Achilles’ son, thy trusted champion, arrive. Exit Hermione.

ANDROMACHE: My trusted champion, yes! how strange it is, that, though some god hath devised cures for mortals against the venom of reptiles, no man ever yet hath discovered aught to cure a woman’s venom, which is far worse than viper’s sting or scorching flame; so terrible a curse are we to mankind.

CHORUS: Ah! what sorrows did the son of Zeus and Maia herald, in the day he came to Ida’s glen, guiding that fair young trio of goddesses, all girded for the fray in bitter rivalry about their beauty, to the shepherd’s fold, where dwelt the youthful herdsman all alone by the hearth of his lonely hut.

CHORUS: Soon as they reached the wooded glen, in gushing mountain springs they bathed their dazzling skin, then sought the son of Priam, comparing their rival charms in more than rancorous phrase. But Cypris won the day by her deceitful promises, sweet-sounding words, but fraught with ruthless overthrow to Phrygia’s hapless town and Ilium’s towers.

CHORUS: Would God his mother had smitten him a cruel death-blow on the head before he made his home on Ida’s slopes, in the hour Cassandra, standing by the holy bay-tree, cried out, Slay him, for he will bring most grievous bane on Priam’s town. To every prince she went, to every elder sued for the babe’s destruction.

CHORUS: Ah! had they listened, Ilium’s daughters ne’er had felt the yoke of slavery, and thou, lady, hadst been established in the royal palace; and Hellas had been freed of all the anguish she suffered during those ten long years her sons went wandering, spear in hand, around the walls of Troy; brides had never been left desolate, nor hoary fathers childless.

Part 4

MENELAUS: Behold I bring thy son with me, whom thou didst steal away to a neighbour’s house without my daughter’s knowledge. Thou wert so sure this image of the goddess would protect thee and those who hid him, but thou hast not proved clever enough for Menelaus. And so if thou refuse to leave thy station here, he shall be slain instead of thee. Wherefore weigh it well: wilt die thyself, or see him slain for the sin whereof thou art guilty against me and my daughter?

ANDROMACHE: O fame, fame! full many a man ere now of no account hast thou to high estate exalted. Those, indeed, who truly have a fair repute, I count blest; but those who get it by false pretences, I will never allow have aught but the accidental appearance of wisdom. Thou for instance, caitiff that thou art, didst thou ever wrest Troy from Priam with thy picked troops of Hellenes? thou that hast raised such a storm, at the word of thy daughter, a mere child, and hast entered the lists with a poor captive; unworthy I count thee of Troy’s capture, and Troy still more disgraced by thy victory. Those who only in appearance are men of sense make an outward show, but inwardly resemble the common herd, save it be in wealth, which is their chiefest strength. Come now, Menelaus, let us discuss this argument. Suppose I am slain by thy daughter, and she work her will on me, yet can she never escape the pollution of murder, and public opinion will make thee too an accomplice in this deed of blood, for thy share in the business must needs implicate thee. But even supposing I escape death myself, will ye kill my child? Even then, how will his father brook the murder of his child? Troy has no such coward’s tale to tell of him; nay, he will follow duty’s call; his actions will prove him a worthy scion of Peleus and Achilles. Thy daughter will he thrust forth from his house; and what wilt thou say when seeking to betroth her to another? wilt say her virtue made her leave a worthless lord? Nay, that will be false. Who then will wed her? wilt thou keep her without a husband in thy halls, grown grey in widowhood? Unhappy wretch! dost not see the flood-gates of trouble opening wide for thee? How many a wrong against a wife wouldst thou prefer thy daughter to have found to suffering what I now describe? We ought not on trifling grounds to promote serious mischief; nor should men, if we women are so deadly a curse, bring their nature down to our level. No! if, as thy daughter asserts, I am practising sorcery against her and making her barren, right willingly will I, without any crouching at altars, submit in my own person to the penalty that lies in her husband’s hands, seeing that I am no less chargeable with injuring him if I make him childless. This is my case; but for thee, there is one thing I fear in thy disposition; it was a quarrel for a woman that really induced thee to destroy poor Ilium’s town.

CHORUS: Thou hast said too much for a woman speaking to men. that discretion hath shot away its last shaft from thy soul’s quiver.

MENELAUS: Woman, these are petty matters, unworthy, as thou sayest, of my despotic sway, unworthy too of Hellas. Yet mark this well; his special fancy of the hour is of more moment to a man than Troy’s capture. I then have set myself to help my daughter because I consider her loss of a wife’s rights a grave matter; for whatever else a woman suffers is secondary to this; if she loses her husband’s love she loses her life therewith. Now, as it is right Neoptolemus should rule my slaves, so my friends and I should have control of his; for friends, if they be really friends, keep nothing to themselves, but have all in common. So if I wait for the absent instead of making the best arrangement I can at once of my affairs, I show weakness, not wisdom. Arise then, leave the goddess’s shrine, for by thy death this child escapeth his, whereas, if thou refuse to die, I will slay him; for one of you twain must perish.

ANDROMACHE: Ah me! ’tis a bitter lot thou art offering about my life; whether I take it or not I am equally unfortunate. Attend to me, thou who for a trifling cause art committing an awful crime. Why art thou bent on slaying me? What reason hast thou? What city have I betrayed? Which of thy children was ever slain by me? What house have I fired? I was forced to be my master’s concubine; and spite of that wilt thou slay me, not him who is to blame, passing by the cause and hurrying to the inevitable result? Ah me! my sorrows! Woe for my hapless country! How cruel my fate! Why had I to be a mother too and take upon me a double load of suffering? Yet why do I mourn the past, and o’er the present never shed a tear or compute its griefs? I that saw Hector butchered and dragged behind the chariot, and Ilium, piteous sight! one sheet of flame, while I was haled away by the hair of my head to the Argive ships in I slavery, and on my arrival in Phthia was assigned to Hector’s murderer as his mistress. What pleasure then has life for me? Whither am I to turn my gaze? to the present or the past? My babe alone was left me, the light of my life; and him these ministers of death would slay. No! they shall not, if my poor life can save him; for if he be saved, hope in him lives on, while to ’twere shame to refuse to die for my son. Lo! here I leave the altar and give myself into your hands, to cut or stab, to bind or hang. Ah! my child, to Hades now thy mother passes to save thy dear life. Yet if thou escape thy doom, remember me, my sufferings and my death, and tell thy father how I fared, with fond caress and streaming eye and arms thrown round his neck. Ah! yes, his children are to every man as his own soul; and whoso sneers at this through inexperience, though he suffers less anguish, yet tastes the bitter in his cup of bliss.

CHORUS: Thy tale with pity fills me; for every man alike, stranger though he be, feels pity for another’s distress. Menelaus, ’tis thy duty to reconcile thy daughter and this captive, giving her a respite from sorrow.

MENELAUS: Ho! sirrahs, catch me this woman; hold her fast; for ’tis no welcome story she will have to hear. It was to make thee leave the holy altar of the goddess that I held thy child’s death before thy eyes, and so induced thee to give thyself up to me to die. So stands thy case, be well assured; but as for this child, my daughter shall decide whether she will slay him or no. Get thee hence into the house, and there learn to bridle thy insolence in speaking to the free, slave that thou art.

ANDROMACHE: Alas! thou hast by treachery beguiled me; I was deceived.

MENELAUS: Proclaim it to the world; I do not deny it

ANDROMACHE: Is this counted cleverness amongst you who dwell by the Eurotas?

MENELAUS: Yes, and amongst Trojans too, that those who suffer should retaliate.

ANDROMACHE: Thinkest thou God’s hand is shortened, and that thou wilt not be punished?

MENELAUS: Whene’er that comes, I am ready to bear it. But thy life will I have.

ANDROMACHE: Wilt likewise slay this tender chick, whom thou hast snatched from ’neath my wing?

MENELAUS: Not I, but I will give him to my daughter to slay if she will.

ANDROMACHE: Ah me! why not begin my mourning then for thee, my child?

MENELAUS: Of a truth ’tis no very sure hope that he has left.

ANDROMACHE: O citizens of Sparta, the bane of all the race of men, schemers of guile, and masters in lying, devisers of evil plots, with crooked minds and tortuous methods and ne’er one honest thought, ’tis wrong that ye should thrive in Hellas. What crime is wanting in your list? How rife is murder with you! How covetous ye are! One word upon your lips, another in your heart, this is what men always find with you. Perdition catch ye! Still death is not so grievous, as thou thinkest, to me. No! for my life ended in the day that hapless Troy was destroyed with my lord, that glorious warrior, whose spear oft made a coward like thee quit the field and seek thy ship. But now against a woman hast thou displayed the terrors of thy panoply, my would-be murderer. Strike then! for this my tongue shall never flatter thee or that daughter of thine. For though thou wert of great account in Sparta, why so was I in Troy. And if I am now in sorry plight, presume not thou on this; thou too mayst be so yet.

CHORUS: Never, oh! never will I commend rival wives or sons of different mothers, a cause of strife, of bitterness, and grief every house. I would have a husband content with one wife whose rights he shareth with no other.

CHORUS: Not even in states is dual monarchy better to bear than undivided rule; it only doubles burdens and causes faction amongst the citizens. Often too will the Muse sow strife ’twixt rivals in the art of minstrelsy.

Part 5

CHORUS: Again, when strong winds are drifting mariners, the divided counsel of the wise is not conducive to steering, and their collective wisdom has less weight than the inferior intelligence of the single man who has sole authority; for this is the essence of power alike in house and state, whene’er men care to find the proper moment.

CHORUS: This Spartan, the daughter of the great chief Menelaus, proves this; for she hath kindled hot fury against a rival, and is bent on slaying the hapless Trojan maid and her child to further her bitter quarrel. Tis a murder gods and laws and kindness all forbid. Ah! lady, retribution for this deed will visit thee yet.

CHORUS: But lo! before the house I see those two united souls, condemned to die. Alas! for thee, poor lady, and for thee, unhappy child, who art dying on account of thy mother’s marriage, though thou hast no share therein and canst not be blamed by the royal house.

ANDROMACHE: Behold me journeying on the downward path, my hands so tightly bound with cords that they bleed.

MOLOSSUS: O mother, mother mine! I too share thy downward path, nestling ’neath thy wing.

ANDROMACHE: A cruel sacrifice! ye rulers of Phthia!

MOLOSSUS: Come, father! succour those thou lovest.

ANDROMACHE: Rest there, my babe, my darling! on thy mother’s bosom, e’en in death and in the grave.

MOLOSSUS: Ah, woe is me! what will become of me and thee too, mother mine?

MENELAUS: Away, to the world below! from hostile towers ye came, the pair of you; two different causes necessitate your deaths; my sentence takes away thy life, and my daughter Hermione’s requires his; for it would be the height of folly to leave our foemen’s sons, when we might kill them and remove the danger from our house.

ANDROMACHE: O husband mine! I would I had thy strong arm and spear to aid me, son of Priam.

MOLOSSUS: Ah, woe is me! what spell can I now find to turn death’s stroke aside?

ANDROMACHE: Embrace thy master’s knees, my child, and pray to him.

MOLOSSUS: Spare, O spare my life, kind master!

ANDROMACHE: Mine eyes are wet with tears, which trickle down my cheeks, as doth a sunless spring from a smooth rock. Ah me!

MOLOSSUS: What remedy, alas! can I provide me ’gainst my ills?

MENELAUS: Why fall at my knees in supplication? hard as the rock and deaf as the wave am I. My own friends have I helped, but for thee have I no tie of affection; for verily it cost me a great part of my life to capture Troy and thy mother; so thou shalt reap the fruit thereof and into Hades’ halls descend.

CHORUS: Behold! I see Peleus drawing nigh; with aged step he hasteth hither.

PELEUS: calling out as he comes in sight. What means this? I ask you and your executioner; why is the palace in an uproar? give a reason; what mean your lawless machinations? Menelaus, hold thy hand. Seek not to outrun justice. To his attendant. Forward! faster, faster! for this matter, methinks, admits of no delay; now if ever would I fain resume the vigour of my youth. First however will I breathe new life into this captive, being to her as the breeze that blows a ship before the wind. Tell me, by what right have they pinioned thine arms and are dragging thee and thy child away? like a ewe with her lamb art thou led to the slaughter, while I and thy lord were far away.

ANDROMACHE: Behold them that are haling me and my child to death, e’en as thou seest, aged prince. Why should I tell thee? For not by one urgent summons alone but by countless messengers have I sent for thee. No doubt thou knowest by hearsay of the strife in this house with this man’s daughter, and the reason of my ruin. So now they have torn and are dragging me from the altar of Thetis, the goddess of thy chiefest adoration and the mother of thy gallant son, without any proper trial, yea, and without waiting for my absent master; because, forsooth, they knew my defencelessness and my child’s, whom they mean to slay with me his hapless mother, though he has done no harm. But to thee, O sire, I make my supplication, prostrate at thy knees, though my hand cannot touch thy friendly beard; save me, I adjure thee, reverend sir, or to thy shame and my sorrow shall we be slain.

Part 6

PELEUS: Loose her bonds, I say, ere some one rue it; untie her folded hands.

MENELAUS: I forbid it, for besides being a match for thee, I have a far better right to her.

PELEUS: What! art thou come hither to set my house in order? Art not content with ruling thy Spartans?

MENELAUS: She is my captive; I took her from Troy.

PELEUS: Aye, but my son’s son received her as his prize.

MENELAUS: Is not all I have his, and all his mine?

PELEUS: For good, but not evil ends; and surely not for murderous violence.

MENELAUS: Never shalt thou wrest her from my grasp.

PELEUS: With this good staff I’ll stain thy head with blood!

MENELAUS: Just touch me and see! Approach one step!

PELEUS: What! shalt thou rank with men? chief of cowards, son of cowards! What right hast thou to any place ’mongst men? Thou who didst let a Phrygian rob thee of thy wife, leaving thy home without bolt or guard, as if forsooth the cursed woman thou hadst there was a model of virtue. No! a Spartan! maid could not be chaste, e’en if she would, who leaves her home and bares her limbs and lets her robe float free, to share; with youths their races and their sports,-- customs I cannot away with. Is it any wonder then that ye fail to educate your women in virtue? Helen might have asked thee this, seeing that she said goodbye to thy affection and tripped off with her young gallant to a foreign land. And yet for her sake thou didst marshal all the hosts of Hellas and lead them to Ilium, whereas thou shouldst have shown thy loathing for her by refusing to stir a spear, once thou hadst found her false; yea, thou shouldst have let her stay there, and even paid a price to save ever having her back again. But that was not at all the way thy thoughts were turned; wherefore many a brave life hast thou ended, and many an aged mother hast thou left childless in her home, and grey-haired sires of gallant sons hast reft. Of that sad band am I a member, seeing in thee Achilles murderer like a malignant fiend; for thou and thou alone hast returned from Troy without a scratch, bringing back thy splendid weapons in their splendid cases just as they went. As for me, I ever told that amorous boy to form no alliance with thee nor take unto his home an evil mother’s child; for daughters bear the marks of their mothers’ ill-repute into their new homes. Wherefore, ye wooers, take heed to this my warning: Choose the daughter of a good mother. And more than this, with what wanton insult didst thou treat thy brother, bidding him sacrifice his daughter in his simpleness! So fearful wast thou of losing thy worthless wife. Then after capturing Troy,–for thither too will I accompany thee,–thou didst not slay that woman, when she was in thy power; but as soon as thine eyes caught sight of her breast, thy sword was dropped and thou didst take her kisses, fondling the shameless traitress, too weak to stem thy hot desire, thou caitiff wretch! Yet spite of all thou art the man to come and work havoc in my grandson’s halls when he is absent, seeking to slay with all indignity a poor weak woman and her babe; but that babe shall one day make thee and thy daughter in thy home rue it, e’en though his birth be trebly base. Yea, for oft ere now hath seed, sown on barren soil, prevailed o’er rich deep tilth, and many a bastard has proved a better man than children better born. Take thy daughter hence with thee! Far better is it for mortals to have a poor honest man either as married kin or friend than a wealthy knave; but as for thee, thou art a thing of naught.

CHORUS: The tongue from trifling causes contrives to breed great strife ’mongst men; wherefore are the wise most careful not to bring about a quarrel with their friends.

MENELAUS: Why, pray, should one call these old men wise, or those who once had a reputation in Hellas for being so? when thou, the great Peleus, employest language disgraceful to thyself and abusive of me because of a barbarian woman, though thou shouldst have banished her far beyond the streams of Nile or Phasis, and ever encouraged me; seeing that she comes from Asia’s continent where fell so many of the sons of Hellas, victims to the spear; and likewise because she shared in the spilling of thy son’s blood; for Paris who slew thy son Achilles, was brother to Hector, whose wife she was. And dost thou enter the same abode with her, and deign to let her share thy board, and suffer her to rear her brood of vipers in thy house? But I, after all this foresight for thee, old man, and myself, am to have her torn from my clutches for wishing to slay her. Yet come now, for there is no disgrace in arguing the matter out; suppose my daughter has no child, while this woman’s sons grow up, wilt thou set them up to rule the land of Phthia, barbarians born and bred to lord it over Hellenes? Am I then so void of sense because I hate injustice, and thou so full of cleverness? Consider yet another point; say thou hadst given a daughter of thine to some citizen, and hadst then seen her thus treated, wouldst thou have sat looking on in silence? I trow not. Dost thou then for a foreigner rail thus at thy nearest friends? Again, thou mayst say, husband and wife have an equally strong case if she is wronged by him, and similarly if he find her guilty of indiscretion in his house; yet while he has ample powers in his own hands, she depends on parents and friends for her case. Surely then I am right in helping my own kin! Thou art in thy dotage; for thou wilt do me more, good by speaking of my generalship than by concealing it. Helen’s trouble was not of her own choosing, but sent by heaven, and it proved a great benefit to Hellas; her sons, till then untried in war or arms, turned to deeds of prowess, and it is experience which teaches man all he knows. I showed my wisdom in refraining from slaying my wife, directly I caught sight of her. Would that thou too hadst ne’er slain Phocus! All this I bring before thee in pure good-will, not from anger. But if thou resent it, thy tongue may wag till it ache, yet shall I gain by prudent forethought.

CHORUS: Cease now from idle words, ’twere better far, for fear ye both alike go wrong.

PELEUS: Alas! what evil customs now prevail in Hellas! Whene’er the host sets up a trophy o’er the foe, men no more consider this the work of those who really toiled, but the general gets the credit for it. Now he was but one among ten thousand others to brandish his spear; he only did the work of one; but yet he wins more praise than they. Again, as magistrates in all the grandeur of office they scorn the common folk, though they are naught themselves; whereas those others are ten thousand times more wise than they, if daring combine with judgment. Even so thou and thy brother, now take your seats in all the swollen pride of Trojan fame and Trojan generalship, exalted by the toilsome efforts of others. But I will teach thee henceforth to consider Idaean Paris a foe less terrible than Peleus, unless forthwith thou pack from this roof, thou and thy childless daughter too, whom my own true son will hale through his halls by the hair of her head; for her barrenness will not let her endure fruitfulness in others, because she has no children herself. Still if she is unlucky in the matter of offspring, is that a reason why we should be left childless? Begone! ye varlets, let her go! I will soon see if anyone will hinder me from loosing her hands. To Andromache. Arise; these trembling hands of mine will untie the twisted thongs that bind thee. Out on thee, coward! is this how thou hast galled her wrists? Didst think thou wert lashing up a lion or bull? or wert afraid she would snatch a sword and defend herself against thee? Come, child, nestle to thy mother’s arms; help me loose her bonds; I will yet rear thee in Phthia to be their bitter foe. If your reputation for prowess and the battles ye have fought were taken from you Spartans, in all else, be very sure, you have not your inferiors.

CHORUS: The race of old men practises no restraint; and their testiness makes it hard to check them.

MENELAUS: Thou art only too ready to rush into abuse; while, as for me, I came to Phthia by constraint and have therefore no intention either of doing or suffering anything mean. Now must I return home, for I have no time to waste; for there is a city not so very far from Sparta, which aforetime was friendly but now is hostile; against her will I march with my army and bring her into subjection. And when I have arranged that matter as I wish, I will return; and face to face with my son-in-law I will give my version of the story and hear his. And if he punish her, and for the future she exercise self-control, she shall find me do the like; but if he storm, I’ll storm as well; and every act of mine shall be a reflex of his own. As for thy babbling, I can bear it easily; for, like to a shadow as thou art, thy voice is all thou hast, and thou art powerless to do aught but talk. Exit Menelaus.

PELEUS: Lead on, my child, safe beneath my sheltering wing, and thou too, poor lady; for thou art come into a quiet haven after the rude storm.

ANDROMACHE: Heaven reward thee and all thy race, old sire, for having saved my child and me his hapless mother! Only beware lest they fall upon us twain in some lonely spot upon the road and force me from thee, when they see thy age, my weakness, and this child’s tender years; take heed to this, that we be not a second time made captive, after escaping now.

PELEUS: Forbear such words, prompted by a woman’s cowardice. Go on thy way; who will lay a finger on you? Methinks he will do it to his cost. For by heaven’s grace I rule o’er many a knight and spearman bold in my kingdom of Phthia; yea, and myself can still stand straight, no bent old man as thou dost think; such a fellow as that a mere look from me will put to flight in spite of my years. For e’en an old man, be he brave, is worth a host of raw youths; for what avails a fine figure if a man is a coward? Exeunt Peleus, Andromache, and Molossus.

Part 7

CHORUS: Oh! to have never been born, or sprung from noble sires, the heir to mansions richly stored; for if aught untoward e’er befall, there is no lack of champions for sons of noble parents, and there is honour and glory for them when they are proclaimed scions of illustrious lines; time detracts not from the legacy these good men leave, but the light of their goodness still burns on when they are dead.

CHORUS: Better is it not to win a discreditable victory, than to make justice miscarry by an invidious exercise of power; for such a victory, though men think it sweet for the moment, grows barren in time and comes very near being a family reproach. This is the life I commend, this the life. I set before me as my ideal, to exercise no authority beyond what is right either in the marriage-chamber or in the state.

CHORUS: O aged son of Aeacus! now am I sure that thou wert with the Lapithae, wielding thy famous spear, when they fought the Centaurs; and on Argo’s deck didst pass the cheerless strait beyond the sea-beat Symplegades on her voyage of note; and when in days long gone the son of Zeus spread slaughter round Troy’s famous town, thou too didst share his triumphant return to Europe.

NURSE: Alas! good friends, what a succession of troubles is to-day provided us! My mistress Hermione within the house, deserted by her father and in remorse for her monstrous deed in plotting the death of Andromache and her child, is bent on dying; for she is afraid her husband will in requital for this expel her with dishonour from his house or put her to death, because she tried to slay the innocent. And the servants that watch her can scarce restrain her efforts to hang herself, scarce catch the sword and wrest it from her hand. So bitter is her anguish, and she hath recognized the villainy of her former deeds. As for me, friends, I am weary of keeping my mistress from the fatal noose; do ye go in and try to save her life; for if strangers come, they prove more persuasive than the friends of every day.

CHORUS: Ah yes! I hear an outcry in the house amongst the servants, confirming the news thou hast brought. Poor sufferer! she seems about to show a lively grief for her grave crimes; for she has escaped her servants’ hands and is rushing from the house, eager to end her life.

HERMIONE: rushing wildly on to the stage. Woe, woe is me! I will tear my hair and scratch cruel furrows in my cheeks.

NURSE: My child, what wilt thou do? Wilt thou disfigure thyself?

HERMIONE: Ah me! ah me! Begone, thou fine-spun veil! float from my head away!

NURSE: Daughter, cover up thy bosom, fasten thy robe.

HERMIONE: Why should I cover it? My crimes against my lord are manifest and clear, they cannot be hidden.

NURSE: Art so grieved at having devised thy rival’s death?

HERMIONE: Indeed I am; I deeply mourn my fatal deeds of daring; alas! I am now accursed in all men’s eyes!

NURSE: Thy husband will pardon thee this error.

HERMIONE: Oh! why didst thou hunt me to snatch away my sword? Give, oh! give it back, dear nurse, that I may thrust it through my heart. Why dost thou prevent me hanging myself?

NURSE: What! was I to let thy madness lead thee on to death?

HERMIONE: Ah me, my destiny! Where can I find some friendly fire? To what rocky height can I climb above the sea or ’mid some wooded mountain glen, there to die and trouble but the dead?

NURSE: Why vex thyself thus? on all of us sooner or later heaven’s visitation comes.

HERMIONE: Thou hast left me, O my father, left me like a stranded bark, all alone, without an oar. My lord will surely slay me; no home is mine henceforth beneath my husband’s roof. What god is there to whose statue I can as a suppliant haste? or shall I throw myself in slavish wise at slavish knees? Would I could speed away from Phthia’s land on bird’s dark pinion, or like that pine-built ship, the first that ever sailed betwixt the rocks Cyanean!

NURSE: My child, I can as little praise thy previous sinful excesses, committed against the Trojan captive, as thy present exaggerated terror. Thy husband will never listen to a barbarian’s weak pleading and reject his marriage with thee for this. For thou wast no captive from Troy whom he wedded, but the daughter of a gallant sire, with a rich dower, from a city too of no mean prosperity. Nor will thy father forsake thee, as thou dreadest, and allow thee to be cast out from this house. Nay, enter now, nor show thyself before the palace, lest the sight of thee there bring reproach upon thee, my daughter. Exit Nurse.

CHORUS: Lo! a stranger of foreign appearance from some other land comes hurrying towards us.

Part 8

ORESTES: Ladies of this foreign land! is this the home, the palace of Achilles’ son?

CHORUS: Thou hast it; but who art thou to ask such a question?

ORESTES: The son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, by name Orestes, on my way to the oracle of Zeus at Dodona. But now that I am come to Phthia, I am resolved to inquire about my kinswoman, Hermione of Sparta; is she alive and well? for though she dwells in a land far from my own, I love her none the less.

HERMIONE: Son of Agamemnon, thy appearing is as a haven from the storm to sailors; by thy knees I pray, have pity on me in my distress, on me of whose fortunes thou art inquiring. About thy knees I twine my arms with all the force of sacred fillets.

ORESTES: Ha! what is this? Am I mistaken or do I really see before me the queen of this palace, the daughter of Menelaus?

HERMIONE: The same, that only child whom Helen, daughter of Tyndareus, bore my father in his halls; never doubt that.

ORESTES: O saviour Phoebus, grant us respite from our woe! But what is the matter? art thou afflicted by gods or men?

HERMIONE: Partly by myself, partly by the man who wedded me, and partly by some god. On every side I see ruin.

ORESTES: Why, what misfortune could happen to a woman as yet childless, unless her honour is concerned?

HERMIONE: My very complaint! Thou hast hit my case exactly.

ORESTES: On whom has thy husband set his affections in thy stead?

HERMIONE: On his captive, Hector’s wife.

ORESTES: An evil case indeed, for a man to have two wives!

HERMIONE: ’Tis even thus. So I resented it.

ORESTES: Didst thou with woman’s craft devise a plot against thy rival?

HERMIONE: Yes, to slay her and her bastard child.

ORESTES: And didst thou slay them, or did something happen to rescue them from thee?

HERMIONE: It was old Peleus, who showed regard to the weaker side.

ORESTES: Hadst thou any accomplice in this attempted murder?

HERMIONE: My father came from Sparta for this very purpose.

Part 9

ORESTES: And was he after all defeated by that old man’s prowess ?

HERMIONE: Oh no! but by shame; and he hath gone and left me all alone.

ORESTES: I understand; thou art afraid of thy husband for that thou hast done.

HERMIONE: Thou hast guessed it; for he will have a right to me. What can I say for myself? Yet I beseech thee by Zeus the god of our family, send me to a land as far as possible from this, or to my father’s house; for these very walls seem to cry out Begone! and all the land of Phthia bates me. But if my lord return ere that from the oracle of Phoebus, he will put me to death on a shameful charge, or enslave me to his mistress, whom I ruled before. Maybe some one will say, How was it thou didst go thus astray? I was ruined by mischievous women who came to me and puffed me up with words like these: What! wilt thou suffer that vile captive, a mere bondmaid, to dwell within thy house and share thy wedded rights? By Heaven’s queen! if it were my house she should not live to reap my marriage-harvest! And I listened to the words of these Sirens, the cunning, knavish, subtle praters, and was filled with silly thoughts. What need had I to care about my lord? I had all I wanted, wealth in plenty, a house in which I was mistress, and as for children, mine would be born in wedlock, while hers would be bastards, half-slaves to mine. Oh! never, never,–this truth will I repeat,–should men of sense, who have wives, allow women-folk to visit them in their homes, for they teach them mischief; one, to gain some private end, helps to corrupt their honour; another, having made a slip herself, wants a companion in misfortune, while many are wantons; and hence it is men’s houses are tainted. Wherefore keep strict guard upon the portals of your houses with bolts and bars; for these visits of strange women lead to no good result, but a world of mischief.

CHORUS: Thou hast given thy tongue too free a rein regarding thy own sex. I can pardon thee in this case, but still women ought to smooth over their sisters’ weaknesses.

ORESTES: ’Twas sage counsel he gave who taught men to hear the arguments on both sides. I, for instance, though aware of the confusion in this house, the quarrel between thee and Hector’s wife, waited awhile and watched to see whether thou wouldst stay here or from fear of that captive art minded to quit these halls. Now it was not so much regard for thy message that brought me hither, as the intention of carrying thee away from this house, if, as now, thou shouldst grant me a chance of saying so. For thou wert mine formerly, but art now living with thy present husband through thy father’s baseness; since he, before invading Troy’s domains, betrothed thee to me, and then afterwards promised thee to thy present lord, provided he captured the city of Troy. So, as soon as Achilles’ son returned hither, I forgave thy father, but entreated the bridegroom to forego his marriage with thee, telling him all I had gone through and my present misfortune; I might get a wife, I said, from amongst friends, but outside their circle ’twas no easy task for one exiled like myself from home. Thereat he grew abusive, taunting me with my mother’s murder and those blood-boltered fiends. And I was humbled by the fortunes of my house, and though ’tis true, I grieved, yet did I endure my sorrow, and reluctantly departed, robbed of thy promised hand. Now therefore, since thou findest thy fortune so abruptly changed and art fallen thus on evil days and hast no help, I will take thee hence and place thee in thy father’s hands. For kinship hath strong claims, and in adversity there is naught better than a kinsman’s kindly aid.

HERMIONE: As for my marriage, my father must look to it; ’tis not for me to decide that. Yes, take me hence as soon as may be, lest my husband come back to his house before I am gone, or Peleus hear that I am deserting his son’s abode and pursue me on horse-back.

ORESTES: Rest easy about the old man’s power; and, as for Achilles’ son with all his insolence to me, never fear him; such a crafty net this hand hath woven and set for his death with knots that none can loose; whereof I will not speak before the time, but, when my plot begins to work, Delphi’s rock will witness it. If but my allies in the Pythian land abide by their oaths, this same murderer of his mother will show that no one else shall marry thee my rightful bride. To his cost will he demand satisfaction of King Phoebus for his father’s blood; nor shall his repentance avail him, though he is now submitting to the god. No! he shall perish miserably by Apollo’s hand and my fake accusations; so shall he end out my enmity. For the deity upsets the fortune of them that hate him. and suffers them not to be high-minded. Exeunt Orestes and Hermione.

CHORUS: O Phoebus! who didst fence the hill of Ilium with a fair coronal of towers, and thou, ocean-god! coursing o’er the main with thy dark steeds, wherefore did ye hand over in dishonour your own handiwork to the war-god, master of the spear, abandoning Troy to wretchedness?

CHORUS: Many a well-horsed car ye yoked on the banks of Simois, and many a bloody tournament did ye ordain with never a prize to win; and Ilium’s princes are dead and gone; no longer in Troy is seen the blaze of fire on altars of the gods with the smoke of incense.

CHORUS: The son of Atreus is no more, slain by the hand of his wife, and she herself hath paid the debt of blood by death, and from her children’s hands received her doom. The god’s own bidding from his oracle was levelled against her, in the day that Agamemnon’s son set forth from Argos and visited his shrine; so he slew her, aye, spilt his own mother’s blood. O Phoebus, O thou power divine, how can I believe the story?

CHORUS: Anon wherever Hellenes gather, was heard the voice of lamentation, mothers weeping o’er their children’s fate, as they left their homes to mate with strangers. Ah! thou art not the only one, nor thy dear ones either, on whom the cloud of grief hath fallen. Hellas had to bear the visitation, and thence the scourge crossed to Phrygia’s fruitful fields, raining the bloody drops the; death-god loves.

PELEUS: Ye dames of Phthia, answer my questions. I heard a vague rumour that the daughter of Menelaus had left these halls and fled; so now am I come in hot haste to learn if this be true; for it is the duty of those who are at home to labour in the interests of their absent friends.

CHORUS: Thou hast heard aright, O Peleus; ill would it become me to hide the evil case in which I now find myself; our queen has fled and left these halls.

PELEUS: What was she afraid of? explain that to me.

CHORUS: She was fearful her lord would cast her out

PELEUS: In return for plotting his child’s death? surely not?

CHORUS: Yea, and she was afraid of yon captive.

PELEUS: With whom did she leave the house? with her father?

CHORUS: The son of Agamemnon came and took her hence.

Part 10

PELEUS: What view hath he to further thereby? Will he marry her?

CHORUS: Yes, and he is plotting thy grandson’s death.

PELEUS: From an ambuscade, or meeting him fairly face to face?

CHORUS: In the holy place of Loxias, leagued with Delphians.

PELEUS: God help us! This is an immediate danger. Hasten one of you with all speed to the Pythian altar and tell our friends there what has happened here, ere Achilles’ son be slain by his enemies. Enter a Messenger.

MESSENGER: Woe worth the day! what evil tidings have I brought for thee, old sire, and for all who love my master! woe is me!

PELEUS: Alas! my prophetic soul hath a presentiment.

MESSENGER: Aged Peleus, hearken! Thy grandson is no more; so grievously is he smitten by the men of Delphi and the stranger from Mycenae.

CHORUS: Ah! what wilt thou do, old man? Fall not; uplift thyself.

PELEUS: I am a thing of naught; death is come upon me. My voice is choked, my limbs droop beneath me.

MESSENGER: Hearken; if thou art eager also to avenge thy friends, lift up thyself and hear what happened.

PELEUS: Ah, destiny! how tightly hast thou caught me in thy toils, a poor old man at life’s extremest verge! But tell me how he was taken from me, my one son’s only child; unwelcome as such news is, I fain would hear it.

MESSENGER: As soon as we reached the famous soil of Phoebus, for three whole days were we feasting our eyes with the sight. And this, it seems, caused suspicion; for the folk, who dwell near the god’s shrine, began to collect in groups, while Agamemnon’s son, going to and fro through the town, would whisper in each man’s ear malignant hints: Do ye see yon fellow, going in and out of the god’s treasure-chambers, which are full of the gold stored there by all mankind? He is come hither a second time on the same mission as before, eager to sack the temple of Phoebus. Thereon there ran an angry murmur through the city, and the magistrates flocked to their council-chamber, while those, who have charge of the god’s treasures, had a guard privately placed amongst the colonnades. But we, knowing naught as yet of this, took sheep fed in the pastures of Parnassus, and went our way and stationed ourselves at the altars with vouchers and Pythian seers. And one said: What prayer, young warrior, wouldst thou have us offer to the god? Wherefore art thou come? And he answered: I wish to make atonement to Phoebus for my past transgression; for once I claimed from him satisfaction for my father’s blood. Thereupon the rumour, spread by Orestes, proved to have great weight, suggesting that my master was lying and had come on a shameful errand. But he crosses the threshold of the temple to pray to Phoebus before his oracle, and was busy with his burnt-offering; when a body of men armed with swords set themselves in ambush against him in the cover of the bay- trees, and Clytemnestra’s son, that had contrived the whole plot was one of them. There stood the young man praying to the god in sight of all, when lo! with their sharp swords they stabbed Achilles’ unprotected son from behind. But he stepped back, for it was not a mortal wound he had received, and drew his sword, and snatching armour from the pegs where it hung on a pillar, took his stand upon the altar-steps, the picture of a warrior grim; then cried he to the sons of Delphi, and asked them: Why seek to slay me when I am come on a holy mission? What cause is there why I should die? But of all that throng of bystanders, no man answered him a word, but they set to hurling stones. Then he, though bruised and battered by the showers of missiles from all sides, covered himself behind his mail and tried to ward off the attack, holding his shield first here, then there, at arm’s length, but all of no avail; for a storm of darts, arrows and javelins, hurtling spits with double points, and butchers’ knives for slaying steers, came flying at his feet; and terrible was the war-dance thou hadst then seen thy grandson dance to avoid their marksmanship. At last, when they were hemming him in on all sides, allowing him no breathing space, he left the shelter of the altar, the hearth where victims are placed, and with one bound was on them as on the Trojans of yore; and they turned and fled like doves when they see the hawk. Many fell in the confusion; some wounded, and others trodden down by one another along the narrow passages; and in that hushed holy house uprose unholy din and echoed back from the rocks. Calm and still my master stood there in his gleaming harness like a flash of light, till from the inmost shrine there came a voice of thrilling horror, stirring the crowd to make a stand. Then fell Achilles’ son, smitten through the flank by some Delphian’s biting blade, some fellow that slew him with a host to help; and as he fell, there was not one that did not stab him, or cast a rock and batter his corpse. So his whole body, once so fair, was marred with savage wounds. At last they cast the lifeless clay, lying near the altar, forth from the fragrant fane. And we gathered up his remains forthwith and are bringing them to thee, old prince, to mourn and weep and honour with a deep-dug tomb. This is how that prince who vouchsafeth oracles to others, that judge of what is right for all the world, hath revenged himself on Achilles’ son, remembering his ancient quarrel as a wicked man would. How then can he be wise? Exit Messenger. The body of Neoptolemus is carried in on a bier.

CHORUS: Lo! E’en now our prince is being carried on a bier from Delphi’s land unto his home. Woe for him and his sad fate, and woe for thee, old sire! for this is not the welcome thou wouldst give Achilles’ son, the lion’s whelp; thyself too dost share his evil lot.

PELEUS: Ah! woe is me! here is a sad sight for me to see and take unto my halls! Ah me! ah me! I am undone, thou city of Thessaly! My line now ends; I have no children left me in my home. Oh! the sorrows I seem born to endure! What friend can I look to for relief? Ah, dear lips, and cheeks, and hands! Would thy destiny had slain thee ’neath Ilium’s walls beside the banks of Simois!

CHORUS: Had he so died, my aged lord, he had won him honour thereby, and thine had been the happier lot.

PELEUS: O marriage, marriage, woe to thee! thou bane of my home, thou destroyer of my city! Ah my child, my boy! would that the honour of wedding thee, fraught with evil as it was to my children and house, had not thrown oer thee, my son, Hermiones deadly net! O that the thunderbolt had slain her sooner! and that thou, rash mortal, hadst never charged the great god Phoebus with aiming that murderous shaft that spilt thy hero-fathers blood!

CHORUS: Woe! woe! alas! With due observance of funeral rites will I begin the mourning for my dead master.

PELEUS: Alack and well-a-day! I take up the tearful dirge, ah me! old and wretched as I am.

CHORUS: ’Tis Heaven’s decree; God willed this heavy stroke.

Part 11

PELEUS: O darling child, thou hast left me all alone in my halls, old and childless by thy loss.

CHORUS: Thou shouldst have died, old sire, before thy children.

PELEUS: Shall I not tear my hair, and smite upon my head with grievous blows? O city! of both my children hath Phoebus robbed me.

CHORUS: What evils thou hast suffered, what sorrows thou hast seen, thou poor old man! what shall be thy life hereafter?

PELEUS: Childless, desolate, with no limit to my grief, I must drain the cup of woe, until I die.

CHORUS: ’Twas all in vain the gods wished thee joy on thy wedding day.

PELEUS: All my hopes have flown away, fallen short of my high boasts.

CHORUS: A lonely dweller in a lonely home art thou.

PELEUS: I have no city any longer; there! on the ground my sceptre do I cast; and thou, daughter of Nereus, neath thy dim grotto, shalt see me grovelling in the dust, a ruined king.

CHORUS: Look, look! What is that moving? what influence divine am I conscious of? Look, maidens, mark it well; see, yonder is some deity, wafted through the lustrous air and alighting on the plains of Phthia, home of steeds.

THETIS: O Peleus! because of my wedded days with thee now long agone, I Thetis am come from the halls of Nereus. And first I counsel thee not to grieve to excess in thy present distress, for I too who need ne’er have born children to my sorrow, have lost the child of our love, Achilles swift of foot, foremost of the sons of Hellas. Next will I declare why I am come, and do thou give ear. Carry yonder corpse, Achilles’ son, to the Pythian altar and there bury it, a reproach to Delphi, that his tomb may proclaim the violent death he met at the hand of Orestes. And for his captive wife Andromache,–she must dwell in the Molossian land, united in honourable wedlock with Helenus, and with her this babe, the sole survivor as he is of all the line of Aeacus, for from him a succession of prosperous kings of Molossia is to go on unbroken; for the race that springs from thee and me, my aged lord, must not thus be brought to naught; no! nor Troy’s line either; for her fate too is cared for by the gods, albeit her fall was due to the eager wish of Pallas. Thee too, that thou mayst know the saving grace of wedding me, will I, release from all the ills that flesh is heir to and make a deity to know not death nor decay. From henceforth in the halls of Nereus shalt thou dwell with me, god and goddess together; thence shalt thou rise dry-shod from out the main and see Achilles, our dear son, settled in his island-home by the strand of Leuce, that is girdled by the Euxine sea. But get thee to Delphi’s god-built town, carrying this corpse with thee, and, after thou hast buried him, return and settle in the cave which time hath hollowed in the Sepian rock and there abide, till from the sea I come with choir of fifty Nereids to be thy escort thence; for fate’s decree thou must fulfil; such is the pleasure of Zeus. Cease then to mourn the dead; this is the lot which heaven assigns to all, and all must pay their debt to death.

PELEUS: Great queen, my honoured wife, from Nereus sprung, all hail! thou art acting herein as befits thyself and thy children. So I will stay my grief at thy bidding, goddess, and, when I have buried the dead, will seek the glens of Pelion, even the place where I took thy beauteous form to my embrace. Surely after this every prudent man will seek to marry a wife of noble stock and give his daughter to a husband good and true, never setting his heart on a worthless woman, not even though she bring a sumptuous dowry to his house. So would men ne’er suffer ill at heaven’s hand.

CHORUS: Many are the shapes of Heaven’s denizens, and many a thing they bring to pass contrary to our expectation; that which we thought would be is not accomplished, while for the unexpected God finds out a way. E’en such hath been the issue of this matter.

Contents — 14 sections

1. Part 1
2. Part 2
3. Part 3
4. Part 4
5. Part 5
6. Part 6
7. Part 7
8. Part 8
9. Part 9
10. Part 10
11. Part 11
12. Part 12
13. Part 13
14. Part 14

Part 1

GHOST: I have come from out of the charnel-house and gates of gloom, where Hades dwells apart from gods, I Polydorus, a son of Hecuba, the daughter of Cisseus, and of Priam. Now my father, when Phrygia’s capital was threatened with destruction by the spear of Hellas, took alarm and conveyed me secretly from the land of Troy to Polymestor’s house, his guest-friend in Thrace, who sows these fruitful plains of Chersonese, curbing by his might a nation delighting in horses. And with me my father sent much gold by stealth, so that, if ever Ilium’s walls should fall, his children that survived might not want for means to live. I was the youngest of Priam’s sons; and this it was that caused my secret removal from the land; for my childish arm was not able to carry weapons or to wield the spear. So long then as the bulwarks of our land stood firm, and Troy’s battlements abode unshaken, and my brother Hector prospered in his warring, I, poor child, grew up and flourished, like some vigorous shoot, at the court of the Thracian, my father’s guest-friend. But when Troy fell and Hector lost his life and my father’s hearth was rooted up, and he himself fell butchered at the god-built altar by the hands of Achilles’ murderous son; then my father’s friend killed me, his helpless guest, for the sake of the gold, and then cast me into the swell of the sea, to keep the gold for himself in his house. And there I lie, at one time upon the strand, at another in the salt sea’s surge, drifting ever up and down upon the billows, unwept, unburied; but now I am hovering over the head of my dear mother Hecuba, a disembodied spirit, keeping my airy station these three days, ever since my poor mother came from Troy to linger here in the Chersonese. Meanwhile all the Achaeans sit idly here in their ships at the shores of Thrace; for the son of Peleus, Achilles, appeared above his tomb and stopped the whole army of Hellas, as they were making straight for home across the sea, demanding to have my sister Polyxena offered at his tomb, and to receive his reward. And he will obtain this prize, nor will they that are his friends refuse the gift; and on this very day fate is leading my sister to her doom. So will my mother see two children dead at once, me and that ill-fated maid. For I, to win a grave, ah me! will appear among the rippling waves before her servant-maid’s feet. Yes! I have begged this from the powers below, to find a tomb and fall into my mother’s hands. So shall I have my heart’s desire; but now I will get out of the way of aged Hecuba, for here she passes on her way from the shelter of Agamemnon’s tent, terrified at my spectre. Alas! O mother, from a palace to face a life of slavery, how sad your lot, as sad as once it was blessed! Some god is now destroying you, setting this in the balance to outweigh your former bliss.

HECUBA: Guide these aged steps, my servants, forth before the house; guide and support your fellow-slave, once your queen, you maids of Troy. Grasp my aged hand, take me, support me, guide me, lift me up; and I will lean upon your bent arm as on a staff and quicken my halting footsteps onwards. O dazzling light of Zeus! O gloom of night! why am I thus scared by fearful visions of the night? O lady Earth, mother of dreams that fly on sable wings! I am seeking to avert the vision of the night, the sight of horror which I learned from my dreams about my son, who is safe in Thrace, and Polyxena, my dear daughter. You gods of this land! preserve my son, the last and only anchor of my house, now settled in Thrace, the land of snow, safe in the keeping of his father’s friend. Some fresh disaster is in store, a new strain of sorrow will be added to our woe. Such ceaseless thrills of terror never wrung my heart before. Oh! where, you Trojan maidens, can I find inspired Helenus or Cassandra, that they may read me my dream? For I saw a dappled deer mangled by a wolf’s bloody fangs, torn from my knees by force, piteously. And this too filled me with fear; over the summit of his tomb appeared Achilles’ phantom, and for his prize he would have one of the luckless maids of Troy. Therefore, I implore you, divine powers, avert this horror from my daughter, from my child.

CHORUS: Hecuba, I have hastened away to you, leaving my master’s tent, where the lot assigned me as his slave, when I was driven from the city of Ilium, hunted by Achaeans at the point of the spear; no alleviation do I bring for your sufferings; no, I have laden myself with heavy news, and am a herald of sorrow to you, lady. It is said the Achaeans have determined in full assembly to offer your daughter in sacrifice to Achilles; for you know how one day he appeared standing on his tomb in golden armor, and stayed the sea-borne ships, though they had their sails already hoisted, with this pealing cry: Where away so fast, you Danaids, leaving my tomb without its prize? A violent dispute with stormy altercation arose, and opinion was divided in the warrior army of Hellas, some being in favor of offering the sacrifice at the tomb, others dissenting. There was Agamemnon, all eagerness in your interest, because of his love for the frenzied prophetess; but the two sons of Theseus, scions of Athens, though supporting different proposals, yet agreed on the same decision, which was to crown Achilles’ tomb with fresh blood; for they said they never would set Cassandra’s bed before Achilles’ valor. Now the zeal of the rival disputants was almost equal, until that shifty, smooth-mouthed liar, the son of Laertes, whose tongue is always at the service of the mob, persuaded the army not to put aside the best of all the Danaids for want of a servant-maid’s sacrifice, nor have it said by any of the dead that stand beside Persephone that the Danaids have left the plains of Troy without gratitude for their companions who died for Hellas. Odysseus will be here in an instant, to drag the tender maiden from your breast and tear her from your aged arms. Go to the temples, go to the altars, at Agamemnon’s knees sit as a suppliant! Invoke the gods, both those in heaven and those beneath the earth. For either your prayers will avail to spare you the loss of your unhappy child, or you must see your daughter fall before the tomb, her crimson blood spurting in deep dark jets from her neck encircled with gold.

HECUBA: Woe, woe is me! What words, or cries, or lamentations can I utter? Ah me! for the sorrows of my closing years! for slavery too cruel to endure, to bear! Woe, woe is me! What champion do I have? Family, and city—where are they? Aged Priam is no more; no more my children now. Which way am I to go, either this or that? Where shall I turn my steps? Where is any god or divine power to come to my aid? Ah, Trojan maids! bringers of evil tidings! Messengers of woe! you have made an end, an utter end of me; life on earth has no more charm for me. Oh! luckless steps, lead on, guide your aged mistress here to the tent. My child, daughter of a most wretched woman, come forth; listen to your mother’s voice.

POLYXENA: Oh! mother, mother, why do you call so loud? what news is it you have proclaimed, scaring me, like a cowering bird, from my chamber by this alarm?

HECUBA: Alas, my daughter!

POLYXENA: Why this ominous address? it means sorrow for me.

HECUBA: Woe for your life!

POLYXENA: Tell it, hide it no longer. Ah mother! how I dread, I dread the import of your loud laments.

HECUBA: Ah my daughter! a luckless mother’s child!

POLYXENA: Why do you tell me this?

HECUBA: The Argives with one consent are eager for your sacrifice to the son of Peleus at his tomb.

POLYXENA: Ah! my mother! how can you speak of such a dire mischance? Tell me all, mother, yes all!

HECUBA: It is an ill-boding rumor I tell, my child; they bring me word that sentence is passed upon your life by the Argives’ vote.

POLYXENA: Alas, for your cruel sufferings, my persecuted mother! woe for your life of grief! What grievous outrage has some fiend sent on you, hateful, horrible? No more shall I your daughter share your bondage, hapless youth on hapless age attending. For you, alas! will see me, your hapless child, torn from your arms like a calf of the hills, and sent beneath the darkness of the earth with severed throat for Hades, where with the dead shall I be laid, ah me! For your unhappiness I weep with plaintive wail, mother; but for my own life, its ruin and its outrage, never a tear I shed; no, death has become to me a happier lot than life.

CHORUS LEADER: See where Odysseus comes in haste, to announce some fresh command to you, Hecuba.

ODYSSEUS: Lady, I think you know already the intention of the army, and the vote that has been passed; still I will declare it. It is the Achaeans’ will to sacrifice your daughter Polyxena at the mound heaped over Achilles’ grave; and they appoint me to take the maid and bring her there, while the son of Achilles is chosen to preside over the sacrifice and act as priest. Do you know then what to do? Do not be forcibly torn from her, nor match your might against mine; recognize the limits of your strength, and the presence of your troubles. Even in adversity it is wise to yield to reason’s dictates.

HECUBA: Alas! a dreadful trial is near, it seems, full of mourning, rich in tears. Yes, I too escaped death where death had been my due, and Zeus did not destroy me but is still preserving my life, that I may witness in my misery fresh sorrows surpassing all before. But if the bond may ask the free of things that do not grieve them or wrench their heart-strings, you ought to speak in answer to my questions and I ought to hear what you have to say.

ODYSSEUS: Granted; put your questions; I do not grudge you that delay.

HECUBA: Do you know when you came to spy on Ilium, disguised in rags and tatters, while down your cheek ran drops of blood?

Part 2

ODYSSEUS: I do; for it was no slight impression it made upon my heart.

HECUBA: Did Helen recognize you and tell me only?

ODYSSEUS: I well remember the great risk I ran.

HECUBA: Did you embrace my knees in all humility?

ODYSSEUS: Yes, so that my hand grew dead and cold upon your robe.

HECUBA: Was it I that saved and sent you forth again?

ODYSSEUS: You did, and so I still behold the light of day.

HECUBA: What did you say then, when in my power?

ODYSSEUS: Doubtless I found plenty to say, to save my life.

HECUBA: Are not you then playing a sorry part to plot against me thus, after the kind treatment you by your own confession received from me, showing me no gratitude but all the ill you can? A thankless race! all you who covet honor from the mob for your oratory. Oh that you were unknown to me! you who harm your friends and think no more of it, if you can say a word to win the mob. But tell me, what kind of cleverness did they think it, when against this child they passed their bloody vote? Was it duty that led them to slay a human victim at the tomb, where sacrifice of oxen is more fitting? or does Achilles, if claiming the lives of those who slew him as his recompense, show his justice by marking her out for death? No! she at least never injured him. He should have demanded Helen as a victim at his tomb, for she it was that proved his ruin, bringing him to Troy; or if some captive of surpassing beauty was to be singled out for death, this did not point to us; for the daughter of Tyndareus was fairest of all, and her injury to him was proved no less than ours. Against the justice of his plea I pit this argument. Now hear the recompense due from you to me at my request. On your own confession, you fell at my feet and embraced my hand and aged cheek; I in my turn now do the same to you, and claim the favor then bestowed; and I implore you, do not tear my child from my arms or slay her; there are dead enough. In her I take delight and forget my sorrows; she is my comfort in place of many a loss, my city and my nurse, my staff and journey’s guide. It is not right that those in power should use it out of season, or, when prosperous, suppose they will be always so. For I also was prosperous once, but now my life is lived, and one day robbed me of all my bliss. Friend, by your beard, have some regard and pity for me; go to Achaea’s army, and talk them over, saying how hateful a thing it is to slay women whom at first you spared out of pity, after dragging them from the altars. For among you the same law holds good for slave and free alike respecting bloodshed; such a reputation as yours will persuade them even though its words are weak; for the same argument, when proceeding from those of no account, has not the same force as when it is uttered by men of mark.

CHORUS LEADER: Human nature is not so stony-hearted as to hear your plaintive tale and catalogue of sorrows, without shedding a tear.

ODYSSEUS: O Hecuba, be schooled by me, and do not in your angry mood count him a foe who speaks wisely. Your life I am prepared to save, for the service I received; I do not say otherwise. But what I said to all, I will not now deny, that after Troy’s capture I would give your daughter to the chief man of our army because he asked a victim. For here is a source of weakness to many states, whenever a man of brave and generous soul receives no greater honor than his inferiors. Now Achilles, lady, deserves honor at our hands, since on behalf of Hellas the man died most nobly. Is not this a foul reproach to treat him as a friend in life, but, when he is gone from us, to treat him so no more? Enough! what will they say, if once more there comes a gathering of the army and a contest with the foe? Shall we fight or nurse our lives, seeing the dead have no honors? For myself, indeed, when alive, if my daily store were scant, yet it would be all-sufficient, but my tomb I should wish to be an object of respect, for this gratitude has long to run. You speak of cruel sufferings; hear my answer. Among us are grey old women and men no less miserable than you, and brides bereft of gallant husbands, over whom this Trojan dust has closed. Endure these sorrows; for us, if we are wrong in resolving to honor the brave, we shall bring upon ourselves a charge of ignorance; but as for you barbarians, do not regard your friends as such and pay no homage to your gallant dead, so that Hellas may prosper and you may reap the fruits of such policy.

CHORUS LEADER: Alas! how cursed is slavery always in its nature, forced by the might of the stronger to endure unseemly treatment.

HECUBA: Daughter, my pleading to avert your bloody death was wasted idly, hurled forth on the air; but you, if endowed with greater power than your mother, make haste to utter every pleading note like the tuneful nightingale, to save your soul from death. Throw yourself pitiably at Odysseus’ knees, and try to move him—here is your plea: he too has children—to feel pity for your sad fate.

POLYXENA: Odysseus, I see you hiding your right hand beneath your robe and turning away your face, so that I may not touch your beard. Take heart; you are safe from the suppliant’s god in my case, for I will follow you, both because I must and because it is my wish to die; for if I were unwilling, a coward would I show myself, a woman faint of heart. Why should I prolong my days? I whose father was lord of all the Phrygians, my chiefest pride in life. Then I was nursed on fair hopes to be a bride for kings, the center of keen jealousy among suitors, to see whose home I would make my own; and over each lady of Ida I was queen; ah me! admired among maidens, equal to a goddess, save for death alone, but now I am a slave! That name first makes me long for death, so strange it sounds; and then perhaps my lot might give me to some savage master, one that would buy me for money—me the sister of Hector and many others—who would make me knead him bread within his halls, or sweep his house or set me working at the loom, leading a life of misery; while some slave, bought I know not where, will taint my bed, once deemed worthy of royalty. No, never! Here I close my eyes upon the light, free as yet, and dedicate myself to Hades. Lead me away, Odysseus, and do your worst, for I see nothing within my reach to make me hope or expect with any confidence that I am ever again to be happy. Mother, do not seek to hinder me by word or deed, but join in my wish for death before I meet with shameful treatment undeserved. For whoever is not used to taste of sorrows, though he bears it, yet it galls him when he puts his neck within the yoke; far happier would he be dead than alive, for life bereft of honor is toil and trouble.

CHORUS LEADER: A wondrous mark, most clearly stamped, does noble birth imprint on men, and the name goes still further where it is deserved.

HECUBA: A noble speech, my daughter! but there is sorrow linked with its noble sentiments. Odysseus, if you must please the son of Peleus, and avoid reproach, do not slay this maid, but lead me to Achilles’ pyre and torture me unsparingly; it was I that bore Paris, whose fatal shaft laid low the son of Thetis.

ODYSSEUS: It is not your death, my lady, that Achilles’ ghost has demanded of the Achaeans, but hers.

HECUBA: At least then slaughter me with my child; so shall there be a double drink of blood for the earth and the dead that claims this sacrifice.

ODYSSEUS: The maiden’s death suffices; no need to add a second to the first; would we did not need even this!

Part 3

HECUBA: Die with my daughter I must and will.

ODYSSEUS: How so? I did not know I had a master.

HECUBA: I will cling to her like ivy to an oak.

ODYSSEUS: Not if you will listen to those who are wiser than you.

HECUBA: Be sure I will never willingly relinquish my child.

ODYSSEUS: Well, be equally sure I will never go away and leave her here.

POLYXENA: Mother, listen to me; and you, son of Laertes, make allowance for a parent’s natural wrath. My poor mother, do not fight with our masters. Will you be thrown to the ground, be roughly thrust aside and wound your aged skin, and in unseemly fashion be torn from me by youthful arms? This you will suffer; but do not, for it is not right for you. No, my dear mother! give me your beloved hand, and let me press your cheek to mine; for never again, but now for the last time, shall I behold the dazzling sun-god’s orb. Take my last farewells now. O mother, my mother! I pass beneath the earth.

HECUBA: O my daughter, I am still to live and be a slave.

POLYXENA: Unwedded I depart, never having tasted the married joys that were my due!

HECUBA: Yours, my daughter, is a piteous lot, and sad is mine also.

POLYXENA: There in Hades’ courts shall I lie apart from you.

HECUBA: Ah me, what shall I do? where shall I end my life?

POLYXENA: Daughter of a free-born father, a slave I am to die.

HECUBA: Not one of all my fifty children left!

POLYXENA: What message can I take for you to Hector or your aged lord?

HECUBA: Tell them that of all women I am the most miserable.

POLYXENA: Ah! breasts and paps that fed me with sweet food!

HECUBA: Oh, my daughter—your wretched, untimely fate!

POLYXENA: Farewell, my mother! farewell, Cassandra!

HECUBA: Fare well! others do, but not your mother, no!

Part 4

POLYXENA: You too, my brother Polydorus, in Thrace, the home of steeds!

HECUBA: Yes, if he lives, which I doubt; so luckless am I in every way.

POLYXENA: He lives; and, when you die, he will close your eyes.

HECUBA: I am dead; sorrow has forestalled death here.

POLYXENA: Come veil my head, Odysseus, and take me away; for now, before the fatal blow, my heart is melted by my mother’s wailing, and hers by mine. O light of day! for still I may call you by your name, though now my share in you is only the time I take to go between Achilles’ tomb and the sword. Odysseus and his attendants lead Polyxena away.

HECUBA: Alas! I faint; my limbs sink under me. O my daughter, embrace your mother, stretch out your hand, give it to me; do not leave me childless! Ah, friends! it is my death-blow. Oh! to see that Spartan woman, Helen, sister of the sons of Zeus, in such a plight; for her bright eyes have caused the shameful fall of Troy’s once prosperous town. Hecuba sinks fainting to the ground.

CHORUS: O breeze, breeze of the sea, that wafts swift galleys, ocean’s coursers, across the surging main! Where will you bear me, the sorrowful one? To whose house shall I be brought, to be his slave and chattel? to some haven in the Dorian land, or in Phthia, where men say Apidanus, father of fairest streams, makes fat and rich the soil?

CHORUS: Or to an island home, sent on a voyage of misery by oars that sweep the brine, leading a wretched existence in halls where the first-created palm and the bay-tree put forth their sacred shoots for dear Latona, a memorial of her divine birth-pains? and there with the maids of Delos shall I hymn the golden head-band and bow of Artemis, their goddess?

CHORUS: Or in the city of Pallas, the home of Athena of the lovely chariot, shall I then upon her saffron robe yoke horses, embroidering them on my web in brilliant varied shades, or the race of Titans, put to sleep by Zeus the son of Cronos with bolt of flashing flame?

CHORUS: Alas for my children! alas for my ancestors, and my country which is falling in smouldering ruin among the smoke, sacked by the Argive spear, while I upon a foreign shore am called a slave, indeed! leaving Asia, Europe’s handmaid, and receiving in its place a deadly marriage-bower.

TALTHYBIUS: Where can I find Hecuba, who once was queen of Ilium, you Trojan maidens?

CHORUS LEADER: There she lies near you, Talthybius, stretched full length upon the ground, wrapped in her robe.

TALTHYBIUS: O Zeus! what can I say? that your eye is over man? or that we hold this opinion all to no purpose, when it is chance that rules the mortal sphere? Was not this the queen of wealthy Phrygia, the wife of Priam highly blessed? And now her city is utterly overthrown by the foe, and she, a slave in her old age, her children dead, lies upon the ground, soiling her wretched head in the dust. Ah! old as I am, may death be my lot before I am caught in any shameful mischance. Arise, poor lady! lift up yourself and raise that white head.

HECUBA: Oh! who are you that will not let my body rest? Why disturb me in my anguish, whoever you are?

TALTHYBIUS: I, Talthybius, have come, the servant of the Danaids; Agamemnon has sent me for you, lady.

HECUBA: Good friend, have you come because the Achaeans are resolved after all to slay me too at the grave? How welcome your tidings would be! Let us hasten and lose no time; please lead the way, old man.

TALTHYBIUS: I have come to fetch you to bury your daughter’s corpse, lady; and those that send me are the two sons of Atreus and the Achaean people.

HECUBA: Alas! What will you say? Have you not after all come to fetch me to my doom, but to announce ill news? Lost, my child! snatched from your mother’s arms! and I am childless now, at least as regards you; ah, woe is me! How did you end her life? was any mercy shown? or did you deal ruthlessly with her as though your victim were a foe, old man? Speak, though your words must be pain to me.

TALTHYBIUS: Lady, you wish me to have a double benefit of tears in pity for your child; for now too as I tell the sad tale my eyes will be wet, as they were at the tomb when she was dying. All Achaea’s army was gathered there in full array before the tomb to see your daughter sacrificed; and the son of Achilles took Polyxena by the hand and set her on the top of the mound, while I was near; and a chosen band of young Achaeans followed to hold your child and prevent her struggling. Then Achilles’ son took in his hands a brimming cup of gold and raised in his hand an offering to his dead father, making a sign to me to proclaim silence throughout the Achaean army. So I stood at his side and in their midst proclaimed, Silence, you Achaeans! let all the people be silent! peace! be still! So I hushed the army. Then he spoke: Son of Peleus, my father, accept the offering I pour for you to appease your spirit, strong to raise the dead; and come to drink the black blood of a pure girl, which I and the army are offering you; oh! be propitious to us; grant that we may loose our prows and the cables of our ships, and, meeting with a prosperous voyage from Ilium, all come to our country. So he spoke; and all the army echoed his prayer. Then seizing his golden sword by the hilt he drew it from its scabbard, signing to the picked young Argive warriors to hold the maid. But she, when she perceived it, uttered this speech: O Argives, who have sacked my city! of my free will I die; let no one lay hand on me; for bravely will I yield my neck. By the gods, leave me free; so slay me, that death may find me free; for to be called a slave among the dead fills my royal heart with shame. Then the people shouted their applause, and king Agamemnon told the young men to let go the maid. And she, hearing her master’s words, took her robe and tore it open from the shoulder to the waist, displaying a breast and bosom fair as a statue’s; then sinking on her knee, one word she spoke more piteous than all the rest, Young prince, if it is my breast you are eager to strike, see, here it is, strike home! or if at my neck your sword you will aim, that throat is here and ready. Then he, half glad, half sorry in his pity for the maid, cut with the steel the channels of her breath, and streams of blood gushed forth; but she, even in death, took good heed to fall with grace, hiding from the gaze of men what must be hidden. When she had breathed her last through the fatal gash, no Argive set his hand to the same task, but some were strewing leaves over the corpse in handfuls, others bringing pine-logs and heaping up a pyre; and the one who brought nothing would hear from him who did such taunts as these, Do you stand still, ignoble wretch, with no robe or ornament to bring for the maiden? will you give nothing to her that showed such peerless bravery and spirit? Such is the tale I tell about your daughter’s death, and regard you as blessed beyond all mothers in your noble child, yet crossed in fortune more than all.

CHORUS LEADER: Upon the race of Priam and my city some fearful curse has burst; it is sent by God, and we must bear it.

Part 5

HECUBA: O my daughter! among this crowd of sorrows I do not know where to turn my gaze; for if I set myself to one, another will not let me be; while from this again another grief summons me, finding a successor to sorrow’s throne. And now I can not efface from my mind the memory of your sufferings sufficiently to stay my tears; yet the story of your noble death has taken from the keenness of my grief. Is it not then strange that a poor land, when blessed by heaven with a lucky year, yields a good crop, while that which is good, if robbed of needful care, bears little fruit; yet among men the base is nothing else but wicked, the good man is good, never changing for the worse because of misfortune, but ever the same? Is then the difference due to birth or bringing up? Good training doubtless gives lessons in good conduct, and if a man has mastered this, he knows what is shameful by the standard of the good. And these are random shafts from my mind, I know. To Talthybius Go and proclaim to the Argives that they do not touch my daughter’s body but keep the crowd away. For when a countless army is gathered, the mob knows no restraint, and the unruliness of sailors exceeds that of fire, all abstinence from crime being counted criminal. Talthybius goes out. Addressing a servant Now you, my aged handmaid, take a pitcher and dip it in the salt sea and bring it here, that I for the last time may wash my child, an unwed bride, a ravished virgin, and lay her out, as she deserves, ah! how can I? impossible! but as best I can; and what will that amount to? I will collect adornment from the captives, my companions in these tents, if perhaps any of them escaping her new master’s eye has made some theft from her home. The servant departs. O towering halls, O home so happy once, O Priam, rich in store of fairest wealth, most blessed of fathers, and I no less, the grey-haired mother of your race, how are we brought to nothing, stripped of our former pride! And in spite of all we vaunt ourselves, one on the riches of his house, another because he has an honored name among his fellow-citizens! But these things are nothing; in vain are all our thoughtful schemes, in vain our boastful words. He is happiest who meets no sorrow day by day. Hecuba enters the tent.

CHORUS: Woe and tribulation were made my lot in life, when Alexander first cut his beams of pine in Ida’s woods, to sail across the heaving sea in quest of Helen’s bed, loveliest woman on whom the sun-god turns his golden eye.

CHORUS: For here begins trouble’s cycle, and, worse than that, relentless fate; and from one man’s folly came a universal curse, bringing death to the land of Simois, with trouble from an alien shore. The strife the shepherd decided on Ida, between three daughters of the blessed gods,

CHORUS: brought as its result war and bloodshed and the ruin of my home; and many a Spartan maiden too is weeping bitter tears in her halls on the banks of fair Eurotas, and many a mother whose sons are slain, is smiting her gray head and tearing her cheeks, making her nails bloody in the furrowed gash.

MAID-SERVANT: Oh! ladies, where is Hecuba, our queen of sorrow, who conquers all in tribulation, men and women both alike? No one shall dispute the crown with her.

CHORUS LEADER: What now, unhappy one with your cry of misery? Your evil tidings never seem to rest.

MAID-SERVANT: It is to Hecuba I bring my bitter news; no easy task is it for mortal lips to speak smooth words in sorrow.

CHORUS LEADER: Look, she is coming even now from the shelter of the tent, appearing just in time to hear you speak. Hecuba comes out of the tent.

MAID-SERVANT: O mistress, most hapless beyond all words of mine to tell; you are ruined, you no longer exist, though you are alive; of children, husband, city bereft; hopelessly undone!

HECUBA: This is no news but insult; I have heard it all before. But why have you come, bringing here to me the corpse of Polyxena, on whose burial Achaea’s army was reported to be busily engaged?

MAID-SERVANT: She knows nothing, but mourns Polyxena, not grasping her new sorrows.

HECUBA: Ah! woe is me! you are surely not bringing here frenzied Cassandra, the prophetic maid?

MAID-SERVANT: You speak of the living; but the dead you do not weep is here. Uncovering the corpse Mark well the body now laid bare; is not this a sight to fill you with wonder, and upset your hopes?

HECUBA: Ah me! it is the corpse of my son Polydorus I behold, whom the Thracian man was keeping safe for me in his halls. Alas! this is the end of all; my life is over. chanting O my son, my son, alas! I now begin the laments, a frantic strain I learned just now from some avenging fiend.

MAID-SERVANT: What! so you knew your son’s fate, poor lady?

HECUBA: I cannot, cannot credit this fresh sight I see. One woe succeeds to another; no day will ever pass without groans and tears.

CHORUS LEADER: Alas! poor lady, our sufferings are cruel indeed.

HECUBA: O my son, child of a luckless mother, what was the manner of your death? by what fate do you lie here? by whose hands?

MAID-SERVANT: I do not know. I found him on the sea-shore.

HECUBA: Cast up on the smooth sand, or thrown there after the murderous blow?

Part 6

MAID-SERVANT: The waves had washed him ashore.

HECUBA: Alas! alas! I now know the vision I saw in my sleep; the dusky-winged phantom did not escape me, the vision I saw of you, my son, now no more within the bright sunshine.

CHORUS LEADER: Who slew him then? Can your dream-lore tell us that?

HECUBA: It was my own familiar friend, the knight of Thrace, with whom his aged father had placed the boy in hiding.

CHORUS LEADER: O horror! what will you say? did he slay him to get the gold?

HECUBA: O dreadful crime! O deed without a name! beyond wonder! impious! intolerable! Where are the laws between guest and host? Accursed of men! how have you mangled his flesh, slashing the poor child’s limbs with ruthless sword, lost to all sense of pity!

CHORUS LEADER: Alas for you! how some deity, whose hand is heavy on you, has sent you troubles beyond all other mortals! But I see our lord and master Agamemnon; so let us be still from now on, my friends.

AGAMEMNON: Hecuba, why are you delaying to come and bury your daughter? for it was for this that Talthybius brought me your message begging that no one of the Argives should touch your child. And so we granted this, and are not touching her, but this delay of yours fills me with wonder. And so I have come to send you from here; for our part there is well performed—if here there is any place for well. He sees the body. Oh! what man is this I see near the tents, some Trojan’s corpse? It is not an Argive’s body; that the garments it is clad in tell me.

HECUBA: Unhappy one! in naming you I name myself; Hecuba, what shall I do? throw myself here at Agamemnon’s knees, or bear my sorrows in silence?

AGAMEMNON: Why do you turn your back towards me and weep, refusing to say what has happened? Who is this?

HECUBA: But if he should count me as a slave and foe and spurn me from his knees, I would add to my anguish.

AGAMEMNON: I am no prophet born; therefore, if I am not told, I cannot learn the current of your thoughts.

HECUBA: Can it be that in estimating this man’s feelings I make him out too ill-disposed, when he is not really so?

AGAMEMNON: If your wish really is that I should remain in ignorance, we are of one mind; for I have no wish myself to listen.

HECUBA: Without his aid I shall not be able to avenge my children. Why do I still ponder the matter? I must do and dare whether I win or lose. Turning to Agamemnon Agamemnon, by your knees, by your beard and conquering hand I implore you—

AGAMEMNON: What is your desire? to be set free? that is easily done.

HECUBA: Not that; give me vengeance on the wicked, and I am willing to lead a life of slavery forever.

AGAMEMNON: Well, but why do you call me to your aid?

HECUBA: It is a matter you little know of, king. Do you see this corpse, for whom my tears now flow?

AGAMEMNON: I do; but what is to follow, I cannot guess.

Part 7

HECUBA: He was once my child; I bore him in my womb.

AGAMEMNON: Which of your sons is he, poor sufferer?

HECUBA: Not one of Priam’s race who fell beneath Ilium’s walls.

AGAMEMNON: Did you indeed have another son besides those, lady?

HECUBA: Yes, the one you see here, of whom it seems I have small gain.

AGAMEMNON: Where then was he, when his city was being destroyed?

HECUBA: His father, fearful of his death, conveyed him out of Troy.

AGAMEMNON: Where did he place him apart from the sons he then had?

HECUBA: In this very land, where his corpse was found.

AGAMEMNON: With Polymestor, the king of this country?

HECUBA: He was sent here in charge of gold, most bitter trust!

AGAMEMNON: By whom was he slain? What death overtook him?

HECUBA: By whom but this man? His Thracian host slew him.

AGAMEMNON: The wretch! could he have been so eager for the gold?

HECUBA: Just so, when he heard of the Phrygians’ disaster.

AGAMEMNON: Where did you find him? or did some one bring his corpse?

HECUBA: This woman, who happened upon it on the sea-shore.

AGAMEMNON: Was she seeking it, or bent on other tasks?

HECUBA: She had gone to fetch water from the sea to wash Polyxena.

AGAMEMNON: It seems then his host slew him and cast his body out to sea.

Part 8

HECUBA: Yes, for the waves to toss, after mangling him in this way.

AGAMEMNON: Woe to you for your measureless troubles!

HECUBA: I am ruined; no evil now is left, Agamemnon.

AGAMEMNON: Ah! what woman was ever born to such mischance?

HECUBA: There is no one, unless you would name Chance herself. But hear my reason for throwing myself at your knees. If my treatment seems to you deserved, I will be content; but, if otherwise, help me to punish this most godless host, fearless alike of gods in heaven or hell, who has done a most unholy deed; who, though often he had shared my board and been counted first of all my guest-friends meeting with every kindness he could claim—. And receiving my consideration, he slew my son, and bent though he was on murder, did not think it right to bury him, but cast his body forth to sea. I may be a slave and weak as well, but the gods are strong, and Custom too which prevails over them, for by custom it is that we believe in them and set up boundaries of right and wrong for our lives. Now if this principle, when referred to you, is to be set at nothing, and they are to escape punishment who murder guests or dare to plunder the temples of gods, then all fairness in human matters is at an end. Consider this then a disgrace and show regard for me, have pity on me, and, like an artist standing back from his picture, look on me and closely scan my piteous state. I was once a queen, but now I am your slave; a happy mother once, but now childless and old alike, bereft of city, utterly forlorn, the most wretched woman living. as Agamemnon is turning away. Ah! woe is me! where would you withdraw your steps from me? My efforts then will be in vain, ah me! Why, oh! why do we mortals toil, as we must, and seek out all other sciences, but Persuasion, the only real mistress of mankind, we take no further pains to master completely by offering to pay for the knowledge, so that any man could convince his fellows as he pleased and gain his point at once? How shall anyone hereafter hope for prosperity? All those my sons are gone from me, and she, my daughter, is a slave and suffers shame. I am lost; I see the smoke leaping over my city. Further—though this is perhaps idly urged, to plead your love, still I will put the case—at your side lies my daughter, Cassandra, the inspired maiden, as the Phrygians call her. How then, king, will you acknowledge those nights of rapture, or what return shall my daughter or I her mother have for the love she has lavished on her lord? Listen, then; do you see this corpse? By doing him a service, you will do it to a kinsman of your bride’s. I have only one thing yet to urge. Oh! would I had a voice in arms, in hands, in hair and feet, placed there by the arts of Daedalus or some god, that all together they might with tears embrace your knees, bringing a thousand pleas to bear on you! O my lord and master, most glorious light of Hellas, listen, stretch forth a helping hand to this aged woman, for all she is a thing of nothing; still do so. For it is always a good man’s duty to help the right, and to punish evil-doers wherever found.

CHORUS LEADER: It is strange how each extreme meets in human life! Custom determines even our natural ties, making the most bitter foes friends, and regarding as foes those who formerly were friends.

AGAMEMNON: Hecuba, I feel compassion for you and your son and your ill-fortune, as well as for your suppliant gesture, and I would gladly see that impious host pay you this forfeit for the sake of heaven and justice, if I could only find some way to help you without appearing to the army to have plotted the death of the Thracian king for Cassandra’s sake. For on one point I am assailed by perplexity: the army count this man their friend, the dead their foe; that he is dear to you is a matter apart, in which the army has no share. Reflect on this; for though you find me ready to share your toil and quick to lend my aid, yet the risk of being reproached by the Achaeans makes me hesitate.

HECUBA: Ah! there is not in the world a single man free; for he is a slave either to money or to fortune, or else the people in their thousands or the fear of public prosecution prevents him from following the dictates of his heart. But since you are afraid, deferring too much to the rabble, I will rid you of that fear. Thus: be aware of my plot if I devise mischief against this murderer, but refrain from any share in it. And if any uproar or attempt at rescue breaks out among the Achaeans, when the Thracian is suffering his doom, check it without seeming to do so on my account. For what remains—take heart—I will arrange everything well.

AGAMEMNON: How? what will you do? will you take a sword in your old hand and slay the barbarian, or do you have drugs or some means to aid you? Who will take your part? Where will you procure friends?

HECUBA: Sheltered beneath these tents is a crowd of Trojan women.

AGAMEMNON: Do you mean the captives, the booty of the Hellenes?

HECUBA: With their help I will punish my murderous foe.

AGAMEMNON: How are women to master men?

HECUBA: Numbers are a fearful thing, and joined to craft a desperate foe.

AGAMEMNON: True; still I have a mean opinion of the female race.

HECUBA: What? did not women slay the sons of Aegyptus, and utterly clear Lemnos of men? But let it be thus; put an end to our conference, and send this woman for me safely through the army. To a servant And you are to draw near my Thracian friend and say, Hecuba, once queen of Ilium, summons you, on your own business no less than hers, your children too, for they also must hear what she has to say. The servant goes out. Defer awhile, Agamemnon, the burial of Polyxena lately slain, so that brother and sister may be laid on the same pyre and buried side by side, a double cause of sorrow to their mother.

AGAMEMNON: So shall it be; yet if the army were able to sail, I could not have granted you this favor; but as it is, for the god sends forth no favoring breeze, the army must wait and look for a calm voyage. Good luck to you, for this is the interest alike of individual and state, that the wrong-doer be punished and the good man prosper. Agamemnon departs as Hecuba withdraws into the tent.

CHORUS: No more, my native Ilium, shall you be counted among the towns never sacked; so thick a cloud of Hellene troops is settling all around, wasting you with the spear; you are shorn of your crown of towers, and fouled most piteously with filthy soot; no more, ah me! shall I tread your streets.

CHORUS: It was in the middle of the night my ruin came, in the hour when sleep steals sweetly over the eyes after the feast is done. After the music and dancing, my husband had brought the sacrifice to an end and was lying in our bridal-chamber, his spear hung on a peg; with never a thought of the sailor-throng encamped upon the Trojan shores.

CHORUS: And I was braiding my tresses beneath a tight-drawn head-band before my golden mirror’s countless rays, so that I might lie down to rest; when through the city rose a din, and a cry went ringing down the streets of Troy: You sons of Hellas, when, oh! when will you sack the citadel of Ilium, and seek your homes?

Part 9

CHORUS: I left my bed, wearing only a tunic, like a Dorian girl, and sought in vain, ah me! to station myself at the holy hearth of Artemis; for, after seeing my husband slain, I was led away over the broad sea; with many a backward look at my city, when the ship began her homeward voyage and parted me from Ilium’s strand; till alas! for very grief I fainted,

CHORUS: Cursing Helen the sister of the Dioscuri, and Paris the baleful shepherd of Ida; for it was their marriage, which was no marriage but misery sent by some demon, that robbed me of my country and drove me from my home. Oh! may the sea’s salt flood never carry her home again; and may she never set foot in her father’s halls!

POLYMESTOR: My dear friend Priam, and you no less, Hecuba, I weep to see you and your city thus, and your daughter lately slain. Ah! there is nothing to be relied on; fair fame is insecure, nor is there any guarantee that prosperity will not be turned to woe. For the gods confound our fortunes, tossing them to and fro, and introduce confusion, so that our perplexity may make us worship them. But what use is it to lament these things, and make no advance ahead of trouble? If you are blaming me at all for my absence, stop a moment; I happened to be away in the very heart of Thrace when you came here; but on my return, just as I was starting from my home for the same purpose, your maid fell in with me, and gave me your message, which brought me here at once.

HECUBA: Polymestor, I am held in such wretchedness that I blush to meet your eye; for my present evil case makes me ashamed to face you who saw me in happier days, and I could not look on you with unfaltering gaze. Do not then think it ill-will towards you, Polymestor; there is another cause as well, I mean the custom which forbids women to meet men’s gaze.

POLYMESTOR: No wonder, surely. But what need do you have of me? Why did you send for me to come here from my house?

HECUBA: I wish to tell you and your children a private matter of my own; please bid your attendants withdraw from the tent.

POLYMESTOR: Retire; this desert spot is safe enough. The guards go out; to Hecuba You are my friend, and this Achaean army is well-disposed to me. But you must tell me how prosperity is to help its unlucky friends; for I am ready to do so.

HECUBA: First tell me of the child Polydorus, whom you are keeping in your house, received from me and his father; is he alive? The rest I will ask you after that.

POLYMESTOR: Yes, you still have a share in fortune there.

HECUBA: Well said, dear friend! how worthy of you!

POLYMESTOR: What next would you learn of me?

HECUBA: has he any recollection of me his mother?

POLYMESTOR: Yes, he was longing to steal away here to you.

HECUBA: Is the gold safe, which he brought with him from Troy?

POLYMESTOR: Safe under lock and key in my halls.

HECUBA: Do save it, but do not desire your neighbor’s goods.

POLYMESTOR: Not I; may I benefit by what I have, lady!

HECUBA: Do you know what I wish to say to you and your children?

POLYMESTOR: No; your words will declare it.

HECUBA: O you who are as dear to me as you now are, there are—

Part 10

POLYMESTOR: What is it that I and my children must learn?

HECUBA: Ancient vaults filled full of gold by Priam’s ancestors.

POLYMESTOR: Is it this you would tell your son?

HECUBA: Certainly, through you; for you are a righteous man.

POLYMESTOR: What need then of these children’s presence?

HECUBA: It is better they should know it, in case of your death.

POLYMESTOR: Well said; it is also the wiser way.

HECUBA: Then do you know where the shrine of Trojan Athena is?

POLYMESTOR: Is the gold there? what is there to mark it?

HECUBA: A black rock rising above the ground.

POLYMESTOR: Is there anything else you want to tell me about the place?

HECUBA: I wish to keep safe the treasure I brought from Troy.

POLYMESTOR: Where can it be? inside your dress, or have you hidden it?

HECUBA: It is safe among a heap of spoils within these tents.

POLYMESTOR: Where? This is the station built by the Achaeans to surround their fleet.

HECUBA: The captive women have huts of their own.

POLYMESTOR: It is safe to enter? are there no men about?

HECUBA: There are no Achaeans within; we women are alone. Enter then the tent, for the Argives are eager to set sail from Troy for home; and, when you have accomplished all that you must do, you shall return with your children to the place where you have lodged my son. Hecuba leads Polymestor and his children into the tent.

CHORUS: Not yet have you paid the penalty, but perhaps you will.

CHORUS: Like one who slips and falls into the surge with no haven near, so shall you lose your own life for the life you have taken. For where liability to justice coincides with heaven’s law; there is ruin full of death and doom. Your hopes of this journey shall cheat you, for it has led you, unhappy wretch! to the halls of death; and to no warrior’s hand shall you resign your life.

Part 11

POLYMESTOR: O horror! I am blinded of the light of my eyes, ah me!

CHORUS LEADER: Did you hear, friends, that Thracian’s cry of woe?

POLYMESTOR: O horror! horror! my children! 0 the cruel blow.

CHORUS LEADER: Friends, there is strange mischief afoot in yo.

POLYMESTOR: No, you shall never escape for all your hurried flight; for with a blow I will burst open the inmost recesses of this building.

CHORUS LEADER: Hark! how he launches a bolt with weighty hand! Shall we force an entry? The crisis calls on us to aid Hecuba and the Trojan women.

HECUBA: Strike on, spare not, burst the doors! you shall never replace bright vision in your eyes or see your children, whom I have slain, alive again.

CHORUS LEADER: What! have you foiled the Thracian stranger and is he in your power, mistress? Is all your threat now brought to pass?

HECUBA: A moment, and you shall see him before the tent, blind, advancing with blind random step; and the bodies of his two children whom I with my brave women of Troy killed; he has paid me the penalty; here he comes from the tent, as you see. I will withdraw out of his path and stand aside from the hot fury of the Thracian, my deadly foe.

POLYMESTOR: Woe is me! where can I go, where halt, or turn? shall I crawl like a wild four-footed beast on their track, as my reward? Which path shall I take first, this or that, eager as I am to clutch those Trojan murderesses that have destroyed me? You wretched, cursed daughters of Phrygia! to what corner have you fled cowering before me? O sun-god, would you could heal, could heal my bleeding eyes, ridding me of my blindness! Ha! hush! I catch the stealthy footsteps of the women here. Where can I dart on them and gorge on their flesh and bones, making for myself a wild beasts’ meal, inflicting mutilation in requital of their outrage on me? Ah, woe is me! where am I rushing, leaving my children unguarded for maenads of hell to mangle, to be murdered and ruthlessly cast forth upon the hills, a feast of blood for dogs? Where shall I stay or turn my steps, like a ship that lies anchored at sea, gathering close my linen robe and rushing to that chamber of death, to guard my children?

CHORUS LEADER: Woe to you! what grievous outrage has been done to you! a fearful penalty for your foul deed

POLYMESTOR: Woe is me! Ho! my Thracian spearmen, armed, a race of knights whom Ares inspires! Ho! Achaeans! sons of Atreus! To you I loudly call; come here, by the gods! Does any one hearken, or will no one help me? Why do you delay? Women, captive women have destroyed me. A fearful fate is mine; ah me! my hideous outrage! Where can I turn or go? Shall I take wings and soar aloft to the mansions of the sky, where Orion and Sirius dart from their eyes a flash as of fire, or shall I, in my misery, plunge to Hades’ murky flood?

CHORUS LEADER: It is pardonable, for a man suffering from evils too heavy to bear, to rid himself of a wretched existence.

AGAMEMNON: Hearing a cry I have come here; for Echo, child of the mountain-rock, has sent her voice loud-ringing through the army, causing a tumult. If we had not known that Troy’s towers were levelled by the might of Hellas, this uproar would have caused no slight panic.

POLYMESTOR: Best of friends! for by your voice I know you, Agamemnon; do you see my piteous state?

AGAMEMNON: What! hapless Polymestor, who has stricken you? who has blinded your eyes, staining the pupils with blood? who has slain these children? whoever he was, fierce must have been his wrath against you and your children.

POLYMESTOR: Hecuba, helped by the captive women, has destroyed me—not destroyed, far worse than that.

AGAMEMNON: What do you say? Was it you that did this deed, as he says? You, Hecuba, that have ventured on this inconceivable daring?

POLYMESTOR: Ha! what is that? is she somewhere near? Show me, tell me where, that I may grip her in my hands and rend her limb from limb, bespattering her with gore.

AGAMEMNON: You creature, what are you about?

Part 12

POLYMESTOR: By the gods I entreat you, let me vent on her the fury of my arm.

AGAMEMNON: Hold! banish that savage spirit from your heart and plead your cause, so that after hearing you and her in turn I may fairly decide what reason there is for your present sufferings.

POLYMESTOR: I will tell my tale. There was a son of Priam, Polydorus, the youngest, a child by Hecuba, whom his father Priam sent to me from Troy to bring up in my halls, suspecting no doubt the fall of Troy. I killed him; but hear my reason for killing him, how cleverly and wisely I had thought it out. My fear was that if that child were left to be your enemy, he would repeople Troy and settle it afresh; and the Achaeans, knowing that a son of Priam survived, might bring another expedition against the Phrygian land, and then harry and lay waste these plains of Thrace, for the neighbours of Troy to experience the very troubles we were lately suffering, O king. Now Hecuba, having discovered the death of her son, brought me here on the following pretext, saying she would tell me of hidden treasure stored up in Ilium by the race of Priam; and she led me apart with my children into the tent, that no other might hear her news. So I sat down on a couch in their midst to rest; for there were many of the Trojan maidens seated there, some on my right hand, some on my left, as if beside a friend; and they were praising the weaving of our Edonian handiwork, looking at this robe as they held it up to the light; while others examined my Thracian spear and so stripped me of two-fold protection. And those that were young mothers were dandling my children in their arms, with loud admiration, as they passed them on from hand to hand to remove them far from their father; and then after their smooth speeches—would you believe it?—in an instant snatching daggers from somewhere in their dress they stab my children; while others, like foes, seized me hand and foot; and if I tried to raise my head, anxious to help my children, they would clutch me by the hair; while if I stirred my hands, I could do nothing, poor wretch! for the numbers of the women. At last they did a fearful deed, worse than what had gone before; for they took their brooches and stabbed the hapless pupils of my eyes, making them gush with blood, and then fled through the chambers; up I sprang like a wild beast in pursuit of the shameless murderesses, searching along each wall with hunter’s care, dealing buffets, spreading ruin. This then is what I have suffered because of my zeal for you, Agamemnon, for slaying an enemy of yours. But to spare you a lengthy speech, if any of the men of former times have spoken ill of women, if any does so now, or shall do so hereafter, I will say all this in one short sentence; for neither land or sea produces such a race, as whoever has had to do with them knows.

CHORUS LEADER: Curb your bold tongue, and do not, because of your own woes, thus embrace the whole race of women in one reproach.

HECUBA: Never ought words to have outweighed deeds in this world, Agamemnon. No! if a man’s deeds were good, so should his words have been; if, on the other hand, evil, his words should have been unsound, instead of its being possible at times to speak injustice well. There are, it is true, clever persons, who have made a science of this, but their cleverness cannot last for ever; a miserable end awaits them; no one ever yet escaped. This part of my prelude belongs to you. Now will I turn to this fellow, and will give you your answer, you who say it was to save Achaea double toil and for Agamemnon’s sake that you killed my son. No, villain, in the first place the barbarian race would never be friends with Hellas, nor could it be. Again, what interest did you have to further by your zeal? was it to form some marriage, or on the score of kinship, or what reason? or was it likely that they would sail here again and destroy your country’s crops? Whom do you expect to persuade into believing that? If you would only speak the truth, it was the gold that slew my son, and your greedy spirit. Now tell me this: why, when Troy was victorious, when her ramparts still stood round her, when Priam was alive, and Hector’s warring prospered, why did you not then, if you were really minded to do Agamemnon a service, slay the child, for you had him in your palace beneath your care, or bring him with you alive to the Argives? But when the enemy took us from the light and our city made a signal by its smoke, you murdered the guest who had come to your hearth. Furthermore, to prove your villainy, hear this; if you were really a friend to those Achaeans, you should have brought the gold, which you say you are keeping not for yourself but for this man, and given it to them, for they were in need and had endured a long exile from their native land. But not even now can you bring yourself to part with it, but persist in keeping it in your palace. Again, had you kept my son safe and sound, as your duty was, a fair renown would have been your reward, for it is in trouble’s hour that the good most clearly show their friendship; though prosperity by itself in every case finds friends. If you were in need of money and he were prosperous, that son of mine would have been as a mighty treasure for you to draw upon; but now you have him no longer to be your friend, and the benefit of the gold is gone from you, your children too, and you yourself are in this sorry plight. I say to you, Agamemnon, if you help this man, you will show your worthlessness; for you will be serving a guest-friend neither pious nor to be trusted where he should be, not devout, not just; while I shall say you delight in evil-doers, being such a one yourself; but I do not abuse my masters.

CHORUS LEADER: Ah! how a good cause always affords men an opening for a good speech.

AGAMEMNON: To be judge in a stranger’s troubles goes much against my grain, but still I must; yes, for to take this matter in hand and then put it from me is a shameful course. My opinion, that you may know it, is that it was not for the sake of the Achaeans or me that you killed your guest, but to keep that gold in your own house. In your trouble you make a case in your own interests. Perhaps among you it is a light thing to murder guests, but with us in Hellas it is a disgrace. How can I escape reproach if I judge you not guilty? I could not. No, since you endured your horrid crime, endure as well its painful consequence.

POLYMESTOR: Woe is me! worsted by a woman and a slave, I am, it seems, to suffer by unworthy hands.

HECUBA: Is it not just for your atrocious crime?

POLYMESTOR: Ah, my children! ah, my blinded eyes! woe is me!

HECUBA: You grieve; but what of me? Do you think I do not grieve for my son?

POLYMESTOR: You wicked wretch! Is your delight in mocking me?

HECUBA: Yes, for I am avenged on you; have I not cause for delight?

POLYMESTOR: It will soon cease, when ocean’s flood—

HECUBA: Shall convey me to the shores of Hellas?

POLYMESTOR: No, but will close over you when you fall from the masthead.

HECUBA: Who will force me to take the leap?

POLYMESTOR: Of your own accord you will climb the ship’s mast.

HECUBA: With wings upon my back, or by what means?

POLYMESTOR: You will become a dog with bloodshot gaze.

Part 13

HECUBA: How did you know of my transformation?

POLYMESTOR: Dionysus, our Thracian prophet, told me so.

HECUBA: And did he prophesy to you nothing of your present trouble?

POLYMESTOR: No, for you would never have caught me thus by guile.

HECUBA: Dead or alive shall I complete my life here?

POLYMESTOR: Dead; and to your tomb shall be given a name—;

HECUBA: Recalling my form, or what will you tell me?

POLYMESTOR: The hapless hound’s grave, a mark for mariners.

HECUBA: It is nothing to me, now that you have paid me the penalty.

POLYMESTOR: Further, your daughter Cassandra must die.

HECUBA: I scorn the prophecy! I give it to you to keep for yourself.

POLYMESTOR: The wife of Agamemnon, grim keeper of his palace, shall slay her.

HECUBA: Never may the daughter of Tyndareus do such a frantic deed!

POLYMESTOR: And she shall slay this man as well, lifting high the axe.

AGAMEMNON: You creature, are you mad? are you so eager to find sorrow?

POLYMESTOR: Kill me, for in Argos there awaits you a murderous bath.

AGAMEMNON: Ho! servants, drag away him from my sight!

POLYMESTOR: Do my words pain you?

AGAMEMNON: Stop his mouth!

POLYMESTOR: Close it now; for I have spoken.

Part 14

AGAMEMNON: Make haste and cast him upon some desert island, since his mouth is full of such exceeding presumption. Go, unhappy Hecuba, and bury your two corpses; and you, Trojan women, must draw near your masters’ tents, for lo! I perceive a breeze just rising to waft us home. May we reach our country well and find all well at home, released from troubles here! Polymestor is dragged away by Agamemnon’s guards.

CHORUS: Away to the harbour and the tents, my friends, to prove the toils of slavery! for such is fate’s relentless hest.

Contents — 19 sections

1. Part 1
2. Part 2
3. Part 3
4. Part 4
5. Part 5
6. Part 6
7. Part 7
8. Part 8
9. Part 9
10. Part 10
11. Part 11
12. Part 12
13. Part 13
14. Part 14
15. Part 15
16. Part 16
17. Part 17
18. Part 18
19. Part 19

Part 1

PEASANT: O ancient plain of land, the streams of Inachus, from which king Agamemnon once mounted war on a thousand ships and sailed to the land of Troy. After he had slain Priam, the ruler of Ilium, and captured the famous city of Dardanus, he came here to Argos and set up on the high temples many spoils of the barbarians. And in Troy he was successful; but at home he died by the guile of his wife Clytemnestra and the hand of Aegisthus, son of Thyestes. And he left behind the ancient scepter of Tantalus, and is dead; but Aegisthus rules the land, possessing Agamemnon’s wife, the daughter of Tyndareus. Now as for those whom he left in his house when he sailed to Troy, his son Orestes and his young daughter Electra: when Orestes was about to die at the hand of Aegisthus, his father’s old servant stole him away and gave him to Strophius to bring up in the land of the Phocians. Electra stayed in her father’s house, and when she came to the blooming season of youth, the foremost suitors of the land of Hellas asked for her in marriage. But Aegisthus feared she might bear to some chieftain a son who would avenge Agamemnon, and so he kept her at home and did not betroth her to any bridegroom. When even this filled him with great fear, that she might secretly bear children to some noble lord, Aegisthus planned to kill her, but her mother, although cruel at heart, rescued her from his hand. For she had a pretext for having slain her husband, but she feared that she would be despised for the murder of her children. So then, for these reasons, Aegisthus devised such a scheme: he promised gold to anyone who should kill Agamemnon’s son, who had left the country as an exile, while Electra he gave in marriage to me. My ancestors were Mycenaeans; in that respect at least I am not to blame. My family was noble in race but poor in money—which is the ruin of good birth. He gave her to a powerless man so that his fear might lose its power. For if some man of high position got her, he would have roused the sleeping blood of Agamemnon and judgment would have come at some time to Aegisthus. But I have never (Cypris knows this too) dishonored her in bed; she is still a virgin indeed. I am ashamed to have the daughter of a wealthy man and violate her, when I was not born of equal rank. And I groan for the wretched Orestes, called my kinsman, if he shall ever return to Argos and see the unfortunate marriage of his sister. And whoever says I am a fool if I do not touch a young girl when I have her in my house, let him know that he measures soundness of mind by worthless standards of judgment, and he himself is a fool.

ELECTRA: O black night, nurse of the golden stars, in which I go to the river’s streams, bearing this pitcher resting on my head—not because I have come to such a point of necessity, but so that I may show to the gods Aegisthus’ insolence—and send forth laments into the wide sky, to my father. For the deadly daughter of Tyndareus, my mother, has cast me out of the house to please her husband; since she has borne other children in her union with Aegisthus, she considers Orestes and me secondary in the home.

PEASANT: Why, unhappy one, do you do this work, laboring for my sake, though you were well brought up before, and do not stop, even when I tell you this?

ELECTRA: I hold you equal to the gods in kindness, for in my distress you have not insulted me. It is a great allotment for mortals to find a healer for ill fortune, such as I have in you. And so, even though unbidden, I ought to share your labors, relieving you of work as far as I have strength, so that you may bear it more easily. You have enough to do outside; I must keep the house in order. It is pleasant for the worker coming in from outside to find things within right.

PEASANT: Go, then, if you wish; and in fact the springs are not far from my house. When it is day, I will drive the oxen to my lands and sow the fields. For no idler, though he has the gods’ names always on his lips, can gather a livelihood without hard work. Exeunt Peasant and Electra. Enter Orestes and Pylades.

ORESTES: Pylades, I hold you first among men as a kind and trusted friend to me. You alone of my friends have honored me, Orestes, being as I am in dreadful suffering from Aegisthus, who killed my father, he and my most deadly mother. I have come from the mystic shrine of the god to Argive land, and no one knows it, to repay my father’s murderers with murder. During this past night, going to my father’s tomb, I wept and cut off a lock of my hair as an offering and sacrificed over the altar the blood of a slaughtered sheep, unnoticed by the tyrants who rule this land. And now I do not set foot within the walls, but I have come to the borders of this land combining two desires: I may escape to another country if anyone on the watch should recognize me; and, looking for my sister (for they say that she lives here, joined in marriage, and is no longer a virgin), I may meet with her and, having her as an accomplice for murder, I may learn clearly what is happening within the walls. And now, since dawn is lifting up her bright eye, let us step aside from this path. For either some plowman or serving maid will come in our sight, from whom we may ask if my sister lives in this place. But now that I see this maidservant, bearing a weight of water on her shorn head, let us sit down, and inquire of this slave girl, if we may receive some word about the matter, Pylades, for which we have come to this land. They retire a little.

ELECTRA: Hasten your step, it is time; go onward, onward, weeping! Ah me! I am Agamemnon’s child, and Clytemnestra, hated daughter of Tyndareus, bore me; the citizens call me unhappy Electra. Alas for my cruel pain and hateful life! O father, Agamemnon, you lie in Hades, by the butchery of your wife and Aegisthus.

ELECTRA: Come, waken the same lament, take up the enjoyment of long weeping.

ELECTRA: Hasten your step, it is time; go onward, onward, weeping. Ah me! In what city and what household do you wander about, my wretched brother, leaving your pitiable sister in our ancestral home, to great pain? Come to me, the unhappy one, as a deliverer from this pain, oh Zeus, Zeus, and as a defender for my father against his most hateful bloodshed; bring the wanderer to shore in Argos.

ELECTRA: Take this pitcher from my head and put it down, so that I may cry aloud the night-time laments for my father. A wail, a song of death, of death, for you, father, under the earth, I speak the laments in which I am always engaged, day by day, tearing my skin with my nails, and striking my cropped head with my hand, for your death.

ELECTRA: Oh, oh, tear my face; as a clear-sounding swan beside the river’s streams calls to its dearest father, dying in the crafty snares of the net, so I lament you, my unhappy father,

ELECTRA: washed by the very last bath, in the most piteous bed of death. Oh, me, your bitter cleaving by the axe, father, the bitter plans of the way from Troy! Your wife welcomed you with no victor’s garlands or crowns, but with a two-edged sword, making you the mournful victim of Aigisthus, she got a treacherous bed-fellow.

CHORUS: O Electra, daughter of Agamemnon, I have come to your rustic courtyard. A milk-drinker from Mycenae has come, he has come, a mountain walker; he reports that the Argives are proclaiming a sacrifice for the third day from now, and that all maidens are to go to Hera’s temple.

ELECTRA: My unhappy heart beats fast, friends, but not at adornment or gold; nor will I set up choruses with the maidens of Argos and beat my foot in the mazes of the dance. By tears I pass the night; tears are my unhappy care day by day. See if my filthy hair, and the rags of my dress, will be fit for a princess, a daughter of Agamemnon, or for Troy, once taken, which remembers my father.

CHORUS: Mighty is the goddess; come then, and borrow from me thick-woven clothes to wear, and gold—as a favor to me—accessories to adornment. Do you think to rule over your enemies by tears, if you do not revere the gods? Honoring the gods not by lamentation but by prayers, you will have good fortune, child.

ELECTRA: No god attends to the voice of the ill-fated one, or to the slaying of my father long ago. Alas for the dead, and for the living vagabond, who dwells in another land somewhere, miserably wandering to a slave’s hearth, yet born of that renowned father. I myself live in a poor man’s house, wasting my life away, an exile from my father’s house, on the mountain crags. But my mother, with a new husband, makes her home in a bed stained by blood.

CHORUS LEADER: Helen, your mother’s sister, is the cause of many evils to the Hellenes and to your house.

ELECTRA: Ah! Women, I have broken off my lament; strangers, who had their lair at the altar, are rising from ambush towards the household. Let us escape the villains by flight, you along the path and I to the house.

ORESTES: Stay, poor girl; do not fear my hand.

ELECTRA: O Phoebus Apollo! I beseech you to spare my life.

Part 2

ORESTES: May I kill others more hated than you!

ELECTRA: Go away! Do not touch one whom you must not touch.

ORESTES: There is no one I have a better right to touch.

ELECTRA: Then why are you in ambush, with drawn sword, near my house?

ORESTES: Wait and hear, and you will soon say the same.

ELECTRA: I am still; in any case, I am yours, since you are the stronger.

ORESTES: I have come to bring you word from your brother.

ELECTRA: Oh best of friends! Is he alive or dead?

ORESTES: Alive; for I want to tell you the good news first.

ELECTRA: May you be happy, as a reward for your most welcome tidings.

ORESTES: I give that blessing for us two to have in common.

ELECTRA: Where does the unhappy one live, in his unhappy exile?

ORESTES: He goes miserably about, not following the customs of any one city.

ELECTRA: Surely he does not want for a living, day by day?

ORESTES: He has that, but an exile is a helpless man at best.

ELECTRA: What is this message you have come bringing from him?

ORESTES: If you are alive, and if so, how you are.

ELECTRA: Well then, you see first of all how withered my body is.

ORESTES: Yes, so wasted with sorrow that I sigh for it.

ELECTRA: And my head and hair, close shaven as if by a Scythian’s razor.

Part 3

ORESTES: Your brother and your dead father perhaps gnaw at your heart.

ELECTRA: Alas! For what is dearer to me than they?

ORESTES: Ah! What are you to your brother, do you think?

ELECTRA: He is far away, not here to be my friend.

ORESTES: Why are you living here, far from the city?

ELECTRA: I am married, stranger; a deadly match.

ORESTES: I pity your brother. Is your husband a Mycenaean?

ELECTRA: Not one to whom my father ever hoped to give me.

ORESTES: Tell me so that I may hear and inform your brother.

ELECTRA: I live in his house, at a distance from the city.

ORESTES: A ditch-digger or a herdsman is worthy of the house.

ELECTRA: He is a man poor but noble, and respectful to me.

ORESTES: What is this respect that your husband has?

ELECTRA: He has never dared to touch me in bed.

ORESTES: Does he hold some form of religious chastity, or does he think you unworthy?

ELECTRA: He did not think himself worthy to insult my family.

ORESTES: And how was he not delighted to make such a marriage?

ELECTRA: He thinks the person who gave me did not have that right, stranger.

ORESTES: I understand; he fears that he may someday be punished by Orestes.

ELECTRA: He does fear that, but he is also a virtuous man.

Part 4

ORESTES: Ah! You have described a noble man, and he must be treated well.

ELECTRA: Yes, if ever the one now absent comes home.

ORESTES: But did your mother, who gave you birth, endure this?

ELECTRA: Women love their husbands, stranger, not their children.

ORESTES: Why did Aegisthus insult you in this way?

ELECTRA: He planned for me to bear powerless children, when he gave me to such a man.

ORESTES: So that you might not bear sons to punish him, of course?

ELECTRA: That was his plan; may he make amends to me for it!

ORESTES: Does your mother’s husband know that you are a virgin?

ELECTRA: He does not know; we steal that from him by our silence.

ORESTES: Are these women who hear our talk friends of yours ?

ELECTRA: They will keep both your words and mine well hidden.

ORESTES: What then could Orestes do in this matter if he comes to Argos?

ELECTRA: Do you ask this? You have said a shameful word; isn’t it the critical time now?

ORESTES: But if he does come, how might he kill his father’s murderers?

ELECTRA: By daring such things as his enemies dared against my father.

ORESTES: And would you dare, with him, to kill your mother?

ELECTRA: Yes, with that same axe by which my father died.

ORESTES: Am I to tell him this, and that your purpose is steadfast?

ELECTRA: Once I had shed my mother’s blood, I might die!

Part 5

ORESTES: Ah! Would that Orestes were near by, to hear that!

ELECTRA: But, stranger, I would not know him if I saw him.

ORESTES: No wonder, for you were both young when you were parted.

ELECTRA: There is only one of my friends who would recognize him.

ORESTES: The man who is said to have stolen him away from murder?

ELECTRA: Yes, the old man, my father’s old servant.

ORESTES: Did the dead man, your father, find burial?

ELECTRA: He found what he could, cast out of the house.

ORESTES: Alas, the things you have said! For perception of suffering, even another’s, gnaws at mortals. Speak, so that when I know, I may tell your brother the story, unpleasant, but necessary to hear. Pity is not present at all in clownishness, but in wise men. And indeed it is not without mischief for the wise to have overly profound thoughts.

CHORUS LEADER: And I have the same desire in my heart as this man. Being far from the town, I do not know the city’s scandals, and now I want to learn them.

ELECTRA: I will speak, if I must—and one must speak to a friend—about my own and my father’s heavy misfortunes. Since you are setting the tale in motion, I entreat you, stranger, tell Orestes of our sorrows, mine and his. First of all, in what clothes I live like a beast in a stall, with what filth I am weighted down, under what roof I dwell, having lived in a royal home; I myself working hard on my clothes at the loom, or else I shall go barely clad and do without; always carrying water from the springs myself, with no share in the festival rites, no part in the dance. I turn away from married women, as a virgin; and I turn away from Castor, who sought me in marriage before he joined the gods, for I was his relative. But my mother, in the spoils of Troy, is seated on her throne, and at her chair stand slaves from Asia, my father’s plunder, fastening their Trojan robes with golden brooches. And still my father’s blood has rotted black on the wall, while the one who killed him mounts the same chariot and goes forth; and is proud to hold in his blood-stained hands the scepter with which my father used to command the Hellenes. Agamemnon’s grave, dishonoured, has not yet ever received any libations, or branch of myrtle, but his altar is barren of ornament. That famous one, my mother’s husband, leaps on the grave, they say, when soaked in drink, and pelts my father’s marble monument with stones, and dares to say this to us: Where is your son Orestes? Is he here to defend the tomb for you nobly? Orestes is insulted in this way while absent. But, stranger, I beg you, report these things. There are many calling him to come—I am their interpreter—these hands, this tongue, my broken heart, my shorn head, and his own father. For it is shameful, if his father exterminated the Trojans but Orestes is unable to kill a man, one against one, being young and born from a more noble father.

CHORUS LEADER: And look, I see him, I mean your husband, on his way home, his day’s work done.

PEASANT: Oh! who are these strangers I see at my door? Why have they come here to my rustic gate? Do they want something from me? For it is shameful for a woman to be standing with young men.

ELECTRA: Dearest, do not be suspicious of me; you shall hear the truth; for these strangers have come to me as messengers of news from Orestes. But, strangers, pardon him for what he said.

PEASANT: What do they say? The man is alive and sees the light of day?

ELECTRA: He is, at least in their report, and I believe them.

PEASANT: Surely then he remembers something of your father’s wrongs and your own?

ELECTRA: These are things to hope for; a man in exile is powerless.

PEASANT: What message from Orestes have they come to declare?

ELECTRA: He sent them as spies of my wrongs.

Part 6

PEASANT: Then they see a part of it, and perhaps you are telling them the rest.

ELECTRA: They know; they have all these things in abundance.

PEASANT: Then shouldn’t you have opened the doors to them long before? Go into the house; for in return for your good tidings, you shall find as much hospitality as my house holds in store. Servants, take their baggage within the house. Do not contradict me, since you are friends coming from a friend; for, even if I am poor, I will not display manners that are ill-bred.

ORESTES: By the gods! Is this the man who makes a fraud of your marriage, because he does not want to shame Orestes?

ELECTRA: This is the one who is called my husband, unhappy as I am.

ORESTES: Ah! There is no exact way to test a man’s worth; for human nature has confusion in it. For instance, I have seen before now the son of a noble father worth nothing, and good children from evil parents; famine in a rich man’s spirit, and a mighty soul in a poor man’s body. How then does one rightly distinguish and judge these things? By wealth? A sorry test to use. Or by those who have nothing? But poverty has a disease, it teaches a man to be wicked in his need. But shall I turn to warfare? Who, facing the enemy’s spear, could be a witness as to who is brave? It is best to leave these matters alone, at random. For this man, neither important in Argos, nor puffed up by the good reputation of his family, but one of the many, has been found to be the best. Do not be foolish, you who wander about full of empty notions, but judge those noble among men by their company and by their habits. For such men rule well both states and homes; while those bodies that are empty of mind are only ornaments in the market-place. For the strong arm does not await the battle any better than the weak; this depends on natural courage. But, since Agamemnon’s son, both present and not present, for whose sake we have come, is worthy of it, let us accept a lodging in this house. Calling to his servants. We must go within this house, slaves. May a man poor but eager be a better host for me than a rich man! And so I am content with the reception into this man’s house, though I would have wanted your brother, in good fortune, to lead me to his fortunate home. Perhaps he may come; the oracles of Loxias are sure, but human prophecy I dismiss. Exeunt Orestes and Pylades.

CHORUS LEADER: Now more than before, Electra, I feel the warmth of joy at my heart; for perhaps good fortune, advancing with difficulty, might come to a good resting-place.

ELECTRA: O reckless man, why, knowing the poverty of your house, did you welcome these strangers, greater than you?

PEASANT: What? If they are really as noble as they seem, won’t they be equally content among great and small?

ELECTRA: Since you, one of the small, have now made this error, go to my father’s dear old servant, who tends his flocks, an outcast from the city, by the river Tanaus which cuts a boundary between Argive land and the land of Sparta; bid him come, since these men have arrived at my house, and provide something for the guests’ meal. He will be glad, and will offer prayers to the gods, when he hears that the child, whom he once saved, is alive. I cannot get anything from my mother or from my father’s house; for we would bring bitter news, if she, the hard-hearted, were to learn that Orestes is still alive.

PEASANT: I will take this message to the old man, if you wish; but go inside the house at once and make things ready there. Surely a woman, if she wants to, can find many additions to a meal. Really there is still enough in the house to cram them with food for one day at least. It is in such cases, whenever I fail in my intentions, that I see how wealth has great power, to give to strangers, and to expend in curing the body when it falls sick; but money for our daily food comes to little; for every man when full, rich or poor, gets an equal amount. Exeunt Electra and Peasant.

CHORUS: O famous ships, you that once with countless oars went to Troy, conducting dances with the Nereids, where the music-loving dolphin leapt and rolled at your dark-blue prows, bringing Achilles, the son of Thetis, light in the leap of his foot, with Agamemnon to the banks of Trojan Simois.

CHORUS: The Nereids, leaving Euboea’s headlands, brought from Hephaestus’ anvil his shield-work of golden armor, up to Pelion and the glens at the foot of holy Ossa, the Nymphs’ watch-tower . . . where his father, the horseman, was training the son of Thetis as a light for Hellas, sea-born, swift-footed for the sons of Atreus.

CHORUS: I heard, from someone who had arrived at the harbor of Nauplia from Ilium, that on the circle of your famous shield, O son of Thetis, were wrought these signs, a terror to the Phrygians: on the surrounding base of the shield’s rim, Perseus the throat-cutter, over the sea with winged sandals, was holding the Gorgon’s body, with Hermes, Zeus’ messenger, the rustic son of Maia.

CHORUS: In the center of the shield the sun’s bright circle was shining on winged horses, and the heavenly chorus of stars, Pleiades, Hyades, bringing defeat to the eyes of Hector; and upon his gold-forged helmet were sphinxes, bearing in their talons prey from singing. On his breast-plate a lioness, breathing flame, was eager in flight, with her claws, seeing the colt of Pirene.

CHORUS: On the bloody hilt four-footed horses were prancing, while over their backs black dust rose up. But your adultery killed the lord of such mighty warriors, evil-minded daughter of Tyndareus! For this the gods of heaven will one day send you to death; truly the day will come when I shall see, under your red throat, blood gushing forth at the sword.

OLD MAN: Where, where is my young queen and mistress, Agamemnon’s child, whom I once brought up? How steep is the approach to her house, for a wrinkled old man to ascend with this foot! Still, for these friends, I must drag along my back bent double and sinking knees. Oh, daughter—for I see you now before the house—I have come, bringing you from my own sheep this newborn nursling of the flock, having drawn it away from its mother, and garlands, and cheeses I have taken from the press, and this old treasure of Dionysus, furnished with fragrance, small, but sweet to pour a cup of it into a weaker drink. Let some one carry these gifts into the house for the guests. I have moistened my eyes with tears, and wish to wipe them off on this shred of my robe.

ELECTRA: Why are your eyes wet, old man? Have my troubles stirred your memory, after an interval of time? Or are you groaning over the sad exile of Orestes, and over my father, whom you once held in your arms and brought up, in vain for you and for your friends?

OLD MAN: In vain; but still I could not endure this: for I came to his grave, an addition to my journey, and falling on it I wept for its desolation; then I opened the wine-skin which I am bringing to the guests, and poured a libation, and set myrtle-sprigs round the tomb. On the alter itself I saw a black-fleeced ram as an offering, and there was blood, not long poured out, and severed locks of yellow hair. And I wondered, child, who ever dared come to the the tomb; for it was no Argive at least. But perhaps your brother has somehow come secretly and on his return has done honor to his father’s wretched grave. Go look to see if the color of the cut lock is the same as yours, putting it to your own hair; it is usual for those who have the same paternal blood to have a close bodily resemblance in most points.

ELECTRA: Old man, your words are unworthy of a wise man, if you think my own brave brother would come to this land secretly for fear of Aegisthus. Then, how will a lock of hair correspond, the one made to grow in the wrestling schools of a well-bred man, the other, a woman’s lock, by combing? No, it is impossible. But you could find in many people hair very similar, although they are not of the same blood, old man.

Part 7

OLD MAN: Then stand in the footprint and see if the tread of the boot will measure with your own foot, child.

ELECTRA: How could there be an imprint of feet on a stony plot of ground? And if there is, the foot of brother and sister would not be the same in size, for the male conquers.

OLD MAN: There is not, even if your brother, coming to this land . . . by which you might know your loom’s weaving, in which I once stole him away from death?

ELECTRA: Don’t you know that I was still young when Orestes was driven out of the land? And even if I had woven him a robe, how could he, a child then, have the same one now, unless his clothes grew together with his body? But either a stranger, taking pity on his grave. . .

OLD MAN: Where are the guests? I want to see them and question them about your brother.

ELECTRA: There they are, coming quickly out of the house.

OLD MAN: They are well-born, but that may ring false; for many of the well-born are base. However; I give the guests welcome.

ORESTES: Welcome, old man! To which of your friends, Electra, does this ancient remnant of a man belong?

ELECTRA: This is the one who brought up my father, stranger.

ORESTES: What are you saying? Is this the one who stole away your brother?

ELECTRA: This is the one who saved him, if indeed he is still alive.

ORESTES: Oh! Why does he look at me, as if he were examining the clear mark impressed on a silver coin? Is he comparing me to someone?

ELECTRA: Perhaps he is glad to see in you a companion of Orestes.

ORESTES: A beloved man, yes. But why is he circling all around me?

ELECTRA: I too am amazed, looking at this, stranger.

OLD MAN: O mistress, daughter Electra, pray to the gods.

ELECTRA: For what thing, present or absent?

OLD MAN: To have a beloved treasure, which the god is revealing.

ELECTRA: See: I call on the gods. Or whatever do you mean, old man?

OLD MAN: Look now at this man, my child, your dearest one.

Part 8

ELECTRA: I have been looking for a long time, to see whether you have lost your mind.

OLD MAN: Lost my mind, because I see your brother?

ELECTRA: What do you mean, old man, by this word, unhoped for?

OLD MAN: That I see Orestes here, Agamemnon’s son.

ELECTRA: What mark do you see, by which I shall be persuaded?

OLD MAN: A scar along his brow, where he fell and drew blood one day in his father’s home when chasing a fawn with you.

ELECTRA: What are you saying? I see the sign of the fall.

OLD MAN: Then do you hesitate to embrace your dearest one?

ELECTRA: Not any longer, old man; for my heart is persuaded by your tokens. O you who have appeared at last, I hold you, beyond all hope.

ORESTES: And you are held by me at last.

ELECTRA: I never expected it.

ORESTES: Nor did I hope.

ELECTRA: Are you that one?

ORESTES: Yes, your one ally. If I draw back the cast of the net I am aiming for—but I have confidence; or else we must no longer believe in gods, if wrong is to be victorious over right.

CHORUS: You have come, you have come, oh, long-delayed day, you have lighted up, you have made visible a beacon to the city, who in long ago exile went forth from his father’s house, unhappily wandering. A god, now, a god brings our victory, my dear. Lift up your hands, lift up your words, send prayers to the gods for your brother with fortune, with fortune, to enter the city.

ORESTES: Well; I have the loving pleasures of your greeting and later I will give them back in turn. You, old man, for you have come at the right time, tell me, what should I do to avenge myself on my father’s murderer ? Do I still have any well-disposed friends in Argos? Or am I wholly bankrupt, just as my fortunes are? With whom shall I ally myself? By night or day? What course shall I take against my enemies?

OLD MAN: Child, you have no friend in your misfortune. For this thing is a godsend indeed, to share in common, both good and bad. But you—for you have been destroyed from the foundations, in the eyes of your friends, and you have left them no hope—hear it from me and know: all that you have is in your own arm and fortune, to win your father’s home and your city.

ORESTES: What must I do then to accomplish this?

OLD MAN: Kill Thyestes’ son and your mother.

ORESTES: I have come for that victor’s crown; but how shall I grasp it?

Part 9

OLD MAN: Not by going within the walls, even if you wanted to.

ORESTES: Is he well furnished with garrisons and body-guards?

OLD MAN: You have understood; for, clearly, he is afraid of you, and does not sleep.

ORESTES: Well; it is for you to plan the next step, old man.

OLD MAN: Hear me then; for something has just come to me.

ORESTES: May you reveal something good, and may I understand it.

OLD MAN: I saw Aegisthus, when I was on my way here.

ORESTES: I approve what you have said. Where was he?

OLD MAN: Near these fields, at his stables.

ORESTES: What was he doing? I see some hope, out of difficulties.

OLD MAN: He was preparing a feast for the Nymphs, I thought.

ORESTES: In return for the bringing up of children or for a coming birth?

OLD MAN: I only know this: he was preparing to sacrifice an ox.

ORESTES: With how many men? Or alone with his slaves?

OLD MAN: No Argive was there, but a band of his own servants.

ORESTES: Surely there isn’t anyone who will know me if he sees me, old man?

OLD MAN: There are slaves, who have never even seen you.

ORESTES: Would they be well disposed to me, if I should prevail?

OLD MAN: Yes, for that is the way of slaves, luckily for you.

ORESTES: However might I approach him then?

Part 10

OLD MAN: By going where he will see you as he sacrifices.

ORESTES: He has fields by the road, it seems?

OLD MAN: Yes, and when he sees you there, he will invite you to the feast.

ORESTES: I shall be a bitter companion in the feast, if the god wishes it.

OLD MAN: After that, you yourself invent something, as it falls out.

ORESTES: Well said. But my mother, where is she?

OLD MAN: At Argos; but she will join her husband for the feast.

ORESTES: Why didn’t my mother set out with her husband?

OLD MAN: From fear of the citizens’ reproach she stayed behind.

ORESTES: I understand; she knows that the city suspects her.

OLD MAN: Something like that; for an unholy woman is an object of hatred.

ORESTES: How then shall I kill her and him at once?

ELECTRA: I shall prepare my mother’s slaughter!

ORESTES: And as for the other matter, fortune will ordain well.

ELECTRA: Let this man here help us with both.

OLD MAN: I will; but how will you find a way to kill your mother?

ELECTRA: Go to Clytemnestra, old man, and say this: report that I have given birth to a male child.

OLD MAN: That you have given birth some time ago, or quite recently?

ELECTRA: Ten days ago, in which a woman who has given birth stays pure.

OLD MAN: And how does this grant us the slaughter of your mother?

Part 11

ELECTRA: She will come, when she hears of my childbirth pangs.

OLD MAN: How is that? Do you think she cares for you, child?

ELECTRA: Yes; and she will weep, surely, over my child’s low rank.

OLD MAN: Perhaps; bring your story back again to the turning-point.

ELECTRA: Well then, if she comes, it is clear that she will die.

OLD MAN: Yes, she will come right up to the door of your house.

ELECTRA: Won’t it then be a little thing for her to turn aside to Hades?

OLD MAN: May I die, once I have seen this!

ELECTRA: First of all, old man, guide my brother—

OLD MAN: To the place where Aegisthus is now sacrificing to the gods?

ELECTRA: Then, going to meet my mother, give her my message.

OLD MAN: So that the very words will seem to have been said by you.

ELECTRA: Your work begins at once; you have drawn the first lot in the slaughter.

ORESTES: I would go, if some one would show me the way.

OLD MAN: Yes, I can escort you myself, not against my will.

ORESTES: O Zeus, god of my fathers, be also the vanquisher of my enemies—

ELECTRA: And have pity on us; for we have suffered pitiably—

OLD MAN: Yes, indeed, have pity on your own descendants.

ELECTRA: And Hera, you who rule Mycenae’s altars—

ORESTES: Give us victory, if we are asking for what is right.

Part 12

OLD MAN: Yes, indeed, give them the right of vengeance for their father.

ORESTES: You too, father, living below the earth through an unholy deed—

ELECTRA: And Lady Earth, to whom I give my hands—

OLD MAN: Defend, defend these, your dearest children.

ORESTES: Now come and bring with you all the dead as allies.

ELECTRA: Those who destroyed the Trojans in war with you—

OLD MAN: And all who hate the unholy and polluted.

ELECTRA: Do you hear me, you who suffered dreadful things from my mother?

OLD MAN: Your father hears everything, I know; but it is time to be on our way.

ELECTRA: And I tell you therefore that Aegisthus is to die; if you fall dead in the struggle, I am also dead, do not count me as alive; for I will strike my heart with a two-edged sword. I will go indoors and make things ready there. So that if a good report comes from you, the whole house will cry aloud in triumph; but, if you die, it will be the opposite of that. These are my words to you.

ORESTES: I know it all.

ELECTRA: Therefore you must be a man. Exeunt Orestes, Pylades, and Old Man. And you, women, please take care to give a shout in signal of this contest. I will keep a sword ready, holding it in my hand, for I will not ever, if defeated, submit to my enemies the right to insult my body. Exit Electra.

CHORUS: The story remains in old legends that Pan, the keeper of wild beasts, breathing sweet-voiced music on his well-joined pipes, once brought from its tender mother on Argive hills a lamb with beautiful golden fleece. A herald stood on the stone platform and cried aloud, To assembly, Mycenaeans, go to assembly to see the omens given to our blessed rulers. . . . and they honored the house of Atreus.

CHORUS: The altars of beaten gold were set out; and through the town the altar fires of the Argives blazed; the flute, handmaid of the Muse’s song, sounded its note sweetly, and lovely songs of the golden lamb swelled forth, saying that Thyestes had the luck; for he persuaded Atreus’ own wife to secret love, and carried off to his house the portent; coming before the assembly he declared that he had in his house the horned sheep with fleece of gold.

CHORUS: Then, it was then that Zeus changed the radiant paths of the stars, and the light of the sun, and the bright face of dawn; and the sun drove across the western back of the sky with hot flame from heaven’s fires, while the rain-clouds went northward and Ammon’s lands grew parched and faint, not knowing moisture, robbed of heaven’s fairest showers of rain.

CHORUS: It is said, but I have small belief in it, that the sun turned round his glowing throne of gold, changing it to the misfortune of mankind, for the punishment of mortals. But tales that frighten men are profitable for service to the gods; of whom you had no thought, when you killed your husband, you who are the relative of famous brothers.

CHORUS LEADER: Oh, oh! My friends, did you hear a noise—or did an empty notion come to me?—like the underground rumbling from Zeus? Look, the breeze rises, bringing with it a sign. Mistress, Electra, leave the house!

ELECTRA: My friends, what is it? How do we stand in the contest?

LEADER: I only know this; I hear a wailing that means bloodshed.

ELECTRA: I heard it also, far off, but still heard.

Part 13

LEADER: Yes, the sound is coming a long way, but it is clear.

ELECTRA: The groan was of an Argive; was it from my friends?

LEADER: I don’t know; for the whole tune of the shout is confused.

ELECTRA: You are calling out to me my death; why do I delay?

LEADER: Hold back, to learn your fortune clearly.

ELECTRA: No, no; we are vanquished; where are the messengers?

LEADER: They will come; it is no trivial matter to kill a king.

MESSENGER: O victorious maidens of Mycenae, I report to all his friends that Orestes has conquered, and Aegisthus, the murderer of Agamemnon, lies on the ground; but we must offer prayers to the gods.

ELECTRA: Who are you? How trustworthy is your announcement?

MESSENGER: Don’t you know your brother’s servant when you look at me?

ELECTRA: O best of friends! I could not recognize your face out of fear; but now I know you well. What are you saying? Is my father’s hated murderer dead?

MESSENGER: He is dead; I am telling you twice what you certainly want to hear.

ELECTRA: O gods, and all-seeing justice, at last you have come. In what way and by what form of death did he kill Thyestes’ son? I would like to learn.

MESSENGER: After we had left this house, we stepped onto the broad highway and went to the place where the famous King of Mycenae was. He turned out to be walking in a well-watered garden, plucking a wreath of tender myrtle-sprays for his head; when he saw us, he called out, Welcome, strangers! Who are you and from where do you come? from what country? Orestes said, We are Thessalians, going to the Alpheus river to sacrifice to Olympian Zeus. When Aegisthus heard that, he said, You must be my guests for the feast with us now, for I happen to be sacrificing an ox to the Nymphs; and if you get out of bed at dawn, it will make no difference to you. But let us go within—while he was addressing us, he took us by the hand and led us off the road—you must not refuse. Let someone bring water immediately for my guests, so that they may stand around the altar near the basin. But Orestes said: Just now we purified ourselves in clean water from the river’s streams. So if strangers must join in the sacrifice with citizens, Aegisthus, we are ready and will not refuse, lord. So they ended their public conversation. The slaves who formed the master’s bodyguard laid aside their spears, and all applied their hands to the work. Some brought the bowl to catch the blood, others took up baskets, while others kindled fire and set cauldrons around the hearth, and the whole roof rang. Then your mother’s bed-fellow took barley for sprinkling, and cast it upon the altar with these words, Nymphs of the rocks, may I and my wife, the daughter of Tyndareus, often sacrifice at home, in good fortune as now, and may my enemies suffer—meaning you and Orestes. But my master prayed for the opposite, not speaking the words aloud, that he might win his father’s house. Aegisthus took from a basket a long straight knife, and cutting off some of the calf’s hair laid it with his right hand on the sacred fire, and then cut the calf’s throat when the servants had lifted it upon their shoulders, and said this to your brother: They boast that this is among the honorable accomplishments for the Thessalians: to cut up a bull rightly and to tame horses; take the knife, stranger, and show us if the report about the Thessalians is true. Orestes seized in his hands the well-hammered Dorian knife and threw from his shoulders his graceful buckled robe; he chose Pylades as an assistant in the work and drove back the servants; and taking the calf by the hoof, he laid bare its white flesh, with arm outstretched, and flayed the hide quicker than a runner finishes the two laps of the horses’ race-course; and then he laid the flanks open. Aegisthus took the entrails in his hands and inspected them. Now the liver had no lobe, while the portal vein and near-by gall-bladder revealed threatening approaches to the one who was observing it. Aegisthus was angry, but my master asked, Why are you disheartened? Stranger, I fear some treachery from abroad. Agamemnon’s son is the man I hate most, and an enemy to my house. But Orestes said, Do you really fear treachery from an exile, when you rule the city? Instead of the Dorian knife, let someone bring me a Thessalian axe and let me split the breast-bone, so that we may hold the sacrificial feast. He took the axe and cut. Now Aegisthus took up the entrails, and was inspecting and sorting them out. As he was bending down, your brother rose on tiptoe and struck him on the spine; his back-bone broke apart; with his whole body he struggled up and down, and cried out, dying hard in his blood. As soon as the servants saw it, they rushed to arms, many to fight against two; yet Pylades and Orestes in their bravery stood to face them, brandishing their weapons. Then he said: I do not come hostile to this city or to my own servants; I, the unhappy Orestes, have avenged myself on the murderer of my father; but do not kill me, old servants of my father! They, when they heard his words, held back their spears, and he was recognized by an old man, who had been long in the household. Immediately they crowned your brother with a wreath, and shouted with joy. And he comes bringing a head to show you, not that of the Gorgon, but of the one you hate, Aegisthus; his death today has paid in blood a bitter debt of blood.

CHORUS: Set your step to the dance, my dear, like a fawn leaping high up to heaven with joy. Your brother is victorious and has accomplished the wearing of a crown . . . beside the streams of Alpheus. Come sing a glorious victory ode, to my dance.

ELECTRA: O light, O blaze of the sun, drawn by its team! O earth and night, all that I saw before; now I am free to open my eyes, for Aegisthus, my father’s murderer, has fallen. Come, let me bring out whatever adornment for hair that I have and my house contains, friends, and I shall wreath the head of my conquering brother.

CHORUS: It is for you to bring adornment now for his head; our dance, dear to the Muses, will go on. Now, those who were once our dear kings will rule our land justly, having destroyed the unjust. So let the shout, harmonious with joy, go up.

ELECTRA: O glorious victor, Orestes, son of a father victorious in battle under Troy, receive this band for the locks of your hair. You have come home, running a contest of the stadium that was not useless, but rather killing Aegisthus, the murderer of your father and mine. And you, his companion, Pylades, taught by a most pious father, receive a garland from my hand; for you also bear an equal part of the contest, with Orestes. May you always seem to me fortunate!

ORESTES: First believe that the gods, Electra, are the leaders of our fortune, and then praise me as the servant of them and of fate. I come, having killed Aegisthus not in word but in deed; to add this proof to your knowledge, I am bringing you his corpse, which, if you wish, you may expose as prey for wild animals or impale and press it down on a stake as spoil for birds, the children of the air; for now he is your slave, once called your master.

ELECTRA: I am ashamed, but equally I wish to speak.

Part 14

ORESTES: What is it? Speak, as you are free from fear.

ELECTRA: I am ashamed to insult the dead, for fear someone might hurl malice at me.

ORESTES: There is no one who would blame you.

ELECTRA: Our citizens are hard to please, and love scandal.

ORESTES: Speak, if you need to say anything, sister; for we engaged in hostilities with him on terms without truce.

ELECTRA: Well then! Which of your evil acts shall I tell of first, as a beginning? What sort of end shall I make? What part of my speech shall I assign to the middle place? And yet I never ceased, throughout the early mornings, repeating what I wished to say to your face, if ever I were free from my old terrors. And now I am; so I will pay you back with those reproaches I wanted to make when you were alive. You destroyed me, and orphaned me and this man here of a dear father, though you were wronged in no way by us; and you made a shameful marriage with my mother, and killed her husband, who led the armies of Hellas, though you never went to Troy. You were so foolish that you really expected, in marrying my mother, that she would not be unfaithful to you, though you were wronging my father’s bed. Know that whoever ruins another’s wife, in secret love, and then is forced to take her himself, is pitiable, if he thinks that the chastity which did not govern her before will do so with him. You lived most miserably, although you thought it otherwise; you knew well that you had made an unholy marriage, and my mother knew that she had in you an impious husband. Both being wicked, she took up your fortune, you her evil. Among all the Argives you would hear this: That woman’s husband, not that man’s wife. Although this is a shameful thing, for the wife to rule the house and not the husband; and I hate those children who are called in the city not the sons of the man, their father, but of their mother. For instance, when a man makes a remarkable marriage, one above his rank, there is no talk of the husband but only of the wife. This deceived you the most, in your ignorance: you professed to be some one, strong in your wealth, but that is nothing, except to associate with briefly. It is nature that is secure, not wealth; for, always standing by, it takes away troubles; but prosperity, when it lives wickedly and with fools, flies out of the house, flowering for a short time. As to your women, I am silent—for it is not good for a maiden to speak of this—but I will tell riddles that can be understood. You were insolent because you had a king’s house and were endowed with good looks. May I never have a husband with a girl’s face, but one with a man’s ways. For the children of the latter cling to a life of arms, while the fair ones are only an ornament in the dance. Spurning the corpse with her foot Begone, knowing nothing of how you were discovered and paid the penalty in time. So let no evildoer suppose, even if he runs the first step well, that he will get the better of Justice, until he comes to the end of the finish-line and makes the last turn in life.

CHORUS LEADER: He did terrible things, and repaid them to you and Orestes; for Justice has great strength.

ELECTRA: Well then; you must carry the body of this man inside and hide it, slaves, so that when my mother comes, she may not see his corpse before her slaughter.

ORESTES: Wait! Let us go into another matter.

ELECTRA: What? Those are not rescuers from Mycenae whom I see?

ORESTES: No, but the mother who bore me.

ELECTRA: Then finely she walks to the middle of the net. —And here she comes, splendid in her chariot and dress.

ORESTES: What are we going to do? Shall we kill our mother?

ELECTRA: Surely pity did not seize you, when you saw your mother?

ORESTES: Ah! How can I kill her when she bore me and brought me up?

ELECTRA: As she killed your father and mine.

ORESTES: O Phoebus, you prophesied a great folly—

ELECTRA: Where Apollo is a fool, who are the wise?

ORESTES: You who declared I was to kill my mother, whom it is clearly wrong to kill.

ELECTRA: How can you be hurt by avenging your father?

Part 15

ORESTES: I shall stand trial as a matricide, though I was pure before.

ELECTRA: And by not defending your father, you will be impious.

ORESTES: I, my mother—? To whom will I pay the penalty for her murder?

ELECTRA: And to whom, if you give up our father’s vengeance?

ORESTES: Was it a fiend who spoke in the likeness of the god?

ELECTRA: Seated on the holy tripod? I do not think so.

ORESTES: I cannot believe that this oracle was well prophesied.

ELECTRA: Do not become a coward and fall into unmanliness!

ORESTES: Am I to devise the same crafty scheme for her?

ELECTRA: The same death that you gave to her husband, Aegisthus.

ORESTES: I will go in; it is a dreadful task I am beginning and I will do dreadful things. If the gods approve, let it be; to me the contest is bitter and also sweet.

CHORUS: Hail, Queen of the land of Argos, child of Tyndareus, and sister of those two noble sons of Zeus who dwell in the fiery heavens among the stars, whose honored office it is to save mortals in the high waves. Welcome, I give you worship equal to the blessed gods for your wealth and great prosperity. Now is the time to pay our court to your fortunes. Welcome, o queen.

CLYTEMNESTRA: Come out of the wagon, Trojan maids, and take my hand, that I may step down from the chariot. The homes of the gods are adorned with Phrygian spoils, but I have obtained these women, choice objects from the land of Troy, in return for the daughter whom I lost, a slight reward but an ornament to my house.

ELECTRA: And, mother—for I live as a slave in this miserable house, cast out from my father’s home—may I not take that blessed hand of yours?

CLYTEMNESTRA: These slaves are here; take no trouble on my account.

ELECTRA: What? You sent me away from home, a captive; I was taken when my home was taken, like these, all of us orphaned of a father.

CLYTEMNESTRA: Well, your father laid such plots against those whom least of all he should have, his own family. I will tell you; although when a woman gets an evil reputation, her tongue is bitter. In my opinion, not rightly; but it is correct for those who learn about the matter to hate, if it deserves hatred; if not, why hate at all? Now Tyndareus gave me to your father not so that I or any children I might bear should die. But that man went from the house, taking my child, with the persuasion of a marriage with Achilles, to Aulis which held the fleet; and there he stretched Iphigenia over the pyre, and cut her white cheek. And if, as a cure for the capture of the city, or as a benefit to his house, or to save his other children, he had killed one on behalf of many, I would have pardoned him. But, because Helen was lustful and the one who had her as a wife did not know how to punish the betrayer—for these reasons he destroyed my child. Well, although I was wronged, I would not have been angry at this, nor would I have killed my husband. But he came back to me with a girl, raving and possessed, and put her in his bed, and had two brides at once in the same house. A woman is a foolish thing, I don’t deny it; but, this granted, whenever a husband goes astray and rejects his own bed, the woman is likely to imitate her husband and find another love. And then in us the blame shines clearly, while the men, who caused this, are not badly spoken of. Now if Menelaus had been secretly snatched from his home, should I have killed Orestes to save Menelaus, my sister’s husband? How would your father have endured this? And so isn’t it right for him to die when he had killed what was mine, since I would have suffered at his hands? I killed him, I turned where indeed it was possible to go—to his enemies. For which one of your father’s friends would have joined me in his murder? Speak, if you want to say anything, and make your retort with frankness, in what way your father died unfairly.

CHORUS LEADER: Justly spoken, but this justice is shameful. For a woman should yield to her husband in all things, if she has sense; anyone who does not agree does not come within the scope of what I say.

ELECTRA: Remember, mother, those last words of yours, giving me frankness towards you.

CLYTEMNESTRA: I say it again, and I do not deny it, child.

Part 16

ELECTRA: Then will you treat me badly, when you hear it?

CLYTEMNESTRA: No, no, I will give some pleasure to your heart.

ELECTRA: I will speak, and this is the beginning of my preface: oh, mother, I wish that you had a better heart. For though your beauty, and Helen’s, is worthy to bring you praise, yet you two were born true sisters, both frivolous, not worthy of Castor. She was carried off, willingly ruined; and you have destroyed the bravest man in Greece, putting forward the excuse that you killed a husband for the sake of a child; for they don’t know you so well as I do. You who, before your daughter’s death was decided, as soon as your husband had started from home, were adorning the golden locks of your hair at the mirror. A wife who decks herself out for beauty, when her husband is gone from home—strike her off the list as worthless. There is no need for her to show her pretty face out of doors, unless she is seeking some mischief. Of all the women in Hellas you were the only one I know to be joyful when Troy was fortunate, and with a clouded face when it was weaker, since you did not want Agamemnon to return from Troy. And yet it was in your power to be chaste, and rightly; you had a husband, no worse than Aegisthus, whom Hellas chose to be its commander; and when your sister Helen had done her work, it was possible for you to achieve great fame, for the bad gives a standard of comparison to the good and provides a spectacle. But if, as you say, my father killed your daughter, what is the wrong I and and my brother have done you? How was it that after you had killed your husband, you did not assign to us our father’s home, but you brought the goods belonging to another to bed, buying your marriage with wages? And how is it that your husband is not exiled in the place of your son, nor has he died in my place, although he has killed me, alive, twice as much as my sister? If murder, giving judgment, requites murder, your son Orestes and I must kill you to avenge our father. For if that was just, then so is this.

CLYTEMNESTRA: Child, it was always your nature to love your father. This is what happens: some children are for their fathers, others in turn love their mothers more than a father. I will forgive you; for I do not rejoice so very much at what I have done, child. You, a woman who has just given birth—why is your body so unwashed and meanly clad? Alas for my schemes! I drove on in anger against my husband more than I should have.

ELECTRA: You sigh too late, when you have no remedy. My father is dead; but why do you not recall that exile, your own wandering son?

CLYTEMNESTRA: l am afraid; I am looking to my interests, not his. For he is angry, they say, over the murder of his father.

ELECTRA: And why do you cause your husband to be cruel to me?

CLYTEMNESTRA: Such are his ways. You have a stubborn nature also.

ELECTRA: Yes, for I am in distress. Yet I will cease from my anger.

CLYTEMNESTRA: And then he will no longer be harsh to you.

ELECTRA: He is proud; for he lives in my home.

CLYTEMNESTRA: You see? Again you are rekindling new quarrels.

ELECTRA: I am silent; I fear him—as I fear him.

CLYTEMNESTRA: Stop this talk! But why did you summon me, child?

ELECTRA: You have heard, I suppose, that I have given birth; in thanks for this, please sacrifice—for I do not know how—on the tenth day, as is the custom for the child. For I have no experience, being childless before.

CLYTEMNESTRA: This is work for another, the one who delivered you.

ELECTRA: I was all alone in my labor and at the baby’s birth.

CLYTEMNESTRA: Is this household situated with no friends as neighbors?

ELECTRA: No one is willing to have the poor as friends.

CLYTEMNESTRA: But I will go to make the tenth-day sacrifice to the gods for the child; and when I have done you this favor, I will go to the field where my husband is sacrificing to the Nymphs. Take this team away, my attendants, and bring it to the stalls; and when you think that I have finished this sacrifice to the gods, be ready; for I must also please my husband.

Part 17

ELECTRA: Go into a poor house; but please take care that my smoke-grimed walls do not smear your robes with soot. For you will make the sacrifice to the gods that you ought to make. Going in to the house. The basket is ready, and the knife sharpened, the same that killed the bull by whose side you will lie, struck down. Even in Hades’ house you will be the bride of the one whom you slept with in life. This is the favor I will give you, and you will give me retribution for my father. Exit Electra.

CHORUS: Requital for evils; the breezes of the house shift and blow. At another time my leader, my own, fell murdered in the bath, and the roof and stone walls of the house cried aloud, while he said: O cruelty! My wife, why are you murdering me on my return to my dear country in the tenth year? . . .

CHORUS: Retribution for straying love has flowed back and brings to judgment the one who killed her wretched husband, when he came at last to his home and to the towering Cyclopean walls; with her own hand she killed him with the sharp-edged weapon, holding the axe in her hands. Unhappy husband! whatever the curse that possessed that wretched woman. Like a lioness of the hills that ranges through the meadowland woods, she accomplished these things.

CLYTEMNESTRA: O children, by the gods, do not kill your mother.

CHORUS: Do you hear her cries within the house?

CLYTEMNESTRA: O God! Ah me!

CHORUS: I also wail for you, overpowered by your children. Truly the god deals out justice, whenever it befalls. You have suffered cruelly, unhappy one, yet you did unholy things to your husband.

CHORUS LEADER: But here they come from the house, defiled in the newly shed blood of their mother, a triumphal rout, evidence of the pitiable sacrifice. There is no house more pitiable than the race of Tantalus, nor has there ever been.

ORESTES: O Earth, and Zeus who sees all mortal acts, look at these loathsome bloody deeds, these two bodies lying on the earth at the blow from my hand, atonement for my suffering . . .

ELECTRA: Too many tears, my brother, and I am the cause. Unhappy, that I came to fiery rage against this woman, who was my mother!

CHORUS: Alas for your fate; you gave birth to unbearable pain, and you suffered it, miserably and beyond, from your children. Yet you have rightly paid for their father’s murder.

ORESTES: Ah, Phoebus! you proclaimed in song unclear justice, but you have brought about clear woes, and granted me a bloody destiny far from the land of Hellas. To what other city can I go? What host, what pious man will look at me, who killed my mother?

ELECTRA: Ah me! Where can I go, to what dance, to what marriage? What husband will receive me into the bridal bed?

CHORUS: Again, again your thought changes with the breeze; for now you think piously, though you did not before, and you did dreadful things, my dear, to your unwilling brother.

ORESTES: Did you see how the unhappy one threw off her robe and showed her bosom in the slaughter, alas, hurling to the ground the limbs that gave me birth? And her hair, I—

CHORUS: I know it well; you passed through agony, hearing the mournful wail of the mother that bore you.

ORESTES: She uttered this cry, putting her hand to my chin: My child, I entreat you! And she clung to my cheeks, so that the sword fell from my hand.

CHORUS: The unhappy one! How did you endure to see the blood of your mother, breathing her last before your eyes?

ORESTES: I threw my cloak over my eyes, and began the sacrifice by plunging the sword into my mother’s throat.

ELECTRA: And I urged you on and put my hand to the sword together with you.

Part 18

CHORUS: You have done the most dreadful of deeds.

ORESTES: Take and hide the limbs of our mother beneath a robe, and close the wounds. Turning to the corpse Ah! You gave birth to your own murderers.

ELECTRA: There, I am putting this cloak over the one loved and not loved.

CHORUS: An end of great troubles for the house.

CHORUS LEADER: Divine forms are seen above the house. But see the ones who are appearing over the top of the house—spirits or gods from heaven? For this path does not belong to men. Why ever do they come into the clear sight of mortals?

DIOSKOUROI: Son of Agamemnon, listen; the twin sons of Zeus, your mother’s brothers, Castor and his brother Polydeuces, are calling you. Having just now calmed the swell of the sea, terrible for ships, we have come to Argos when we saw the slaying of our sister, your mother. Now she has her just reward, but you have not acted justly, and Phoebus, Phoebus—but I am silent, for he is my lord; although he is wise, he gave you oracles that were not. But it is necessary to accept these things. As to what remains, you must do what Fate and Zeus have accomplished for you. Give Electra to Pylades as his wife to take to his home; but you leave Argos; for it is not for you, who killed your mother, to set foot in this city. And the dread goddesses of death, the one who glare like hounds, will drive you up and down, a maddened wanderer. Go to Athens and embrace the holy image of Pallas; for she will prevent them, flickering with dreadful serpents, from touching you, as she stretches over your head her Gorgon-faced shield. There is a hill of Ares, where the gods first sat over their votes to decide on bloodshed, when savage Ares killed Halirrothius, son of the ocean’s ruler, in anger for the unholy violation of his daughter, so that the tribunal is most sacred and secure in the eyes of the gods. You also must run your risk here, for murder. An equal number of votes cast will save you from dying by the verdict; for Loxias will take the blame upon himself, since it was his oracle that advised your mother’s murder. And this law will be set for posterity, that the accused will always win his case if he has equal votes. Then the dread goddesses, stricken with grief at this, will sink into a cleft of the earth beside this hill, a holy, revered prophetic shrine for mortals. You must found an Arcadian city beside the streams of Alpheus near the sacred enclosure to Lycaean Apollo; and the city will be called after your name. I say this to you. As for this corpse of Aegisthus, the citizens of Argos will cover it in the earth in burial. But as for your mother, Menelaus, who has arrived at Nauplia only now after capturing Troy, will bury her, with Helen helping him; for she has come from Proteus’ house, leaving Egypt, and she never went to Troy; Zeus, to stir up strife and bloodshed among mortals, sent a phantom of Helen to Ilium. Now let Pylades, having one who is both a virgin and a married woman, go home from the Achaean land, and let him conduct the one called your brother-in-law to the land of Phocis, and give him a weight of riches. But you set out along the narrow Isthmus, and go to Cecropia’s blessed hill. For once you have completed your appointed lot of murder, you will be happy, freed from these troubles.

CHORUS: Sons of Zeus, is it right for us to draw near to speak with you?

DIOSKOUROI: It is right, for those not polluted by this murder.

ELECTRA: May I too share your conversation, sons of Tyndareus?

DIOSKOUROI: You too; to Phoebus I will attribute this bloody deed.

CHORUS: How was it that you, being gods and the brothers of this murdered woman, did not keep the death-goddesses away from her house?

DIOSKOUROI: Necessity’s fate led to what must be, and unwise speech from the mouth of Phoebus.

ELECTRA: But what Apollo, what sort of oracles, ordained for me to be my mother’s murderer?

DIOSKOUROI: The deeds were shared, the fates were shared; one ancestral curse has ground down both.

ORESTES: Ah, my sister, seeing you after a long time, at once I am robbed of your affection, and I must abandon you, abandoned by you.

DIOSKOUROI: She has a husband and a home; she does not suffer pitiably, except that she leaves the city of the Argives.

ELECTRA: And what other unhappiness is greater than to leave the boundary of one’s native land?

ORESTES: But I shall leave my father’s house, and at a stranger’s tribunal undergo trial for my mother’s murder.

DIOSKOUROI: Have courage; you will go to the holy town of Pallas; only hold out.

ELECTRA: Clasp me to your breast, my dearest brother; for the curse of our mother’s blood is separating us from our father’s home.

Part 19

ORESTES: Throw your arms in close embrace about me. Lament as if I were dead, over my grave.

DIOSKOUROI: Alas! You have said things terrible even for gods to hear. For in me and in the Olympians there is pity for much-suffering mortals.

ORESTES: I shall no longer see you!

ELECTRA: Nor will I draw near your sight!

ORESTES: These are my last words to you.

ELECTRA: Farewell, my city! And a long farewell to you, my fellow-countrywomen!

ORESTES: Are you going already, most faithful one?

ELECTRA: I am going, my young eye wet with tears.

ORESTES: Go, Pylades, and be happy; marry Electra.

DIOSKOUROI: Marriage will be for them to think of. But go towards Athens, seeking to escape these hounds of hell, for they are pursuing you fearfully, the dark-skinned ones, with snakes for hands, holding a reward of dreadful pains. But we two must go in haste over the Sicilian sea to rescue the seagoing ships. As we go through the plains of the air, we do not come to the aid of those who are polluted; but we save and release from severe hardships those who love piety and justice in their ways of life. And so, let no one wish to act unjustly, or set sail with perjurers; as a god, I give this address to mortals.

CHORUS: Farewell! Any mortal who is able to fare well, and is not worn down by any misfortune, achieves happiness.