Aeschylus

A LYRICO-DRAMATIC SPECTACLE

“?? ????? e? ?pe??f???? st???essa? ??t??

?? ??st? d? ap????t? ?a??? ??t?t? ???a????.”

“Greeks that ’scaped the Trojan war-cry, and the wailing battle-field,

But home returning basely perished by a wicked woman’s guile.”

Homer, Odys. xi. 383-4.

PERSONS

Watchman.

Chorus of Argive Elders.

Clytemnestra, Wife of Agamemnon.

Herald.

Agamemnon, King of Argos and MycenÆ.

Cassandra, a Trojan Prophetess, Daughter of Priam.

Ægisthus, Son of Thyestes.

Scene—The Royal Palace in Argos.

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS

Of all that rich variety of Epic materials with which the early minstrel-literature of Greece supplied the drama of a future age, there was no more notable cycle among the ancients than that which went by the popular name of ??st??, or the Returns; comprehending an account of the adventures that befell the various Hellenic heroes of the Trojan war in their return home. To this cycle, in its most general acceptation, the Odyssey itself belongs; though the name of ??st??, according to the traditions of the ancient grammarians, is more properly confined to a legendary Epic, composed by an old poet, Agias of Troezene, of which the return of Agamemnon and Menelaus forms the principal subject. Of this Epos the grammarian Proclus^f1 gives us the following abstract:—

“Athena raises a strife between Agamemnon and Menelaus concerning their voyage homeward. Agamemnon remains behind, in order to pacify the wrath of Athena; but Diomede and Nestor depart, and return in safety to their own country. After them Menelaus sails, and arrives with five ships in Egypt; the rest of his vessels having been lost in a storm. Meanwhile, Calchas and Leonteus and Polypoetes go to Colophon, and celebrate the funeral obsequies of Tiresias, who had died there. There is then introduced the shade of Achilles appearing to Agamemnon, and warning him of the dangers that he was about to encounter. Then follows a storm as the fleet is passing the Capharean rocks, at the south promontory of Euboea, on which occasion the Locrian Ajax is destroyed by the wrath of Athena, whom he had offended. Neoptolemus, on the other hand, under the protection of Thetis, makes his way overland through Thrace (where he encounters Ulysses in Maronea), to his native country, and proceeding to the country of the Molossi, is there recognised by his grandfather, the aged Peleus, the father of Achilles. The poem then concludes with an account of the murder of Agamemnon by Ægisthus and Clytemnestra, of the revenge taken on her by Orestes and Pylades, and of the return of Menelaus to LacedÆmon.”^f2

The last sentence of this curious notice contains the Epic germ of which the famous trilogy—the Agamemnon, the Choephoroe, and the Eumenides of Æschylus—present the dramatic expansion. The celebrity of the legends with regard to the return of the mighty Atridan arose naturally from the prominent situation in which he stood as the admiral of the famous thousand-masted fleet; and, besides, the passage from the old Troezenian minstrel just quoted, is sufficiently attested by various passages—some of considerable length—in the Odyssey, which will readily present themselves to the memory of those who are familiar with the productions of the great Ionic Epopoeist. In the very opening of that poem, for instance, occur the following remarkable lines:—

“Strange, O strange, that mortal men immortal gods will still be blaming,

Saying that the source of evil lies with us; while they, in sooth,

More than Fate would have infatuate with sharp sorrows pierce themselves!

Thus even now Ægisthus, working sorrow more than Fate would have,

The Atridan’s wife hath wedded, and himself returning slain,

Knowing well the steep destruction that awaits him; for ourselves

Sent the sharp-eyed Argus-slayer, Hermes, to proclaim our will,

That nor him he dare to murder, nor his wedded wife to woo.

Thus spoke Hermes well and wisely; but thy reckless wit, Ægisthus,

Moved he not; full richly therefore now thy folly’s fine thou payest.”

And the same subject is reverted to in the Third Book (v. 194), where old Nestor, in Pylos, gives an account to Telemachus, first of his own safe return, and then of the fate of the other Greeks, so far as he knew; and, again, in the Fourth Book (v. 535) where Menelaus is informed of his brother’s sad fate (slain “like a bull in a stall”) by the old prophetic Proteus, the sea harlequin of the African coast; and, also, in the Eleventh Book (v. 405), where Ulysses, in Hades, hears the sad recital from the injured shade of the royal Atridan himself.

The tragic events by which Agamemnon and his family have acquired such a celebrity in the epic and dramatic annals of Greece, are but the sequel and consummation of a series of similar events commencing with the great ancestor of the family; all which hang together in the chain of popular tradition by the great moral principle so often enunciated in the course of these dramas, that sin has always a tendency to propagate its like, and a root of bitterness once planted in a family, will grow up and branch out luxuriantly, till, in the fulness of time, it bears those bloody blossoms, and fruits of perdition that are its natural product. The guilty ancestor, in the present case, is the well-known Tantalus, the peculiar style of whose punishment in the infernal regions has been stereotyped, for the modern memory, in the shape of one of the most common and most expressive words in the English language. Tantalus, a son of Jove, a native of Sipylos in Phrygia, and who had been admitted to the table of the gods, thinking it a small matter to know the divine counsels, if he did not, at the same time, gratify his vanity by making a public parade of his knowledge before profane ears, was punished in the pit of Tartarus by those tortures of ever reborn and never gratified desire which every schoolboy knows. His son, Pelops, an exile from his native country, comes with great wealth to Pisa; and having, by stratagem, won, in a chariot race, Hippodamia, the daughter of Oernomaus, king of that place, himself succeeded to the kingdom, and became so famous, according to the legend, as to lend a new name to the southern peninsula of Greece which was the theatre of his exploits.^f3 In his career also, however, the traces of blood are not wanting, which soil so darkly the path of his no less famous descendants. Pelops slew Myrtilus, the charioteer by whose aid he had won the race that was the beginning of his greatness; and it was the Fury of this Myrtilus—or “his blood crying to Heaven,” as in Christian style we should express it—that, according to one poet (Eurip. Orest. 981), gave rise to the terrible retributions of blood by which the history of the Pelopidan family is marked. Of Pelops, according to the common account, Atreus and Thyestes were the sons. These having murdered their stepbrother, Chrysippus, were obliged to flee for safety to MycenÆ, in Argolis, where, in the course of events, they afterwards established themselves, and became famous for their wealth and for their crimes. The bloody story of these hostile brothers commences with the seduction, by Thyestes, of Aerope, the wife of Atreus; in revenge for which insult, Atreus recalls his banished brother, and, pretending reconciliation, offers that horrid feast of human flesh—the blood of the children to the lips of the father—from which the sun turned away his face in horror. The effect of this deed of blood was to entail, between the two families of Thyestes and Atreus, a hereditary hostility, the fruits of which appeared afterwards in the person of Ægisthus, the son of the former, who is found, in this first play of the trilogy, engaged with Clytemnestra in a treacherous plot to avenge his father’s wrongs, by the murder of his uncle’s son.

Agamemnon, the son, or, according to a less common account (for which see Schol. ad Iliad II. 249), the grandson of Atreus, being distinguished above the other Hellenic princes for wealth and power, was either by special election appointed, or by that sort of irregular kingship common among half-civilized nations, allowed to conduct the famous expedition against Troy that in early times foreshadowed the conquests of Alexander the Great, and the influence of the Greek language and letters in the East. Such a distant expedition as this, like the crusades in the middle ages, was not only a natural living Epos in itself, but would necessarily give rise to that intense glow of popular sympathy, and that excited state of the popular imagination, which enable the wandering poets of the people to make the best poetic use of the various dramatic incidents that the realities of a highly potentiated history present. Accordingly we find, in the very outset of the expedition, the fleet, storm-bound in the harbour of Aulis, opposite Euboea, enabled to pursue its course, under good omens, only by the sacrifice of the fairest daughter of the chief. This event—a sad memorial of the barbarous practice of human sacrifice, even among the polished Greeks—formed the subject of a special play, perhaps a trilogic series of plays,^f4 by Æschylus. This performance, however, has been unfortunately lost; and we can only imagine what it may have been by the description in the opening chorus of the present play, and by the beautiful, though certainly far from Æschylean, tragedy of Euripides. For our present purpose, it is sufficient to note that, in the Agamemnon, special reference is made to the sacrifice of Iphigenia, both as an unrighteous deed on the part of the father, for which some retribution was naturally to be expected, and as the origin of a special grudge in the mind of the mother, which she afterwards gratifies by the murder of her husband.

As to that deed of blood itself, and its special adaptation for dramatic purposes, there can be no doubt; as little that Æschylus has used his materials in the present play in a fashion that satisfies the highest demands both of lyric and dramatic poetry, as executed by the first masters of both. The calm majesty and modest dignity of the much-tried monarch; the cool self-possession, and the smooth front of specious politeness that mark the character of the royal murderess: the obstreperous bullying of the cowardly braggart, who does the deed with his heart, not with his hand; the half-wild, half-tender ravings of the horror-haunted Trojan prophetess; these together contain a combination of highly wrought dramatic elements, such as is scarcely excelled even in the all-embracing pages of our own Shakespere. As far removed from common-place are the lyrical—in Æschylus never the secondary—elements of the piece. The sublime outbreak of Cassandra’s prophetic horror is, as the case demanded, made to exhibit itself as much under the lyric as in the declamatory form; while the other choral parts, remarkable for length and variety, are marked not only by that mighty power of intense moral feeling which is so peculiarly Æschylean, but by the pictorial beauty and dramatic reality that distinguish the workmanship of a great lyric master from that of the vulgar dealer in inflated sentiment and sonorous sentences.

AGAMEMNON

Watchman.

I pray the gods a respite from these toils,

This long year’s watch that, dog-like, I have kept,

High on the Atridan’s battlements,ⁿ¹ beholding

The nightly council of the stars, the circling

Of the celestial signs, and those bright regents,

High-swung in ether, that bring mortal men

Summer and winter. Here I watch the torch,

The appointed flame that wings a voice from Troy,

Telling of capture; thus I serve her hopes,

The masculine-minded who is sovereign here.ⁿ²

And when night-wandering shades encompass round

My dew-sprent dreamless couch (for fear doth sit

In slumber’s chair, and holds my lids apart),

I chaunt some dolorous ditty, making song,

Sleep’s substitute, surgeon my nightly care,

And the misfortunes of this house I weep,

Not now, as erst, by prudent counsels swayed.

Oh! soon may the wished for sign relieve my toils,

Thrice-welcome herald, gleaming through the night!

[The beacon is seen shining.]

All hail thou cresset of the dark! fair gleam

Of day through midnight shed, all hail! bright father

Of joy and dance, in Argos, hail! all hail!

Hillo! hilloa!

I will go tell the wife of Agamemnon

To shake dull sleep away, and lift high-voicedⁿ³

The jubilant shout well-omened, to salute

This welcome beacon, if, indeed, old Troy

Hath fallen—as flames this courier torch to tell.

Myself will dance the prelude to this joy.

My master’s house hath had a lucky throw,

And thrice six falls to me,ⁿ⁴ thanks to the flame!

Soon may he see his home; and soon may I

Carry my dear-loved master’s hand in mine!

The rest I whisper not, for on my tongue

Is laid a seal.ⁿ⁵ These walls, if they could speak,

Would say strange things. Myself to those that know

Am free of speech, to whoso knows not dumb. [Exit.

Enter Chorus in procession. March time.

Chorus.

Nine years have rolled, the tenth is rolling,

Since the strong Atridan pair,

Menelaus and Agamemnon,

Sceptred kings by Jove’s high grace,ⁿ⁶

With a host of sworn alliance,

With a thousand triremes rare,

With a righteous strong defiance,

Sailed for Troy. From furious breast

Loud they clanged the peal of battle;

Like the cry of vultures wild

O’er the lone paths fitful-wheeling,ⁿ⁷

With their plumy oarage oaring

Over the nest by the spoiler spoiled,

The nest dispeopled now and bare,

Their long but fruitless care.

But the gods see it: some Apollo,

Pan or Jove, the wrong hath noted,

Heard the sharp and piercing cry

Of the startled birds, shrill-throated

Tenants of the sky;

And the late-chastising Furyⁿ⁸

Sent from above to track the spoiler,

Hovers vengeful nigh.

Thus great Jove, the high protector

Of the hospitable laws,ⁿ⁹

’Gainst Alexander sends the Atridans,

Harnessed in a woman’s cause,

The many-lorded fair.

Toils on toils shall come uncounted,

(Jove hath willed it so);

Limb-outwearying hard endeavour,

Where the strong knees press the dust,

Where the spear-shafts split and shiver,

Trojan and Greek shall know.

But things are as they are: the chain

Of Fate doth brad them; sighs are vain,

Tears, libations, fruitless flow,

To divert from purposed ire

The powers whose altars know no fire.ⁿ¹⁰

But we behind that martial train

Inglorious left remain,

Old and frail, and feebly leaning

Strength as of childhood on a staff.

Yea! even as life’s first unripe marrow

In the tender bones are we,

From war’s harsh service free.

For hoary Eld, life’s leaf up-shrunken,

Totters, his three-footed way

Feebly feeling, weak as childhood,

Like a dream that walks by day.

But what is this? what wandering word,

Clytemnestra queen, hath reached thee?

What hast seen? or what hast heard

That from street to street swift flies

Thy word, commanding sacrifice?

All the altars of all the gods

That keep the city, gods supernal,

Gods Olympian, gods infernal,

Gods of the Forum, blaze with gifts;

Right and left the flame mounts high,

Spiring to the sky,

With the gentle soothings cherished

Of the oil that knows no malice,ⁿ¹¹

And the sacred cake that smokes

From the queen’s chamber in the palace.

What thou canst and may’st, declare;

Be the healer of the care

That bodes black harm within me; change it

To the bright and hopeful ray,

Which from the altar riseth, chasing

From the heart the sateless sorrow

That eats vexed life away.

[The Chorus, having now arranged themselves into a regular band in the middle of the Orchestra, sing the First choral hymn.

CHORAL HYMN.
STROPHE.

I’ll voice the strain.ⁿ¹² What though the arm be weak

That once was strong,

The suasive breath of Heaven-sent memories stirs

The old man’s breast with song.

My age hath virtue left

To sing what fateful omens strangely beckoned

The twin kings to the fray,

What time to Troy concentuous marched

The embattled Greek array.

Jove’s swooping bird, king of all birds,^f5 led on

The kings of the fleet with spear and vengeful hand:

By the way-side from shining seats serene,

Close by the palace, on the spear-hand seen,^f6

Two eagles flapped the air,

One black, the other silver-tipt behind,

And with keen talons seized a timorous hare,

Whose strength could run no more,

Itself, and the live burden which it bore.

Sing woe and well-a-day! But still

May the good omens shame the ill.

ANTISTROPHE.

The wise diviner of the host^f7 beheld,

And knew the sign;

The hare-devouring birds with diverse wings

Typed the Atridan pair,

The diverse-minded kings;ⁿ¹³

And thus the fate he chaunted:—Not in vain

Ye march this march to-day;

Old Troy shall surely fall, but not

Till moons on moons away

Have lingering rolled. Rich stores by labour massed

Clean-sweeping Fate shall plunder. Grant the gods,

While this strong bit for Troy we forge with gladness,

No heavenly might in jealous wrath o’ercast

Our mounting hope with sadness.

For the chaste Artemis^f8 a sore grudge nurses

Against the kings; Jove’s winged hounds she curses,ⁿ¹⁴

The fierce war-birds that tore

The fearful hare, with the young brood it bore.

Sing woe and well-a-day! but still

May the good omens shame the ill.

EPODE.

The lion’s fresh-dropt younglings, and each whelp

That sucks wild milk, and through the forest roves,

Live not unfriended; them the fair goddess loves,ⁿ¹⁵

And lends her ready help.

The vision of the birds shall work its end

In bliss, but dashed not lightly with black bane;^f9

I pray thee, PÆan, may she never sendⁿ¹⁶

Contrarious blasts dark-lowering, to detain

The Argive fleet.

Ah! ne’er may she desire to feast her eyes

On an unblest unholy sacrifice,

From festal use abhorrent, mother of strife,

And sundering from her lawful lord the wife.^f10

Stern-purposed waits the child-avenging wrathⁿ¹⁷

About the fore-doomed halls,

Weaving dark wiles, while with sure-memoried sting

Fury to Fury calls.

Thus hymned the seer, the doom, in dubious chaunt

Bliss to the chiefs dark-mingling with the bane,

From the way-haunting birds; and we

Respondent to the strain,

Sing woe and well-a-day! but still

May the good omens shame the ill.

STROPHE I.

Jove, or what other nameⁿ¹⁸

The god that reigns supreme delights to claim,

Him I invoke; him of all powers that be,

Alone I find,

Who from this bootless load of doubt can free

My labouring mind.

ANTISTROPHE I.

Who was so great of yore,

With all-defiant valour brimming o’er,ⁿ¹⁹

Is mute; and who came next by a stronger arm

Thrice-vanquished fell;

But thou hymn victor Jove: so in thy heart

His truth shall dwell

STROPHE II.

For Jove doth teach men wisdom, sternly wins

To virtue by the tutoring of their sins;

Yea! drops of torturing recollection chill

The sleeper’s heart; ’gainst man’s rebellious will

Jove works the wise remorse:

Dread Powers, on awful seats enthroned, compel

Our hearts with gracious force.ⁿ²⁰

ANTISTROPHE II.

The elder chief, the leader of the ships,

Heard the dire doom, nor dared to ope his lips

Against the seer, and feared alone to stand

’Gainst buffeting fate, what time the Chalcian strand^f11

Saw the vexed Argive masts

In Aulis tides hoarse-refluent,ⁿ²¹ idly chained

By the fierce Borean blasts;

STROPHE III.

Blasts from Strymon^f12 adverse braying,

Harbour-vexing, ship-delaying,

Snapping cables, shattering oars,

Wasting time, consuming stores,

With vain-wandering expectation,

And with long-drawn slow vexation

Wasting Argive bloom.

At length the seer forth-clanged the doom,

A remedy strong to sway the breeze,

And direful Artemis to appease,

But to the chiefs severe:

The Atridans with their sceptres struck the ground,

Nor could restrain the tear.

ANTISTROPHE III.

Then spake the elder. To deny,

How hard! still harder to comply!

My daughter dear, my joy, my life,

To slay with sacrificial knife,

And with life’s purple-gushing tide,

Imbrue a father’s hand, beside

The altar of the gods.

This way or that is ill: for how

Shall I despise my federate vow?

How leave the ships? That all conspire

Thus hotly to desire

The virgin’s blood—wind-soothing sacrifice—

Is the gods’ right. So be it.ⁿ²²

STROPHE IV.

Thus to necessity’s harsh yoke he bared

His patient neck. Unblissful blew the gale

That turned the father’s heartⁿ²³

To horrid thoughts unholy, thoughts that dared

The extreme of daring. Sin from its primal spring

Mads the ill-counsel’d heart, and arms the hand

With reckless strength. Thus he

Gave his own daughter’s blood, his life, his joy,

To speed a woman’s war, and consecrateⁿ²⁴

His ships for Troy.

ANTISTROPHE IV.

In vain with prayers, in vain she beats dull ears

With a father’s name; the war-delighting chiefs

Heed not her virgin years.

The father stood; and when the priests had prayed,

Take her, he said; in her loose robes enfolden,

Where prone and spent she lies,ⁿ²⁵ so lift the maid;

Even as a kid is laid,

So lay her on the altar; with dumb force

Her beauteous^f13 mouth gag, lest it breathe a voice

Of curse to Argos.

STROPHE V.

And as they led the maid, her saffron robeⁿ²⁶

Sweeping the ground, with pity-moving dart

She smote each from her eye,

Even as a picture beautiful, fain to speak,

But could not. Well that voice they knew of yore;

Oft at her father’s festive board,

With gallant banqueters ringed cheerly round,

The virgin strain they heardⁿ²⁷

That did so sweetly pour

Her father’s praise, whom Heaven had richly crowned

With bounty brimming o’er.

ANTISTROPHE V.

The rest I know not, nor will vainly pry;

But Calchas was a seer not wont to lie.

Justice doth wait to teach

Wisdom by suffering. Fate will have its way.

The quickest ear is pricked in vain to-day,

To catch to-morrow’s note. What boots

To forecast woe, which, on no wavering wing,ⁿ²⁸

The burthen’d hour shall bring.

But we, a chosen band,

Left here sole guardians of the Apian land,^f14

Pray Heaven, all good betide!

Enter Clytemnestra.

Chorus.

Hail Clytemnestra! honour to thy sceptre!

When her lord’s throne is vacant, the wife claims

His honour meetly. Queen, if thou hast heard

Good news, or to the hope of good that shall be,

With festal sacrifice dost fill the city,

I fain would know; but nothing grudge thy silence.

Clytemnestra.

Bearing blithe tidings, saith the ancient saw,

Fair Morn be gendered from boon mother Night!

News thou shalt hear beyond thy topmost hope;

The Greeks have ta’en old Priam’s city.

Chorus.

How!

Troy taken! the word drops from my faithless ear.

Clytemnestra.

The Greeks have taken Troy. Can I speak plainer?

Chorus.

Joy o’er my heart creeps, and provokes the tear.

Clytemnestra.

Thine eye accuses thee that thou art kind.

Chorus.

What warrant of such news? What certain sign?

Clytemnestra.

Both sign and seal, unless some god deceive me.

Chorus.

Dreams sometimes speak; did suasive visions move thee?

Clytemnestra.

Where the soul sleeps, and the sense slumbers, there

Shall the wise ask for reasons?

Chorus.

Ever swift

Though wingless, Fame,ⁿ²⁹ with tidings fair hath cheered thee.

Clytemnestra.

Thou speak’st as one who mocks a simple girl.

Chorus.

Old Troy is taken? how?—when did it fall?

Clytemnestra.

The self-same night that mothers this to-day.

Chorus.

But how? what stalwart herald ran so fleetly?

Clytemnestra.

HephÆstus.^f15 He from Ida shot the spark;ⁿ³⁰

And flaming straightway leapt the courier fire

From height to height; to the HermÆan rock

Of Lemnos, first from Ida; from the isle

The AthÓan steep of mighty Jove received

The beaming beacon; thence the forward strength

Of the far-travelling lamp strode gallantlyⁿ³¹

Athwart the broad sea’s back. The flaming pine

Rayed out a golden glory like the sun,

And winged the message to Macistus’ watch-tower.

There the wise watchman, guiltless of delay,

Lent to the sleepless courier further speed;

And the Messapian station hailed the torch

Far-beaming o’er the floods of the EurÍpus.

There the grey heath lit the responsive fire,

Speeding the portioned message; waxing strong,

And nothing dulled across Asopus’ plain

The flame swift darted like the twinkling moon,

And on CithÆron’s rocky heights awaked

A new receiver of the wandering light.

The far-sent ray, by the faithful watch not spurned,

With bright addition journeying, bounded o’er

GorgÓpus’ lake and Ægiplanctus’ mount,

Weaving the chain unbroken.ⁿ³² Hence it spread

Not scant in strength, a mighty beard of flame,ⁿ³³

Flaring across the headlands that look down

On the Saronic gulf.ⁿ³⁴ Speeding its march,

It reached the neighbour-station of our city,

Arachne’s rocky steep; and thence the halls

Of the AtridÆ recognised the signal,

Light not unfathered by IdÆan fire.

Such the bright train of my torch-bearing heralds,

Each from the other fired with happy news,

And last and first was victor in the race.ⁿ³⁵

Such the fair tidings that my lord hath sent,

A sign that Troy hath fallen.

Chorus.

And for its fall

Our voice shall hymn the gods anon: meanwhile

I’m fain to drink more wonder from thy words.

Clytemnestra.

This day Troy fell. Methinks I see’t; a host

Of jarring voices stirs the startled city,

Like oil and acid, sounds that will not mingle,

By natural hatred sundered. Thou may’st hear

Shouts of the victor, with the dying groan,

Battling, and captives’ cry; upon the dead—

Fathers and mothers, brothers, sisters, wives—

The living fall—the young upon the old;

And from enthrallÉd necks wail out their woe.

Fresh from the fight, through the dark night the spoilers

Tumultuous rush where hunger spurs them on,

To feast on banquets never spread for them.

The homes of captive Trojan chiefs they share

As chance decides the lodgment; there secure

From the cold night-dews and the biting frosts,

Beneath the lordly roof, to their hearts’ contentⁿ³⁶

They live, and through the watchless night prolong

Sound slumbers. Happy if the native gods

They reverence, and the captured altars spare,ⁿ³⁷

Themselves not captive led by their own folly!

May no unbridled lust of unjust gain

Master their hearts, no reckless rash desire!

Much toil yet waits them. Having turned the goal,ⁿ³⁸

The course’s other half they must mete out,

Ere home receive them safe. Their ships must brook

The chances of the sea; and, these being scaped,

If they have sinnedⁿ³⁹ the gods their own will claim,

And vengeance wakes till blood shall be atoned.

I am a woman; but mark thou well my words;

I hint the harm; but with no wavering scale,

Prevail the good! I thank the gods who gave me

Rich store of blessings, richly to enjoy.

Chorus.

Woman, thou speakest wisely as a man,

And kindly as thyself. But having heard

The certain signs of Agamemnon’s coming,

Prepare we now to hymn the gods; for surely

With their strong help we have not toiled in vain.

O regal Jove! O blessed Night!

Thou hast won thee rich adornments,

Thou hast spread thy shrouding meshes

O’er the towers of Priam. Ruin

Whelms the young, the old. In vain

Shall they strive to o’erleap the snare,

And snap the bondsman’s galling chain,

In woe retrieveless lost.

Jove, I fear thee, just protector

Of the wrong’d host’s sacred rights;

Thou didst keep thy bow sure bent

’Gainst Alexander; not before

The fate-predestined hour, and not

Beyond the stars, with idle aim,

Thy cunning shaft was shot.

CHORAL HYMN.
STROPHE I.

The hand of Jove hath smote them; thou

May’st trace it plainly;

What the god willed, behold it now

Not purposed vainly!

The gods are blind,ⁿ⁴⁰ and little caring,

So one hath said, to mark the daring

Of men, whose graceless foot hath ridden

O’er things to human touch forbidden.

Godless who said so; sons shall rue

Their parents’ folly,

Who flushed with wealth, with insolence flown,

The sober bliss of man outgrown,

The trump of Mars unchastened blew,

And stirred red strife without the hue

Of justice wholly.

Live wiselier thou, not waxing gross

With gain, thou shalt be free from loss.

Weak is his tower, with pampering wealth

In brief alliance

Who spurns great Justice’ altar dread

With damned defiance;

Him the deep hell shall claim, and shame

His vain reliance.

ANTISTROPHE I.

Self-will fell AtÉ’s daughter,ⁿ⁴¹ still

Fore-counselling ruin,

Shall spur him on resistless borne

To his undoing.

Fined with sharp loss beyond repairing,

His misery like a beacon flaring,

Shall shine to all. Like evil brass,

That tested shows a coarse black mass,

His deep distemper he shall show

By dints of trial.

Even as a boy in wanton sport,ⁿ⁴²

Chasing a bird to his own hurt,

And to the state’s redeemless loss,

Whom, when he prays, the gods shall cross

With sheer denial,

And sweep the lewd and lawless liver

From earth’s fair memory for ever;

Thus to the Atridans’ palace came

False Alexander,

And shared the hospitable board,

A bold offender,

Filching his host’s fair wife away

To far Scamander.

STROPHE II.

She went, and to the Argive city left

Squadrons shield-bearing,

Battle preparing,

Swords many-flashing,

Oars many-plashing;

She went, destruction for her dowry bearing,

To the Sigean shore;

Light with swift foot she brushed the doorstead, daring

A deed undared before.

The prophets of the house loud wailing,ⁿ⁴³

Cried with sorrow unavailing,

“Woe to the Atridans! woe!

The lofty palaces fallen low!

The marriage and the marriage bed,

The steps once faithful, fond to follow

There where the faithful husband led!”

He silent stood in sadness, not in wrath,ⁿ⁴⁴

His own eye scarce believing,

As he followed her flight beyond the path

Of the sea-wave broadly heaving.

And phantoms sway each haunt well known,

Which the lost loved one wont to own,

And the statued forms that look from their seats

With a cold smile serenely,

He loathes to look on; in his eye

Pines AphroditÉ^f16 leanly.

ANTISTROPHE II.

In vain he sleeps; for in the fretful night

Shapes of fair seeming

Flit through his dreaming,

Soothing him sweetly,

Leaving him fleetly

Of bliss all barren. The shape fond fancy weaves him

His eager grasp would keep,

In vain; it cheats the hand; and leaves him, sweeping

Swift o’er the paths of sleep.

These sorrows pierce the Atridan chiefs,

And, worse than these, their private griefs,

But general Greece that to the fray

Sent her thousands, mourns to-day;

And Grief stout-hearted at each door

Sits to bear the burden sore

Of deathful news from the Trojan shore.

Ah! many an Argive heart to-day

Is pricked with wail and mourning,

Knowing how many went to Troy,

From Troy how few returning!

The mothers of each house shall wait

To greet their sons at every gate;

But, alas! not men, but dust of men

Each sorrowing house receiveth,

The urn in which the fleshly case

Its cindered ruin leaveth.

STROPHE III.

For Mars doth market bodies, and for gold

Gives dust, and in the battle of the bold

Holds the dread scales of Fate.

Burnt cinders, a light burden, but to friends

A heavy freight,

He sends from Troy; the beautiful vase he sends

With dust, for hearts, well lined, on which descends

The frequent tear.

And friends do wail their praise; thin here

Expert to wield the pointed spear,

And this who cast his life away,

Nobly in ignoble fray,

For a strange woman’s sake.

And in their silent hearts hate burns;

Against the kings

The moody-muttered grudge creeps forth,

And points its stings.

Others they mourn who ’neath Troy’s wall

Entombed, dark sleep prolong,

Low pressed beneath the hostile sod,

The beautiful, the strong!

ANTISTROPHE III.

O hard to bear, when evil murmurs fly,

Is a nation’s hate; unblest on whom doth lie

A people’s curse!

My heart is dark, in my fear-procreant brain

Bad begets worse.

For not from heaven the gods behold in vain

Hands red with slaughter. The black-mantled train^f17

Who watch and wait,

In their own hour shall turn to bane

The bliss that grew from godless gain.

The mighty man with heart elate

Shall fall; even as the sightless shades,

The great man’s glory fades.

Sweet to the ear is the popular cheer

Forth billowed loudly;

But the bolt from on high shall blast his eyeⁿ⁴⁵

That looketh proudly.

Be mine the sober bliss, and far

From fortune’s high-strung rapture;

Not capturing others, may I never

See my own city’s capture!

EPODE.

Swift-winged with thrilling note it came,

The blithe news from the courier-flame;

But whether true and witnessed well,

Or if some god hath forged a lie,

What tongue can tell?

Who is so young, so green of wit,

That his heart should blaze with a fever fit,

At a tale of this fire-courier’s telling,

When a new rumour swiftly swelling,

May turn him back to dole? To lift the note

Of clamorous triumph ere the fight be fought,

Is a light chance may fitly fall,

Where women wield the spear.ⁿ⁴⁶

A wandering word by woman’s fond faith sped

Swells and increases,

But with dispersion swift a woman’s tale

Is lost and ceases.

Enter Clytemnestra.

Clytemnestra.

Soon shall we know if the light-bearing lamps

And the bright signals of the fiery changes

Spake true or, dream-like, have deceived our sense

With smiling semblance. For, behold, where comes,

Beneath the outspread olive’s branchy shade,

A herald from the beach; and thirsty dust,

Twin-sister of the clay, attests his speed.

Not voiceless he, nor with the smoking flame

Of mountain pine will bring uncertain news.

His heraldry gives increase to our joy,

Or—but to speak ill-omened words I shun;—

May fair addition fair beginning follow!

Chorus.

Whoso fears evil where no harm appears,

Reap first himself the fruit of his own fears.

Enter Herald.

Herald.

Hail Argive land! dear fatherland, all hail!

This tenth year’s light doth shine on my return!

And now this one heart’s hope from countless wrecks

I save! Scarce hoped I e’er to lay my bones

Within the tomb where dearest dust is stored.

I greet thee, native land! thee, shining sun!

Thee, the land’s Sovereign, Jove! thee, Pythian King,

Shooting no more thy swift-winged shafts against us.

Enough on red Scamander’s banks we knew

Thee hostile; now our saviour-god be thou,

Apollo, and our healer from much harm!ⁿ⁴⁷

And you, all gods that guide the chance of fight,

I here revoke; and thee, my high protector,

Loved Hermes, of all heralds most revered.

And you, all heroes that sent forth our hosts,

Bring back, I pray, our remnant with good omens.

O kingly halls! O venerated seats!

O dear-loved roofs, and ye sun-fronting gods,ⁿ⁴⁸

If ever erst, now on this happy day,

With these bright-beaming eyes, duly receive

Your late returning king; for Agamemnon

Comes, like the sun, a common joy to all.

Greet him with triumph, as beseems the man,

Who with the mattock of justice-bringing Jove

Hath dug the roots of Troy, hath made its altars

Things seen no more, its towering temples razed,

And caused the seed of the whole land to perish.

Such yoke on Ilium’s haughty neck the elder

Atridan threw, a king whom gods have blessed

And men revere, ’mongst mortals worthy most

Of honour; now nor Paris, nor in the bond

Partner’d with him, old Troy more crime may boast

Than penalty; duly in the court of fight,

In the just doom of rape and robbery damned,

His pledge is forfeited;ⁿ⁴⁹ his hand hath reaped

Clean bare the harvest of all bliss from Troy.

Doubly they suffer for a double crime.

Chorus.

Hail soldier herald, how farest thou?

Herald.

Right well!

So well that I could bless the gods and die.

Chorus.

Doubtless thy love of country tried thy heart?

Herald.

To see these shores I weep for very joy.

Chorus.

And that soul-sickness sweetly held thee?

Herald.

How?

Instruct my wit to comprehend thy words.

Chorus.

Smitten with love of them that much loved thee.

Herald.

Say’st thou? loved Argos us as we loved Argos?

Chorus.

Ofttimes we sorrowed from a sunless soul.

Herald.

How so? Why should the thought of the host have clouded

Thy soul with sadness?

Chorus.

Sorrow not causeless came;

But I have learned to drug all woes by silence.

Herald.

Whom should’st thou quail before, the chiefs away?

Chorus.

I could have used thy phrase, and wished to die.

Herald.

Die now, an’ thou wilt, for joy! The rolling years

Have given all things a prosperous end, though some

Were hard to bear; for who, not being a god,

Can hope to live long years of bliss unbroken?

A weary tale it were to tell the tithe

Of all our hardships; toils by day, by night,

Harsh harbourage, hard hammocks, and scant sleep.

No sun without new troubles, and new groans,

Shone on our voyage; and when at length we landed,

Our woes were doubled; ’neath the hostile walls,

On marshy meads night-sprinkled by the dews,

We slept, our clothes rotted with drenching rain,

And like wild beasts with shaggy-knotted hair.

Why should I tell bird-killing winter’s sorrows,

Long months of suffering from IdÉan snows,

Then summer’s scorching heat, when noon beheld

The waveless sea beneath the windless air

In sleep diffused; these toils have run their hour.

The dead care not to rise; their roll our grief

Would muster o’er in vain; and we who live

Vainly shall fret at the cross strokes of fate.

Henceforth to each harsh memory of the past

Farewell! we who survive this long-drawn war

Have gains to count that far outweigh the loss.

Well may we boast in the face of the shining sun,

O’er land and sea our winged tidings wafting,

The AchÆan host hath captured Troy; and now

On the high temples of the gods we hang

These spoils, a shining grace, there to remain

An heritage for ever.ⁿ⁵⁰ These things to hear

Shall men rejoice, and with fair praises laud

The state and its great generals, laud the grace

Of Jove the Consummator. I have said.

Chorus.

I own thy speech the conqueror; for a man

Can never be too old to learn good news,

And though thy words touch Clytemnestra most,

Joy to the Atridan’s halls is wealth to me.

Clytemnestra.

I lifted first the shout of jubilee,

Then when the midnight sign of the courier fire

Told the deep downfall of the captured Troy;

But one then mocked my faith, that I believed

The fire-sped message in so true a tale.

’Tis a light thing to buoy a woman’s heart

With hopeful news, they cried; and with these words

They wildered my weak wit. And yet I sped

The sacrifice, and raised the welcoming shout

In woman’s wise, and at a woman’s word

Forthwith from street to street uprose to the gods

Well-omened salutations, and glad hymns,

Lulling the fragrant incense-feeding flame.

What needs there more? The event has proved me right,

Himself—my lord—with his own lips shall speak

The weighty tale; myself will go make ready

With well-earned honour to receive the honoured.

What brighter bliss on woman’s lot may beam,

Than when a god gives back her spouse from war,

To ope the gates of welcome. Tell my husband,

To his loved home, desired of all, to haste.

A faithful wife, even as he left her, here

He’ll find expectant, like a watch-dog, gentle

To him and his, to all that hate him harsh.

The seals that knew his stamp, when hence he sailed,

Unharmed remain, untouched: and for myself

Nor praise nor blame from other man I know,

No more than dyer’s art can tincture brass.ⁿ⁵¹

Herald.

A boast like this, instinct with very truth,

Comes from a noble lady without blame.

Chorus.

Wise words she spake, and words that need no comment

To ears that understand. But say, good Herald,

Comes Menelaus safe back from the wars,

His kindly sway in Argos to resume?

Herald.

I cannot gloss a lie with fair pretence;

The best told lie bears but a short-lived fruit.

Chorus.

Speak the truth plainly, if thou canst not pleasantly;

These twain be seldom wedded; and here, alas!

They stand out sundered with too clear a mark.

Herald.

The man is vanished from the AchÆan host,

He and his vessel. Thou hast heard the truth.

Chorus.

Sailed he from Ilium separate from the fleet?

Or did the tempest part him from his friends!

Herald.

Like a good marksman thou hast hit the mark,

In one short sentence summing many sorrows.

Chorus.

Alive is he or dead? What word hath reached you?

What wandering rumour from sea-faring men?

Herald.

This none can tell, save yon bright sun aloft,

That cherishes all things with his friendly light.

Chorus.

How came the storm on the fleet? or how was ended

The wrath of the gods?

Herald.

Not well it suits to blot

With black rehearsal this auspicious day.

Far from the honors of the blissful godsⁿ⁵²

Be grief’s recital. When with gloomy visage

An ugly tale the herald’s voice unfolds,

At once a general wound, and private grief,

An army lost, the sons of countless houses

Death-doomed by the double scourge so dear to Ares,^f18

A twin-speared harm, a yoke of crimson slaughter:

A herald saddled with such woes may sing

A pÆan to the Erinnyes. But I,

Who to this city blithe and prosperous

Brought the fair news of Agamemnon’s safety,

How shall I mingle bad with good, rehearsing

The wintry wrath sent by the gods to whelm us?

Fire and the sea, sworn enemies of old,ⁿ⁵³

Made friendly league to sweep the AchÆan host

With swift destruction pitiless. Forth rushed

The tyrannous Thracian blasts, and wave chased wave,

Fierce ’neath the starless night, and ship on ship

Struck clashing; beak on butting beak was driven;

The puffing blast, the beat of boiling billows,

The whirling gulph (an evil pilot) wrapt them

In sightless death. And when the shining sun

Shone forth again, we see the Ægean tide

Strewn with the purple blossoms of the dead,

And wrecks of shattered ships. Us and our bark

Some god, no man, the storm-tost hull directing,

Hath rescued scathless, stealing us from the fray,

Or with a prayer begging our life from Fate.

Kind Fortune helmed us further, safely kept

From yeasty ferment in the billowy bay,

Nor dashed on far-ledged rocks. Thus having ’scaped

That ocean hell,ⁿ⁵⁴ scarce trusting our fair fortune,

We hailed the lucid day; but could we hope,

The chance that saved ourselves had saved our friends?

Our fearful hearts with thoughts of them we fed,

Far-labouring o’er the loosely-driving main.ⁿ⁵⁵

And doubtless they, if yet live breath they breathe,

Deem so of us, as we must fear of them,

That they have perished. But I hope the best.

And first and chief expect ye the return

Of Menelaus. If the sun’s blest ray

Yet looks on him, where he beholds the day

By Jove’s devising,ⁿ⁵⁶ not yet willing wholly

To uproot the race of Atreus, hope may be

He yet returns. Thou hast my tale; and I

Have told the truth untinctured with a lie. [Exit.

CHORAL HYMN.
STROPHE I.

Who gave her a name

So true to her fame?

Does a Providence rule in the fate of a word?

Sways there in heaven a viewless power

O’er the chance of the tongue in the naming hour?

Who gave her a name,

This daughter of strife, this daughter of shame,

The spear-wooed maid of Greece?

Helen the taker!ⁿ⁵⁷ ’tis plain to see

A taker of ships, a taker of men,

A taker of cities she.

From the soft-curtained chamber of Hymen she fled,

By the breath of giantⁿ⁵⁸ Zephyr sped,

And shield-bearing throngs in marshalled array

Hounded her flight o’er the printless way,

Where the swift-plashing oar

The fair booty bore

To swirling Simois’ leafy shore,

And stirred the crimson fray.

ANTISTROPHE I.

For the gods sent a bride,

Kin but not kind,ⁿ⁵⁹

Ripe with the counsel of wrath to Troy,

In the fulness of years, the offender to prove,

And assert the justice of Jove;

For great Jove is lord

Of the rights of the hearth and the festal board.

The sons of Priam sang

A song to the praise of the bride:

From jubilant throats they praised her then,

The bride from Hellas brought;

But now the ancient city hath changed

Her hymn to a doleful note.

She weeps bitter tears; she curses the head

Of the woe-wedded Paris; she curses the bed

Of the beautiful bride

That crossed the flood,

And filched the life of her sons, and washed

Her wide-paved streets with blood.

STROPHE II.

Whoso nurseth the cub of a lion

Weaned from the dugs of its dam, where the draught

Of its mountain-milk was free,

Finds it gentle at first and tame.

It frisks with the children in innocent game,

And the old man smiles to see;

It is dandled about like a babe in the arm,

It licketh the hand that fears no harm,

And when hunger pinches its fretful maw,

It fawns with an eager glee.

ANTISTROPHE II.

But it grows with the years; and soon reveals

The fount of fierceness whence it came:

And, loathing the food of the tame,

It roams abroad, and feasts in the fold,

On feasts forbidden, and stains the floor

Of the house that nursed it with gore.

A curse they nursed for their own undoing,

A mouth by which their own friends shall perish;

A servant of AtÉ, a priest of Ruin,ⁿ⁶⁰

Some god hath taught them to cherish.

STROPHE III.

Thus to Troy came a bride of the Spartan race,

With a beauty as bland as a windless calm,

Prosperity’s gentlest grace;

And mild was love’s blossom that rayed from her eye,

The soft-winged dart that with pleasing pain

Thrills heart and brain.

But anon she changed: herself fulfilled

Her wedlock’s bitter end;

A fatal sister, a fatal bride,

Her fateful head she rears;

Herself the Erinnys from Jove to avenge

The right of the injured host, and change

The bridal joy to tears.

ANTISTROPHE III.

’Twas said of old, and ’tis said to-day,

That wealth to prosperous stature grown

Begets a birth of its own:

That a surfeit of evil by good is prepared,

And sons must bear what allotment of woe

Their sires were spared.

But this I rebel to believe: I know

That impious deeds conspire

To beget an offspring of impious deeds

Too like their ugly sire.

But whoso is lust, though his wealth like a river

Flow down, shall be scathless: his house shall rejoice

In an offspring of beauty for ever.

STROPHE IV.

The heart of the haughty delights to beget

A haughty heart.ⁿ⁶¹ From time to time

In children’s children recurrent appears

The ancestral crime.

When the dark hour comes that the gods have decreed,

And the Fury burns with wrathful fires,

A demon unholy, with ire unabated,

Lies like black night on the halls of the fated:

And the recreant son plunges guiltily on

To perfect the guilt of his sires.

ANTISTROPHE IV.

But Justice shines in a lowly cell;

In the homes of poverty, smoke-begrimed,

With the sober-minded she loves to dwell.

But she turns aside

From the rich man’s house with averted eye,

The golden-fretted halls of pride

Where hands with lucre are foul, and the praise

Of counterfeit goodness smoothly sways:

And wisely she guides in the strong man’s despite

All things to an issue of right.

Chorus.

But, hail the king! the city-taking

Seed of Atreus’ race.

How shall I accost thee! How

With beseeming reverence greet thee?

Nor above the mark, nor sinking

Beneath the line of grace?

Many of mortal men there be,

’Gainst the rule of right preferring

Seeming to substance; tears are free

In the eye when woe its tale rehearseth,

But the sting of sorrow pierceth

No man’s liver; many force

Lack-laughter faces to relax

Into the soft lines traced by joy.

But the shepherd true and wise

Knows the faithless man, whose eyes,

With a forward friendship twinkling,

Fawn with watery love.ⁿ⁶²

For me, I nothing hide. O King,

In my fancy’s picturing,

From the Muses far I deemed thee,

And thy soul not wisely helming

When thou drew’st the knife

For Helen’s sake, a woman, whelming

Thousands in ruin, rushing rashly

On unwelcome strife.

But now all’s well. No shallow smiles

We wear for thee, thy weary toils

All finished. Thou shalt know anon

What friends do serve thee truly,

And who in thy long absence used

Their stewardship unduly.

Enter Agamemnon with attendants; Cassandra behind.

Agamemnon.

First Argos hail! and ye, my country’s gods,

Who worked my safe return, and nerved my arm

With vengeance against Priam! for the gods,

Taught by no glozing tongue, but by the sight

Of their own eyes knew justice; voting ruin

And men-destroying death to ancient Troy,

Their fatal pebbles in the bloody urn

Not doubtingly they dropt; the other vase,

Unfed with hope of suffrage-bearing hand,

Stood empty. Now the captured city’s smoke

Points where it fell. Raves Ruin’s storm; the winds

With crumbled dust and dissipated gold

Float grossly laden. To the immortal gods

These thanks, fraught with rich memory of much good,

We pay; they taught our hands to spread the net

With anger-whetted wit; a woman’s frailty

Laid bare old Ilium to the Argive bite,

And with the setting Pleiads outleapt a birth

Of strong shield-bearers from the fateful horse.

A fierce flesh-tearing lion leapt their wails,

And licked a surfeit of tyrannic blood.

This prelude to the gods. As for thy words

Of friendly welcome, I return thy greeting,

And as your thought, so mine; for few are gifted

With such rich store of love, to see a friend

Preferred and feel no envy; ’tis a disease

Possessing mortal men, a poison lodged

Close by the heart, eating all joy away

With double barb—has own mischance who suffers

And bliss of others sitting at his gate,

Which when he sees he groans. I know it well;

They who seemed most my friends, and many seemed,

Were but the mirrored show, the shadowy ghost

Of something like to friendship, substanceless.

Ulysses only, most averse to sail,

Was still most ready an the yoke with me

To bear the harness; living now or dead,

This praise I frankly give him. For the rest,

The city and the gods, we will take counsel

In full assembly freely. What is good

We will give heed that it be lasting; where

Disease the cutting or the caustic cure

Demands, we will apply it. I, meanwhile,

My hearth and home salute, and greet the gods,

Who, as they sent me to the distant fray,

Have brought me safely back. Fair victory,

Once mine, may she dwell with me evermore!

Clytemnestra.

Men! Citizens! ye reverend Argive seniors,

No shame feel I, even in your face, to tell

My husband-loving ways. Long converse lends

Boldness to bashfulness. No foreign griefs,

Mine own self-suffered woes I tell. While he

Was camping far at Ilium, I at home

Sat all forlorn, uncherished by the mate

Whom I had chosen; this was woe enough

Without enforcement; but, to try me further,

A host of jarring rumours stormed my doors,

Each fresh recital with a murkier hue

Than its precedent; and I must hear all.

If this my lord, had borne as many wounds

In battle as the bloody fame recounted,

He had been pierced throughout even as a net;

And had he died as oft as Rumour slew him,

He might have boasted of a triple coilⁿ⁶³

Like the three-bodied Geryon, while on earth

(Of him below I speak not), and like him

Been three times heaped with a cloak of funeral dust.

Thus fretted by cross-grained reports, oft-times

The knotted rope high-swung had held my neck,

But that my friends with forceful aid prevented.

Add that my son, pledge of our mutual vows,

Orestes is not here; nor think it strange.

Thy Phocian spear-guest,ⁿ⁶⁴ the most trusty Strophius,

Took him in charge, a twofold danger urging

First thine beneath the walls of Troy, and further

The evil likelihood that, should the Greeks

Be worsted in the strife, at home the voice

Of many-babbling anarchy might cast

The council down, and as man’s baseness is,

At fallen greatness insolently spurn.

Moved by these thoughts I parted with my boy,

And for no other cause. Myself the while

So woe-worn lived, the fountains of my grief

To their last drop were with much weeping drained;

And far into the night my watch I’ve kept

With weary eyes, while in my lonely room

The night-torch faintly glimmered. In my dream

The buzzing gnat, with its light-brushing wing,

Startled the fretful sleeper; thou hast been

In waking hours, as in sleep’s fitful turns

My only thought. But having bravely borne

This weight of woe, now with blithe heart I greet

Thee, my heart’s lord, the watch-dog of the fold,

The ship’s sure mainstay, pillared shaft whereon

Rests the high roof, fond parent’s only child,

Land seen by sailors past all hope, a day

Lovely to look on when the storm hath broken,

And to the thirsty wayfarer the flow

Of gushing rill. O sweet it is, how sweet

To see an end of the harsh yoke that galled us!

These greetings to my lord; nor grudge me, friends,

This breadth of welcome; sorrows we have known

Ample enough. And now, thou precious head,

Come from thy car; nay, do not set thy foot,

The foot that trampled Troy, on common clay.

What ho! ye laggard maids! why lags your task

Behind the hour? Spread purple where he treads.

Fitly the broidered foot-cloth marks his path,

Whom Justice leadeth to his long-lost home

With unexpected train. What else remains

Our sleepless zeal, with favour of the gods,

Shall order as befits.

Agamemnon.

Daughter of Leda, guardian of my house!

Almost thou seem’st to have spun thy welcome out

To match my lengthened absence; but I pray thee

Praise with discretion, and let other mouths

Proclaim my pÆans. For the rest, abstain

From delicate tendance that would turn my manhood

To woman’s temper. Not in barbaric wise

With prostrate reverence base, kissing the ground,

Mouth sounding salutations; not with purple,