Electra, the daughter of Agamemnon, has been living beneath the hated domination of Aegisthus and Clytemnestra, the murderer and murderess of her father. Her brother Orestes, the avenger of blood and the hope of her house, has been living in banishment, while she has been looking and longing for his return. At length he returns with his faithful comrade Pylades, and intimates his presence by placing a lock of his hair as his offering on Agamemnon's tomb. Electra announces the discovery to the Chorus of Trojan women, who bear her libation for her to the tomb of her father, and from whom the play is named.
* * * * *
ORESTES DISCOVERS HIMSELF TO ELECTRA.
LINES 158-274.
ELECTRA.
My father's grave has drunk the holy wine;
Now lend your ears to the strange news I bring.
CHORUS.
Speak on, my heart thrills with expectancy.
ELECTRA.
I found this lock of hair upon the tomb.
CHORUS.
Who was it, man or maid, that laid it there?
ELECTRA.
This to divine were not so difficult.
CHORUS.
Old as I am on thy young lips I hang.
ELECTRA.
From what head could the lock be cut but mine?
CHORUS.
They that should offer mourning locks are foes.
ELECTRA.
This lock of hair is wondrous like in hue.
CHORUS.
Like to whose hair? 'Tis this I long to learn.
ELECTRA.
Like, passing like, to hers that speaks to thee.
CHORUS.
Think'st thou Orestes sent it secretly?
ELECTRA.
The lock in hue is like no hair but his.
CHORUS.
But how could he adventure to come here?
ELECTRA.
Perchance he sent the offering to his sire.
CHORUS.
This will not staunch the fountain of my woes,
If he is ne'er to set foot in our land.
ELECTRA.
Not less through me a tide of passion rolled,
And as it were an arrow pierced my breast,
While from my eyes coursed down my thirsty cheeks
The gushing tears, till sorrow's fount was dry,
As on this lock I looked. No citizen
Of ours could own it saving one alone;
Nor was it shred by her the murderess
That but usurps a mother's hallowed name,
To us, her children, so unmotherly.
Surely to say what I would fain believe,
That this fair offering from Orestes comes
Dearest of men, I dare not, yet I hope.
Oh, would it had a voice to speak to me,
And so to end distraction in my soul;
That I might cast it scornfully away,
If it were taken from a hated head.
If from a head I love, that it might pay
With me sad homage to my father's tomb.
CHORUS.
The heavenly powers on whom we call well know
With what a sea, like storm-tossed mariners,
We battle; yet, if destiny be kind,
From a small seed a mighty tree may spring.
ELECTRA.
Then, for a second sign, foot-prints I find
Like to my own in shape and measurement.
For there were two imprints, one of his own,
The other of a fellow-traveller's foot;
And those of his own foot, compared with mine,
In their whole shape exactly correspond.
I am all anguish and bewilderment.
ORESTES (suddenly entering).
Pray for whatever else thy soul desires,
And may a like fulfilment crown the prayer.
ELECTRA.
What prayer of mine now have the gods fulfilled?
ORESTES.
Whom thou didst yearn to see is now before thee.
ELECTRA.
Whom I did yearn to see? What was his name?
ORESTES.
Orestes, by thy craving lips pronounced.
ELECTRA.
In what respect, then, has my prayer been heard?
ORESTES.
The bearer of that name beloved am I.
ELECTRA.
Stranger, is this some trick thou playest on me?
ORESTES.
An 'twere, I should conspire against myself.
ELECTRA.
Sure thou art sporting with my misery.
ORESTES.
Sporting with thine were sporting with my own.
ELECTRA.
And is it to Orestes' self I speak?
ORESTES.
Orestes' self, whom seeing thou dost doubt
Thine eyesight, though a lock of hair or prints
Of feet that tallied with thine own could raise
My apparition in thy fluttering heart.
Apply the lock which tallies with thy hair
To this my head from which it was cut off.
Look on this robe, the work of thine own hand,
And trace the figures which thy shuttle wrought.
But calm thee, let not joy distract thy soul,
For near of kin we know is far from kind.
ELECTRA.
O hope and darling of my father's house,
Seed of redemption, watered with my tears,
Trust thy right arm; it shall win back thy home.
Thou art the fourfold object of my love:
Electra has no father left but thee;
No mother—hateful she who bears that name;
Thou art to me in my lost sister's place;
The brother thou that dost my name uphold;
Only let might and justice and the king
Of gods and men be with thee in the fight.
ORESTES.
Zeus, Zeus, look down on what is passing here,
Take pity on the eagle's brood, whose sire,
Trapped in the coils of a most deadly snake,
Was stung to death and left his orphan brood
A prey to hunger. For no strength have they
To bring the quarry home, as did their sire.
In me and my Electra here thou seest
Two eaglets of their sire alike bereft,
And outcasts both from what was once their home.
ELECTRA.
High honour did our father pay to thee,
Rich gifts he gave thy shrine; his offspring gone,
Who will be left to heap thy altars more?
Thy race of eagles lost, thou wilt have none
To be the herald of thy will to man.
This royal stock blasted, thou wilt have none
To tend thy shrine on days of sacrifice.
Watch o'er us, and the house that now seems fallen
Past hope, may to its ancient greatness rise.
CHORUS.
My children, of your line sole trust and stay,
Be silent lest your words be overheard,
And borne by some loose babbler to the ear
Of those in power, whom soon I hope to see
Laid smouldering on the pitchy funeral pile.
ORESTES.
My trust is in Apollo's oracle
That bade me set forth on this enterprise,
With high command and threats of dire disease
To gripe my vitals if I failed to wreak
Vengeance upon my father's murderers,
Enjoining me to slay as they had slain,
Taking no fine as quittance for his blood.
For this was I to answer with my life.
And as I would escape the penalties
[Footnote: This passage is corrupt or dislocated, and perplexes the
commentators. I have tried to give the general sense.]
That injured and neglected ghosts demand;
As fell diseases that with cankering maw
Eat the distempered flesh from off the bones,
Madness and panic fears that haunt by night;
Then banishment from human intercourse;
From the libation, from the loving cup,
And from the altar, whence a father's wrath
Unseen should drive the recreant; at the last
Death without honour and without a friend.—
Think ye that I such oracles could slight?
And if I did, the deed must still be done;
For many motives join to set me on:
The gods command, my murdered father calls
For vengeance, and my desperate need impels;
All bid me save our famous citizens,
Troy's glorious conquerors, from the base yoke
Of yonder pair of women; for his heart
Is womanish, if not, we soon will know.
* * * * *
CLYTAEMNESTRA PLEADS TO HER SON ORESTES FOR HER LIFE IN VAIN.
LINES 860-916.
SERVANT.
Alas! my lord is slain, my lord is slain,
My lord is slain; Aegisthus is no more.
Haste and unbar the woman's chamber, haste;
Be stirring, or your aid will come too late.
What, ho! what, ho!
I shout unto the sleeping or the deaf.
Whither has Clytaemnestra gone? What does she?
Now is the queen on peril's sharpest edge,
And like to fall by the avenger's sword.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
How now? What means this shouting in the house?
SERVANT.
It means that dead men kill and live men die.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
Ah me! Too well I can thy riddle guess;
By treason as we slew, we shall be slain.
Fetch me the axe, which well this hand can wield,
And we will strike for death or victory,
For to this mortal issue have we come.
ORESTES.
'Tis thee I seek; thy leman has enough.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
Ah me! Aegisthus, then, my love, is slain.
ORESTES.
Thy love is he? Then shalt thou share his tomb,
And be his faithful consort to the end.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
Oh, stay thy hand, my child, and spare this breast,
On which so often thou didst slumbering lie
And suck with baby lips the milk of life.
ORESTES.
Say, Pylades, shall nature's plea be heard?
PYLADES.
Half of Apollo's best has been fulfilled;
Think on the other half and on thine oath.
Better defy the world than brave the gods.
ORESTES.
Thou hast well spoken, and I do assent.
(To CLYTAEMNESTRA.)
Come in; I'll lay thee at thy leman's side.
He to my father living was preferred,
And now in death his partner thou shalt be,
The guerdon due to thy adulterous love.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
I nursed thee; let me at thy side grow old.
ORESTES.
What, dwell with thee, my father's murderess?
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
Blame destiny, my son, for what I did.
ORESTES.
Blame destiny for what I now must do.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
Hast thou no reverence for a mother's prayer?
ORESTES.
That mother ruthlessly cast off her child.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
Not cast thee off; but sent thee to a friend.
ORESTES.
Twice was I sold, although a freeman born.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
What was the price that I received for thee?
ORESTES.
To tell thee in plain words I am ashamed.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
Tell it, but tell thy sire's transgression too.
ORESTES.
Home-keeping wives should not the toilers chide.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
'Tis sad for wives to lie without their mates.
ORESTES.
Yet wives are fed by those that sweat abroad.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
It seems, my child, thou wilt thy mother slay.
ORESTES.
Not on my head but thine thy blood will be.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
Strike, and a mother's Furies follow thee.
ORESTES.
A father's will, if I withhold the blow.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
Deaf as the grave is he to whom I wail.
ORESTES.
As died my father thou art doomed to die.
CLYTAEMNESTRA.
My womb too truly has a serpent borne.
ORESTES.
No lying prophet was thy dream of fear.
Unnatural was thy deed, so be thy doom.
