Four Plays of Aeschylus Part 10

Is it in skill of bow and shaft that Athens' men excel?

CHORUS

Nay, they bear bucklers in the fight, and thrust the spear-point well.

ATOSSA

And who is shepherd of their host and holds them in command?

CHORUS

To no man do they bow as slaves, nor own a master's hand.

ATOSSA

How should they bide our brunt of war, the East upon the West?

CHORUS

That could Darius' valiant horde in days of yore attest!

ATOSSA

A boding word, to us who bore the men now far away!

CHORUS

Nay-as I deem, the very truth will dawn on us to-day.

A Persian by his garb and speed, a courier draws anear- He bringeth news, of good or ill, for Persia's land to hear.

[Enter A MESSENGER.

MESSENGER O walls and towers of all the Asian realm, O Persian land, O treasure-house of gold!

How, by one stroke, down to destruction, down, Hath sunk our pride, and all the flower of war That once was Persia's, lieth in the dust!

Woe on the man who first announceth woe- Yet must I all the tale of death unroll!

Hark to me, Persians! Persia's host lies low.

CHORUS

O ruin manifold, and woe, and fear!

Let the wild tears run down, for the great doom is here!

MESSENGER

This blow hath fallen, to the utterance, And I, past hope, behold my safe return!

CHORUS

Too long, alack, too long this life of mine, That in mine age I see this sudden woe condign!

MESSENGER

As one who saw, by no loose rumour led, Lords, I would tell what doom was dealt to us.

CHORUS

Alack, how vainly have they striven!

Our myriad hordes with shaft and bow Went from the Eastland, to lay low h.e.l.las, beloved of Heaven!

MESSENGER

Piled with men dead, yea, miserably slain, Is every beach, each reef of Salamis!

CHORUS

Thou sayest sooth-ah well-a-day!

Battered amid the waves, and torn, On surges. .h.i.ther, thither, borne, Dead bodies, bloodstained and forlorn, In their long cloaks they toss and stray!

MESSENGER

Their bows availed not! all have perished, all, By charging galleys crushed and whelmed in death.

CHORUS

Shriek out your sorrow's wistful wail!

To their untimely doom they went; Ill strove they, and to no avail, And minished is their armament!

MESSENGER

Out on thee, hateful name of Salamis, Out upon Athens, mournful memory!

CHORUS

Woe upon this day's evil fame!

Thou, Athens, art our murderess; Alack, full many a Persian dame Is left forlorn and husbandless!

ATOSSA

Mute have I been awhile, and overwrought At this great sorrow, for it pa.s.seth speech, And pa.s.seth all desire to ask of it.

Yet if the G.o.ds send evils, men must bear.

(To the MESSENGER) Unroll the record! stand composed and tell, Although thy heart be groaning inwardly, Who hath escaped, and, of our leaders, whom Have we to weep? what chieftains in the van Stood, sank, and died and left us leaderless?

MESSENGER

Xerxes himself survives and sees the day.

ATOSSA

Then to my line thy word renews the dawn And golden dayspring after gloom of night!

MESSENGER

But the brave marshal of ten thousand horse, Artembares, is tossed and flung in death Along the rugged rocks Silenian.

And Dadaces no longer leads his troop, But, smitten by the spear, from off the prow Hath lightly leaped to death; and Tenagon, In true descent a Bactrian n.o.bly born, Drifts by the sea-lashed reefs of Salamis, The isle of Ajax. Gone Lilaeus too, Gone are Arsames and Argestes! all, Around the islet where the sea-doves breed, Dashed their defeated heads on iron rocks; Arcteus, who dwelt beside the founts of Nile, Adeues, Pheresseues, and with them Pharnuchus, from one galley's deck went down.

Matallus, too, of Chrysa, lord and king Of myriad hordes, who led unto the fight Three times ten thousand swarthy cavaliers, Fell, with his swarthy and abundant beard Incarnadined to red, a crimson stain Outrivalling the purple of the sea!

There Magian Arabus and Artames Of Bactra perished-taking up, alike, In yonder stony land their long sojourn.

Amistris too, and he whose strenuous spear Was foremost in the fight, Amphistreus fell, And gallant Ariomardus, by whose death Broods sorrow upon Sardis: Mysia mourns For Seisames, and Tharubis lies low- Commander, he, of five times fifty s.h.i.+ps, Born in Lyrnessus: his heroic form Is low in death, ungraced with sepulchre.

Dead too is he, the lord of courage high, Cilicia's marshal, brave Syennesis, Than whom none dealt more carnage on the foe, Nor perished by a more heroic end.

So fell the brave: so speak I of their doom, Summing in brief the fate of myriads!

ATOSSA

Ah well-a-day! these crowning woes I hear, The shame of Persia and her shrieks of dole!

But yet renew the tale, repeat thy words, Tell o'er the count of those h.e.l.lenic s.h.i.+ps, And how they ventured with their beaked prows To charge upon the Persian armament.

MESSENGER