The Seven Plays in English Verse Part 11

ATH. He stood in darkness at the generals' gates.

OD. What then restrained his eager hand from murder?

ATH. I turned him backward from his baleful joy, And overswayed him with blind phantasies, To swerve against the flocks and well-watched herd Not yet divided from the public booty.

There plunging in he hewed the horned throng, And with him Havoc ranged: while now he thought To kill the Atreidae with hot hand, now this Now that commander, as the fancy grew.

I, joining with the tumult of his mind, Flung the wild victim on the fatal net.

Anon, this toil being overpast, he draws The living oxen and the panting sheep With cords to his home, not as a horned prey, But as in triumph marshalling his foes: Whom now he tortures in their bonds within.

Come, thou shalt see this madness in clear day, And tell to the Argives all I show thee here Only stand firm and shrink not, I will turn His eyes askance, not to distinguish thee, Fear nought--Ho! thou that bindest to thy will The limbs of those thy captives, come thou forth!

Aias! advance before thy palace gate!

OD. My Queen! what dost thou? Never call him forth.

ATH. Hush, hus.h.!.+ Be not so timorous, but endure.

OD. Nay, nay! Enough. He is there, and let him bide.

ATH. What fear you? Dates his valour from to day?

OD. He was and is my valiant enemy.

ATH. Then is not laughter sweetest o'er a foe?

OD. No more! I care not he should pa.s.s abroad.

ATH. You flinch from seeing the madman in full view.

OD. When sane, I ne'er had flinched before his face.

ATH. Well, but even now he shall not know thee near.

OD. How, if his eyes be not transformed or lost?

ATH. I will confound his sense although he see.

OD. Well, nothing is too hard for Deity.

ATH. Stand still and keep thy place without a word.

OD. I must. Would I were far away from here!

ATH. Aias! Again I summon thee. Why pay So scanty heed to her who fights for thee?

_Enter_ AIAS _with a b.l.o.o.d.y scourge._

AIAS. Hail, offspring of the Highest! Pallas, hail!

Well hast thou stood by me. Triumphal gold Shall crown thy temple for this lordly prey.

ATH. A fair intention! But resolve me this: Hast dyed thy falchion deep in Argive blood?

AI. There is my boast; that charge I'll ne'er deny.

ATH. Have Atreus' sons felt thy victorious might?

AI. They have. No more they'll make a scorn of me!

ATH. I take it, then, they are dead.

AI. Ay, now they are dead, Let them arise and rob me of mine arms!

ATH. Good. Next inform us of Laertes' son; How stands his fortune? Hast thou let him go?

AI. The accursed fox! Dost thou inquire of him?

ATH. Ay, of Odysseus, thy late adversary.

AI. He sits within, dear lady, to my joy, Bound; for I mean him not just yet to die.

ATH. What fine advantage wouldst thou first achieve?

AI. First, tie him to a pillar of my hall--

ATH. Poor wretch! What torment wilt thou wreak on him?

AI. Then stain his back with scourging till he die.

ATH. Nay, 'tis too much. Poor caitiff! Not the scourge!

AI. Pallas, in all things else have thou thy will, But none shall wrest Odysseus from this doom.

ATH. Well, since thou art determined on the deed, Spare nought of thine intent: indulge thy hand!

AI. (_waving the b.l.o.o.d.y scourge_).

I go! But thou, I charge thee, let thine aid Be evermore like valiant as to-day. [_Exit_

ATH. The G.o.ds are strong, Odysseus. Dost thou see?

What man than Aias was more provident, Or who for timeliest action more approved?

OD. I know of none. But, though he hates me sore, I pity him, poor mortal, thus chained fast To a wild and cruel fate,--weighing not so much His fortune as mine own. For now I feel All we who live are but an empty show And idle pageant of a shadowy dream.

ATH. Then, warned by what thou seest, be thou not rash To vaunt high words toward Heaven, nor swell thy port Too proudly, if in puissance of thy hand Thou pa.s.sest others, or in mines of wealth.

Since Time abases and uplifts again All that is human, and the modest heart Is loved by Heaven, who hates the intemperate will. [_Exeunt_

CHORUS (_entering_).

Telamonian child, whose hand Guards our wave-encircled land, Salamis that b.r.e.a.s.t.s the sea, Good of thine is joy to me; But if One who reigns above Smite thee, or if murmurs move From fierce Danaans in their hate Full of threatening to thy state, All my heart for fear doth sigh, Shrinking like a dove's soft eye.

Hardly had the darkness waned, [_Half-Chorus I._ When our ears were filled and pained With huge scandal on thy fame.

Telling, thine the arm that came To the cattle-browsed mead, Wild with prancing of the steed, And that ravaged there and slew With a sword of fiery hue All the spoils that yet remain, By the sweat of spearmen ta'en.