Chapter IV: Part 4

CLYTEMNESTRA. I spoke to you before; and what I spoke Suited the time; nor shames me now to speak Mine own refutal. For how shall we entrap Our foe, our seeming friend, in scapeless ruin, Save that we fence him round with nets too high For his o'erleaping? What I did, I did Not with a random inconsiderate blow, But from old Hate, and with maturing Time. Here, where I struck, I take my rooted stand, Upon the finished deed:[n88] the blow so given, And with wise forethought so by me devised, That flight was hopeless, and to ward it vain. With many-folding net, as fish are caught, I drew the lines about him, mantled round With bountiful destruction; twice I struck him, And twice he groaning fell with limbs diffused Upon the ground; and as he fell, I gave The third blow, sealing him a votive gift To gloomy Hades, saviour of the dead. And thus he spouted forth his angry soul, Bubbling a bitter stream of frothy slaughter, And with the dark drops of the gory dew Bedashed me; I delighted nothing less Than doth the flowery calix, full surcharged With fruity promise, when Jove's welkin down Distils the rainy blessing. Men of Argos, Rejoice with me in this, or, if ye will not, {83} Then do I boast alone. If e'er 'twas meet To pour libations to the dead, he hath them In justest measure. By most righteous doom, Who drugged the cup with curses to the brim, Himself hath drunk damnation to the dregs.

CHORUS. Thou art a bold-mouthed woman. Much we marvel To hear thee boast thy husband's murder thus.

CLYTEMNESTRA. Ye tempt me as a woman, weak, unschooled. But what I say, ye know, or ought to know, I say with fearless heart. Your praise or blame Is one to me. Here Agamemnon lies, My husband, dead, the work of this right hand-- The hand of a true workman. Thus it stands.

STROPHE. CHORUS. Woman! what food on wide earth growing Hast thou eaten of? What draught From the briny ocean quaffed, That for such deed the popular breath Of Argos should with curses crown thee, As a victim crowned for death? Thou hast cast off: thou hast cut off Thine own husband:[n89] thou shalt be From the city of the free Thyself a cast-off: justly hated With staunch hatred unabated.

CLYTEMNESTRA. My sentence thou hast spoken; shameful flight, The citizens' hate, the people's vengeful curse: For him thou hast no curse, the bloody man Who, when the fleecy flocks innumerous pastured, Passed the brute by, and sacrificed my child, My best-beloved, fruit of my throes, to lull The Thracian blasts asleep. Why did thy wrath, In righteous guerdon of this foulest crime, Not chase this man from Greece? A greedy ear And a harsh tongue thou hast for me alone. But mark my words,[n90] threats I repay with threats; If that thou canst subdue me in fair fight, Subdue me; but if Jove for me decide, Thou shalt be wise, when wisdom comes too late.

ANTISTROPHE. CHORUS. Thou art high and haughty-hearted, And from lofty thoughts within thee {84} Mighty words are brimming o'er: For thy sober sense is madded With the purple-dripping gore; And thine eyes with fatness swell[n91] From bloody feasts: but mark me well, Time shall come, avenging Time, And hunt thee out, and track thy crime: Then thou, when friends are far, shalt know Stroke for stroke, and blow for blow.

CLYTEMNESTRA. Hear thou this oath, that seals my cause with right: By sacred Justice, perfecting revenge, By Até, and the Erinnys of my child, To whom I slew this man, I shall not tread The threshold of pale Fear, the while doth live Ægisthus, now, as he hath been, my friend, Stirring the flame that blazes on my hearth, My shield of strong assurance. For the slain, Here lieth he that wronged a much-wronged woman, Sweet honey-lord of Trojan Chryseids. And for this spear-won maid, this prophetess, This wise diviner, well-beloved bed-fellow, And trusty messmate of great Agamemnon, She shares his fate, paying with him the fee Of her own sin, and like a swan hath sung Her mortal song beside him. She hath been Rare seasoning added to my banquet rare.

STROPHE I.[n92] CHORUS. O would some stroke of Fate--no dull disease Life's strings slow-rending, No bed-bound pain--might bring, my smart to soothe, The sleep unending! For he, my gracious lord, my guide, is gone, Beyond recalling; Slain for a woman's cause, and by the hands Of woman falling.

STROPHE II.
O Helen! Helen! phrenzied Helen,
Many hearts of thee are telling
Damned destruction thou hast done,
There where thousands fell for one
'Neath the walls of Troy!

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ANTISTROPHE II.
Bloomed from thee the blossom gory
Of famous Agamemnon's glory;
Thou hast roused the slumbering strife,
From age to age, with eager knife,
Watching to destroy.

STROPHE III.
CLYTEMNESTRA.
Death invoke not to relieve thee
From the ills that vainly grieve thee!
Nor, with ire indignant swelling,
Blame the many-murdering Helen!
Damned destruction did she none,
There, where thousands fell for one,
'Neath the walls of Troy.

ANTISTROPHE I.
O god that o'er the doomed Atridan halls[n93]
With might prevailest,
Weak woman's breast to do thy headlong will
With murder mailest!
O'er his dead body, like a boding raven,
Thou tak'st thy station,
Piercing my marrow with thy savage hymn
Of exultation.

ANTISTROPHE III.
CLYTEMNESTRA.
Nay, but now thou speakest wisely;
This thrice-potent god precisely
Works our woe, and weaves our sorrow.
He with madness stings the marrow,
And with greed that thirsts for blood;
Ere to-day's is dry, the flood
Flows afresh to-morrow.

STROPHE IV.
CHORUS.
Him, even him, this terrible god, to bear
These walls are fated;
From age to age he worketh wildly there
With wrath unsated.
Not without Jove, Jove cause and end of all,
Nor working vainly.
Comes no event but with high sway the gods
Have ruled it plainly.

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STROPHE V.
CHORUS.
O the king! the king! for thee
Tears in vain my cheek shall furrow,
Words in vain shall voice my sorrow!
As in a spider's web thou liest;
Godless meshes spread for thee,
An unworthy death thou diest!

STROPHE VI. CHORUS. There, even there thou liest, woe's me, outstretched On couch inglorious; O'er thee the knife prevailed, keen-edged, by damned Deceit victorious.

STROPHE VII. CLYTEMNESTRA. Nay, be wise, and understand; Say not Agamemnon's wife Wielded in this human hand The fateful knife. But a god, my spirit's master, The unrelenting old Alastor[n94] Chose this wife, his incarnation, To avenge the desecration Of foul-feasting Atreus; he Gave, to work his wrath's completion, To the babes this grown addition.

ANTISTROPHE IV. CHORUS. Thy crime is plain: bear thou what thou hast merited, Guilt's heavy lading; But that fell Spirit, from sire to son inherited, Perchance was aiding. Black-mantled Mars through consanguineous gore Borne onwards blindly, Old horrors to atone, fresh Murder's store Upheaps unkindly.

ANTISTROPHE V.
O the king! the king! for thee
Tears in vain my cheek shall furrow,
Words in vain shall voice my sorrow!
As in a spider's web thou liest;
Godless meshes spread for thee,
An unworthy death thou diest.

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ANTISTROPHE VI. CHORUS. There, even there, thou liest, woe's me, outstretched On couch inglorious! O'er thee the knife prevailed, keen-edged, by damned Deceit victorious.

ANTISTROPHE VII. CLYTEMNESTRA. Say not thou that he did die By unworthy death inglorious; Erst himself prevailed by damned Deceit victorious, Then when he killed the deep-lamented Iphigenía, nor relented When for my body's fruit with weeping I besought him. Springs his reaping From what seed he sowed. Not he In Hades housed shall boast to-day; So slain by steel as he did slay.

STROPHE VIII. CHORUS. I'm tossed with doubt, on no sure counsel grounded, With fear confounded. No drizzling drops, a red ensanguined shower, Upon the crazy house, that was my tower, Comes wildly sweeping, On a new whetstone whets her blade the Fate With eyes unweeping.

STROPHE IX. CHORUS. O Earth, O Earth, would thou hadst yawned, And in thy black pit whelmed me wholly, Ere I had seen my dear-loved lord In the silver bath thus bedded lowly! Who will bury him? and for him With salt tears what eyes shall brim? Wilt thou do it--thou, the wife That slew thy husband with the knife? Wilt thou dare, with blushless face, Thus to offer a graceless grace? With false show of pious moaning, Thine own damned deed atoning?

STROPHE X. CHORUS. What voice the praises of the godlike man Shall publish clearly? {88} And o'er his tomb the tear from eyelids wan Shall drop sincerely?

STROPHE XI. CLYTEMNESTRA. In vain thy doubtful heart is tried With many sorrows. By my hand Falling he fell, and dying died.[n95] I too will bury him; but no train Of mourning men for him shall plain In our Argive streets; but rather In the land of sunless cheer She shall be his convoy; she, Iphigenía, his daughter dear. By the stream of woes[f30] swift-flowing, Round his neck her white arms throwing, She shall meet her gentle father, And greet him with a kiss.

ANTISTROPHE VIII. CHORUS. Crime quitting crime, and which the more profanely Were questioned vainly; 'Tis robber robbed, and slayer slain, for, though Oft-times it lag, with measured blow for blow Vengeance prevaileth, While great Jove lives.[n96] Who breaks the close-linked woe Which Heaven entaileth?

ANTISTROPHE IX. CHORUS. O Earth, O Earth, would thou hadst yawned, And in thy black pit whelmed me wholly, Ere I had seen my dear-loved lord In the silver bath thus bedded lowly! Who will bury him? and for him With salt tears, what eyes shall brim? Wilt thou do it? thou, the wife That killed thy husband with the knife? Wilt thou dare, with blushless face, Thus to offer a graceless grace? With false show of pious moaning Thine own damned deed atoning?

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ANTISTROPHE X. CHORUS. What voice the praises of the god-like man Shall publish clearly? And o'er his tomb the tear from eyelids wan Shall drop sincerely?

ANTISTROPHE XI. CLYTEMNESTRA. Cease thy cries. Where Heaven entaileth, Thyself didst say, woe there prevaileth. But for this tide enough hath been Of bloody work. My score is clean. Now to the ancient stern Alastor, That crowns the Pleisthenids[f31] with disaster, I vow, having reaped his crop of woe From me, to others let him go, And hold with them his bloody bridal, Of horrid murders suicidal! Myself, my little store amassed Shall freely use, while it may last, From murdering madness healed.

[_Enter_ ÆGISTHUS.

ÆGISTHUS. O blessed light! O happy day proclaiming The justice of the gods! Now may I say The Olympians look from heaven sublime, to note Our woes, and right our wrongs, seeing as I see In the close meshes of the Erinnyes tangled This man--sweet sight to see!--prostrate before me, Having paid the forfeit of his father's crime. For Atreus, ruler of this Argive land, This dead man's father--to be plain--contending About the mastery, banished from the city Thyestes, his own brother and my father. In suppliant guise back to his hearth again The unhappy prince returned, content if he Might tread his native acres, not besprent With his own blood. Him with a formal show Of hospitality--not love--received The father of this dead, the godless Atreus; And to my father for the savoury use Of festive viands gave his children's flesh To feed on; in a separate dish concealed {90} Were legs and arms, and the fingers' pointed tips,[n97] Broke from the body. These my father saw not; But what remained, the undistinguished flesh, He with unwitting greed devoured, and ate A curse to Argos. Soon as known, his heart Disowned the unholy feast, and with a groan Back-falling he disgorged it. Then he vowed Dark doom to the Pelopidae, and woes Intolerable, while with his heel he spurned[n98] The supper, and thus voiced the righteous curse: THUS PERISH ALL THE RACE OF PLEISTHENES! See here the cause why Agamemnon died, And why his death most righteous was devised By me; for I, Thyestes' thirteenth son, While yet a swaddled babe, was driven away To houseless exile with my hapless sire. But me avenging Justice nursed, and taught me, Safer by distance, with invisible hand To reach this man, and weave the brooded plot, That worked his sure destruction. Now 'tis done; And gladly might I die, beholding him, There as he lies where Vengeance trapped his crimes.

CHORUS. Ægisthus, that thou wantonest in the woe Worked by thy crime I praise not. Thou alone Didst slay this man, and planned the piteous slaughter With willing heart. So say'st thou: but mark well, Justice upon thy head the stony curse Shall bring avoidless from the people's hand.

ÆGISTHUS. How? Thou who sittest on the neathmost bench, Speak'st thus to me who ply the upper oar? 'Tis a hard task to teach an old man wisdom, And dullness at thy years is doubly dull; But chains and hunger's pangs sure leeches are, And no diviner vends more potent balms To drug a doting wit.[n99] Have eyes, and see, Kick not against the pricks, nor vainly beat Thy head on rocks.

CHORUS. (_to_ CLYTEMNESTRA) Woman, how couldst thou dare, On thine own hearth to plot thy husband's death; First having shamed his bed, to welcome him With murder from the wars?

ÆGISTHUS. Speak on; each word shall be a fount of tears, I'll make thy tongue old Orpheus' opposite. {91} He with sweet sounds led wild beasts where he would, Thou where thou wilt not shalt be led, confounding The woods with baby cries. Thou barkest now, But, being bound, the old man shall be tame.

CHORUS. A comely king wert thou to rule the Argives! Whose wit had wickedness to plan the deed, But failed the nerve in thy weak hand to do it.

ÆGISTHUS. 'Twas wisely schemed with woman's cunning wit To snare him. I, from ancient date his foe, Stood in most just suspicion. Now, 'tis done; And I, succeeding to his wealth, shall know To hold the reins full tightly. Who rebels Shall not with corn be fatted for my traces, But, stiffly haltered, he shall lodge secure In darkness, with starvation for his mate.

CHORUS. Hear me yet once. Why did thy dastard hand Shrink from the deed? But now his wife hath done it, Tainting this land with murder most abhorred, Polluting Argive gods. But still Orestes Looks on the light; him favouring Fortune shall Nerve with one stroke to smite this guilty pair.

ÆGISTHUS. Nay, if thou for brawls art eager, and for battle, thou shalt know--

CHORUS. Ho! my gallant co-mates, rouse ye![n100] 'tis an earnest business now! Quick, each hand with sure embracement hold the dagger by the hilt!

ÆGISTHUS. I can also hold a hilted dagger--not afraid to die.

CHORUS. DIE!--we catch the word thou droppest; lucky chance, if thou wert dead!

CLYTEMNESTRA. Not so, best-beloved! there needeth no enlargement to our ills. We have reaped a liberal harvest, gleaned a crop of fruitful woes, Gained a loss in brimming measure: blood's been shed enough to-day. Peacefully, ye hoary Elders, enter now your destined homes, Ere mischance o'ertake you, deeming WHAT IS DONE HATH SO BEEN DONE, AS IT BEHOVED TO BE, contented if the dread god add no more, He that now the house of Pelops smiteth in his anger dire. Thus a woman's word doth warn ye, if that ye have wit to hear.

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ÆGISTHUS. Babbling fools are they; and I forsooth must meekly bear the shower, Flowers of contumely east from doting drivellers, tempting fate! O! if length of hoary winters brought discretion, ye should know Where the power is; wisely subject you the weak to me the strong.

CHORUS. Ill beseems our Argive mettle to court a coward on a throne.

ÆGISTHUS. Shielded now, be brave with words; my deeds expect some future day.

CHORUS. Ere that day belike some god shall bring Orestes to his home.

ÆGISTHUS. Feed, for thou hast nothing better, thou and he, on empty hope.

CHORUS. Glut thy soul, a lusty sinner, with sin's fatness, while thou may'st.

ÆGISTHUS. Thou shalt pay the forfeit, greybeard, of thy braggart tongue anon.

CHORUS. Oh, the cock beside its partlet now may crow right valiantly!

CLYTEMNESTRA. Heed not thou these brainless barkings. While to folly folly calls, Thou and I with wise command shall surely sway these Argive halls.

[The End]

CHOEPHORÆ OR, THE LIBATION-BEARERS

{93}

A LYRICO-DRAMATIC SPECTACLE

Ἐκ γὰρ Ὀρέσταο τίσις ἔσσεται Ἀτρέιδαο Ὁπποτ ἄν ἡβήσῃ τε κὰι ἧς ἱμείρεται ἄιης. HOMER.

Think upon our father,
Give the sword scope--think what a man was he.
LANDOR.

PERSONS

{94}

ORESTES, Son of Agamemnon. PYLADES, Friend of Orestes. CHORUS OF CAPTIVE WOMEN. ELECTRA, Sister of Orestes. NURSE OF ORESTES. CLYTEMNESTRA, Mother of Orestes. ÆGISTHUS. SERVANT.

SCENE--_as in the preceding piece. The Tomb of Agamemnon in the centre of the Stage._

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS

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THE right of the avenger of blood, so familiar to us from its prominency in the Mosaic Law (see Numbers, chap. 35), is a moral phenomenon which belongs to a savage or semi-civilized state of society in all times and places; and appears everywhere with the most distinct outline in the rich records of the early age of Greece, which we possess in the Homeric poems. No doubt, the most glowing intensity, and the passionate exaggeration of the feeling, from which this right springs, is found only among the hot children of the Arabian desert;[f1] and in no point of his various enactments were the wisdom and the humanity of their great Jewish lawgiver more conspicuous than in the appointment of sacerdotal cities of refuge, which set certain intelligible bounds of space and time to the otherwise interminable prosecution of family feuds, and the gratification of private revenge. But the great traits of the system of private revenge for manslaughter, stand out clearly in the Iliad and Odyssey; and the whole of the ancient heroic mythology of Greece is full of adventures and strange chances that grew out of this germ. Out of many, I shall mention only the following instance. In the twenty-third book of the Iliad (v. 82), when the shade of Patroclus appears at the head of his sorrowful, sleeping friend, after urging the necessity of instant funeral, for the peace of his soul, he proceeds to make a further request, as follows:--

"This request I make, this strict injunction I on thee would lay,
Not apart from thine Achilles, place thy dear Patroclus' bones;
But together as, like brothers, in your father's house we grew,
Then when me, yet young, Menœtius from the Locrian Opus guiding,
To the halls of Peleus brought because that I had slain a man,
Even thy son, Amphidamas, whom unwittingly of life I reft
In a brainish moment, foolishly, when we quarrelled o'er the dice;
Then the horseman, Peleus, kindly took me to his house, and kindly
Reared me with his son, and bade me be thy comrade to the end;
So my bones, when they are gathered, place where thine shall also be,
In the two-eared golden urn which gracious Thetis gave to thee."

In these verses, we see the common practice of the heroic ages in Greece, with regard to manslaughter. No matter how slight the occasion might be out of which the lethal quarrel arose; how {96} innocent soever of all hostile intention the unhappy offender; the only safety to him from the private revenge of the kinsman of the person unwittingly slain, was to flee to a country that acknowledged some foreign chief, and find both a friend and a country in a distant land. All this, too, in an era of civilization, when courts of law and regular judges (as from various passages of Homer is apparent) were not altogether unknown; but nature is stronger than law, and passion slow to yield up its fiery right of summary revenge, for the cold, calculating retribution of an impartial judge.

The person on whom the duty of avenging shed blood, according to the heroic code of morals, fell, was the nearest of kin to the person whose blood had been shed; and accordingly we find (as stated more at large by Gesenius and Michaelis[f2]) that in the Hebrew language, the same word means both an avenger of blood and a kinsman, while in the cognate Arabic the term for an avenger means also a _survivor_--that is, the surviving kinsman. In the same way, when Clytemnestra, as we have just seen in the previous drama, had treacherously murdered her husband Agamemnon, the code of social morality then existing laid the duty of avenging this most unnatural deed on the nearest relation of the murdered chieftain, viz.--his son, Orestes; a sore duty indeed, in this case, as the principal offender was his own mother: so that in vindicating one feeling of his filial nature the pious son had to do violence to another; but a duty it still remained; and there does not appear the slightest trace that it was considered one whit the less imperative on account of the peculiar relation that existed here between the dealer of the vengeful blow and the person on whom it was dealt. WHOSO SHEDDETH MAN'S BLOOD BY MAN SHALL HIS BLOOD BE SHED was the old patriarchal law on the subject, proclaimed without limitation and without exception; and the cry of innocent blood rose to Heaven with peculiar emphasis when the sufferer was both a father and a king.

"Good, how good, when one who dies unjustly leaves a son behind him
To avenge his death!"--Odyss. iii. 196,

is the wisdom of old Nestor with regard to this subject and this very case: and the wise goddess Athena, the daughter of the Supreme Councillor, in whom "all her father lives," stamps her distinct approval on the deed of Orestes, by which Clytemnestra was murdered, and holds him up as an illustrious example to Telemachus, by which his own conduct was to be regulated in {97} reference to the insolent and unjust suitors who were consuming his father's substance.

"This when thou hast done, and well accomplished, as the need demands,
Then behoves thee in thy mind with counsel rife to ponder well
How the suitors that obscenely riot in thy father's halls
Thou by force or fraud may'st slay: for surely now the years are come,
When too old thou art to trifle like a child with childish things.
Hast not heard what fair opinion the divine Orestes reaped
From the general voice consenting to the deed, then when he slew
The deceitful false Ægisthus, slayer of his famous sire."
Odyssey i. 293.

Public opinion, therefore, to use a modern phrase, not only justified Orestes in compassing the death of his mother, but imperatively called on him to do so. Public opinion, however, could not control Nature, nor save the unfortunate instrument of paternal retribution from that revulsion of feeling which must necessarily ensue, when the hand of the son is once red with the blood of her whose milk he had sucked. Orestes finds himself torn in twain by two contrary instincts, the victim of two antagonist rights. No sooner are the Furies of the father asleep, than those of the mother awake; and thus the bloody catastrophe of the present piece prepares the way for that tragic conflict of opposing moral claims set forth with such power in the third piece of this trilogy--the Eumenides.

The action of this play is the simplest possible, and will, for the most part, explain itself sufficiently as it proceeds. Clytemnestra, disturbed in conscience, and troubled by evil dreams, sends a chorus of young women to offer libations at the tomb of Agamemnon, which, in the present play, may fitly be conceived as occupying the centre of the stage.[f3] These "libation-bearers" give the name to the piece. In their pious function, Electra, the daughter of Agamemnon, joins; and as she is engaged in the solemn rite, her brother Orestes (who had been living as an exile in Phocis with Strophius, married to Anaxibia, the sister of Agamemnon) suddenly arrives, and making himself known to his sister, plans with her the murder of Ægisthus and Clytemnestra--which is accordingly executed. Scarcely is this done, when the Furies of the murdered mother appear, and commence that chase of the unhappy son from land to land, which is ended in the next piece only by the eloquent intercession of Apollo, and the deliberative wisdom of the blue-eyed virgin-goddess of the Acropolis.

As a composition, the Choephoræ is decidedly inferior both to {98} the Agamemnon which precedes, and the Eumenides which follows it; and the poet, as if sensible of this weakness, following the approved tactics of rhetoricians and warriors, has dexterously placed it in a position where its deficiencies are least observed. At the same time, in passing a critical judgment on this piece we must bear in mind two things--_first_, that some parts of this play that appear languid, long-drawn, and ineffective to us who read, may have been overflowing with the richest emotional power in their living musical exhibition; and, _secondly_, that many parts, especially of the choral chaunts, have been so maimed and shattered by time that the modern commentator is perhaps as much chargeable with the faults of the translation as the ancient tragedian.

CHOEPHORÆ

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[_Enter_ ORESTES. _and_ PYLADES.

ORESTES. Hermes, that wieldest underneath the ground What power thy father lent,[n1] be thou my saviour And my strong help, and grant his heart's request To the returning exile! On this mound, My father's tomb, my father I invoke, To hear my cry! * * * * * * * * My early growth of hair To Inachus I vowed;[n2] this later lock The right of grief for my great sire demands. * * * * * * But what is this? what sad procession comes Of marshalled maids in sable mantles clad? What mission brings them? Some new woe that breaks Upon our fated house? Or, do they come To soothe the ancient anger of the dead With sweet libations for my father's tomb? 'Tis even so: for lo! Electra comes-- My sister--with them in unblissful grief Pre-eminent. O Jove, be thou mine aid,[n3] And nerve my hand to avenge my father's wrong! Stand we aside, my Pylades, that we May learn the purpose of the murky pomp. [_They go aside._

CHORUS.
(_dressed in sable vestments, bearing vessels with libations._)
STROPHE I.
Missioned from these halls I come
In the sable pomp of woe,
Here to wail and pour libations,
With the bosom-beating blow;
And my cheeks, that herald sorrow,[n4]
With the fresh-cut nail-ploughed furrow,
Grief's vocation show.
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See! my rent and ragged stole
Speaks the conflict of my soul;
My vex'd heart on grief is feeding,
Night and day withouten rest;
Riven with the ruthless mourning,
Hangs the linen vest, adorning
Woefully my breast.

ANTISTROPHE I.
Breathing wrath through nightly slumbers,
By a dream-encompassed lair,
Prophet of the house of Pelops,
Terror stands with bristling hair.
Through the dark night fitful yelling,
He within our inmost dwelling
Did the sleeper scare.
Heavily, heavily terror falls
On the woman-governed halls!
And, instinct with high assurance,
Speak the wise diviners all;
"The dead, the earth-hid dead are fretful,
And for vengeance unforgetful,
From their graves they call."

STROPHE II.
This graceless grace to do, to ward
What ills the dream portendeth
This pomp--O mother Earth!--and me
The godless woman sendeth.
Thankless office! Can I dare,
Naming thee, to mock the air?
Blood that stains with purple track
The ground, what price can purchase back?
O the hearth beset with mourning!
O the proud halls' overturning!
Darkness, blithe sight's detestation,
Sunless sorrow spread
Round the house of desolation,
Whence the lord is fled.

ANTISTROPHE II.
The kingly majesty that was
The mighty, warlike-hearted,
That swayed the general ear and will,
The unconquered, hath departed.
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And now fear rules,[n5] and we obey,
Unwillingly, a loveless sway.
Who holds the key of plenty's portals
Is god, and more than god to mortals;
But justice from her watchful station,
With a sure-winged visitation
Swoops; and some in blazing noon
She for doom doth mark,
Some in lingering eve, and some
In the deedless dark.

EPODE.
When mother Earth hath drunk black gore,
Printed on the faithful floor,
The staring blot remaineth;
There the deep disease is lurking;
There thrice double-guilt is working
Woes that none restraineth.
As virgin-chambers once polluted
Never may be pure again,
So filthy hands with blood bedabbled[n6]
All the streams of all the rivers
Flow to wash in vain.
For me I suffer what I must;
By ordinance divine,
Since Troy was levelled with the dust
The bondman's fate is mine.
What the masters of my fate
In their strength decree,[n7]
Just or unjust, matters not,
Is the law to me.
I must look content; and chain
Strongest hate with tightest rein;
I for my mistress' woes must wail,
And for my own, beneath the veil;[n8]
I must sit apart,
And thaw with tears my frozen heart,
When no eye may see.

[_Enter_ ELECTRA.

ELECTRA. Ye ministering maids with dexterous heed That tend this household, as with me ye share {102} This pomp of supplication, let me share In your good counsel. Speak, and tell me how, This flood funereal pouring on the tomb, I shall find utterance in well-omened words? Shall I declare me bearer of sweet gifts From a dear wife to her dear lord? I fear To mingle faslehood with libations pure, Poured on my father's tomb.[n9] Or shall I pray, As mortals wont to pray, that he may send Just retribution, and a worthy gift Of ill for ill to them that sent these garlands? Or shall I silent stand, nor with my tongue Give honour, as in dumb dishonoured death My father died, and give the Earth to drink A joyless stream, as who throws lustral ashes[n10] With eyes averse, and flings the vase away? Your counsel here I crave; ye are my friends, And bear with me, within these fated halls A common burden. Speak, and no craven fear Lurk in your breasts! The man that lives most free, And him to sternest masterdom enthralled, One fate abides. Lend me your wisdom, friends.

CHORUS. Thy father's tomb shall be to me an altar; As before God I'll speak the truth to thee.

ELECTRA. Speak thus devoutly, and thou'lt answer well.

CHORUS. Give words of seemly honour, as thou pourest, To all that love thy father.

ELECTRA.
Who are they?

CHORUS. Thyself the first, and whoso hates Ægisthus.

ELECTRA. That is myself and thou.

CHORUS.
Thyself may'st judge.

ELECTRA. Hast thou none else to swell the scanty roll?

CHORUS. One far away, thy brother, add--Orestes.

ELECTRA. 'Tis well remembered, very well remembered.

CHORUS. Nor them forget that worked the deed of guilt.

ELECTRA. Ha! what of them? I'd hear of this more nearly.

CHORUS. Pray that some god may come, or mortal man.

ELECTRA. Judge or avenger?

CHORUS. Roundly pray the prayer, Some god or man may come to slay the slayer.

ELECTRA. And may I pray the gods such boon as this?

CHORUS. Why not? What other quittance to a foe Than hate repaid with hate, and blow with blow?[n11]

{103}

ELECTRA. (_approaching to the tomb of Agamemnon_) Hermes, that swayest underneath the ground,[f4] [n12] Of powers divine, Infernal and Supernal, Most weighty herald, herald me in this, That every subterranean god, and earth, Even mother earth, who gave all things their birth, And nurseth the reviving germs of all, May hear my prayer, and with their sleepless eyes Watch my parental halls. And while I dew Thy tomb with purifying stream, O father, Pity thou me, and on thy loved Orestes With pity look, and to our long lost home Restore us!--us, poor friendless outcasts both, Bartered by her who bore us, and exchanged Thy love for his who was thy murderer. Myself do menial service in this house; Orestes lives in exile; and they twain In riot waste the fruits of thy great toils. Hear thou my prayers, and quickly send Orestes With happy chance to claim his father's sceptre! And give thou me a wiser heart, and hand More holy-functioned than the mother's was That bore thy daughter. Thus much for myself, And for my friends. To those that hate my father, Rise thou with vengeance mantled-dark to smite Those justly that unjustly smote the just. These words of evil imprecation dire,[n13] Marring the pious tenor of my prayer, I speak constrained: but thou for me and mine Send good, and only good, to the upper air, The gods being with thee, mother Earth, and Justice With triumph in her train. This prayer receive And these libations. Ye, my friends, the while Let your grief blossom in luxuriant wail, Lifting the solemn pæan of the dead.

CHORUS.[n14]
Flow! in plashing torrents flow!
Wretched grief for wretched master!
O'er this heaped mound freely flow,
Refuge of my heart's disaster!
O thou dark majestic shade,
{104}
Hear, O hear me! While anear thee
Pours this sorrow-stricken maid
The pure libation,
May the solemn wail we lift
Atone the guilt that taints the gift
With desecration!
O that some god from Scythia far,
To my imploring,
Might send a spearman strong in war,
Our house restoring!
Come Mars, with back-bent bow, thy hail
Of arrows pouring,
Or with the hilted sword assail,
And in the grapple close prevail,
Of battle roaring!

ELECTRA.[n15] These mild libations, earth-imbibed, my father Hath now received. Thy further counsel lend.

CHORUS. In what? Within me leaps my heart for fear.

ELECTRA. Seest thou this lock of hair upon the tomb?

CHORUS. A man's hair is it, or a low-zoned maid's?[n16]

ELECTRA. Few points there are to hit. 'Tis light divining.

CHORUS. I am thine elder; yet I fain would reap Instruction from young lips.

ELECTRA. If it was dipt From head in Argos, it should be my own.[n17]

CHORUS. For they that should have shorn the mourning lock Are foes, not friends.

ELECTRA.
'Tis like, O strange! how like!

CHORUS. Like what? What strange conception stirs thy brain?

ELECTRA. 'Tis like--O strange!--to these same locks I wear. And yet--

CHORUS. Not being yours, there's none, I know, Can claim it but Orestes.

ELECTRA. In sooth, 'tis like. Trimmed with one plume Orestes was and I.

CHORUS. But how should he have dared to tread this ground?

ELECTRA. Belike, he sent it by another's hand, A votive lock to grace his father's tomb.

CHORUS. Small solace to my grief, if that he lives, Yet never more may touch his native soil.

ELECTRA. I, too, as with a bitter wave was lashed, And pierced, as with an arrow, at the sight Of this loved lock; and from my thirsty eyne {105} With troubled overflowings unrestrained The full tide gushes: for none here would dare To gift a lock to Agamemnon's grave; No citizen, much less the wife that slew him. My mother most unmotherly, her own children With godless hate pursuing, evil-minded: And though to think this wandering lock have graced My brother's head--even his--my loved Orestes, Were bliss too great, yet will I hold the hope. O that this lock might with articulate voice Pronounce a herald's tale, and I no more This way and that with dubious thought be swayed! That I might know if from a hostile head 'Twas shorn, and hate it as it hate deserves, Or, if from friends, my sorrows' fellow make it, The dearest grace of my dear father's tomb! But the gods know our woes; them we invoke, Whirled to and fro in eddies of dark doubt, Like vessels tempest-tossed. If they will save us, They have the power from smallest seed to raise The goodliest tree. But lo! a further proof[n18]-- Footsteps, a perfect print, that seem to bear A brotherhood with mine! Nay, there are two-- This claimed by him, and that by some true friend That shares his wanderings. See, the heel, the sole, Thus measured with my own, prove that they were Both fashioned in one mould. 'Tis very strange! I'm racked with doubt, my wits are wandering.

ORESTES. (_coming forward_) Nay, rather thank the gods! Thy first prayer granted, Pray that fair end may fair beginning follow.[n19]

ELECTRA. Sayest thou? What cause have I to thank the gods?

ORESTES. Even here before thee stands thine answered prayer.

ELECTRA. One man I wish to see: dost know him--thou?

ORESTES. Thy wish of wishes is to see Orestes.

ELECTRA. Even so: but wishing answers no man's prayer.

ORESTES. I am the man. No dearer one expect That wears that name.

ELECTRA.
Nay, but this is some plot?

ORESTES. That were to frame a plot against myself.

ELECTRA. Unkind, to scoff at my calamities!

ORESTES. To scoff at thine, were scoffing at mine own.

ELECTRA. And can it be? Art thou indeed Orestes?

{106}

ORESTES. My bodily self thou seest, and dost not know! And yet the votive lock shorn from my head, Being to thine, my sister's hair, conform, And my foot's print with curious ardour scanned, Could wing thy faith beyond the reach of sense, That thou didst seem to see me! Take the lock, And match it nicely with this mother crop That bore it. More; behold this web,[n20] the fruit Of thine own toil, the strokes of thine own shuttle, The wild beasts of the woods by thine own hand Empictured! Nay, be calm, and keep thy joy Within wise bounds. Too well I know that they Who should be friends here are our bitterest foes.

ELECTRA. O of my father's house the chiefest care! Seed of salvation, hope with many, tears Bewept, with thy strong arm thou shalt restore Thy father's house. O my life's eye, thou dost Four several functions corporate in one Discharge for me! My father thou, and thine The gentler love that should have been my mother's, My justly hated mother; and in her place, Who died by merciless immolation,[f5] thou Must be my sister, so even as thou art My faithful brother, loved much and revered. May Power and Justice aid thee, mighty Twain,[n21] And a third mightier, JOVE supremely great.

ORESTES. O Jove, great Jove, of all these things be thou Spectator! And behold the orphan'd brood, Of eagle father strangled in the folds And deadly coil of loathly basilisk! Them sireless see in dire starvation's gripe, Too weak of wing to bear unto the nest Their father's prey. So we before thee stand, Myself and this Electra, sire-bereaved, And exiles both from our paternal roof. If we, the chickens of the pious father That crowned thee with much sacrifice, shall fail, Where shalt thou find a hand like his, to offer Gifts from the steaming banquet? If the brood Of the eagle perish, where shall be thy signs, That speak from Heaven persuasive to mankind? If all this royal trunk shall rot, say who, {107} When blood of oxen flows on holidays, Shall stand beside thine altar? O give ear, And of this house so little now, and fallen So low, rebuild the fortunes!

CHORUS. Hush, my children! If ye would save your father's house, speak softly, Lest some one hear, and, with swift babblement, Inform their ears who rule; whom may I see Flayed on a fire, with streaming pitch well fed!

ORESTES. Fear not. The mighty oracle of Loxias, By whose commands I dare the thing I dare, Will not deceive me. He, with shrill-voiced warning, Foretold that freezing pains through my warm liver Should torturing shoot, if backward to avenge My father's death, and even as he was slain, To slay the slayers, exasperate at the loss[n22] Of my so fair possessions. Thus to do He gave me strict injunction: else myself With terrible pains, of filial zeal remiss, Should pay the fine. The evil-minded Powers Beneath the Earth[n23] would visit me in wrath, A leprous tetter with corrosive tooth Creep o'er my skin, and fasten on my flesh, And with white scales the white hair grow, defacing My bloom of health; and from my father's tomb Ripe with avenging ire the Erinnyes Should ruthlessly invade me. Thus he spake, And through the dark his prescient eyebrow arched.[n24] Sharp arrows through the subterranean night, Shot by dear Shades that through the Infernal halls Roam peaceless, madness, and vain fear o' nights, Prick with sharp goads, and chase from street to street, With iron scourge, the meagre-wasted form Of the Fury-hunted sinner; him no share In festal cup awaits, or hallowed drop Of pure libation;[n25] the paternal wrath, Hovering unseen, shall drive him from the altar; Him shall no home receive, no lodgment hold, Unhonoured and unfriended he shall die, Withered and mummied with the hot dry plague. Such oracle divine behoves me trust With single faith, or, be I faithless, still The vengeance must be done. All things concur {108} To point my purpose; the divine command My sore heart-grief for a loved father's death, The press of want, the spoiling of my goods, The shame to see these noble citizens, Proud Troy's destroyers, basely bent beneath The yoke of two weak women: for he hath A woman's soul: if not, the proof is near.

CHORUS.
Mighty Fates, divinely guiding
Human fortunes to their end,
Send this man, with Jove presiding,
Whither Justice points the way.
Words of bitter hatred duly
Pay with bitter words: for thus
With loud cry triumphant shouting
Justice pays the sinner's debt.
BLOOD FOR BLOOD AND BLOW FOR BLOW,
THOU SHALT REAP AS THOU DIDST SOW;
Age to age with hoary wisdom
Speaketh thus to men.[n26]

STROPHE I. ORESTES. O father, wretched father, with what air Of word or deed impelling, Shall I be strong to waft the filial prayer To thy dim distant dwelling? There where in dark, the dead-man's day, thou liest,[n27] Be our sharp wailing (Grace of the dead, and Hades' honour highest), With thee prevailing!

STROPHE II.
CHORUS.
Son, the strong-jawed funeral fire
Burns not the mind in the smoky pyre;
Sleeps, but not forgets the dead
To show betimes his anger dread.
For the dead the living moan,
That the murderer may be known.
They who mourn for parent slain
Shall not pour the wail in vain,
Bright disclosure shall not lack
Who through darkness hunts the track.

{109}

ANTISTROPHE I. ELECTRA. Hear thou our cries, O father, when for thee The frequent tear is falling; The wailing pair o'er thy dear tomb to thee From their hearts' depths are calling; The suppliant and the exile at one tomb Their sorrow showering, Helpless and hopeless; mantled round with gloom, Woe overpouring!

CHORUS.
Nay, be calm; the god that speaks
With voice oracular shall attune
Thy throat to happier notes;
Instead the voice of wail funereal,
Soon the jubilant shout shall shake
His father's halls with joy, and welcome
The new friend to his home.

STROPHE III. ORESTES. If but some Lycian spear, 'neath Ilium's walls, Had lowly laid thee, A mighty name in the Atridan halls Thou wouldst have made thee! Then hadst thou pitched thy fortune like a star, To son and grandson shining from afar; Beyond the wide-waved sea, the high-heaped mound Had told for ever Thy feats of battle, and with glory crowned Thy high endeavour.

ANTISTROPHE II.
CHORUS.
Ah! would that thou hadst found thy end
There, where dear friend fell with friend,
And marched with them to Hades dread,
The monarch of the awful dead,[n28]
Sitting beside the throne with might
Of them that rule the realms of night;
For thou in life wert monarch true,
Expert each kingly deed to do,
Leading, with thy persuasive rod,
Submissive mortals like a god.

ANTISTROPHE III. ELECTRA. Thou wert a king, no fate it was for thee To die as others {110} 'Neath Ilium's walls, far, far beyond the sea, With many brothers. Unworthy was the spear to drink thy blood, Where far Scamander rolls his swirling flood. Justly who slew had drawn themselves thy lot, And perished rather, And thou their timeless fate had welcomed, not They thine, my father.

CHORUS.
Child, thy grief begetteth visions
Brighter than gold, and overtopping
Hyperborean bliss.[n29]
Ah, here the misery rudely riots,
With double lash. These twins, their help
Sleeps beneath the ground; and they
Who hold dominion here, alas!
With unholy sceptre sway.
Woe is me! but chiefly woe
Children dear to you!

STROPHE IV. ELECTRA. Chiefly to me! Thy words shoot like an arrow, And pierce my marrow. O Jove, O Jove! that sendest from below[n30] The retribution slow, Against the stout heart and bold hand, That dared defy thy high command. Even though a parent feel the woe, Prepare, prepare the finished blow.

STROPHE V. CHORUS. Mine be soon to lift the strain, O'er the treacherous slayer slain, To shout with bitter exultation, O'er the murtherous wife's prostration! Why should I the hate conceal, That spurs my heart with promptest zeal, Bitter thoughts, that gathering grow, Like blustering winds, that beat the plunging vessel's prow?

ANTISTROPHE IV.
ORESTES.
O thou that flourishest, and mak'st to flourish,
By thy hands perish
All they that hate me! Cleave the heads of those,
That are Orestes' foes!
{111}
Pledge the land in peace to live,
For injustice justice give;
Ye that honoured reign below,[n31]
Furies! prepare the crowning blow.

CHORUS.
Wont hath been, and shall be ever,
That when purple gouts bedash
The guilty ground, then BLOOD DOTH BLOOD
DEMAND, AND BLOOD FOR BLOOD SHALL FLOW.
Fury to Havoc cries; and Havoc,
The tainted track of blood pursuing,
From age to age works woe.

STROPHE VI.
ELECTRA.
Ye powers of Hades dread!
Fell Curses of the Dead,
Hear, me when I call!
Behold! The Atridan hall,
Dashed in dishonoured fall,
Lies low and graceless all.
O mighty Jove, I see
Mine only help in thee!

ANTISTROPHE V.
CHORUS.
Thy piteous tale doth make my heart
From its central hold back start;
Hope departs, and blackening Fear
Rules my fancy, while I hear.
And if blithe confidence awhile[n32]
Lends my dull faith the feeble smile,
Soon, soon departs that glimpse of cheer,
And all my map of things is desolate and drear.

ANTISTROPHE VI.
ORESTES.
For why! our tale of wrong
In hate of parents strong,
Spurneth the flatterer's arm,
Mocketh the soothing charm.
The mother gave her child[n33]
This wolfish nature wild;
And I from her shall learn
To be thus harsh and stern.

{112}

STROPHE VII.
CHORUS.
Like a Persian mourner[n34]
Singing sorrow's tale,
Like a Cissian wailer,
I did weep and wail.
O'er my head swift-oaring
Came arm on arm amain,
The voice of my deploring
Like the lashing rain!
Sorrow's rushing river
O'er me flooding spread,
Black misfortune's quiver
Emptied on my head!

ELECTRA.
Mother bold, all-daring,
On a bloody bier
Thine own lord forth bearing
Slain without a tear.
Alone, unfriended he did go
Down to the sunless homes below.

STROPHE VIII.
ORESTES.
Thou hast named the dire dishonor;
The gods shall send swift judgment on her.
By Heaven's command,
By her own son's hand,
Slain she shall lie;
And I, having dealt the fated death,
Myself shall die!

ANTISTROPHE VII.
ELECTRA.
Be the butcher's work remembered,
Mangled was he, and dismembered;
Like vilest clay,
She cast him away,
With burial base;
Mocking the son, the father branding
With dark disgrace.

ANTISTROPHE VIII.
ORESTES.
Thou dost tell too truly
All my father's woe.

ELECTRA.
I, the while, accounted
Lower than most low,
{113}
Like a dog, was sundered
From my father's hearth,
An evil dog, and wandered
Far from seats of mirth;
In my chamber weeping
Tears of silent woe,
From rude gazers keeping
Grief too great for show.
Hear these words; and hearing
Nail them in thy soul,
With steady purpose nearing,
And noiseless pace, thy goal.
Go where just wrath leads the way,
With stout heart tread the lists to-day.

STROPHE IX. ORESTES. O father, help thy friends, when helping thee!

ELECTRA. My tears, if they can help, shall flow for thee.

CHORUS. And this whole mingled choir shall raise for thee The sistered cry: O hear! In light of day appear, And help thy banded friends, to avenge thy foes for thee!

ANTISTROPHE IX. ORESTES. Now might with might engage, and right with right!

ELECTRA. And the gods justly the unjust shall smite.

CHORUS.[n36] The tremulous fear creeps o'er my frame to hear Thy words; for, though long-dated, The thing divinely fated Shall surely come at last, our cloudy prayers to clear.

STROPHE X.
ELECTRA.
O home-bred pain,
Stroke of perdition that refuses
Concord with the holy Muses!
O burden more than heart can bear,
Disease that no physician's care
Makes sound again!

ANTISTROPHE X.
ORESTES.
So; even so.
No far-sent leech this tetter uses;
A home-bred surgery it chooses.
{114}
I the red strife myself pursue,
Pouring this dismal hymn to you,
Ye gods below!

CHORUS.
Blessed powers, propitious dwelling,
Deep in subterranean darkness,
Hear this pious prayer;
May all trials end in triumph
To the suppliant pair!

ORESTES. Father, who died not as a king should die, Give me to rule, as thou didst rule, these halls.

ELECTRA. My supplication hear, thy strong help lend me, Scathless myself[n37] to work Ægisthus' harm.

ORESTES. Thus of the rightful feasts that soothe the Shades Thou too shalt taste,[n38] and not dishonoured lie, When savoury fumes mount to our country's dead.

ELECTRA. And I my whole of heritage will offer, The blithe libations of my marriage feast. Thy tomb before all tombs I will revere.

ORESTES. O Earth, relax thy hold, and give my father To see the fight!

ELECTRA. O Persephassa,[f6] send The Atridan forth, in beauty clad and strength.

ORESTES. The bath that drank thy life remember, father.

ELECTRA. The close-drawn meshes of thy death remember.

ORESTES. The chain, not iron-linked, that bound thee, then When to the death the kingly game was hunted.

ELECTRA. Then when with treacherous folds they curtained thee.

ORESTES. Wake, father, wake to avenge thy speechless wrongs!

ELECTRA. Lift, father, lift thy dear-loved head sublime!

ORESTES. Send justice forth to work the just revenge, Like quit with like, and harm with harm repay; Thou wert the conquered then, rise now to conquer.

ELECTRA. And hear this last request, my father, looking On thy twin chickens nestling by thy tomb; Pity the daughter, the male seed protect, Nor let the name revered of ancient Pelops Be blotted from the Earth! Thou art not dead, Though housed in Hades, while thy children live, For children are as echoes that prolong Their parents' fame; the floating cork are they That buoyant bear the net deep sunk in the sea. Hear, father--when we weep, we weep for thee, And, saving us, thou savest thine own honour.

{115}

CHORUS. Well spoken both:[n39] and worthily fall the tears On this dear tomb, too long without them. Now, If to the deed thy purpose thou hast buckled, Orestes, try what speed the gods may give thee.[n40]

ORESTES. I'll do the deed. Meanwhile not idly this I ask of thee--what moved her soul to send These late libations, limping remedy For wounds that cannot heal? A sorry grace To feed the senseless dead with sacrifice, When we have killed the living. What she means I scarce may guess, but the amend is less Than the offence. All ocean poured in offering For the warm life-drops of one innocent man Is labour lost. Old truth thus speaks to all. How was it?

CHORUS. That I well may tell, for I Was with her. Hideous dreams did haunt her sleep; Night-wandering terrors scared her godless breast, That she did send these gifts to soothe the Shades.

ORESTES. What saw she in her dream?

CHORUS. She dreamt, she said, She had brought forth a serpent.

ORESTES.
A serpent, say'st thou?

CHORUS. Ay! and the dragon birth portentous moved, All swaddled like a boy.

ORESTES. Eager for food, doubtless, the new-born monster?

CHORUS. The nurturing nipple herself did fearless bare.

ORESTES. How then? escaped the nipple from the bite?

CHORUS. The gouted blood did taint the milk, that flowed From the wounded paps.

ORESTES. No idle dream was this. And he who sent it was my father.

CHORUS. Then She from her sleep up started, and cried out, And many lamps, whose splendour night had blinded, Rushed forth, to wait upon their mistress' word. Straightway she sends us with funereal gifts, A medicinal charm, if medicine be For griefs like hers!

ORESTES. Now hear me, Earth profound, And my dear father's tomb, that so this dream May find in me completion! Thus I read it-- As left the snake the womb that once hid me, {116} And in the clothes was swathed that once swathed me, And as it sucked the breast that suckled me, And mingled blood with milk once sucked by me, And as she groaned with horror at the sight, Thus it beseems who bore a monstrous birth No common death to die. I am the serpent Shall bite her breast. It is a truthful dream. My seer be thou. Say have I read it well?

CHORUS. Bravely. Now, for the rest, thy friends instruct What things to do, and what things to refrain.