Chapter III: Part 3

ATOSSA.
Friends, whosoe’er is versed in human ills,
Knoweth right well that when a wave of woe
Comes on a man, he sees in all things fear;
While, in flood-tide of fortune, ’tis his mood
To take that fortune as unchangeable,
Wafting him ever forward. Mark me now—
The gods’ thwart purpose doth confront mine eyes,
And all is terror to me; in mine ears
There sounds a cry, but not of triumph now—
So am I scared at heart by woe so great.
Therefore I wend forth from the house anew,
Borne in no car of state, nor robed in pride
As heretofore, but bringing, for the sire
Who did beget my son, libations meet
For holy rites that shall appease the dead—
The sweet white milk, drawn from a spotless cow,
The oozing drop of golden honey, culled
By the flower-haunting bee, and therewithal
Pure draughts of water from a virgin spring;
And lo! besides, the stainless effluence,
Born of the wild vine’s bosom, shining store
Treasured to age, this bright and luscious wine.
And eke the fragrant fruit upon the bough
Of the grey olive-tree, which lives its life
In sprouting leafage, and the twining flowers,
Bright children of the earth’s fertility.
But you, O friends! above these offerings poured
To reconcile the dead, ring out your dirge
To summon up Darius from the shades,
Himself a shade; and I will pour these draughts,
Which earth shall drink, unto the gods of hell.

CHORUS.
Queen, by the Persian land adored,
By thee be this libation poured,
Passing to those who hold command
Of dead men in the spirit-land!
And we will sue, in solemn chant,
That gods who do escort the dead
In nether realms, our prayer may grant—
Back to us be Darius led!

O Earth, and Hermes, and the king
Of Hades, our Darius bring!
For if, beyond the prayers we prayed,
He knoweth aught of help or aid,
He, he alone, in realms below,
Can speak the limit of our woe!

Doth he hear me, the king we adored, who is god among gods of the
dead?
Doth he hear me send out in my sorrow the pitiful, manifold cry,
The sobbing lament and appeal? is the voice of my suffering sped
To the realm of the shades? doth he hear me and pity my sorrowful
sigh?
O Earth, and ye Lords of the dead! release ye that spirit of might,
Who in Susa the palace was born! let him rise up once more to the
light!

There is none like him, none of all
That e’er were laid in Persian sepulchres!
Borne forth he was to honoured burial,
A royal heart! and followed by our tears.
God of the dead, O give him back to us,
Darius, ruler glorious!
He never wasted us with reckless war—
God, counsellor, and king, beneath a happy star!
Ancient of days and king, awake and come—
Rise o’er the mounded tomb!
Rise, plant thy foot, with saffron sandal shod
Father to us, and god!
Rise with thy diadem, O sire benign,
Upon thy brow!
List to the strange new sorrows of thy line,
Sire of a woeful son!

A mist of fate and hell is round us now,
And all the city’s flower to death is done!
Alas, we wept thee once, and weep again!
O Lord of lords, by recklessness twofold
The land is wasted of its men,
And down to death are rolled
Wreckage of sail and oar,
Ships that are ships no more,
And bodies of the slain!

The GHOST OF DARIUS rises.

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Ye aged Persians, truest of the true,
Coevals of the youth that once was mine,
What troubleth now our city? harken, how
It moans and beats the breast and rends the plain!
And I, beholding how my consort stood
Beside my tomb, was moved with awe, and took
The gift of her libation graciously.
But ye are weeping by my sepulchre,
And, shrilling forth a sad, evoking cry,
Summon me mournfully, _Arise, arise_.
No light thing is it, to come back from death,
For, in good sooth, the gods of nether gloom
Are quick to seize but late and loth to free!
Yet among them I dwell as one in power—
And lo, I come! now speak, and speed your words,
Lest I be blamed for tarrying overlong!
What new disaster broods o’er Persia’s realm?

CHORUS.
With awe on thee I gaze,
And, standing face to face,
I tremble as I did in olden days!

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Nay, but as I rose to earth again, obedient to your call,
Prithee, tarry not in parley! be one word enough for all—
Speak and gaze on me unshrinking, neither let my face appal!

CHORUS.
I tremble to reveal,
Yet tremble to conceal
Things hard for friends to feel!

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Nay, but if the old-time terror on your spirit keeps its hold,
Speak thou, O royal lady who didst couch with me of old!
Stay thy weeping and lamenting and to me reveal the truth—
Speak! for man is born to sorrow; yea, the proverb sayeth sooth!
’Tis the doom of mortal beings, if they live to see old age,
To suffer bale, by land and sea, through war and tempest’s rage.

ATOSSA.
O thou whose blissful fate on earth all mortal weal excelled—
Who, while the sunlight touched thine eyes, the lord of all wert
held!
A god to Persian men thou wert, in bliss and pride and fame—
I hold thee blest too in thy death, or e’er the ruin came!
Alas, Darius! one brief word must tell thee all the tale—
The Persian power is in the dust, gone down in blood and bale!

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Speak—by what chance? did man rebel, or pestilence descend?

ATOSSA.
Neither! by Athens’ fatal shores our army met its end.

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Which of my children led our host to Athens? speak and say.

ATOSSA.
The froward Xerxes, leaving all our realm to disarray.

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Was it with army or with fleet on folly’s quest he went?

ATOSSA.
With both alike, a twofold front of double armament.

GHOST OF DARIUS.
And how then did so large a host on foot pass o’er the sea?

ATOSSA.
He bridged the ford of Helle’s strait by artful carpentry.

GHOST OF DARIUS.
How? could his craft avail to span the torrent of that tide?

ATOSSA.
’Tis sooth I say—some unknown power did fatal help provide!

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Alas, that power in malice came, to his bewilderment!

ATOSSA.
Alas, we see the end of all, the ruin on us sent.

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Speak, tell me how they fared therein, that thus ye mourn and weep?

ATOSSA.
Disaster to the army came, through ruin on the deep!

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Is all undone? hath all the folk gone down before the foe?

ATOSSA.
Yea, hark to Susa’s mourning cry for warriors laid low!

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Alas for all our gallant aids, our Persia’s help and pride!

ATOSSA.
Ay! old with young, the Bactrian force hath perished at our side!

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Alas, my son! what gallant youths hath he sent down to death!

ATOSSA.
Alone, or with a scanty guard—for so the rumour saith—

GHOST OF DARIUS.
He came—but how, and to what end? doth aught of hope remain?

ATOSSA.
With joy he reached the bridge that spanned the Hellespontine main.

GHOST OF DARIUS.
How? is he safe, in Persian land? speak soothly, yea or nay!

ATOSSA.
Clear and more clear the rumour comes, for no man to gainsay.

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Woe for the oracle fulfilled, the presage of the war
Launched on my son, by will of Zeus! I deemed our doom afar
In lap of time; but, if a king push forward to his fate,
The god himself allures to death that man infatuate!
So now the very fount of woe streams out on those I loved,
And mine own son, unwisely bold, the truth hereof hath proved!
He sought to shackle and control the Hellespontine wave,
That rushes from the Bosphorus, with fetters of a slave!—
To curb and bridge, with welded links, the streaming water-way,
And guide across the passage broad his manifold array!
Ah, folly void of counsel! he deemed that mortal wight
Could thwart the will of Heaven itself and curb Poseidon’s might!
Was it not madness? much I fear lest all my wealth and store
Pass from my treasure-house, to be the snatcher’s prize once more!

ATOSSA.
Such is the lesson, ah, too late! to eager Xerxes taught—
Trusting random counsellors and hare-brained men of nought,
Who said _Darius mighty wealth and fame to us did bring,
But thou art nought, a blunted spear, a palace-keeping king!_
Unto those sorry counsellors a ready ear he lent,
And led away to Hellas’ shore his fated armament.

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Therefore through them hath come calamity
Most huge and past forgetting; nor of old
Did ever such extermination fall
Upon the city Susa. Long ago
Zeus in his power this privilege bestowed,
That with a guiding sceptre one sole man
Should rule this Asian land of flock and herd.
Over the folk a Mede, Astyages,
Did grasp the power: then Cyaxares ruled
In his sire’s place, and held the sway aright,
Steering his state with watchful wariness.
Third in succession, Cyrus, blest of Heaven,
Held rule and ’stablished peace for all his clan:
Lydian and Phrygian won he to his sway,
And wide Ionia to his yoke constrained,
For the god favoured his discretion sage.
Fourth in the dynasty was Cyrus’ son,
And fifth was Mardus, scandal of his land
And ancient lineage. Him Artaphrenes,
Hardy of heart, within his palace slew,
Aided by loyal plotters, set for this.
And I too gained the lot for which I craved,
And oftentimes led out a goodly host,
Yet never brought disaster such as this
Upon the city. But my son is young
And reckless in his youth, and heedeth not
The warnings of my mouth. Mark this, my friends,
Born with my birth, coeval with mine age—
Not all we kings who held successive rule
Have wrought, combined, such ruin as my son!

CHORUS.
How then, O King Darius? whitherward
Dost thou direct thy warning? from this plight
How can we Persians fare towards hope again?

GHOST OF DARIUS.
By nevermore assailing Grecian lands,
Even tho’ our Median force be double theirs—
For the land’s self protects its denizens.

CHORUS.
How meanest thou? by what defensive power?

GHOST OF DARIUS.
She wastes by famine a too countless foe.

CHORUS.
But we will bring a host more skilled than huge.

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Why, e’en that army, camped in Hellas still,
Shall never win again to home and weal!

CHORUS.
How say’st thou? will not all the Asian host
Pass back from Europe over Helle’s ford?

GHOST OF DARIUS.
Nay—scarce a tithe of all those myriads,
If man may trust the oracles of Heaven
When he beholds the things already wrought,
Not false with true, but true with no word false
If what I trow be truth, my son has left
A chosen rear-guard of our host, in whom
He trusts, now, with a random confidence!
They tarry where Asopus laves the ground
With rills that softly bless Boeotia’s plain—
There is it fated for them to endure
The very crown of misery and doom,
Requital for their god-forgetting pride!
For why? they raided Hellas, had the heart
To wrong the images of holy gods,
And give the shrines and temples to the flame!
Defaced and dashed from sight the altars fell,
And each god’s image, from its pedestal
Thrust and flung down, in dim confusion lies!
Therefore, for outrage vile, a doom as dark
They suffer, and yet more shall undergo—
They touch no bottom in the swamp of doom,
But round them rises, bubbling up, the ooze!
So deep shall lie the gory clotted mass
Of corpses by the Dorian spear transfixed
Upon Plataea’s field! yea, piles of slain
To the third generation shall attest
By silent eloquence to those that see—
_Let not a mortal vaunt him overmuch_.
For pride grows rankly, and to ripeness brings
The curse of fate, and reaps, for harvest, tears!
Therefore when ye behold, for deeds like these,
Such stern requital paid, remember then
Athens and Hellas. Let no mortal wight,
Holding too lightly of his present weal
And passionate for more, cast down and spill
The mighty cup of his prosperity!
Doubt not that over-proud and haughty souls
Zeus lours in wrath, exacting the account.
Therefore, with wary warning, school my son,
Though he be lessoned by the gods already,
To curb the vaunting that affronts high Heaven!
And thou, O venerable Mother-queen,
Beloved of Xerxes, to the palace pass
And take therefrom such raiment as befits
Thy son, and go to meet him: for his garb
In this extremity of grief hangs rent
Around his body, woefully unstitched,
Mere tattered fragments of once royal robes!
Go thou to him, speak soft and soothing words—
Thee, and none other, will he bear to hear,
As well I know. But I must pass away
From earth above, unto the nether gloom;
Therefore, old men, take my farewell, and clasp,
Even amid the ruin of this time,
Unto your souls the pleasure of the day,
For dead men have no profit of their gold!

[_The GHOST OF DARIUS sinks._]

CHORUS.
Alas, I thrill with pain for Persia’s woes—
Many fulfilled, and others hard at hand!

ATOSSA.
O spirit of the race, what sorrows crowd
Upon me! and this anguish stings me worst,
That round my royal son’s dishonoured form
Hang rags and tatters, degradation deep!
I will away, and, bringing from within
A seemly royal robe, will straightway strive
To meet and greet my son: foul scorn it were
To leave our dearest in his hour of shame.

[_Exit ATOSSA._]

CHORUS.
Ah glorious and goodly they were, the life and the lot that we
gained,
The cities we held in our hand when the monarch invincible reigned,
The king that was good to his realm, sufficing, fulfilled of his
sway,
A lord that was peer of the gods, the pride of the bygone day!
Then could we show to the skies great hosts and a glorious name,
And laws that were stable in might; as towers they guarded our fame!
There without woe or disaster we came from the foe and the fight,
In triumph, enriched with the spoil, to the land and the city’s
delight.
What towns ere the Halys he passed! what towns ere he came to the
West,
To the main and the isles of the Strymon, and the Thracian region
possess’d!
And those that stand back from the main, enringed by their fortified
wall,
Gave o’er to Darius, the king, the sceptre and sway over all!
Those too by the channel of Helle, where southward it broadens and
glides,
By the inlets, Propontis! of thee, and the strait of the Pontic
tides,
And the isles that lie fronting our sea-board, and the Eastland looks
on each one,
Lesbo and Chios and Paros, and Samos with olive-trees grown,
And Naxos, and Myconos’ rock, and Tenos with Andros hard by,
And isles that in midmost Aegean, aloof from the continent, lie—
And Lemnos and Icaros’ hold—all these to his sceptre were bowed,
And Cnidos and neighbouring Rhodes, and Soli, and Paphos the proud,
And Cyprian Salamis, name-child of her who hath wrought us this
wrong!
Yea, and all the Ionian tract, where the Greek-born inhabitants
throng,
And the cities are teeming with gold—Darius was lord of them all,
And, great by his wisdom, he ruled, and ever there came to his call,
In stalwart array and unfailing, the warrior chiefs of our land,
And mingled allies from the tribes who bowed to his conquering hand!
But now there are none to gainsay that the gods are against us; we
lie
Subdued in the havoc of wreck, and whelmed by the wrath of the sky!

Enter XERXES in disarray.

XERXES.
Alas the day, that I should fall
Into this grimmest fate of all,
This ruin doubly unforeseen!
On Persia’s land what power of Fate
Descends, what louring gloom of hate?
How shall I bear my teen?
My limbs are loosened where they stand,
When I behold this aged band—
Oh God! I would that I too, I,
Among the men who went to die,
Were whelmed in earth by Fate’s command!

CHORUS.
Ah welladay, my King! ah woe
For all our heroes’ overthrow—
For all the gallant host’s array,
For Persia’s honour, pass’d away,
For glory and heroic sway
Mown down by Fortune’s hand to-day!
Hark, how the kingdom makes its moan,
For youthful valour lost and gone,
By Xerxes shattered and undone!
He, he hath crammed the maw of hell
With bowmen brave, who nobly fell,
Their country’s mighty armament,
Ten thousand heroes deathward sent!
Alas, for all the valiant band,
O king and lord! thine Asian land
Down, down upon its knee is bent!

XERXES.
Alas, a lamentable sound,
A cry of ruth! for I am found
A curse to land and lineage,
With none my sorrow to assuage!

CHORUS.
Alas, a death-song desolate
I send forth, for thy home-coming!
A scream, a dirge for woe and fate,
Such as the Asian mourners sing,
A sorry and ill-omened tale
Of tears and shrieks and Eastern wail!

XERXES.
Ay, launch the woeful sorrow’s cry,
The harsh, discordant melody,
For lo, the power, we held for sure,
Hath turned to my discomfiture!

CHORUS.
Yea, dirges, dirges manifold
Will I send forth, for warriors bold,
For the sea-sorrow of our host!
The city mourns, and I must wail
With plashing tears our sorrow’s tale,
Lamenting for the loved and lost!

XERXES.
Alas, the god of war, who sways
The scales of fight in diverse ways,
Gives glory to Ionia!
Ionian ships, in fenced array,
Have reaped their harvest in the bay,
A darkling harvest-field of Fate,
A sea, a shore, of doom and hate!

CHORUS.
Cry out, and learn the tale of woe!
Where are thy comrades? where the band
Who stood beside thee, hand in hand,
A little while ago?
Where now hath Pharandákes gone,
Where Psammis, and where Pelagon?
Where now is brave Agdabatas,
And Susas too, and Datamas?
Hath Susiscanes past away,
The chieftain of Ecbatana?

XERXES.
I left them, mangled castaways,
Flung from their Tyrian deck, and tossed
On Salaminian water-ways,
From surging tides to rocky coast!

CHORUS.
Alack, and is Pharnuchus slain,
And Ariomardus, brave in vain?
Where is Seualces’ heart of fire?
Lilaeus, child of noble sire?
Are Tharubis and Memphis sped?
Hystaechmas, Artembáres dead?
And where is brave Masistes, where?
Sum up death’s count, that I may hear!

XERXES.
Alas, alas, they came, their eyes surveyed
Ancestral Athens on that fatal day.
Then with a rending struggle were they laid
Upon the land, and gasped their life away!

CHORUS.
And Batanochus’ child, Alpistus great,
Surnamed the Eye of State—
Saw you and left you him who once of old
Ten thousand thousand fighting-men enrolled?
His sire was child of Sesamas, and he
From Megabates sprang. Ah, woe is me,
Thou king of evil fate!
Hast thou lost Parthus, lost Oebares great?
Alas, the sorrow! blow succeedeth blow
On Persia’s pride; thou tellest woe on woe!

XERXES.
Bitter indeed the pang for comrades slain,
The brave and bold! thou strikest to my soul
Pain, pain beyond forgetting, hateful pain.
My inner spirit sobs and sighs with dole!

CHORUS.
Another yet we yearn to see,
And see not! ah, thy chivalry,
Xanthis, thou chief of Mardian men
Countless! and thou, Anchares bright,
And ye, whose cars controlled the fight,
Arsaces and Diaixis wight,
Kegdadatas, Lythimnas dear,
And Tolmus, greedy of the spear!
I stand bereft! not in thy train
Come they, as erst! ah, ne’er again
Shall they return unto our eyes,
Car-borne, ’neath silken canopies!

XERXES.
Yea, gone are they who mustered once the host!

CHORUS.
Yea, yea, forgotten, lost!

XERXES.
Alas, the woe and cost!

CHORUS.
Alas, ye heavenly powers!
Ye wrought a sorrow past belief,
A woe, of woes the chief!
With aspect stern, upon us Ate looms!

XERXES.
Smitten are we—time tells no heavier blow!

CHORUS.
Smitten! the doom is plain!

XERXES.
Curse upon curse and pang on pang we know!

CHORUS.
With the Ionian power
We clashed, in evil hour!
Woe falls on Persia’s race, yea, woe again, again!

XERXES.
Yea, smitten am I, and my host is all to ruin hurled!

CHORUS.
Yea verily—in mighty wreck hath sunk the Persian world!

XERXES.
(_holding up a torn robe and a quiver_)
See you this tattered rag of pride?

CHORUS.
I see it, welladay!

XERXES.
See you this quiver?

CHORUS.
Say, hath aught survived and ’scaped the fray?

XERXES.
A store for darts it was, erewhile!

CHORUS.
Remain but two or three!

XERXES.
No aid is left!

CHORUS.
Ionian folk such darts, unfearing, see!

XERXES.
Right resolute they are! I saw disaster unforeseen.

CHORUS.
Ah, speakest thou of wreck, of flight, of carnage that hath been?

XERXES.
Yea, and my royal robe I rent, in terror at their fall!

CHORUS.
Alas, alas!

XERXES.
Yea, thrice alas!

CHORUS.
For all have perished, all!

XERXES.
Ah woe to us, ah joy to them who stood against our pride!

CHORUS.
And all our strength is minishèd and sundered from our side!

XERXES.
No escort have I!

CHORUS.
Nay, thy friends are whelmed beneath the tide!

XERXES.
Wail, wail the miserable doom, and to the palace hie!

CHORUS.
Alas, alas, and woe again!

XERXES.
Shriek, smite the breast, as I!

CHORUS.
An evil gift, a sad exchange, of tears poured out in vain!

XERXES.
Shrill out your simultaneous wail!

CHORUS.
Alas the woe and pain!

XERXES.
O, bitter is this adverse fate!

CHORUS.
I voice the moan with thee!

XERXES.
Smite, smite thy bosom, groan aloud for my calamity!

CHORUS.
I mourn and am dissolved in tears!

XERXES.
Cry, beat thy breast amain!

CHORUS.
O king, my heart is in thy woe!

XERXES.
Shriek, wail, and shriek again!

CHORUS.
O agony!

XERXES.
A blackening blow—

CHORUS.
A grievous stripe shall fall!

XERXES.
Yea, beat anew thy breast, ring out the doleful Mysian call!

CHORUS.
An agony, an agony!

XERXES.
Pluck out thy whitening beard!

CHORUS.
By handfuls, ay, by handfuls, with dismal tear-drops smeared!

XERXES.
Sob out thine aching sorrow!

CHORUS.
I will thine best obey.

XERXES.
With thine hands rend thy mantle’s fold—

CHORUS.
Alas, woe worth the day!

XERXES.
With thine own fingers tear thy locks, bewail the army’s weird!

CHORUS.
By handfuls, yea, by handfuls, with tears of dole besmeared!

XERXES.
Now let thine eyes find overflow—

CHORUS.
I wend in wail and pain!

XERXES.
Cry out for me an answering moan—

CHORUS.
Alas, alas again!

XERXES.
Shriek with a cry of agony, and lead the doleful train!

CHORUS.
Alas, alas, the Persian land is woeful now to tread!

XERXES.
Cry out and mourn! the city now doth wail above the dead!

CHORUS.
I sob and moan!

XERXES.
I bid ye now be delicate in grief!

CHORUS.
Alas, the Persian land is sad and knoweth not relief!

XERXES.
Alas, the triple banks of oars and those who died thereby!

CHORUS.
Pass! I will lead you, bring you home, with many a broken sigh!

[_Exeunt._]

THE SEVEN AGAINST THEBES

ARGUMENT

Laius, king of the Cadmeans, was warned by the oracle of Delphi that he should not beget a child. But he disobeyed this command, and when a son was born to him, he cast the child away, that he might perish on Cithaeron. But a herdsman found the babe yet alive, and he was nourished in Corinth and grew to manhood, not knowing his true parentage, and was named Oedipus; and he slew, unknowingly, his father, Laius, and afterwards saved the town of the Cadmeans from a devouring monster, and married the widowed queen, Iocaste, and begat sons and daughters. But when he learned what he had wrought unwittingly, he fell into despair, and the queen slew herself. But before Oedipus died, he laid a curse upon his male children, Eteocles and Polynices, that they should make even division of the kingdom by the sword; and it fell out even so, for the two brothers strove together for the inheritance, and Polynices brought an army, from Argos, against Eteocles; and the brothers fought, and fell each by the other’s hand, and the curse was fulfilled.

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

ETEOCLES. A SPY. CHORUS OF CADMEAN MAIDENS. ANTIGONE. ISMENE. A HERALD.

ETEOCLES.
Clansmen of Cadmus, at the signal given
By time and season must the ruler speak
Who sets the course and steers the ship of State
With hand upon the tiller, and with eye
Watchful against the treachery of sleep.
For if all go aright, _thank Heaven_, men say,
But if adversely—which may God forefend!—
One name on many lips, from street to street,
Would bear the bruit and rumour of the time,
_Down with Eteocles!_—a clamorous curse,
A dirge of ruin. May averting Zeus
Make good his title here, in Cadmus’ hold!
You it beseems now boys unripened yet
To lusty manhood, men gone past the prime
And increase of the full begetting seed,
And those whom youth and manhood well combined
Array for action—all to rise in aid
Of city, shrines, and altars of all powers
Who guard our land; that ne’er, to end of time,
Be blotted out the sacred service due
To our sweet mother-land and to her brood.
For she it was who to their guest-right called
Your waxing youth, was patient of the toil,
And cherished you on the land’s gracious lap,
Alike to plant the hearth and bear the shield
In loyal service, for an hour like this.
Mark now! until to-day, luck rules our scale;
For we, though long beleaguered, in the main
Have with our sallies struck the foemen hard.
But now the seer, the feeder of the birds,
(Whose art unerring and prophetic skill
Of ear and mind divines their utterance
Without the lore of fire interpreted)
Foretelleth, by the mastery of his art,
That now an onset of Achaea’s host
Is by a council of the night designed
To fall in double strength upon our walls.
Up and away, then, to the battlements,
The gates, the bulwarks! don your panoplies,
Array you at the breast-work, take your stand
On floorings of the towers, and with good heart
Stand firm for sudden sallies at the gates,
Nor hold too heinous a respect for hordes
Sent on you from afar: some god will guard!
I too, for shrewd espial of their camp,
Have sent forth scouts, and confidence is mine
They will not fail nor tremble at their task,
And, with their news, I fear no foeman’s guile.

Enter a SPY.

THE SPY.
Eteocles, high king of Cadmus’ folk,
I stand here with news certified and sure
From Argos’ camp, things by myself descried.
Seven warriors yonder, doughty chiefs of might,
Into the crimsoned concave of a shield
Have shed a bull’s blood, and, with hands immersed
Into the gore of sacrifice, have sworn
By Ares, lord of fight, and by thy name,
Blood-lapping Terror, _Let our oath be heard—
Either to raze the walls, make void the hold
Of Cadmus—strive his children as they may—
Or, dying here, to make the foemen’s land
With blood impasted_. Then, as memory’s gift
Unto their parents at the far-off home,
Chaplets they hung upon Adrastus’ car,
With eyes tear-dropping, but no word of moan.
For their steeled spirit glowed with high resolve,
As lions pant, with battle in their eyes.
For them, no weak alarm delays the clear
Issues of death or life! I parted thence
Even as they cast the lots, how each should lead,
Against which gate, his serried company.
Rank then thy bravest, with what speed thou may’st,
Hard by the gates, to dash on them, for now,
Full-armed, the onward ranks of Argos come!
The dust whirls up, and from their panting steeds
White foamy flakes like snow bedew the plain.
Thou therefore, chieftain! like a steersman skilled,
Enshield the city’s bulwarks, ere the blast
Of war comes darting on them! hark, the roar
Of the great landstorm with its waves of men!
Take Fortune by the forelock! for the rest,
By yonder dawn-light will I scan the field
Clear and aright, and surety of my word
Shall keep thee scatheless of the coming storm.

ETEOCLES.
O Zeus and Earth and city-guarding gods,
And thou, my father’s Curse, of baneful might,
Spare ye at least this town, nor root it up,
By violence of the foemen, stock and stem!
For here, from home and hearth, rings Hellas’ tongue.
Forbid that e’er the yoke of slavery
Should bow this land of freedom, Cadmus’ hold!
Be ye her help! your cause I plead with mine—
A city saved doth honour to her gods!

[_Exit ETEOCLES, etc._]

Enter the CHORUS OF MAIDENS.

CHORUS. I wail in the stress of my terror, and shrill is my cry of despair. The foemen roll forth from their camp as a billow, and onward they bear! Their horsemen are swift in the forefront, the dust rises up to the sky, A signal, though speechless, of doom, a herald more clear than a cry! Hoof-trampled, the land of my love bears onward the din to mine ears. As a torrent descending a mountain, it thunders and echoes and nears! The doom is unloosened and cometh! O kings and O queens of high Heaven, Prevail that it fall not upon us: the sign for their onset is given— They stream to the walls from without, white-shielded and keen for the fray. They storm to the citadel gates— what god or what goddess can stay The rush of their feet? to what shrine shall I bow me in terror and pray? O gods high-throned in bliss, we must crouch at the shrines in your home! Not here must we tarry and wail: shield clashes on shield as they come— And now, even now is the hour for the robes and the chaplets of prayer! Mine eyes feel the flash of the sword, the clang is instinct with the spear! Is thy hand set against us, O Ares, in ruin and wrath to o’erwhelm Thine own immemorial land, O god of the golden helm? Look down upon us, we beseech thee, on the land that thou lovest of old, And ye, O protecting gods, in pity your people behold! Yea, save us, the maidenly troop, from the doom and despair of the slave, For the crests of the foemen come onward, their rush is the rush of a wave Rolled on by the war-god’s breath! almighty one, hear us and save From the grasp of the Argives’ might! to the ramparts of Cadmus they crowd, And, clenched in the teeth of the steeds, the bits clink horror aloud! And seven high chieftains of war, with spear and with panoply bold, Are set, by the law of the lot, to storm the seven gates of our hold! Be near and befriend us, O Pallas, the Zeus-born maiden of might! O lord of the steed and the sea, be thy trident uplifted to smite In eager desire of the fray, Poseidon! and Ares come down, In fatherly presence revealed, to rescue Harmonia’s town! Thine too, Aphrodite, we are! thou art mother and queen of our race, To thee we cry out in our need, from thee let thy children have grace! Ye too, to scare back the foe, be your cry as a wolf’s howl wild, Thou, O the wolf-lord, and thou, of she-wolf Leto the child! Woe and alack for the sound, for the rattle of cars to the wall, And the creak of the grinding axles! O Hera, to thee is our call! Artemis, maiden beloved! the air is distraught with the spears, And whither doth destiny drive us, and where is the goal of our fears? The blast of the terrible stones on the ridge of our wall is not stayed, At the gates is the brazen clash of the bucklers—Apollo to aid! Thou too, O daughter of Zeus, who guidest the wavering fray To the holy decision of fate, Athena! be with us to-day! Come down to the sevenfold gates and harry the foemen away! O gods and O sisters of gods, our bulwark and guard! we beseech That ye give not our war-worn hold to a rabble of alien speech! List to the call of the maidens, the hands held up for the right, Be near us, protect us, and show that the city is dear in your sight! Have heed for her sacrifice holy, and thought of her offerings take, Forget not her love and her worship, be near her and smite for her sake!

Re-enter ETEOCLES.

ETEOCLES
Hark to my question, things detestable!
Is this aright and for the city’s weal,
And helpful to our army thus beset,
That ye before the statues of our gods
Should fling yourselves, and scream and shriek your fears?
Immodest, uncontrolled! Be this my lot—
Never in troublous nor in peaceful days
To dwell with aught that wears a female form!
Where womankind has power, no man can house,
Where womankind feeds panic, ruin rules
Alike in house and city! Look you now—
Your flying feet, and rumour of your fears,
Have spread a soulless panic on our walls,
And they without do go from strength to strength,
And we within make breach upon ourselves!
Such fate it brings, to house with womankind.
Therefore if any shall resist my rule—
Or man, or woman, or some sexless thing—
The vote of sentence shall decide their doom,
And stones of execution, past escape,
Shall finish all. Let not a woman’s voice
Be loud in council! for the things without,
A man must care; let women keep within—
Even then is mischief all too probable!
Hear ye? or speak I to unheeding ears?

CHORUS.
Ah, but I shudder, child of Oedipus!
I heard the clash and clang!
The axles rolled and rumbled; woe to us
Fire-welded bridles rang!

ETEOCLES.
Say—when a ship is strained and deep in brine,
Did e’er a seaman mend his chance, who left
The helm, t’invoke the image at the prow?

CHORUS.
Ah, but I fled to the shrines, I called to our helpers on high,
When the stone-shower roared at the portals!
I sped to the temples aloft, and loud was my call and my cry,
_Look down and deliver. Immortals!_

ETEOCLES.
Ay, pray amain that stone may vanquish steel!
Were not that grace of gods? ay, ay—methinks,
When cities fall, the gods go forth from them!

CHORUS.
Ah, let me die, or ever I behold
The gods go forth, in conflagration dire!
The foemen’s rush and raid, and all our hold
Wrapt in the burning fire!

ETEOCLES.
Cry not: on Heaven, in impotent debate!
What saith the saw?—_Good saving Strength, in verity,
Out of Obedience breeds the babe Prosperity_.

CHORUS.
’Tis true: yet stronger is the power divine,
And oft, when man’s estate is overbowed
With bitter pangs, disperses from his eyne
The heavy, hanging cloud!

ETEOCLES.
Let men with sacrifice and augury
Approach the gods, when comes the tug of war;
Maids must be silent and abide within.

CHORUS. By grace of the gods we hold it, a city untamed of the spear, And the battlement wards from the wall the foe and his aspect of fear! What need of displeasure herein?

ETEOCLES.
Ay, pay thy vows to Heaven; I grudge them not,
But—so thou strike no fear into our men—
Have calm at heart, nor be too much afraid.

CHORUS.
Alack, it is fresh in mine ears, the clamour and crash of the fray,
And up to our holiest height I sped on my timorous way,
Bewildered, beset by the din!

ETEOCLES.
Now, if ye hear the bruit of death or wounds,
Give not yourselves o’ermuch to shriek and scream,
For Ares ravens upon human flesh.

CHORUS.
Ah, but the snorting of the steeds I hear!

ETEOCLES.
Then, if thou hearest, hear them not too well!

CHORUS.
Hark, the earth rumbles, as they close us round!

ETEOCLES.
Enough if I am here, with plans prepared.

CHORUS.
Alack, the battering at the gates is loud!

ETEOCLES.
Peace! stay your tongue, or else the town may hear!

CHORUS.
O warders of the walls, betray them not!

ETEOCLES.
Bestrew your cries! in silence face your fate.

CHORUS.
Gods of our city, see me not enslaved!

ETEOCLES.
On me, on all, thy cries bring slavery.

CHORUS.
Zeus, strong to smite, turn upon foes thy blow!

ETEOCLES.
Zeus, what a curse are women, wrought by thee!

CHORUS.
Weak wretches, even as men, when cities fall.

ETEOCLES.
What! clasping gods, yet voicing thy despair?

CHORUS.
In the sick heart, fear machete prey of speech.

ETEOCLES.
Light is the thing I ask thee—do my will!

CHORUS.
Ask swiftly: swiftly shall I know my power.

ETEOCLES.
Silence, weak wretch! nor put thy friends in fear.

CHORUS.
I speak no more: the general fate be mine!

ETEOCLES.
I take that word as wiser than the rest.
Nay, more: these images possess thy will—
Pray, in their strength, that Heaven be on our side!
Then hear my prayers withal, and then ring out
The female triumph-note, thy privilege—
Yea, utter forth the usage Hellas knows,
The cry beside the altars, sounding clear
Encouragement to friends, alarm to foes.
But I unto all gods that guard our walls,
Lords of the plain or warders of the mart
And to Isthmus’ stream and Dirge’s rills,
I swear, if Fortune smiles and saves our town,
That we will make our altars reek with blood
Of sheep and kine, shed forth unto the gods,
And with victorious tokens front our fannies—
Corsets and cases that once our foemen wore,
Spear-shattered now—to deck these holy homes!
Be such thy vows to Heaven—away with sighs,
Away with outcry vain and barbarous,
That shall avail not, in a general doom!
But I will back, and, with six chosen men
Myself the seventh, to confront the foe
In this great aspect of a poisèd war,
Return and plant them at the sevenfold gates,
Or e’er the prompt and clamorous battle-scouts
Haste to inflame our counsel with the need.

[_Exit ETEOCLES._]

CHORUS.
I mark his words, yet, dark and deep,
My heart’s alarm forbiddeth sleep!
Close-clinging cares around my soul
Enkindle fears beyond control,
Presageful of what doom may fall
From the great leaguer of the wall!
So a poor dove is faint with fear
For her weak nestlings, while anew
Glides on the snaky ravisher!
In troop and squadron, hand on hand,
They climb and throng, and hemmed we stand,
While on the warders of our town
The flinty shower comes hurtling down!

Gods born of Zeus! put forth your might
For Cadmus’ city, realm, and right!
What nobler land shall e’er be yours,
If once ye give to hostile powers
The deep rich soil, and Dirce’s wave,
The nursing stream, Poseidon gave
And Tethys’ children? Up and save!
Cast on the ranks that hem us round
A deadly panic, make them fling
Their arms in terror on the ground,
And die in carnage! thence shall spring
High honour for our clan and king!
Come at our wailing cry, and stand
As thronèd sentries of our land!

For pity and sorrow it were that this immemorial town Should sink to be slave of the spear, to dust and to ashes gone down, By the gods of Achaean worship and arms of Achaean might Sacked and defiled and dishonoured, its women the prize of the fight— That, haled by the hair as a steed, their mantles dishevelled and torn, The maiden and matron alike should pass to the wedlock of scorn! I hear it arise from the city, the manifold wail of despair— _Woe, woe for the doom that shall be_—as in grasp of the foeman they fare! For a woe and a weeping it is, if the maiden inviolate flower Is plucked by the foe in his might, not culled in the bridal bower! Alas for the hate and the horror—how say it?—less hateful by far Is the doom to be slain by the sword, hewn down in the carnage of war! For wide, ah! wide is the woe when the foeman has mounted the wall; There is havoc and terror and flame, and the dark smoke broods over all, And wild is the war-god’s breath, as in frenzy of conquest he springs, And pollutes with the blast of his lips the glory of holiest things!

Up to the citadel rise clash and din,
The war-net closes in,
The spear is in the heart: with blood imbrued
Young mothers wail aloud,
For children at their breast who scream and die!
And boys and maidens fly,
Yet scape not the pursuer, in his greed
To thrust and grasp and feed!
Robber with robber joins, each calls his mate
Unto the feast of hate—
_The banquet, lo! is spread—
seize, rend, and tear!
No need to choose or share!_
And all the wealth of earth to waste is poured—
A sight by all abhorred!
The grieving housewives eye it;
heaped and blent,
Earth’s boons are spoiled and spent,
And waste to nothingness; and O alas,
Young maids, forlorn ye pass—
Fresh horror at your hearts—beneath the power
Of those who crop the flower!
Ye own the ruffian ravisher for lord,
And night brings rites abhorred!
Woe, woe for you! upon your grief and pain
There comes a fouler stain.

Enter on one side THE SPY; on the other ETEOCLES and the SIX CHAMPIONS.

SEMI-CHORUS.
Look, friends! methinks the scout, who parted hence
To spy upon the foemen, comes with news,
His feet as swift as wafting chariot-wheels.

SEMI-CHORUS.
Ay, and our king, the son of Oedipus,
Comes prompt to time, to learn the spy’s report—
His heart is fainter than his foot is fast!

THE SPY.
Well have I scanned the foe, and well can say
Unto which chief, by lot, each gate is given.
Tydeus already with his onset-cry
Storms at the gate called Proetides; but him
The seer Amphiaraus holds at halt,
Nor wills that he should cross Ismenus’ ford,
Until the sacrifices promise fair.
But Tydeus, mad with lust of blood and broil,
Like to a cockatrice at noontide hour,
Hisses out wrath and smites with scourge of tongue
The prophet-son of Oecleus—_Wise thou art,
Faint against war, and holding back from death!_
With such revilings loud upon his lips
He waves the triple plumes that o’er his helm
Float overshadowing, as a courser’s mane;
And at his shield’s rim, terror in their tone,
Clang and reverberate the brazen bells.
And this proud sign, wrought on his shield, he bears—
The vault of heaven, inlaid with blazing stars;
And, for the boss, the bright moon glows at full,
The eye of night, the first and lordliest star.
Thus with high-vaunted armour, madly bold,
He clamours by the stream-bank, wild for war,
As a steed panting grimly on his bit,
Held in and chafing for the trumpet’s bray!
Whom wilt thou set against him? when the gates
Of Proetus yield, who can his rush repel?

ETEOCLES.
To me, no blazon on a foeman’s shield
Shall e’er present a fear! such pointed threats
Are powerless to wound; his plumes and bells,
Without a spear, are snakes without a sting.
Nay, more—that pageant of which thou tellest—
The nightly sky displayed, ablaze with stars,
Upon his shield, palters with double sense—
One headstrong fool will find its truth anon!
For, if night fall upon his eyes in death,
Yon vaunting blazon will its own truth prove,
And he is prophet of his folly’s fall.
Mine shall it be, to pit against his power
The loyal son of Astacus, as guard
To hold the gateways—a right valiant soul,
Who has in heed the throne of Modesty
And loathes the speech of Pride, and evermore
Shrinks from the base, but knows no other fear.
He springs by stock from those whom Ares spared,
The men called Sown, a right son of the soil,
And Melanippus styled. Now, what his arm
To-day shall do, rests with the dice of war,
And Ares shall ordain it; but his cause
Hath the true badge of Right, to urge him on
To guard, as son, his motherland from wrong.

CHORUS.
Then may the gods give fortune fair
Unto our chief, sent forth to dare
War’s terrible arbitrament!
But ah! when champions wend away,
I shudder, lest, from out the fray,
Only their blood-stained wrecks be sent!

THE SPY.
Nay, let him pass, and the gods’ help be his!
Next, Capaneus comes on, by lot to lead
The onset at the gates Electran styled:
A giant he, more huge than Tydeus’ self,
And more than human in his arrogance—
May fate forefend his threat against our walls!
_God willing, or unwilling_—such his vaunt—
_I will lay waste this city; Pallas’ self,
Zeus’ warrior maid, although she swoop to earth
And plant her in my path, shall stay me not_.
And, for the flashes of the levin-bolt,
He holds them harmless as the noontide rays.
Mark, too, the symbol on his shield—a man
Scornfully weaponless but torch in hand,
And the flame glows within his grasp, prepared
For ravin: lo, the legend, wrought in words,
_Fire for the city bring I_, flares in gold!
Against such wight, send forth—yet whom? what man
Will front that vaunting figure and not fear?

ETEOCLES.
Aha, this profits also, gain on gain!
In sooth, for mortals, the tongue’s utterance
Bewrays unerringly a foolish pride!
Hither stalks Capaneus, with vaunt and threat
Defying god-like powers, equipt to act,
And, mortal though he be, he strains his tongue
In folly’s ecstasy, and casts aloft
High swelling words against the ears of Zeus.
Right well I trust—if justice grants the word—
That, by the might of Zeus, a bolt of flame
In more than semblance shall descend on him.
Against his vaunts, though reckless, I have set,
To make assurance sure, a warrior stern—
Strong Polyphontes, fervid for the fray;
A sturdy bulwark, he, by grace of Heaven
And favour of his champion Artemis!
Say on, who holdeth the next gate in ward?

CHORUS.
Perish the wretch whose vaunt affronts our home!
On him the red bolt come,
Ere to the maiden bowers his way he cleave,
To ravage and bereave!

THE SPY.
I will say on. Eteoclus is third—
To him it fell, what time the third lot sprang
O’er the inverted helmet’s brazen rim,
To dash his stormers on Neistae gate.
He wheels his mares, who at their frontlets chafe
And yearn to charge upon the gates amain.
They snort the breath of pride, and, filled therewith,
Their nozzles whistle with barbaric sound.
High too and haughty is his shield’s device—
An armèd man who climbs, from rung to rung,
A scaling ladder, up a hostile wall,
Afire to sack and slay; and he too cries,
(By letters, full of sound, upon the shield)
_Not Ares’ self shall cast me from the wall_.
Look to it, send, against this man, a man
Strong to debar the slave’s yoke from our town.

ETEOCLES (_pointing to_ MEGAREUS)
Send will I—even this man, with luck to aid—
By his worth sent already, not by pride
And vain pretence, is he. ’Tis Megareus,
The child of Creon, of the Earth-sprung born!
He will not shrink from guarding of the gates,
Nor fear the maddened charger’s frenzied neigh,
But, if he dies, will nobly quit the score
For nurture to the land that gave him birth,
Or from the shield-side hew two warriors down
Eteoclus and the figure that he lifts—
Ay, and the city pictured, all in one,
And deck with spoils the temple of his sire!
Announce the next pair, stint not of thy tongue!

CHORUS.
O thou, the warder of my home,
Grant, unto us, Fate’s favouring tide,
Send on the foemen doom!
They fling forth taunts of frenzied pride,
On them may Zeus with glare of vengeance come;

THE SPY.
Lo, next him stands a fourth and shouts amain,
By Pallas Onca’s portal, and displays
A different challenge; ’tis Hippomedon!
Huge the device that starts up from his targe
In high relief; and, I deny it not,
I shuddered, seeing how, upon the rim,
It made a mighty circle round the shield—
No sorry craftsman he, who wrought that work
And clamped it all around the buckler’s edge!
The form was Typhon: from his glowing throat
Rolled lurid smoke, spark-litten, kin of fire!
The flattened edge-work, circling round the whole,
Made strong support for coiling snakes that grew
Erect above the concave of the shield:
Loud rang the warrior’s voice; inspired for war,
He raves to slay, as doth a Bacchanal,
His very glance a terror! of such wight
Beware the onset! closing on the gates,
He peals his vaunting and appalling cry!

ETEOCLES.
Yet first our Pallas Onca—wardress she,
Planting her foot hard by her gate—shall stand,
The Maid against the ruffian, and repel
His force, as from her brood the mother-bird
Beats back the wintered serpent’s venom’d fang
And next, by her, is Oenops’ gallant son,
Hyperbius, chosen to confront this foe,
Ready to seek his fate at Fortune’s shrine!

In form, in valour, and in skill of arms,
None shall gainsay him. See how wisely well
Hermes hath set the brave against the strong!
Confronted shall they stand, the shield of each
Bearing the image of opposing gods:
One holds aloft his Typhon breathing fire,
But, on the other’s shield, in symbol sits
Zeus, calm and strong, and fans his bolt to flame—
Zeus, seen of all, yet seen of none to fail!
Howbeit, weak is trust reposed in Heaven—
Yet are we upon Zeus’ victorious side,
The foe, with those he worsted—if in sooth
Zeus against Typhon held the upper hand,
And if Hyperbius, (as well may hap
When two such foes such diverse emblems bear)
Have Zeus upon his shield, a saving sign.

CHORUS.
High faith is mine that he whose shield
Bears, against Zeus, the thing of hate.
The giant Typhon, thus revealed,
A monster loathed of gods eterne
And mortal men—this doom shall earn
A shattered skull, before the gate!

THE SPY.
Heaven send it so!
A fifth assailant now
Is set against our fifth, the northern, gate,
Fronting the death-mound where Amphion lies
The child of Zeus.

This foeman vows his faith,
Upon a mystic spear-head which he deems
More holy than a godhead and more sure
To find its mark than any glance of eye,
That, will they, nill they, he will storm and sack
The hold of the Cadmeans. Such his oath—
His, the bold warrior, yet of childish years,
A bud of beauty’s foremost flower, the son
Of Zeus and of the mountain maid. I mark
How the soft down is waxing on his cheek,
Thick and close-growing in its tender prime—
In name, not mood, is he a maiden’s child—
Parthenopaeus; large and bright his eyes
But fierce the wrath wherewith he fronts the gate:
Yet not unheralded he takes his stand
Before the portal; on his brazen shield,
The rounded screen and shelter of his form,
I saw him show the ravening Sphinx, the fiend
That shamed our city—how it glared and moved,
Clamped on the buckler, wrought in high relief!
And in its claws did a Cadmean bear—
Nor heretofore, for any single prey,
Sped she aloft, through such a storm of darts
As now awaits her. So our foe is here—
Like, as I deem, to ply no stinted trade
In blood and broil, but traffick as is meet
In fierce exchange for his long wayfaring!

ETEOCLES.
Ah, may they meet the doom they think to bring—
They and their impious vaunts—from those on high!
So should they sink, hurled down to deepest death!
This foe, at least, by thee Arcadian styled,
Is faced by one who bears no braggart sign,
But his hand sees to smite, where blows avail—
Actor, own brother to Hyperbius!
He will not let a boast without a blow
Stream through our gates and nourish our despair,
Nor give him way who on his hostile shield
Bears the brute image of the loathly Sphinx!
Blocked at the gate, she will rebuke the man
Who strives to thrust her forward, when she feels
Thick crash of blows, up to the city wall.
With Heaven’s goodwill, my forecast shall be true.

CHORUS.
Home to my heart the vaunting goes,
And, quick with terror, on my head
Rises my hair, at sound of those
Who wildly, impiously rave!
If gods there be, to them I plead—
_Give them to darkness and the grave_.