Alas, my
sisters!
Aeschylus
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 armed 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_.
THE SPY
Fronting the sixth gate stands another foe,
Wisest of warriors, bravest among seers--
Such must I name Amphiaraus: he,
Set steadfast at the Homoloid gate,
Berates strong Tydeus with reviling words--
_The man of blood, the bane of state and home,
To Argos, arch-allurer to all ill,
Evoker of the fury-fiend of hell,
Death's minister, and counsellor of wrong
Unto Adrastus in this fatal field_.
Ay, and with eyes upturned and mien of scorn
He chides thy brother Polynices too
At his desert, and once and yet again
Dwells hard and meaningly upon his name
Where it saith _glory_ yet importeth _feud_.
_Yea, such thou art in act, and such thy grace
In sight of Heaven, and such in aftertime
Thy fame, for lips and ears of mortal men!
"He strove to sack the city of his sires
And temples of her gods, and brought on her
An alien armament of foreign foes.
The fountain of maternal blood outpoured
What power can staunch? even so, thy fatherland
Once by thine ardent malice stormed and ta'en,
Shall ne'er join force with thee. " For me, I know
It doth remain to let my blood enrich
The border of this land that loves me not--
Blood of a prophet, in a foreign grave!
Now, for the battle! I foreknow my doom,
Yet it shall be with honour_. So he spake,
The prophet, holding up his targe of bronze
Wrought without blazon, to the ears of men
Who stood around and heeded not his word.
For on no bruit and rumour of great deeds,
But on their doing, is his spirit set,
And in his heart he reaps a furrow rich,
Wherefrom the foison of good counsel springs.
Against him, send brave heart and hand of might,
For the god-lover is man's fiercest foe.
ETEOCLES
Out on the chance that couples mortal men,
Linking the just and impious in one!
In every issue, the one curse is this--
Companionship with men of evil heart!
A baneful harvest, let none gather it!
The field of sin is rank, and brings forth death
At whiles a righteous man who goes aboard
With reckless mates, a horde of villainy,
Dies by one death with that detested crew;
At whiles the just man, joined with citizens
Ruthless to strangers, recking nought of Heaven,
Trapped, against nature, in one net with them,
Dies by God's thrust and all-including blow.
So will this prophet die, even Oecleus' child,
Sage, just, and brave, and loyal towards Heaven,
Potent in prophecy, but mated here
With men of sin, too boastful to be wise!
Long is their road, and they return no more,
And, at their taking-off, by hand of Zeus,
The prophet too shall take the downward way.
He will not--so I deem--assail the gate--
Not as through cowardice or feeble will,
But as one knowing to what end shall be
Their struggle in the battle, if indeed
Fruit of fulfilment lie in Loxias' word.
He speaketh not, unless to speak avails!
Yet, for more surety, we will post a man,
Strong Lasthenes, as warder of the gate,
Stern to the foeman; he hath age's skill,
Mated with youthful vigour, and an eye
Forward, alert; swift too his hand, to catch
The fenceless interval 'twixt shield and spear!
Yet man's good fortune lies in hand of Heaven.
CHORUS
Unto our loyal cry, ye gods, give ear!
Save, save the city! turn away the spear,
Send on the foemen fear!
Outside the rampart fall they, rent and riven
Beneath the bolt of heaven!
THE SPY
Last, let me name yon seventh antagonist,
Thy brother's self, at the seventh portal set--
Hear with what wrath he imprecates our doom,
Vowing to mount the wall, though banished hence,
And peal aloud the wild exulting cry--
_The town is ta'en_--then clash his sword with thine,
Giving and taking death in close embrace,
Or, if thou 'scapest, flinging upon thee,
As robber of his honour and his home,
The doom of exile such as he has borne.
So clamours he and so invokes the gods
Who guard his race and home, to hear and heed
The curse that sounds in Polynices' name!
He bears a round shield, fresh from forge and fire,
And wrought upon it is a twofold sign--
For lo, a woman leads decorously
The figure of a warrior wrought in gold;
And thus the legend runs--_I Justice am,
And I will bring the hero home again,
To hold once more his place within this town,
Once more to pace his sire's ancestral hall_.
Such are the symbols, by our foemen shown--
Now make thine own decision, whom to send
Against this last opponent! I have said--
Nor canst thou in my tidings find a flaw--
Thine is it, now, to steer the course aright.
ETEOCLES
Ah me, the madman, and the curse of Heaven!
And woe for us, the lamentable line
Of Oedipus, and woe that in this house
Our father's curse must find accomplishment!
But now, a truce to tears and loud lament,
Lest they should breed a still more rueful wail!
As for this Polynices, named too well,
Soon shall we know how his device shall end--
Whether the gold-wrought symbols on his shield,
In their mad vaunting and bewildered pride,
Shall guide him as a victor to his home!
For had but Justice, maiden-child of Zeus,
Stood by his act and thought, it might have been!
Yet never, from the day he reached the light
Out of the darkness of his mother's womb,
Never in childhood, nor in youthful prime,
Nor when his chin was gathering its beard,
Hath Justice hailed or claimed him as her own.
Therefore I deem not that she standeth now
To aid him in this outrage on his home!
Misnamed, in truth, were Justice, utterly,
If to impiety she lent her hand.
Sure in this faith, I will myself go forth
And match me with him; who hath fairer claim?
Ruler, against one fain to snatch the rule,
Brother with brother matched, and foe with foe,
Will I confront the issue. To the wall!
CHORUS
O thou true heart, O child of Oedipus,
Be not, in wrath, too like the man whose name
Murmurs an evil omen! 'Tis enough
That Cadmus' clan should strive with Argos' host,
For blood there is that can atone that stain!
But--brother upon brother dealing death--
Not time itself can expiate the sin!
ETEOCLES
If man find hurt, yet clasp his honour still,
'Tis well; the dead have honour, nought beside.
Hurt, with dishonour, wins no word of praise!
CHORUS
Ah, what is thy desire?
Let not the lust and ravin of the sword
Bear thee adown the tide accursed, abhorred!
Fling off thy passion's rage, thy spirit's prompting dire!
ETEOCLES
Nay--since the god is urgent for our doom,
Let Laius' house, by Phoebus loathed and scorned,
Follow the gale of destiny, and win
Its great inheritance, the gulf of hell!
CHORUS
Ruthless thy craving is--
Craving for kindred and forbidden blood
To be outpoured--a sacrifice imbrued
With sin, a bitter fruit of murderous enmities!
ETEOCLES
Yea, my own father's fateful Curse proclaims--
A ghastly presence, and her eyes are dry--
_Strike! honour is the prize, not life prolonged_!
CHORUS
Ah, be not urged of her! for none shall dare
To call thee _coward_, in thy throned estate!
Will not the Fury in her sable pall
Pass outward from these halls, what time the gods
Welcome a votive offering from our hands?
ETEOCLES
The gods! long since they hold us in contempt,
Scornful of gifts thus offered by the lost!
Why should we fawn and flinch away from doom?
CHORUS
Now, when it stands beside thee! for its power
May, with a changing gust of milder mood,
Temper the blast that bloweth wild and rude
And frenzied, in this hour!
ETEOCLES
Ay, kindled by the curse of Oedipus--
All too prophetic, out of dreamland came
The vision, meting out our sire's estate!
CHORUS
Heed women's voices, though thou love them not!
ETEOCLES
Say aught that may avail, but stint thy words.
CHORUS
Go not thou forth to guard the seventh gate!
ETEOCLES
Words shall not blunt the edge of my resolve.
CHORUS
Yet the god loves to let the weak prevail.
ETEOCLES
That to a swordsman, is no welcome word!
CHORUS
Shall thine own brother's blood be victory's palm?
ETEOCLES
Ill which the gods have sent thou canst not shun!
[_Exit_ ETEOCLES. CHORUS
I shudder in dread of the power,
abhorred by the gods of high heaven,
The ruinous curse of the home
till roof-tree and rafter be riven!
Too true are the visions of ill,
too true the fulfilment they bring
To the curse that was spoken of old
by the frenzy and wrath of the king!
Her will is the doom of the children,
and Discord is kindled amain,
And strange is the Lord of Division,
who cleaveth the birthright in twain,--
The edged thing, born of the north,
the steel that is ruthless and keen,
Dividing in bitter division
the lot of the children of teen!
Not the wide lowland around,
the realm of their sire, shall they have,
Yet enough for the dead to inherit,
the pitiful space of a grave!
Ah, but when kin meets kin, when sire and child,
Unknowing, are defiled
By shedding common blood, and when the pit
Of death devoureth it,
Drinking the clotted stain, the gory dye--
Who, who can purify?
Who cleanse pollution, where the ancient bane
Rises and reeks again?
Whilome in olden days the sin was wrought,
And swift requital brought--
Yea on the children of the child came still
New heritage of ill!
For thrice Apollo spoke this word divine,
From Delphi's central shrine,
To Laius--_Die thou childless_! thus alone
Can the land's weal be won!
But vainly with his wife's desire he strove,
And gave himself to love,
Begetting Oedipus, by whom he died,
The fateful parricide!
The sacred seed-plot, his own mother's womb,
He sowed, his house's doom,
A root of blood! by frenzy lured, they came
Unto their wedded shame.
And now the waxing surge, the wave of fate,
Rolls on them, triply great--
One billow sinks, the next towers, high and dark,
Above our city's bark--
Only the narrow barrier of the wall
Totters, as soon to fall;
And, if our chieftains in the storm go down,
What chance can save the town?
Curses, inherited from long ago,
Bring heavy freight of woe:
Rich stores of merchandise o'erload the deck,
Near, nearer comes the wreck--
And all is lost, cast out upon the wave,
Floating, with none to save!
Whom did the gods, whom did the chief of men,
Whom did each citizen
In crowded concourse, in such honour hold,
As Oedipus of old,
When the grim fiend, that fed on human prey,
He took from us away?
But when, in the fulness of days,
he knew of his bridal unblest,
A twofold horror he wrought,
in the frenzied despair of his breast--
Debarred from the grace of the banquet,
the service of goblets of gold,
He flung on his children a curse
for the splendour they dared to withhold,
A curse prophetic and bitter--
_The glory of wealth and of pride,
With iron, not gold, in your hands,
ye shall come, at the last, to divide_!
Behold, how a shudder runs through me,
lest now, in the fulness of time,
The house-fiend awake and return,
to mete out the measure of crime!
[_Enter_ THE SPY.
THE SPY
Take heart, ye daughters whom your mothers' milk
Made milky-hearted! lo, our city stands,
Saved from the yoke of servitude: the vaunts
Of overweening men are silent now,
And the State sails beneath a sky serene,
Nor in the manifold and battering waves
Hath shipped a single surge, and solid stands
The rampart, and the gates are made secure,
Each with a single champion's trusty guard.
So in the main and at six gates we hold
A victory assured; but, at the seventh,
The god that on the seventh day was born,
Royal Apollo, hath ta'en up his rest
To wreak upon the sons of Oedipus
Their grandsire's wilfulness of long ago.
CHORUS
What further woefulness besets our home?
THE SPY
The home stands safe--but ah, the princes twain--
CHORUS
Who? what of them? I am distraught with fear.
THE SPY
Hear now, and mark! the sons of Oedipus--
CHORUS
Ah, my prophetic soul! I feel their doom.
THE SPY
Have done with questions! --with their lives crushed out--
CHORUS
Lie they out yonder? the full horror speak!
Did hands meet hands more close than brotherly?
Came fate on each, and in the selfsame hour?
THE SPY
Yea, blotting out the lineage ill-starred!
Now mix your exultation and your tears,
Over a city saved, the while its lords,
Twin leaders of the fight, have parcelled out
With forged arbitrament of Scythian steel
The full division of their fatherland,
And, as their father's imprecation bade,
Shall have their due of land, a twofold grave.
So is the city saved; the earth has drunk
Blood of twin princes, by each other slain.
CHORUS
O mighty Zeus and guardian powers,
The strength and stay of Cadmus' towers!
Shall I send forth a joyous cry,
_Hail to the lord of weal renewed_?
Or weep the misbegotten twain,
Born to a fatal destiny?
Each numbered now among the slain,
Each dying in ill fortitude,
Each _truly named_, each _child of feud_?
O dark and all-prevailing ill,
That broods o'er Oedipus and all his line,
Numbing my heart with mortal chill!
Ah me, this song of mine,
Which, Thyad-like, I woke, now falleth still,
Or only tells of doom,
And echoes round a tomb!
Dead are they, dead! in their own blood they lie--
Ill-omened the concent that hails our victory!
The curse a father on his children spake
Hath faltered not, nor failed!
Nought, Laius! thy stubborn choice availed--
First to beget, then, in the after day
And for the city's sake,
The child to slay!
For nought can blunt nor mar
The speech oracular!
Children of teen! by disbelief ye erred--
Yet in wild weeping came fulfilment of the word!
[ANTIGONE _and_ ISMENE _approach,
with a train of mourners, bearing the
bodies of_ ETEOCLES _and_ POLYNICES.
Look up, look forth! the doom is plain,
Nor spake the messenger in vain!
A twofold sorrow, twofold strife--
Each brave against a brother's life!
In double doom hath sorrow come--
How shall I speak it? --on the home!
Alas, my sisters! be your sighs the gale,
The smiting of your brows the plash of oars,
Wafting the boat, to Acheron's dim shores
That passeth ever, with its darkened sail,
On its uncharted voyage and sunless way,
Far from thy beams, Apollo, god of day--
The melancholy bark
Bound for the common bourn, the harbour of the dark!
Look up, look yonder! from the home
Antigone, Ismene come,
On the last, saddest errand bound,
To chant a dirge of doleful sound,
With agony of equal pain
Above their brethren slain!
Their sister-bosoms surely swell,
Heart with rent heart according well
In grief for those who fought and fell!
Yet--ere they utter forth their woe--
We must awake the rueful strain
To vengeful powers, in realms below,
And mourn hell's triumph o'er the slain!
Alas! of all, the breast who bind,--
Yea, all the race of womankind--
O maidens, ye are most bereaved!
For you, for you the tear-drops start--
Deem that in truth, and undeceived,
Ye hear the sorrows of my heart!
(_To the dead_. )
Children of bitterness, and sternly brave--
One, proud of heart against persuasion's voice,
One, against exile proof! ye win your choice--
Each in your fatherland, a separate grave!
Alack, on house and heritage
They brought a baneful doom, and death for wage!
One strove through tottering walls to force his way,
One claimed, in bitter arrogance, the sway,
And both alike, even now and here,
Have closed their suit, with steel for arbiter!
And lo, the Fury-fiend of Oedipus, their sire,
Hath brought his curse to consummation dire!
Each in the left side smitten, see them laid--
The children of one womb,
Slain by a mutual doom!
Alas, their fate! the combat murderous,
The horror of the house,
The curse of ancient bloodshed, now repaid!
Yea, deep and to the heart the deathblow fell,
Edged by their feud ineffable--
By the grim curse, their sire did imprecate--
Discord and deadly hate!
Hark, how the city and its towers make moan--
How the land mourns that held them for its own!
Fierce greed and fell division did they blend,
Till death made end!
They strove to part the heritage in twain,
Giving to each a gain--
Yet that which struck the balance in the strife,
The arbitrating sword,
By those who loved the twain is held abhorred--
Loathed is the god of death, who sundered each from life!
Here, by the stroke of steel, behold! they lie--
And rightly may we cry
_Beside their fathers, let them here be laid--
Iron gave their doom, with iron their graves be made--
Alack, the slaying sword, alack, th' entombing spade_!
Alas, a piercing shriek, a rending groan,
A cry unfeigned of sorrow felt at heart!
With shuddering of grief, with tears that start,
With wailful escort, let them hither come--
For one or other make divided moan!
No light lament of pity mixed with gladness,
But with true tears, poured from the soul of sadness,
Over the princes dead and their bereaved home
Say we, above these brethren dead,
_On citizen, on foreign foe,
Brave was their rush, and stern their blow--
Now, lowly are they laid_!
Beyond all women upon earth
Woe, woe for her who gave them birth!
Unknowingly, her son she wed--
The children of that marriage-bed,
Each in the self-same womb, were bred--
Each by a brother's hand lies dead!
Yea, from one seed they sprang, and by one fate
Their heritage is desolate,
The heart's division sundered claim from claim,
And, from their feud, death came!
Now is their hate allayed,
Now is their life-stream shed,
Ensanguining the earth with crimson dye--
Lo, from one blood they sprang, and in one blood they lie!
A grievous arbiter was given the twain--
The stranger from the northern main,
The sharp, dividing sword,
Fresh from the forge and fire
The War-god treacherous gave ill award
And brought their father's curse to a fulfilment dire!
They have their portion--each his lot and doom,
Given from the gods on high!
Yea, the piled wealth of fatherland, for tomb,
Shall underneath them lie!
Alas, alas! with flowers of fame and pride
Your home ye glorified;
But, in the end, the Furies gathered round
With chants of boding sound,
Shrieking, _In wild defeat and disarray,
Behold, ye pass away_!
The sign of Ruin standeth at the gate,
There, where they strove with Fate--
And the ill power beheld the brothers' fall,
And triumphed over all!
ANTIGONE, ISMENE, _and_ CHORUS
(_Processional Chant_)
Thou wert smitten, in smiting,
Thou didst slay, and wert slain--
By the spear of each other
Ye lie on the plain,
And ruthless the deed that ye wrought was,
and ruthless the death of the twain!
Take voice, O my sorrow!
Flow tear upon tear--
Lay the slain by the slayer,
Made one on the bier!
Our soul in distraction is lost,
and we mourn o'er the prey of the spear!
Ah, woe for your ending,
Unbrotherly wrought!
And woe for the issue,
The fray that ye fought,
The doom of a mutual slaughter
whereby to the grave ye are brought!
Ah, twofold the sorrow--
The heard and the seen!
And double the tide
Of our tears and our teen,
As we stand by our brothers in death
and wail for the love that has been!
O grievous the fate
That attends upon wrong!
Stern ghost of our sire,
Thy vengeance is long!
Dark Fury of hell and of death, the hands of thy
kingdom are strong!
O dark were the sorrows
That exile hath known!
He slew, but returned not
Alive to his own!
He struck down a brother, but fell, in the moment of
triumph hewn down!
O lineage accurst,
O doom and despair!
Alas, for their quarrel,
The brothers that were!
And woe! for their pitiful end, who once were our
love and our care!
O grievous the fate
That attends upon wrong!
Stern ghost of our sire,
Thy vengeance is long!
Dark Fury of hell and of death, the hands of thy
kingdom are strong!
By proof have ye learnt it!
At once and as one,
O brothers beloved,
To death ye were done!
Ye came to the strife of the sword, and behold! ye
are both overthrown!
O grievous the tale is,
And grievous their fall,
To the house, to the land,
And to me above all!
Ah God! for the curse that hath come, the sin and
the ruin withal!
O children distraught,
Who in madness have died!
Shall ye rest with old kings
In the place of their pride?
Alas for the wrath of your sire if he findeth you laid
by his side!
[_Enter a_ HERALD.
HERALD
I bear command to tell to one and all
What hath approved itself and now is law,
Ruled by the counsellors of Cadmus' town.
For this Eteocles, it is resolved
To lay him on his earth-bed, in this soil,
Not without care and kindly sepulture.
For why? he hated those who hated us,
And, with all duties blamelessly performed
Unto the sacred ritual of his sires,
He met such end as gains our city's grace,--
With auspices that do ennoble death.
Such words I have in charge to speak of him:
But of his brother Polynices, this--
Be he cast out unburied, for the dogs
To rend and tear: for he presumed to waste
The land of the Cadmeans, had not Heaven--
Some god of those who aid our fatherland--
Opposed his onset, by his brother's spear,
To whom, tho' dead, shall consecration come!
Against him stood this wretch, and brought a horde
Of foreign foemen, to beset our town.
He therefore shall receive his recompense,
Buried ignobly in the maw of kites--
No women-wailers to escort his corpse
Nor pile his tomb nor shrill his dirge anew--
Unhouselled, unattended, cast away!
So, for these brothers, doth our State ordain.
ANTIGONE
And I--to those who make such claims of rule
In Cadmus' town--I, though no other help,
(_Pointing to the body of_ POLYNICES)
I, I will bury this my brother's corse
And risk your wrath and what may come of it!
It shames me not to face the State, and set
Will against power, rebellion resolute:
Deep in my heart is set my sisterhood,
My common birthright with my brothers, born
All of one womb, her children who, for woe,
Brought forth sad offspring to a sire ill-starred.
Therefore, my soul! take thou thy willing share,
In aid of him who now can will no more,
Against this outrage: be a sister true,
While yet thou livest, to a brother dead!
Him never shall the wolves with ravening maw
Rend and devour: I do forbid the thought!
I for him, I--albeit a woman weak--
In place of burial-pit, will give him rest
By this protecting handful of light dust
Which, in the lap of this poor linen robe,
I bear to hallow and bestrew his corpse
With the due covering. Let none gainsay!
Courage and craft shall arm me, this to do.
HERALD
I charge thee, not to flout the city's law!
ANTIGONE
I charge thee, use no useless heralding!
HERALD
Stern is a people newly 'scaped from death.
ANTIGONE
Whet thou their sternness! Burial he shall have.
HERALD
How? Grace of burial, to the city's foe?
ANTIGONE
God hath not judged him separate in guilt.
HERALD
True--till he put this land in jeopardy.
ANTIGONE
His rights usurped, he answered wrong with wrong.
HERALD
Nay--but for one man's sin he smote the State.
ANTIGONE
Contention doth out-talk all other gods!
Prate thou no more--I will to bury him.
HERALD
Will, an thou wilt! but I forbid the deed.
[_Exit_ the HERALD.
CHORUS
Exulting Fates, who waste the line
And whelm the house of Oedipus!
Fiends, who have slain, in wrath condign,
The father and the children thus!
What now befits it that I do,
What meditate, what undergo?
Can I the funeral rite refrain,
Nor weep for Polynices slain?
But yet, with fear I shrink and thrill,
Presageful of the city's will!
Thou, O Eteocles, shalt have
Full rites, and mourners at thy grave,
But he, thy brother slain, shall he,
With none to weep or cry _Alas_,
To unbefriended burial pass?
Only one sister o'er his bier,
To raise the cry and pour the tear--
Who can obey such stern decree?
SEMI-CHORUS
Let those who hold our city's sway
Wreak, or forbear to wreak, their will
On those who cry, _Ah, well-a-day_!
Lamenting Polynices still!
We will go forth and, side by side
With her, due burial will provide!
Royal he was; to him be paid
Our grief, wherever he be laid!
The crowd may sway, and change, and still
Take its caprice for Justice' will!
But we this dead Eteocles,
As Justice wills and Right decrees,
Will bear unto his grave!
For--under those enthroned on high
And Zeus' eternal royalty--
He unto us salvation gave!
He saved us from a foreign yoke,--
A wild assault of outland folk,
A savage, alien wave!
[_Exeunt_.
PROMETHEUS BOUND
ARGUMENT
In the beginning, Ouranos and Gaia held sway over Heaven and Earth.
And manifold children were born unto them, of whom were Cronos, and
Okeanos, and the Titans, and the Giants. But Cronos cast down his
father Ouranos, and ruled in his stead, until Zeus his son cast him
down in his turn, and became King of Gods and men. Then were the
Titans divided, for some had good will unto Cronos, and others unto
Zeus; until Prometheus, son of the Titan lapetos, by wise counsel,
gave the victory to Zeus. But Zeus held the race of mortal men in
scorn, and was fain to destroy them from the face of the earth; yet
Prometheus loved them, and gave secretly to them the gift of fire,
and arts whereby they could prosper upon the earth. Then was Zeus
sorely angered with Prometheus, and bound him upon a mountain, and
afterward overwhelmed him in an earthquake, and devised other
torments against him for many ages; yet could he not slay Prometheus,
for he was a God.
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
STRENGTH AND FORCE.
HEPHAESTUS.
PROMETHEUS.
CHORUS OF SEA-NYMPHS,
DAUGHTERS OF OCEANUS.
OCEANUS.
IO.
HERMES.
_Scene--A rocky ravine in the mountains of Scythia_.
STRENGTH
Lo, the earth's bound and limitary land,
The Scythian steppe, the waste untrod of men!
Look to it now, Hephaestus--thine it is,
Thy Sire obeying, this arch-thief to clench
Against the steep-down precipice of rock,
With stubborn links of adamantine chain.
Look thou: thy flower, the gleaming plastic fire,
He stole and lent to mortal man--a sin
That gods immortal make him rue to-day,
Lessoned hereby to own th' omnipotence
Of Zeus, and to repent his love to man!
HEPHAESTUS
O Strength and Force, for you the best of Zeus
Stands all achieved, and nothing bars your will:
But I--I dare not bind to storm-vext cleft
One of our race, immortal as are we.
Yet, none the less, necessity constrains,
For Zeus, defied, is heavy in revenge!
(_To PROMETHEUS_)
O deep-devising child of Themis sage,
Small will have I to do, or thou to bear,
What yet we must. Beyond the haunt of man
Unto this rock, with fetters grimly forged,
I must transfix and shackle up thy limbs,
Where thou shalt mark no voice nor human form,
But, parching in the glow and glare of sun,
Thy body's flower shall suffer a sky-change;
And gladly wilt thou hail the hour when Night
Shall in her starry robe invest the day,
Or when the Sun shall melt the morning rime.
But, day or night, for ever shall the load
Of wasting agony, that may not pass,
Wear thee away; for know, the womb of Time
Hath not conceived a power to set thee free.
Such meed thou hast, for love toward mankind
For thou, a god defying wrath of gods,
Beyond the ordinance didst champion men,
And for reward shalt keep a sleepless watch,
Stiff-kneed, erect, nailed to this dismal rock,
With manifold laments and useless cries
Against the will inexorable of Zeus.
Hard is the heart of fresh-usurped power!
STRENGTH
Enough of useless ruth! why tarriest thou?
Why pitiest one whom all gods wholly hate,
One who to man gave o'er thy privilege?
HEPHAESTUS
Kinship and friendship wring my heart for him.
STRENGTH
Ay--but how disregard our Sire's command?
Is not thy pity weaker than thy fear?
HEPHAESTUS
Ruthless as ever, brutal to the full!
STRENGTH
Tears can avail him nothing: strive not thou,
Nor waste thine efforts thus unaidingly.
HEPHAESTUS
Out on my cursed mastery of steel!
STRENGTH
Why curse it thus? In sooth that craft of thine
Standeth assoiled of all that here is wrought.
HEPHAESTUS
Would that some other were endowed therewith!
STRENGTH
All hath its burden, save the rule of Heaven,
And freedom is for Zeus, and Zeus alone.
HEPHAESTUS
I know it; I gainsay no word hereof.
STRENGTH
Up, then, and hasten to do on his bonds,
Lest Zeus behold thee indolent of will!
HEPHAESTUS
Ah well--behold the armlets ready now!
STRENGTH
Then cast them round his arms and with sheer strength
Swing down the hammer, clinch him to the crags.
HEPHAESTUS
Lo, 'tis toward--no weakness in the work!
STRENGTH
Smite harder, wedge it home--no faltering here!
He hath a craft can pass th' impassable!
HEPHAESTUS
This arm is fast, inextricably bound.
STRENGTH
Then shackle safe the other, that he know
His utmost craft is weaker far than Zeus.
HEPHAESTUS
He, but none other, can accuse mine art!
STRENGTH
Now, strong and sheer, drive thro' from breast to back
The adamantine wedge's stubborn fang.
HEPHAESTUS
Alas, Prometheus! I lament thy pain.
STRENGTH
Thou, faltering and weeping sore for those
Whom Zeus abhors! 'ware, lest thou rue thy tears!
HEPHAESTUS
Thou gazest on a scene that poisons sight.
STRENGTH
I gaze on one who suffers his desert.
Now between rib and shoulder shackle him--
HEPHAESTUS
Do it I must--hush thy superfluous charge!
STRENGTH
Urge thee I will--ay, hound thee to the prey.
Step downward now, enring his legs amain!
HEPHAESTUS
Lo, it is done--'twas but a moment's toil.
STRENGTH
Now, strongly strike, drive in the piercing gyves--
Stern is the power that oversees thy task!
HEPHAESTUS
Brutish thy form, thy speech brutality!
STRENGTH
Be gentle, an thou wilt, but blame not me
For this my stubbornness and anger fell!
HEPHAESTUS
Let us go hence; his legs are firmly chained.
STRENGTH (_To_ PROMETHEUS)
Aha! there play the insolent, and steal,
For creatures of a day, the rights of gods!
O deep delusion of the powers that named thee
Prometheus, the Fore-thinker! thou hast need
Of others' forethought and device, whereby
Thou may'st elude this handicraft of ours!
[_Exeunt_ HEPHAESTUS, STRENGTH,
_and_ FORCE. --_A pause_.
PROMETHEUS
O Sky divine, O Winds of pinions swift,
O fountain-heads of Rivers, and O thou,
Illimitable laughter of the Sea!
O Earth, the Mighty Mother, and thou Sun,
Whose orbed light surveyeth all--attest,
What ills I suffer from the gods, a god!
Behold me, who must here sustain
The marring agonies of pain,
Wrestling with torture, doomed to bear
Eternal ages, year on year!
Such and so shameful is the chain
Which Heaven's new tyrant doth ordain
To bind me helpless here.
Woe! for the ruthless present doom!
Woe! for the Future's teeming womb!
On what far dawn, in what dim skies,
Shall star of my deliverance rise?
Truce to this utterance! to its dimmest verge
I do foreknow the future, hour by hour,
Nor can whatever pang may smite me now
Smite with surprise. The destiny ordained
I must endure to the best, for well I wot
That none may challenge with Necessity.
Yet is it past my patience, to reveal,
Or to conceal, these issues of my doom.
Since I to mortals brought prerogatives,
Unto this durance dismal am I bound:
Yea, I am he who in a fennel-stalk,
By stealthy sleight, purveyed the fount of fire,
The teacher, proven thus, and arch-resource
Of every art that aideth mortal men.
Such was my sin: I earn its recompense,
Rock-riveted, and chained in height and cold.
[_A pause_.
