THE DEATH OF CLYTEMNESTRA.

ORESTES and ELECTRA.

Electra. Pass on, my brother! she awaits the wretch, Dishonorer, despoiler, murderer.

None other name shall name him. . . she awaits
As would a lover.

Heavenly Gods. . . what poison

O'erflows my lips! . . .

Strike her, the tigress!

Give the sword scope

Adultress! husband-slayer.

How fond of her! how kind to all about,

That he might gladden and teach us . . how proud

Of thee, Orestes tossing thee above

His joyous head and calling thee his crown.

Ah! boys remember not what melts our hearts
And marks them evermore!

Bite not thy lip,
Nor tramp as an unsteady colt the ground,
Nor stare against the wall, but think again
How better than all fathers was our father.
Go..

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Orestes.

Loose me then! for this white hand Electra

Hath fastened upon mine with fiercer grasp
Than mine can grasp the sword.

Electra.

Go, sweet Orestes!

I knew not I was holding thee. . . Avenge him! (Alone.) How he sprang from me!

Sure, he now has reacht

The room before the bath.

The bath door creaks!

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. It hath creakt thus since he . . since thou, O father!

Ever since thou didst loosen its strong valves

Either with all thy dying weight or strength

What groans are those?

Orestes. (Returning.) They sound through hell, Rejoicing the Eumenides.*

:

She slew

Our father she made thee the scorn of slaves;
Me (son of him who ruled this land and more)
She made an outcast.

Would I had been so

O that Zeus

For ever! ere such vengeance.

Electra.

Had let thy arm fall sooner at thy side

Without those drops! list! they are audible,

For they are many . . from the sword's point falling
And down from the mid blade!

Too rash Orestes!

Couldst thou not then have spared our wretched mother?
Orestes. The Gods could not.
Electra.

Orestes. And didst not thou.
Electra.

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She was not theirs, Orestes.

'Twas I, 'twas I, who did it;

Of our unhappiest house the most unhappy!
Under this roof, by every God accursed,

There is no grief, there is no guilt, but mine.
Orestes. Electra! no!

'Tis now my time to suffer. Mine be, with all its pangs, the righteous deed.

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* An ancient scholiast has recorded that the name of Eumenides was given to these Goddesses after the expiation of Orestes. But Catullus (called the learned by his countrymen) represents Ariadne invoking them by this appellation long before the Trojan war. verses are the most majestic in the Roman language.

Eumenides! quarum anguineis redimita capillis
Frons expirantes praeportat pectoris iras,
Huc, huc adventate! &c.

The

THE MADNESS OF ORESTES.

ORESTES and ELECTRA.

Orestes. Heavy and murderous dreams, O my Electra, Have dragged me from myself.

Are we

Is this Mycenai?

are all who should be in our house?

Living? unhurt? our father here? our mother?

Why that deep gasp? for 'twas not sigh nor groan.

She then . . 'twas she who fell! when? How? Beware!
No, no, speak out at once, that my full heart

May meet it, and may share with thee in all
In all . . . but that one thing.

Electra. rolls

It was a dream.

They live? both live?

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The Gods have placed them from us, and there

Between us that dark river

Orestes.

Blood! blood! blood!

I see it roll; I see the hand above it,

Imploring; I see her.

Hiss me not back,

Ye snake-hair'd maids! I will look on; I will
Hear the words gurgle thro' that cursed stream,

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And catch that hand. . that hand . . . which slew my

father!

slay my father!

It can not be
how could it slay my father?
Death to the slave who spoke it!
It tost me up to him to earn a smile,
And was a smile then such a precious boon,
And royal state and proud affection nothing?
Ay, and thee too, Electra, she once taught
To take the sceptre from him at the door. . .
Not the bath-door, not the bath-door, mind that!,
And place it in the vestibule, against

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The spear of Pallas, where it used to stand.
Where is it now? methinks I missed it there.
How we have trembled to be seen to move it!
Both looking up, lest that stern face should frown
Which always gazed on Zeus right opposite.
O! could but one tear more fall from my eyes,
It would shake off these horrid visages,

And melt them into air.

I am not yours,

Fell Goddesses! A just and generous power,
A bright-hair'd God directed me.

Abased is he whom such a God inspired!

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And thus

[After a pause.

Into whose kingdom went they? did they go
Together?

Electra. Oh! they were not long apart.

Orestes. I know why thou art pale; I know whose head

Thy flower-like hands have garlanded; 1 know

For whom thou hast unbraided all thy love.
He well deserves it . . He shall have it all.

Glory and love shall crown thee, my brave sister!
Electra. I am not she of Sparta. Let me live
(If live I must, Orestes!) not unnamed
Nor named too often. speak no more of love,
Ill-omened and opprobrious in this house
A mother should have had, a father had it,
O may a brother let it dwell with him,
Unchangeable, unquestioned, solitary,
Strengthened and hallowed in the depths of grief!
Gaze not so angrily . . I dare not see thee,

I dare not look where comfort should be found.
Orestes. I dare and do behold them all day long,
And, were that face away so like my mother's,
I would advance and question and
They hear me and they know it.
Electra.

compel them

Hear me too,

Ye mighty ones! To me invisible !
And spare him! spare him for without the Gods

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He wrought not what he wrought: And are not ye
Partakers of their counsels and their power?

0 spare the son of him whom ye and they
Sent against Ilion, to perform your will
And bid the rulers of the earth be just.

Orestes. And dare they frighten thee too? frighten thee? And bend thee into prayer?

Off, hateful eyes!

Electra.

I am strong,

Stronger than ever

steel, fire, adamant

But cannot bear thy brow upon my neck.

Can not bear these wild writhings, these loud sobs.
By all the Gods! I think thou art half mad.

I must away

follow me not stand there!

THE PRAYER OF ORESTES.

Orestes. O King Apollo! God Apollo! god Powerful to smite and powerful to preserve! If there is blood upon me, as there seems, Purify that black stain (thou only canst) With every rill that bubbles from these caves Audibly; and come willing to the work. No; 'tis not they; 'tis blood; 'tis blood again That bubbles in my ear, that shakes the shades Of thy dark groves, and lets in hateful gleams, Bringing me What dread sight! What sound abhorr❜d! What screams! They are my mother's: 'Tis her That through the snakes of those three furies glares, And makes them hold their peace that she may speak. Has thy voice bidden them all forth? they slink, Some that would hide away, but must turn back, And others like blue lightnings bound along From rock to rock; and many hiss at me As they draw nearer,

Earth, fire, water, all

eye

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