In this blood-delug’d palace, in whose halls
Either a vengeful Fury I should stalk,
Or else not live at all!—but here I haunt,
A pale, unmeaning ghost, powerless to fright
Or harm, and nurse my longing for my son,
A helpless one, I know it:—but the Gods
Have temper’d me e’en thus; and, in some souls,
Misery, which rouses others, breaks the spring.
And even now, my son, ah me! my son,
Fain would I fade away, as I have liv’d,
Without a cry, a struggle, or a blow,
All vengeance unattempted, and descend
To the invisible plains, to roam with thee,
Fit denizen, the lampless under-world—
But with what eyes should I encounter there
My husband, wandering with his stern compeers,
Amphiaraos, or Mycenae’s king,
Who led the Greeks to Ilium, Agamemnon,
Betray’d like him, but, not like him, aveng’d?
Or with what voice shall I the questions meet
Of my two elder sons, slain long ago,
Who sadly ask me, what, if not revenge,
Kept me, their mother, from their side so long?
Or how reply to thee, my child last-born,
Last-murder’d, who reproachfully wilt say—
Mother, I well believ’d thou lived’st on
In the detested palace of thy foe,
With patience on thy face, death in thy heart,
Counting, till I grew up, the laggard years,
That our joint hands might then together pay
To our unhappy house the debt we owe.
My death makes my debt void, and doubles thine—
But down thou fleest here, and leav’st our scourge
Triumphant, and condemnest all our race
To lie in gloom, for ever unappeas’d.
What shall I have to answer to such words?—
No, something must be dar’d; and, great as erst
Our dastard patience, be our daring now!
Come, ye swift Furies, who to him ye haunt
Permit no peace till your behests are done;
Come Hermes, who dost watch the unjustly kill’d,
And can’st teach simple ones to plot and feign;
Come, lightning Passion, that with foot of fire
Advancest to the middle of a deed
Almost before ’tis plann’d; come, glowing Hate;
Come, baneful Mischief, from thy murky den
Under the dripping black Tartarean cliff
Which Styx’s awful waters trickle down—
Inspire this coward heart, this flagging arm!
How say ye, maidens, do ye know these prayers?
Are these words Merope’s—is this voice mine?
Old man, old man, thou had’st my boy in charge,
And he is lost, and thou hast that to atone.
Fly, find me on the instant where confer
The murderer and his impious setter-on:
And ye, keep faithful silence, friends, and mark
What one weak woman can achieve alone.
I go! I go!—yet, Queen, take this one word:
Attempting deeds beyond thy power to do,
Thou nothing profitest thy friends, but mak’st
Our misery more, and thine own ruin sure. Arcas goes out.
Strophe 1
I have heard, O Queen, how a prince,
Agamemnon’s son, in Mycenae,
Orestes, died but in name,
Lived for the death of his foes.
Alas,
Thou destroyest me!
Whispering hope of a life
Which no stranger unknown,
But the faithful servant and nurse,
Whose tears warrant his truth,
Bears sad witness is lost.
Antistrophe 1
Wheresoe’er men are, there is grief.
In a thousand countries, a thousand
Homes, e’en now is there wail;
Mothers lamenting their sons.
This,
Who lives, witnesses.
But, is it only a fate
Sure, all-common, to lose
In a land of friends, by a friend,
One last, murder-sav’d child?
Strophe 2
Ah me!
Thou confessest the prize
In the rushing, thundering, mad,
Cloud-envelop’d, obscure,
Unapplauded, unsung
Race of calamity, mine?
None can truly claim that
Mournful preeminence, not
Thou.
Not, above all, in the doubts,
Double and clashing, that hang—
Antistrophe 2
What then?
Seems it lighter, my loss,
If, perhaps, unpierc’d by the sword,
My child lies in his jagg’d
Sunless prison of rock,
On the black wave borne to and fro?
Worse, far worse, if his friend,
If the Arcadian within,
If—
With a start.
How say’st thou? within? …
He in the guest-chamber now,
Faithlessly murder’d his friend.
Ye, too, ye, too, join to betray, then
Your Queen!
Ye knew,
O false friends! into what
Haven the murderer had dropp’d?
Ye kept silence?
In fear,
O lov’d mistress! in fear,
Dreading thine over-wrought mood,
What I knew, I conceal’d.
Unhappy one, what deed
Purposes thy despair?
I promise; but I fear.
From the altar, the unavenged tomb,
Fetch me the sacrifice-axe!—
O Husband, O cloth’d
With the grave’s everlasting,
All-covering darkness! O King,
Well-mourn’d, but ill-aveng’d!
Approv’st thou thy wife now?—
The axe!—who brings it?
’Tis here!
But thy gesture, thy look,
Appals me, shakes me with awe.
Alas! alas!—
Behold the fastenings withdrawn
Of the guest-chamber door!—
Ah! I beseech thee—with tears—
He sleeps—sleeps calm. O ye all-seeing Gods!
Thus peacefully do ye let sinners sleep,
While troubled innocents toss, and lie awake?
What sweeter sleep than this could I desire
For thee, my child, if thou wert yet alive?
How often have I dream’d of thee like this,
With thy soil’d hunting-coat, and sandals torn,
Asleep in the Arcadian glens at noon,
Thy head droop’d softly, and the golden curls
Clustering o’er thy white forehead, like a girl’s;
The short proud lip showing thy race, thy cheeks
Brown’d with thine open-air, free, hunter’s life.
Ah me! …
And where dost thou sleep now, my innocent boy?—
In some dark fir-tree’s shadow, amid rocks
Untrodden, on Cyllene’s desolate side;
Where travellers never pass, where only come
Wild beasts, and vultures sailing overhead.
There, there thou liest now, my hapless child!
Stretch’d among briers and stones, the slow, black gore
Oozing through thy soak’d hunting-shirt, with limbs
Yet stark from the death-struggle, tight-clench’d hands,
And eyeballs staring for revenge in vain.
Ah miserable! …
And thou, thou fair-skinn’d Serpent! thou art laid
In a rich chamber, on a happy bed,
In a king’s house, thy victim’s heritage;
And drink’st untroubled slumber, to sleep off
The toils of thy foul service, till thou wake
Refresh’d, and
