Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

ORC.

He to the house of Pluto will conduct her:
Observant of the stated time he comes,
True to the day, when she perforce must die.

ORCUS, APOLLO.

Why art thou here? Why dost thou make this house
Thy haunt, Apollo? Thou dost wrong, again
Th' infernal realms defrauding of their honours,
Torn from them, or delay'd. Sufficed it not

T' have snatch'd Admetus from his doom, the Fates
With fraudful arts deluding? Now again

Arm'd with thy bow why dost thou guard his wife,
Daughter of Pelias, bound by solemn vow,

Saving her husband's life, to die for him?

APOL. Fear not; thy right I reverence and just claim.
ORC. What means thy bow, if thou revere the right?
APOL. It ever is my wont to bear these arms.

ORC.

Aye, and unjustly to defend this house. APOL. I mourn th' afflictions of the man I love.

ORC.

Wou'dst thou defraud me of this second dead?
APOL. The first by violence I took not from thee.
ORC. How on the earth then walks he now alive?
APOL. Ransom'd by her, for whom thou now art come.
ORC. And I will lead her to the realms below.

APOL. Take her: I know not if I might persuade thee.
ORC. Him, whom I ought, to seize; for that prepared.
APOL. No: but t'involve in death ripe, ling'ring age.
ORC. Full well I understand thy speech and zeal.
APOL. May then Alcestis to that age be spared?
ORC. No: honour, be assured, delights e'en me.
APOL. Thou canst but take a single life, no more,
Greater my glory when the youthful die,
APOL. More sumptuous obsequies await her age.
ORC. This were a law in favour of the rich.
APOL. What secret meaning hath thy wisdom here?

ORC.

59. It was customary to bury persons, who died advanced in years, pomp and magnificence than those who died young, Barnes.

with greater

ORC. They with their wealth would purchase to die old.
APOL. Wilt thou not then indulge me with this grace?
ORC. Not I indeed: go to: thou know'st my manners.
APOL. Hostile to mortals, hateful to the gods.

ORC.

Thou canst not have all that thou shou'dst not have. A POL. Yet, ruthless as thou art, soon wilt thou cease This contest; such a man to Pheres' house Comes, to the frozen continent of Thrace Sent by Eurystheus for the savage steeds Yoked to the tyrant's car. He, in this house A welcome guest t' Admetus, will by force Take his wife from thee; and no thanks from me Will be thy due; yet what I now entreat Then thou wilt yield, and I shall hate thee still. Say what thou wilt, nothing the more for that Shalt thou from me obtain: this woman goes, Be sure of that, to Pluto's dark domain. I go, and with this sword assert my claim, For sacred to th' infernal gods that head, Whose hair is hallow'd by this charmed blade.

ORC.

CHORUS.

1st SEM. Before this royal mansion all is still :

What may this melancholy silence mean?
2d SEM. And not a friend is nigh, from whom to learn
Whether we ought to wail the queen now dead,
Or lives she yet, yet sees the light of heav'n,
For conjugal affection justly deem'd

By me, by all, the noblest of her sex.

1st SEM. Hear you a cry, hear you a clash of hands

81. The learned Ruæus, in his note on Eneid iv. 698, gives the best account we have of this opinion of the ancients, that the hair of the dying person was sacred to Proserpine; and that a lock of it must be cut off as an offering to the infernal queen before the soul could be released from the body; that probably it was derived from the sacrifices, in which it was usual to cut some hairs from the forehead of the victim, and to throw them into the flames. See Eneid vi. 245. So the dying person was considered as a victim to the infernal powers.

89, &c. The usual indications of mourning at the house upon the decease of a person are here enumerated; the beating of hands and lamentation of the family

Within, or lamentations for the dead?

2d SEM. Not e'en a servant holds his station here

Before the gates. O, 'midst this awful gloom Appear, bright Pæan, and dispel the storm! 1st SEM. If she were dead, they would not be thus silent; Nor could the body vanish from the house. Whence is thy confidence? My fears o'ercome me. A wife so honour'd would Admetus bear Without due pomp in silence to her tomb? 2d SEM. Nor vase of fountain water do I see

2d SEM. 1st SEM.

Before the doors, as custom claims, to bathe The corse; and none hath on the portal placed His locks, in solemn mourning for the dead Usually shorn; nor does the younger train Of females raise their sorrowing voices high. 1st SEM. Yet this the fatal day, when she must leave The light of heav'n.

2d SEM.

Why dost thou mention this? O, thou hast touch'd my heart, hast touch'd my soul. 1st SEM. When on the good afflictions fall, to grieve Becomes the man that hath been priz'd as honest. In vain, our pious vows are vain : Make we the flying sail our care, The light bark bounding o'er the main, To what new realm shall we repair? To Lycia's hallow'd strand?

STRO.

Or where in solitary state,

'Midst thirsty deserts wild and wide
That close him round on ev'ry side,
Prophetic Ammon holds his awful seat?
What charm, what potent hand

Shall save her from the realms beneath?
He comes, the ruthless tyrant Death:

within, the laver of ablution in the vestibule, the locks hung up there, and the mournful music of the younger women, the præficæ, at the doors. For the custom of cutting off the hair on these occasions, see the first note on the Choephora of Eschylus.

ANTIS.

I have no priest, no altar more,
Whose aid I may implore.

O that the son of Phoebus now

Lived to behold th' ethereal light!
Then might she leave the seats below,
Where Pluto reigns in cheerless night :
The Sage's potent art,

'Till thund'ring Jove's avenging pow'r
Hurl'd his red thunders at his breast,
Could from the yawning gulf releast
To the sweet light of life the dead restore.
Who now shall aid impart?

To ev'ry god at ev'ry shrine

The king hath paid the rites divine:
But vain his vows, his pious care;
And ours is dark despair.

CHORUS, FEMALE ATTENDANT.

CHOR. But of the female train one from the house
Comes bath'd in tears: what tidings shall I hear?
To weep, if aught of ill befals thy lords,
Becomes thee: I would know if yet she lives,
Or sinks beneath the ruthless pow'r of death.
ATT. As living I may speak of her, and dead.
CHOR. Living and dead at once, how may that be?
ATT. E'en now she sinks in death, and breathes her last.

CHOR. Unhappy king, of what a wife bereft !

ATT. Nor knows our lord his suffering, e'er it comes.
CHOR. Is there no hope then yet to save her life?

ATT. Th' inevitable day of fate is come.

CHOR. Have you prepared what the sad case requires?
ATT. Each honour that may grace her obsequies.

CHOR. Illustrious in her death, the best of wives:

169. Dean Swift, in one of his things to Dr. Sheridan, having given his judgment of the old comedians, proceeds to give it also on the old tragedians; and of Euripides speaks thus:

Proceed to tragics. First, Euripides

(An author where I sometimes dip a-days)

ATT.

The sun in his wide course sees not her equal.
The best of wives indeed: who will gainsay it?
What could the brightest pattern of her sex
Do more? What greater proof give of the honour
She bears her husband, than a ready will
To die for him! This all the city knows.
How in the house she hath demean'd herself
Will claim thy admiration. When she knew
The destin'd day was come, in fountain water
She bath'd her lily-tinctur'd limbs, then took
From her rich chests of odorous cedar form'd
A splendid robe, and her most radiant dress:
Thus gorgeously array'd she stood before

The hallow'd flames, and thus address'd her pray'r;
O queen, I go to the infernal shades,

Yet, e'er I go, with reverence let me breathe
My last request, Protect my orphan children,
Make my son happy with the wife he loves,
And wed my daughter to a noble husband:
Nor let them, like their mother, to the tomb
Untimely sink, but in their native land

Be blest through lengthen'd life to honour'd age.
Then to each altar in the royal house

[blocks in formation]

This our fathers applauded as wit, nimium patienter, ne dicam stulte mirati. The misrepresentation of Aristotle, the false judgment on our poet, and the undeserved reflection on his female characters, give us reason to suppose that the Dean dipped but lightly into such authors as these; he might dip deeper into Plautus and Aristophanes; but he plunged deepest into the ribaldry of Lucian and Rabelais.

161. This bathing was intended as preparatory to her funeral, a ceremony always observed by the ancients.

164. This also was in order to her funeral, a sepulchral robe, pãgos rapnior, as Homer calls it, Odyss. ii. 199.

« AnteriorContinuar »