ADMETUS, HERCULES, CHORUS.
ADM. Hail, son of Jove, of Perseus' noble blood.
HERC. Hail thou, Admetus, king of Thessaly.
ADM. I am no stranger to thy friendly wishes.
HERC. Why are thy locks in sign of mourning shorn?
ADM. 'Tis for one dead, whom I must this day bury.
HERC. The god avert thy mourning for a child!
ADM. My children, what I had, live in my house.
HERC. Thy aged father, haply he is
gone.
ADM. My father lives, and she that bore me lives.
HERC. Lies then thy wife Alcestis 'mongst the dead?
ADM. Of her I have in double wise to speak.
HERC. As of the living speak'st thou, or the dead?
ADM. She is, and is no more: this grief afflicts me.
HERC. This gives no information: dark thy words.
Know'st thou not then the destiny assign'd her?
HERC. I know that she submits to die for thee.
ADM. To this assenting is she not no more?
HERC. Lament her not too soon; await the time.
She's dead; one soon to die is now no more.
HERC. It differs wide to be, or not to be.
Such are thy sentiments, far other mine.
HERC. But wherefore are thy tears? What friend is dead?
ADM. A woman; of a woman made I mention!
HERC. Of foreign birth, or one allied to thee?
ADM. Of foreign birth, but to my house most dear.
HERC. How in thy house then did she chance to die?
ADM. Her father dead, she came an orphan hither.
HERC. Would I had found thee with no grief oppressed.
ADM. With what intent dost thou express thee thus?
HERC. To seek some other hospitable hearth.
ADM. Not so, O king; come not so great an ill.
HERC. To those that mourn, a guest is troublesome.
Dead are the dead: but enter thou my house.
HERC. Shame that with those who weep a guest should feast.
ADM We have apartments separate, to receive thee.
HERC. Permit me to depart, much will I thank thee.
It must not be: no, to another house
Thou must not turn aside.Go thou before,
Ope those apartments of the house which bear
A different aspect; give command to those,
Whose charge it is, to spread the plenteous table;
And bar the doors between: the voice of woe
Unseemly heard afflicts the feasting guest.
CHOR. What wou'dst thou do, Admetus? Such a grief
Now lying heavy on thee, canst thou bear
Tadmit a guest? Doth this bespeak thee wise?
If from my house or city I should drive
A coming guest, wou'dst thou commend me more?
Thou wou'dst not: my affliction would not thus
Be less, but more unhospitable I;
And to my former ills this further ill
Be added, I should hear my mansion call'd
The stranger-hating house. Besides, to me
His hospitable doors are always open,
Whene'er I tread the thirsty soil of Argos.
CHOR. Why didst thou then conceal thy present grief,
A stranger friend arriving, as thou say'st?
ADM. My gate he would not enter, had he known
Of my affliction aught: yet acting thus
Some may perchance deem me unwise, nor hold me
Worthy of praise; yet never shall my house
Know to dishonour or reject a guest.
Yes, liberal house, with princely state
To many a stranger, many a guest
Oft hast thou oped thy friendly gate,
Oft spread the hospitable feast.
Beneath thy roof Apollo deign'd to dwell,
Here strung his silver-sounding shell,
And mixing with thy menial train
Deign'd to be call'd the shepherd of the plain:
And as he drove his flocks along,
Whether the winding vale they rove,
Or linger in the upland grove,
He tuned the pastoral pipe, or rural song.
Delighted with thy tuneful lay
No more the savage thirsts for blood;
Amidst thy flocks in harmless play
Wantons the lynx's spotted brood;
Pleas'd from his lair on Othrys' rugged brow
The lion seeks the vale below:
Whilst to thy lyre's melodious sound
The dappled hinds in sportive measures bound;
And as the vocal echo rings,
Lightly their nimble feet they ply,
Leaving their pine-clad forests high,
Charm'd with the sweet notes of thy gladdening strings.
Hence is thy house, Admetus, grac'd
With all that Plenty's hand bestows,
Near the sweet-streaming current plac'd
That from the lake of Bobia flows.
Far to the west extends the wide domain,
Rich-pastur'd mead, and cultur'd plain;
Its bound, the dark Molossian air,
Where the Sun stations his unharness'd car;
And stretching to his eastern ray,
Where Pelion rising in his pride
Frowns o'er th' Ægean's portless tide,
Reaches from sea to sea thy ample sway.
Yet wilt thou ope thy gate e'en now,
E'en now wilt thou receive this guest: Though from thine eye the warm tear flow, Though sorrow rend thy suffering breast: Sad tribute to thy wife, who knew in death Lamented lies thy roof beneath.
But Nature thus her laws decreed,
The generous mind is prompt to generous deed;
For all the pow'r of wisdom lies
Fix'd in the righteous bosom: hence
My soul assumes this confidence,
Fair to the virtuous shall Success arise.
Ye citizens of Pheræ, present here Benevolent to me, my dead adorn'd With every honour the attendant train Are bearing to the tomb and funeral pyre. Do you, for ancient usage so requires, Address her as she takes her last sad way. CHOR. Thy father Pheres, see his aged foot Advances; his attendants in their hands Bear gorgeous presents, honours to the dead.
PHERES, ADMETUS, CHORUS.
PHER. I come, my son, joint sufferer in thy griefs;
For thou hast lost a good and virtuous wife,
None will gainsay it; but thou must perforce
Endure this, though severe. These ornaments
Receive, and let her go beneath the earth:
These honours are her due, since for thy life
She died, my son; nor would she I should be
Childless, nor suffer'd me bereft of thee
To waste in grief my sad remains of life.
The life of all her sex hath she adorn'd
With added lustre by this generous deed.
Othou, that hast preserv'd my son, and rais'd
Our sinking glories, hail! e'en in the house
Of Pluto be thou blest! Such marriages
Pronounce I good; others of little worth.
ADM. Thou comest not to these obsequies by me
Invited, nor thy presence do I deem
Friendly. She never in thy ornaments
Shall be array'd, nor wants she aught of thine
To grace her funeral rites. Then was the time
To shew thy social sorrow, when my life
The Fates demanded: thou cou'dst stand aloof,
Old as thou art, and give a younger up
To die; and wou'dst thou now bewail her death?
Art thou my father? No; nor she, who says
She brought me forth, my mother, though so call'd;
But the base offspring of some slave thy wife
Stole me, and put me to her breast. Thy deeds
Shew what thou art by plain and evident proof;
And never can I deem myself thy son,
Who passest all in mean and abject spirit;
At such an age, just trembling on the verge
Of life, thou wou'dst not, nay, thou daredst not die
For thine own son: but you cou'd suffer her,
Though sprung from foreign blood: with justice then
Her only as iny father must I deem,
Her only as my mother; yet this course
Might'st thou have run with glory, for thy son
Daring to die; brief was the space of life
That could remain to thee; I then had lived
My destin'd time, she too had lived, nor thus
Of her forsaken should I wail my loss."
Yet all, that makes man happy, hadst thou prov'd,
Blest through thy life; in royalty thy youth
Grew up; I was thy son t' inherit from thee
-Thy treasures; that not childless hadst thou died,
Leaving thy desolated house a prey
To plundering strangers. Neither canst thou say
Thou gavest me up to death as one that held
Thy age in rude contempt; I honour'd thee,
With holy reverence, requited thus
By thee, and her that bore me.
Wilt thou not therefore speed thee to beget,
To cherish thy old age, to grace thee dead
With sumptuous vest, and lay thee in the tomb?
That office never shall my hand perform,
For, far as in thee lay, I died; if yet
I view this light, fortune presenting me
Other deliverer, his son I am,
With pious fondness to support his age.
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