SEMICH. Wherefore in heaven's name is this stillness before the palace? why
is the house of Admetus hushed in silence?
SEMICH. But there is not even one of our friends near, who can tell us
whether we have to deplore the departed queen, or whether Alcestis,
daughter of Pelias, yet living views this light, who has appeared to me and
to all to have been the best wife toward her husband.
CHOR. Hears any one either a wailing, or the beating of hands within the
house, or a lamentation, as though the thing had taken place?[9] There is
not however any one of the servants standing before the gates. Oh would
that thou wouldst appear, O Apollo, amidst the waves of this calamity!
SEMICH. They would not however be silent, were she dead.
SEMICH. For the corse is certainly not gone from the house.
SEMICH. Whence this conjecture? I do not presume this. What is it gives you
confidence?
SEMICH. How could Admetus have made a private funeral of his so excellent
wife?
CHOR. But before the gates I see not the bath of water from the
fountain,[10] as is the custom at the gates of the dead: and in the
vestibule is no shorn hair, which is wont to fall in grief for the dead;
the youthful[11] hand of women for the youthful _wife_ sound not.