_Chorus of Trojan Women._
What country calls the captives? Tempe dark?
Or the Thessalian hills? or Phthia's land
Famous for warriors? Trachin's stony plains,
Breeders of cattle? or the great sea's queen, 840
Iolchos? or the spacious land of Crete
Boasting its hundred towns? Gortyna small?
Or sterile Tricca? or Mothone crossed
By swift and frequent rivers? She who lies
Beneath the shadow of the Œtean woods, 845
Whose hostile bowmen came, not once alone,
Against the walls of Troy?
Or Olenos whose homes lie far apart?
Or Pleuron, hateful to the virgin god?
Or Trœzen on the ocean's curving shore? 850
Or Pelion, mounting heavenward, the realm
Of haughty Prothous? There in a vast cave
Great Chiron, teacher of the savage child,
Struck with his plectrum from the sounding strings
Wild music, stirred the boy with songs of war. 855
Perchance Carystus, for its marbles famed,
Calls us; or Chalcis, lying on the coast
Of the unquiet sea whose hastening tide
Beats up the strait; Calydna's wave-swept shore;
Or stormy Genoessa; or the isle 860
Of Peparethus near the seaward line
Of Attica; Enispe smitten oft
By Boreas; or Eleusis, reverenced
For Ceres' holy, secret mysteries?
Or shall we seek great Ajax' Salamis? 865
Or Calydon the home of savage beasts?
Or countries that the Titaressus laves
With its slow waters? Scarphe, Pylos old,
Or Bessus, Pharis, Pisa, Elis famed
For the Olympian games? 870
It matters not what tempest drives us hence,
Or to what land it bears us, so we shun
Sparta, the curse alike of Greece and Troy;
Nor seek the land of Argos, nor the home
Of cruel Pelops, Neritus hemmed in 875
By narrower limits than Zacynthus small,
Nor threatening cliffs of rocky Ithaca.
O Hecuba, what fate, what land, what lord
Remains for thee? In whose realm meetst thou death?
ACT IV
SCENE I
_Helen, Hecuba, Andromache, Polyxena._
_Helen_ [_soliloquizing_]. Whatever sad and joyless marriage bond 880
Holds slaughter, lamentations, bloody war,
Is worthy Helen. Even to fallen Troy
I bring misfortune, bidden to declare
The bridal that Achilles' son prepares
For his dead father, and demand the robe 885
And Grecian ornaments. By me betrayed,
And by my fraud, must Paris' sister die.
So be it, this were happier lot for her;
A fearless death must be a longed-for death.
Why shrink to do his bidding? On the head 890
Of him who plots the crime remains the guilt.
[_Aloud to Polyxena._
Thou noble daughter of Troy's kingly house,
A milder god on thy misfortune looks,
Prepares for thee a happy marriage day.
Not Priam nor unfallen Troy could give 895
Such bridal, for the brightest ornament
Of the Pelasgian race, the man who holds
The kingdom of the wide Thessalian land,
Would make thee his by lawful marriage bonds.
Great Tethys, and the ocean goddesses, 900
And Thetis, gentle nymph of swelling seas,
Will call thee theirs; when thou art Pyrrhus' bride
Peleus will call thee kin, as Nereus will.
Put off thy robe of mourning, deck thyself
In gay attire; unlearn the captive's mien, 905
And suffer skillful hands to smooth thy hair
Now so unkempt. Perchance fate cast thee down
From thy high place to seat thee higher still;
It may be profit to have been a slave.
_Andromache._ This one ill only lacked to fallen Troy: 910
Pleasure, while Pergamus still smoking lies!
Fit hour for marriage! Dare one then refuse?
When Helen would persuade, who doubtful weds?
Thou curse! Two nations owe to thee their fall!
Seest thou the royal tomb, these bones that lie 915
Unburied, scattered over all the field?
Thy bridal is the cause. All Asia's blood,
All Europe's flows for thee, whilst thou, unstirred,
Canst see two husbands fighting, nor decide
Which one to wish the victor! Go, prepare 920
The marriage bed; what need of wedding torch
Or nuptial lights, when burning Troy provides
The fires for these new bridals? Celebrate,
O Trojan women, honor worthily
The marriage feast of Pyrrhus. Smite your breasts, 925
And weep aloud.
_Helen._ Soft comfort is refused
By deep despair, which loses reason, hates
The very sharers of its grief. My cause
I yet may plead before this hostile judge,
Since I have suffered heavier ills than she. 930
Andromache mourns Hector openly,
Hecuba weeps for Priam, I, alone,
In secret, weep for Paris. Is it hard,
Grievous, and hateful to bear servitude?
For ten long years I bore the captive's yoke. 935
Is Ilium laid low, her household gods
Cast down? To lose one's land is hard indeed--
To fear is worse. Your sorrow friendship cheers,
Me conquerors and conquered hate alike.
For thee, there long was doubt whom thou shouldst serve, 940
My master drags me hence without the chance
Of lot. Was I the bringer of the war?
Of so great Teucrian carnage? Think this true
If first a Spartan keel thy waters cut;
But if of Phrygian oars I am the prey, 945
By the victorious goddess as a prize
Given for Paris' judgment, pardon me!
An angry judge awaits me, and my cause
Is left to Menelaus. Weep no more,
Andromache, put by thy grief. Alas, 950
Hardly can I myself restrain my tears.
_Andromache._ How great the ill that even Helen weeps!
Why does she weep? What trickery or crime
Plots now the Ithacan? From Ida's top,
Or Troy's high tower, will he cast the maid 955
Upon the rocks? Or hurl her to the deep
From the great cliff which, from its riven side,
Out of the shallow bay, Sigeon lifts?
What wouldst thou cover with deceitful face?
No ill were heavier than this: to see 960
Pyrrhus the son of Priam's Hecuba.
Speak, plainly tell the penalty thou bringst.
Take from defeat at least this evil,--fraud.
Thou seest thou dost not find us loth to die.
_Helen._ Would that Apollo's prophet bade me take 965
The long delay of my so hated life;
Or that, upon Achilles' sepulcher,
I might be slain by Pyrrhus' cruel hand,
The sharer of thy fate, Polyxena,
Whom harsh Achilles bids them give to him--
To offer to his manes, as his bride 971
In the Elysian Fields.
[_Polyxena shows great joy, Hecuba sinks fainting to the ground._
_Andromache._ See with what joy a noble woman meets
Death-sentence, bids them bring the royal robe,
And fitly deck her hair. She deemed it death 975
To be the bride of Pyrrhus, but this death
A bridal seems. The wretched mother faints,
Her sinking spirit fails; unhappy one,
Arise, lift up thy heart, be strong of soul!
Life hangs but by a thread--how slight a thing 980
Glads Hecuba! She breathes, she lives again,
Death flies the wretched.
_Hecuba._ Lives Achilles still
To vex the Trojans? Still pursues his foes?
Light was the hand of Paris; but the tomb
And ashes of Achilles drink our blood. 985
Once I was circled by a happy throng
Of children, by their kisses weary made,
Parted my mother love amongst them all.
She, now, alone is left; for her I pray,
Companion, solace, healer of my grief, 990
The only child of Hecuba, her voice
Alone may call me mother! Bitter life,
Pass from me, slip away, spare this last blow!
Tears overflow my cheeks--a storm of tears
Falls from her eyes!
_Andromache._ We are the ones should weep, 995
We, Hecuba, whom, scattered here and there,
The Grecian ships shall carry far away.
The maid will find at least a sepulcher
In the dear soil of her loved native land.
_Helen._ Thy own lot known, yet more thou'lt envy hers. 1000
_Andromache._ Is any portion of my lot unknown?
_Helen._ The fatal urn has given thee a lord.
_Andromache._ Whom call I master? Speak, who bears me hence
A slave?
_Helen._ Lot gave thee to the Scyrian king.
_Andromache._ Happy Cassandra, whom Apollo's wrath 1005
Spared from such fate!
_Helen._ The prince of kings claims her.
_Hecuba._ Be glad, rejoice, my child; Andromache
Desires thy bridals, and Cassandra, too,
Desires them. Is there any one would choose
Hecuba for his bride?
_Helen._ Thou fallst a prey 1010
To the unwilling Ithacan.
_Hecuba._ Alas,
What powerless, cruel, unrelenting god
Gives kings by lot to be the prey of kings?
What god unfriendly thus divides the spoil?
What cruel arbiter forbids us choose 1015
Our masters? With Achilles' arms confounds
Great Hector's mother?
To Ulysses' lot!
Conquered and captive am I now indeed,
Besieged by all misfortunes! 'Tis my lord
Puts me to shame, and not my servitude! 1020
Harsh land and sterile, by rough seas enclosed,
Thou wilt not hold my grave! Lead on, lead on,
Ulysses, I delay not, I will go--
Will follow thee; my fate will follow me.
No tranquil calm will rest upon the sea; 1025
Wind, war, and flame shall rage upon the deep,
My woes and Priam's! When these things shall come,
Respite from punishment shall come to Troy.
Mine is the lot, from thee I snatch the prize!
But see where Pyrrhus comes with hasty steps 1030
And troubled face. Why pause? On, Pyrrhus, on!
Into this troubled bosom drive the sword,
And join to thy Achilles his new kin!
Slayer of aged men, up, here is blood, 1034
Blood worthy of thy sword; drag off thy spoil,
And with thy hideous slaughter stain the gods--
The gods who sit in heaven and those in hell!
What can I pray for thee? I pray for seas
Worthy these rites; I pray the thousand ships,
The fleet of the Pelasgians, may meet 1040
Such fate as that I fain would whelm the ship
That bears me hence a captive.
SCENE II
_Chorus._ Sweet is a nation's grief to one who grieves--
Sweet are the lamentations of a land! 1044
The sting of tears and grief is less when shared
By many; sorrow, cruel in its pain,
Is glad to see its lot by many shared,
To know that not alone it suffers loss.
None shuns the hapless fate that many bear;
None deems himself forlorn, though truly so, 1050
If none are happy near him. Take away
His riches from the wealthy, take away
The hundred cattle that enrich his soil,
The poor will lift again his lowered head;
'Tis only by comparison man's poor. 1055
O'erwhelmed in hopeless ruin, it is sweet
To see none happy. He deplores his fate
Who, shipwrecked, naked, finds the longed-for port
Alone. He bears with calmer mien his fate 1059
Who sees, with his, a thousand vessels wrecked
By the fierce tempest, sees the broken planks
Heaped on the shore, the while the northwest wind
Drives on the coast, nor he alone returns
A shipwrecked beggar. When the radiant ram,
The gold-fleeced leader of the flock, bore forth
Phryxus and Helle, Phryxus mourned the fall 1066
Of Helle dropped into the Hellespont.
Pyrrha, Deucalion's wife, restrained her tears,
As he did, when they saw the sea, naught else,
And they alone of living men remained. 1070
The Grecian fleet shall scatter far and wide
Our grief and lamentations. When shall sound
The trumpet, bidding spread the sails? When dip
The laboring oars, and Troy's shores seem to flee?
When shall the land grow faint and far, the sea
Expand before, Mount Ida fade behind? 1076
Then grows our sorrow; then what way Troy lies
Mother and son shall gaze. The son shall say,
Pointing the while, 'There where the curving line
Of smoke floats, there is Ilium.' By that sign
May Trojans know their country. 1081
ACT V
SCENE I
_Hecuba, Andromache, Messenger._
_Messenger._ O bitter, cruel, lamentable fate!
In these ten years of crime what deed so hard,
So sad, has Mars encountered? What decree
Of fate shall I lament? Thy bitter lot, 1085
Andromache? Or thine, thou aged one?
_Hecuba._ Whatever woe thou mournst is Hecuba's;
Their own griefs only others have to bear,
I bear the woes of all, all die through me,
And sorrow follows all who call me friend. 1090
_Andromache._ Suffering ever loves to tell its woes,
Tell of the deaths--the tale of double crime;
Speak, tell us all.
_Messenger._ One mighty tower remains
Of Troy, no more is left; from this high seat
Priam, the arbiter of war, was wont 1095
To view his troops; and in this tower he sat
And, in caressing arms, embraced the son
Of Hector, when that hero put to flight
With fire and sword the trembling, conquered Greeks.
From thence he showed the child its father's deeds.
This tower, the former glory of our walls, 1101
Is now a lonely, ruined mass of rock;
Thither the throng of chiefs and people flock;
From the deserted ships the Grecian host
Come pouring; on the hills some find a place, 1105
Some on the rising cliffs, upon whose top
They stand tiptoe; some climb the pines, and birch,
And laurel, till beneath the gathered crowd
The whole wood trembles; some have found the peaks
Of broken crags; some climb a swaying roof, 1110
Or toppling turret of the falling wall;
And some, rude lookers-on, mount Hector's tomb.
Through all the crowded space, with haughty mien,
Passes the Ithacan, and by the hand
Leads Priam's grandson; nor with tardy step 1115
Does the young hero mount the lofty wall.
Standing upon the top, with fearless heart
He turns his eagle glance from side to side.
As the young, tender cub of some wild beast,
Not able yet to raven with its teeth, 1120
Bites harmlessly, and proudly feels himself
A lion; so this brave and fearless child,
Holding the right hand of his enemy,
Moves host and leaders and Ulysses' self.
He only does not weep for whom all weep, 1125
But while the Ithacan begins the words
Of the prophetic message and the prayers
To the stern gods, he leaps into the midst
Of his and Priam's kingdom, willingly.
_Andromache._ Was ever such a deed by Colchians done, 1130
Or wandering Scythians, or the lawless race
That dwells beside the Caspian? Never yet
Has children's blood Busiris' altars stained,
Nor Diomedes feasted his fierce steeds
On children's limbs! Who took thy body up,
My son, and bore it to the sepulcher? 1136
_Messenger._ What would that headlong leap have left? His bones
Lie dashed in pieces by the heavy fall,
His face and noble form, inheritance
From his illustrious father, are with earth 1140
Commingled; broken is his neck; his head
Is dashed in pieces on the cruel stones
So that the brains gush forth; his body lies
Devoid of form.
_Andromache._ Like Hector, too, in this.
_Messenger._ When from the wall the boy was headlong cast 1145
And the Achaians wept the crime they did,
Then turned these same Achaians to new crimes,
And to Achilles' tomb. With quiet flow
The Rhœtean waters beat the further side,
And opposite the tomb the level plain 1150
Slopes gently upward, and surrounds the place
Like a wide amphitheater; here the strand
Is thronged with lookers-on, who think to end
With this last death their vessels' long delay,
And glad themselves to think the foeman's seed
At last cut off. The fickle, common crowd 1156
Look coldly on; the most part hate the crime.
The Trojans haste with no less eagerness
To their own funeral rites, and, pale with fear,
Behold the final fall of ruined Troy. 1160
As at a marriage, suddenly they bring
The bridal torches; Helen goes before,
Attendant to the bride, with sad head bent.
'So may the daughter of Hermione
Be wed,' the Phrygians pray, 'base Helen find
Again her husband.' Terror seizes both 1166
The awe-struck peoples. With her glance cast down,
Modestly comes the victim; but her cheeks
Glow, and her beauty shines unwontedly;
So shines the light of Phœbus gloriously 1170
Before his setting, when the stars return
And day is darkened by approaching night.
The throng is silenced; all men praise the maid
Who now must die: some praise her lovely form,
Her tender age moves some, and some lament
The fickleness of fortune; every one 1176
Is touched at heart by her courageous soul,
Her scorn of death. She comes, by Pyrrhus led;
All wonder, tremble, pity; when the hill
Is reached, and on his father's grave advanced,
The young king stands, the noble maid shrinks not, 1181
But waits unflinchingly the fatal blow.
Her unquelled spirit moves the hearts of all;
And--a new prodigy--Pyrrhus is slow
At slaughter; but at length, with steady hand,
He buries to the hilt the gleaming sword 1186
Within her breast; the life-blood gushes forth
From the deep wound; in death as heretofore
Her soul is strong; with angry thud she falls
As she would make the earth a heavy load 1190
Upon Achilles' breast. Both armies weep;
The Trojans offer only feeble moans;
The victors mourn more freely. So was made
The sacrifice; her blood lay not for long
Upon the soil, nor flowed away; the tomb 1195
Drank cruelly the gore.
_Hecuba._ Go, conquering Greeks,
Securely seek your homes; with all sail set,
Your fleet may safely skim the longed-for sea.
The lad and maid are dead, the war is done!
Where can I hide my woe, where lay aside 1200
The long delay of the slow-passing years?
Whom shall I weep? my husband, grandson, child,
Or country? Mourn the living or the dead?
O longed-for death, with violence dost thou come
To babes and maidens, but thou fleest from me!
Through long night sought, mid fire, and swords, and spears, 1206
Why fly me? Not the foe, nor ruined home,
Nor flame could slay me, though so near I stood
To Priam!
_Messenger._ [_Talthybius, coming from the Greek camp._
Captive women, seek with speed
The sea; the sails are filled, the vessels move. 1210
End of Project Gutenberg's Two Tragedies of Seneca, by Lucius Annaeus Seneca