MEN. Hail, O ye solar beams, who on this day,
When I my consort Helen shall regain
Your radiance shed. For I am he who long
Endured the toils of battle, Menelaus,
Attended by the Grecian host. To Troy,
Not in a woman’s cause, as many deem,
I came, but came to punish him who broke
The laws of hospitality, and ravished
My consort from my palace. He hath suffered
As he deserved, such was the will of Heaven,
He and his country by the spear of Greece
Have been destroyed. But I am come to bear
That Spartan dame away, whom with regret
I term my consort, though she once was mine.
But she beneath these tents is with the rest
Of Phrygia’s captives numbered: for the troops
Whose arms redeemed her, have to me consigned
That I might either take away, or spare
Her life, and waft her to the Argive coast.
I am resolved that Helen shall not bleed
In Troy, but o’er the foaming waves to Greece
Will I convey her, and to them whose friends
Before yon walls were slain, surrender up
To perish by their vengeance. But with speed
Enter the tent, thence by that hair defiled
With murder, O my followers, drag her forth,
And hither bring: for when a prosperous breeze
Arises, her will I to Greece convey.
HEC. O thou who mov’st the world, and in this earth
Hast fixed thy station, whosoe’er thou art,
Impervious to our reason, whether thou,
O Jove, art dread necessity which rules
All nature, or that soul which animates
The breasts of mortals, thee do I adore,
For in a silent path thou tread’st and guid’st
With justice the affairs of man.
MEN. What means
This innovation in the solemn prayer
You to the gods address?
HEC. I shall applaud
The stroke, O Menelaus, if thou slay
Thy wife; but soon as thou behold’st her, fly,
Lest she with love ensnare thee. For the eyes
Of men she captivates, o’erturns whole cities,
And fires the roofs of lofty palaces,
She is possessed of such resistless charms;
Both I and thou and thousands to their cost,
Alas! are sensible how great her power.