Fifth Episode

LEADER.Look yonder! 'Tis the Prince's man, I weenSpeeding toward this gate, most dark of mien.(A HENCHMAN enters in haste.)

HENCHMAN.Ye women, whither shall I go to seekKing Theseus? Is he in this dwelling? Speak!

LEADER.Lo, where he cometh through the Castle gate!(THESEUS comes out from the Castle.)

HENCHMAN.O King, I bear thee tidings of dire weightTo thee, aye, and to every man, I ween,From Athens to the marches of Trozên.

THESEUS.What? Some new stroke hath touched, unknown to me,The sister cities of my sovranty?

HENCHMAN.Hippolytus is...Nay, not dead; but starkOutstretched, a hairsbreadth this side of the dark.

THESEUS (as though unmoved).How slain? Was there some other man, whose wifeHe had like mine denied, that sought his life?

HENCHMAN.His own wild team destroyed him, and the direCurse of thy lips.The boon of thy great SireIs granted thee, O King, and thy son slain.

THESEUS.Ye Gods! And thou, Poseidon! Not in vainI called thee Father; thou hast heard my prayer!How did he die? Speak on. How closed the snareOf Heaven to slay the shamer of my blood?

HENCHMAN.'Twas by the bank of beating sea we stood,We thralls, and decked the steeds, and combed each mane;Weeping; for word had come that ne'er againThe foot of our Hippolytus should roamThis land, but waste in exile by thy doom.So stood we till he came, and in his toneNo music now save sorrow's, like our own,And in his train a concourse without endOf many a chase-fellow and many a friend.At last he brushed his sobs away, and spake:"Why this fond loitering? I would not breakMy Father's law--Ho, there! My coursers fourAnd chariot, quick! This land is mine no more."Thereat, be sure, each man of us made speed.Swifter than speech we brought them up, each steedWell dight and shining, at our Prince's side.He grasped the reins upon the rail: one strideAnd there he stood, a perfect charioteer,Each foot in its own station set. Then clearHis voice rose, and his arms to heaven were spread:"O Zeus, if I be false, strike thou me dead!But, dead or living, let my Father seeOne day, how falsely he hath hated me!"Even as he spake, he lifted up the goadAnd smote; and the steeds sprang. And down the roadWe henchmen followed, hard beside the rein,Each hand, to speed him, toward the Argive plainAnd Epidaurus.So we made our wayUp toward the desert region, where the bayCurls to a promontory near the vergeOf our Trozên, facing the southward surgeOf Saron's gulf. Just there an angry sound,Slow-swelling, like God's thunder undergroundBroke on us, and we trembled. And the steedsPricked their ears skyward, and threw back their heads.And wonder came on all men, and affright,Whence rose that awful voice. And swift our sightTurned seaward, down the salt and roaring sand.And there, above the horizon, seemed to standA wave unearthly, crested in the sky;Till Skiron's Cape first vanished from mine eye,Then sank the Isthmus hidden, then the rockOf Epidaurus. Then it broke, one shockAnd roar of gasping sea and spray flung far,And shoreward swept, where stood the Prince's car.Three lines of wave together raced, and, fullIn the white crest of them, a wild Sea-BullFlung to the shore, a fell and marvellous Thing.The whole land held his voice, and answeringRoared in each echo. And all we, gazing there,Gazed seeing not; 'twas more than eyes could bear.Then straight upon the team wild terror fell.Howbeit, the Prince, cool-eyed and knowing wellEach changing mood a horse has, gripped the reinsHard in both hands; then as an oarsman strainsUp from his bench, so strained he on the thong,Back in the chariot swinging. But the youngWild steeds bit hard the curb, and fled afar;Nor rein nor guiding hand nor morticed carStayed them at all. For when he veered them round,And aimed their flying feet to grassy ground,In front uprose that Thing, and turned againThe four great coursers, terror-mad. But whenTheir blind rage drove them toward the rocky places,Silent and ever nearer to the traces,It followed rockward, till one wheel-edge grazed.The chariot tript and flew, and all was mazedIn turmoil. Up went wheel-box with a din,Where the rock jagged, and nave and axle-pin.And there--the long reins round him--there was heDragging, entangled irretrievably.A dear head battering at the chariot side,Sharp rocks, and rippled flesh, and a voice that cried:"Stay, stay, O ye who fattened at my stalls,Dash me not into nothing!--O thou falseCurse of my Father!--Help! Help, whoso can,An innocent, innocent and stainless man!"Many there were that laboured then, I wot,To bear him succour, but could reach him not,Till--who knows how?--at last the tangled reinUnclasped him, and he fell, some little veinOf life still pulsing in him.All beside,The steeds, the hornèd Horror of the Tide,Had vanished--who knows where?--in that wild land.O King, I am a bondsman of thine hand;Yet love nor fear nor duty me shall winTo say thine innocent son hath died in sin.All women born may hang themselves, for me,And swing their dying words from every treeOn Ida! For I know that he was true!

LEADER.O God, so cometh new disaster, newDespair! And no escape from what must be!

THESEUS.Hate of the man thus stricken lifted meAt first to joy at hearing of thy tale;But now, some shame before the Gods, some palePity for mine own blood, hath o'er me come.I laugh not, neither weep, at this fell doom.

HENCHMAN.How then? Behoves it bear him here, or howBest do thy pleasure?--Speak, Lord. Yet if thouWilt mark at all my word, thou wilt not beFierce-hearted to thy child in misery.

THESEUS.Aye, bring him hither. Let me see the faceOf him who durst deny my deep disgraceAnd his own sin; yea, speak with him, and proveHis clear guilt by God's judgments from above.(The HENCHMAN departs to fetch HIPPOLYTUS; THESEUS sits waiting in stern gloom, while the CHORUS sing. At the close of their song a Divine Figure is seen approaching on a cloud in the air and the voice of ARTEMIS speaks.)