Agamemnon: Act II

Clytemnestra: Why, sluggish soul, dost thou safe counsel seek?Why hesitate? Closed is the better way.Once thou couldst chastely guard thy widowed couch,And keep thy husband's realm with wifely faith;But now, long since has faith thy palace fled,The homely virtues, honor, piety,And chastity, which goes, but ne'er returns.Loose be thy reins, swift speed thy wanton course;The safest way through crime is by the pathOf greater crime. Consider in thy heartAll woman's wiles, what faithless wives have done,Bereft of reason, blind and passion-driven;What bloody deeds stepmother's hands have dared;Or what she dared, ablaze with impious love,Who left her father's realm for Thessaly:Dare sword, dare poison; else in stealthy flightMust thou go hence with him who shares thy guilt.But who would talk of stealth, of exile, flight?Such were thy sister's deeds: some greater crime,Some mightier deed of evil suits thy hand.

Nurse: O Grecian queen, illustrious Leda's child,What say'st thou there in whispered mutterings?Or what unbridled deeds within thy breast,By reckless passion tossed, dost meditate?Though thou be silent, yet thy face declaresThy hidden pain in speech more eloquent.Whate'er thy grief, take time and room for thought.Time often cures what reason cannot heal.

Clytemnestra: Too dire my grief to wait time's healing hand.My very soul is scorched with flaming pains:I feel the goads of fear and jealous rage,The throbbing pulse of hate, the pangs of love,Base love that presses hard his heavy yokeUpon my heart, and holds me vanquished quite.And always, 'mid those flames that vex my soul,Though faint indeed, and downcast, all undone,Shame struggles on. By shifting seas I'm tossed:As when here wind, there tide impels the deep,The waves stand halting 'twixt the warring powers.And so I'll strive no more to guide my bark.Where wrath, where grief, where hope shall bear me on,There will I speed my course; my helmless shipI've giv'n to be the sport of winds and floods.Where reason fails 'tis best to follow chance.Nurse: Oh, rash and blind, who follows doubtful chance.

Clytemnestra: Who fears a doubtful chance, if 'tis his last?

Nurse: Thy fault may find safe hiding if thou wilt.

Clytemnestra: Nay, faults of royal homes proclaim themselves.

Nurse: Dost thou repent the old, yet plan the new?

Clytemnestra: To stop midway in sin is foolishness.

Nurse: His fears increase, who covers crime with crime.

Clytemnestra: But iron and fire oft aid the healer's art.

Nurse: Yet desperate measures no one first attempts.

Clytemnestra: The path of sin is headlong from the first.

Nurse: Still let thy wifely duty hold thee back.

Clytemnestra: What long-deserted wife regards her lord?

Nurse: Your common children--hast no thought of them?

Clytemnestra: I do think on my daughter's wedding rites,High-born Achilles, and my husband's lies.

Nurse: She freed our Grecian fleet from long delay,And waked from their dull calm the sluggish seas.

Clytemnestra: Oh, shameful thought! that I, the heaven-born childOf Tyndarus, should give my daughter upTo save the Grecian fleet! I see once moreIn memory my daughter's wedding day,Which he made worthy of base Pelops' house,When, with his pious face, this father stoodBefore the altar fires--Oh, monstrous rites!E'en Calchas shuddered at his own dread wordsAnd backward-shrinking fires. O bloody house,That ever wades through crime to other crime!With blood we soothe the winds, with blood we war.

Nurse: Yet by that blood a thousand vessels sailed.

Clytemnestra: But not with favoring omens did they sail;The port of Aulis fairly drave them forth.So launched in war, he still no better fared.Smit with a captive's love, unmoved by prayer,He held as spoil the child of Phoebus' priest,E'en then, as now, a sacred maiden's thrall.Nor could the stern Achilles bend his will,Nor he whose eye alone can read the fates(A faithful seer to us, to captives mild),Nor his pest-smitten camp and gleaming pyres.When baffled Greece stood tottering to her fall,This man with passion pined, had time for love,Thought ever on amours; and, lest his couchShould be of any Phrygian maid bereft,He lusted for Achilles' beauteous bride,Nor blushed to tear her from her lover's arms.Fit foe for Paris! Now new wounds he feels,And burns, inflamed by mad Cassandra's love.And, now that Troy is conquered, home he comes,A captive's husband, Priam's son-in-law!Arise, my soul; no easy task essay;Be swift to act. What dost thou, sluggish, waitTill Phrygian rivals wrest thy power away?Or do thy virgin daughters stay thy hand,Or yet Orestes, image of his sire?Nay, 'tis for these thy children thou must act,Lest greater ills befall them; for, behold,A mad stepmother soon shall call them hers.Through thine own heart, if so thou must, prepareTo drive the sword, and so slay two in one.Let thy blood flow with his; in slaying, die.For death is sweet if with a foeman shared.

Nurse: My queen, restrain thyself, check thy wild wrath,And think how great thy task. Atrides comesWild Asia's conqueror and Europe's lord;He leads Troy captive, Phrygia subdued.'Gainst him wouldst thou with sly assault prevail,Whom great Achilles slew not with his sword,Though he with angry hand the weapon drew;Nor Telamonian Ajax, crazed with rage;Nor Hector, Troy's sole prop and war's delay;Nor Paris' deadly darts; nor Memnon black;Nor Xanthus, choked with corpses and with arms;Nor Simois' waves, empurpled with the slain;Nor Cycnus, snowy offspring of the sea;Nor warlike Rhesus with his Thracian band;Nor that fierce maid who led the Amazons,Armed with the deadly battle-axe and shield?This hero, home returned, dost thou prepareTo slay, and stain thy hearth with impious blood?Would Greece, all hot from conquest, suffer this?Bethink thee of the countless steeds and arms,The sea a-bristle with a thousand ships,The plains of Ilium soaked with streams of blood,Troy taken and in utter ruin laid:Remember this, I say, and check thy wrath,And bid thy thoughts in safer channels run.

Aegisthus: The fatal day which I was born to see,Toward which I've ever looked with dread, is here.Why dost thou fear, my soul, to face thy fate,And turn away from action scarce begun?Be sure that not thy hand is orderingThese dire events, but the relentless gods.Then put thy shame-bought life in pawn to fateAnd let thy heart drain suffering to the dregs.To one of shameful birth death is a boon.Thou comrade of my perils, Leda's child,Be with me still in this; and thy false lord,This valiant sire, shall pay thee blood for blood.But why does pallor blanch thy trembling cheeks?What bodes this softened face, this listless gaze?

Clytemnestra: My husband's love has met and conquered me.Let us retrace our steps, while still there's room,To that estate whence we should ne'er have come;Let even now fair fame be sought again;For never is it over late to mend.Who grieves for sin is counted innocent.

Aegisthus: What madness this? Dost thou believe or hopeThat Agamemnon will be true to thee?Though no grave fears, of conscious guilt begot,Annoyed thy soul with thoughts of punishment;Still would his swelling, o'er-inflated pride,Create in him a dour and headstrong mood.Harsh was he to his friends while Troy still stood;How, think'st thou, has the fall of Troy pricked onHis soul, by nature harsh, to greater harshness?Mycenae's king he went; he will returnHer tyrant. So doth fortune foster pride.With how great pomp this throng of rivals comes!But one of these, surpassing all the rest,Apollo's priestess, holds the king in thrall.And wilt thou meekly share thy lord with her?But she will not. A wife's last infamy--To see her rival ruling in her stead.No throne nor bed can brook a rival mate.

Clytemnestra: Aegisthus, why dost drive me headlong on,And fan to flames again my dying wrath?For if the victor has his right employed,To work his will upon a captive maid,His wife should not complain or reck of this.The law that binds the man fits not the king.And why should I, myself in conscious guilt,Make bold to sit in judgment on my lord?Let her forgive who most forgiveness needs.

Aegisthus: In very truth there's room for mutual grace.But thou know'st naught of royal privilege.Thee will the king judge harshly, to himselfA milder law in gentler mood apply.And this they deem the highest pledge of power,If, what to common mortals is denied,Is given by general will to them alone.

Clytemnestra: He pardoned Helen; home is she returned,To Menelaüs joined, though East and WestHave been engulfed for her in common woe.

Aegisthus: But Menelaüs nursed no secret love,Which closed his heart unto his lawful wife.Thy lord seeks charge against thee, cause of strife.Suppose thy heart and life were free from guilt:What boots an honest life, a stainless heart,When hate condemns the suppliant unheard?Wilt thou seek Sparta's shelter, and returnUnto thy father's house? No shelter waitsThe scorned of kings; that hope were false indeed.

Clytemnestra: None knows my sin save one most faithful friend.

Aegisthus: In vain: no faith is found in royal courts.

Clytemnestra: But surely gifts will buy fidelity.

Aegisthus: Faith bought by gifts is sold for other gifts.

Clytemnestra: My strength and purity of soul revive.Why wouldst thou thwart me? Why, with cozening words,Wouldst thou persuade me to thy evil course?Dost think that I would leave a king of kingsAnd stoop to wed an outcast wretch like thee?

Aegisthus: What? seem I less than Atreus' son to thee,Who am Thyestes' son?

Clytemnestra: Why, so thou art,And grandson too.

Aegisthus: My getting shames me not;For Phoebus' self is voucher for my birth.

Clytemnestra: Name Phoebus not with thine incestuous stock,Who checked his flying steeds and fled the sky,Withdrawn in sudden night, lest he beholdThy father's feast. Wouldst thou besmirch the gods,Thou, trained to revel in unlawful love?Then get thee gone in haste, and rid mine eyesOf that which doth disgrace this noble house;This home is waiting for its king and lord.

Aegisthus: Exile is naught to me, for I am usedTo woe. At thy command I'll farther fleeThan from this house: I but await thy wordTo plunge my dagger in this woeful breast.

Clytemnestra [aside]: Shall I in cruel scorn desert him now?Who sin in company should suffer so.Nay, come with me; we will together waitThe issue of our dark and dangerous fate.

Chorus: Sing Phoebus' praise, O race renowned;With festal laurel wreathe your heads;And let your virgin locks flow free,Ye Argive maids.And ye who drink of the cold Erasinus,Who dwell by Eurotas,Who know the green banks of the silent IsmenusCome join in our singing;And do ye swell our chorus, ye far Theban daughters,Whom the child of Tiresias, Manto the seer,Once taught to bow down to the Delian gods.Now peace has come:Unbend thy victorious bow, O Apollo,Lay down from thy shoulder thy quiver of arrows,And let thy tuneful lyre resoundTo the touch of thy swift-flying fingers.No lofty strain be thine today,But such as on thy milder lyreThou art wont to sound when the learnéd museSurveys thy sports.And yet, an' thou wilt, strike a heavier strain,As when thou didst sing of the Titans o'ercomeBy Jupiter's hurtling bolts;When mountain on lofty mountain piled,Pelion, Ossa, and pine-clad Olympus,Built high to the sky for the impious monstersTheir ladder's rocky rounds.Thou too be with us, Juno, queen,Who sharest the throne of heaven's lord.Mycenae's altars blaze for thee.Thou alone dost protect us,Anxious and suppliant;Thou art the goddess of peace,And the issues of war are thine;And thine are the laurels of victory twinedOn the brow of our king Agamemnon.To thee the boxwood flute resoundsIn solemn festival;To thee the maidens strike the harpIn sweetest song;To thee the votive torch is tossed;The gleaming heifer, all unmarredBy the plow's rough touchFalls at thy shrine.And thou, child of the Thunderer,Pallas illustrious, hear;Before whose might the Dardanian wallsHave trembled and fallen to dust.Thee maidens and matrons in chorus unitedExalt and adore; at thy approachThy temple doors swing open wide,While the welcoming throng, with garlands bedecked,Rejoice at thy coming;And feeble, tottering elders comeTo pay their vows of thanks and praise,And pour their offerings of wineWith trembling hands.And to thee with mindful lips we pray,Bright Trivia, Lucina called.Thy native Delos didst thou bidStand fast upon the sea, and floatNo more, the wandering mock of winds.And now, with firmly fixéd root,It stands secure, defies the gale,And, wont of old to follow ships,Now gives them anchorage.Proud Niobe thy vengeance feltWho thy divinity defied.Now, high on lonely Sipylus,She sits and weeps in stony grief;Though to insensate marble turned,Her tears flow fresh forevermore.And now both men and women joinIn praise to the twin divinities.But thee, above all gods, we praise;Our father and our ruler thou,Lord of the hurtling thunderbolt,At whose dread nod the farthest polesDo quake and tremble.O Jove, thou founder of our race,Accept our gifts, and have regardUnto thy faithful progeny.But lo, a warrior hither comes in haste,With wonted signs of victory displayed;For on his spear a laurel wreath he bears--Eurybates, our king's own messenger.