Hippolytus or Phaedra: Act IV

Messenger: O slavery, thou hard and bitter lot,Why must I voice these woes unspeakable?

Theseus: Fear not, but boldly tell the worst mischance;For mine a heart not unprepared for grief.Messenger: My tongue can find no words to voice its woe.

Theseus: But speak, what evil fortune still besetsMy shattered house?

Theseus: The father knew long since his son had died;But now the adulterer has met his end.Tell me, I pray, the manner of his death.

Messenger: When, fleeing forth, he left the city's walls,With maddened speed he hurried on his way,And quickly yoked his chargers to his car,And curbed them to his will with close-drawn reins.And then, with much wild speech, and cursing loudHis native land, oft calling on his sire,He fiercely shook the reins above his steeds;When suddenly, far out the vast sea roared,And heaved itself to heaven. No wind was thereTo stir the sea, no quarter of the skyBroke in upon its peace; the rising wavesWere by their own peculiar tempest raised.No blast so great had ever stirred the straitsOf Sicily, nor had the deep e'er swelledWith such wild rage before the north wind's breath,When high cliffs trembled with the shock of waves,And hoary foam smote high Leucate's top.The sea then rose into a mighty heap,And, big with monstrous birth, was landward borne.For no ship's wrecking was this swelling pestIntended; landward was its aim. The floodRolled shoreward heavily, something unknownWithin its laden bosom carrying.What land, new born, will lift its head aloft?Is some new island of the CycladesArising? Now the rocky heights are hid,Held sacred to the Epidaurian god,And those high crags well known for Sciron's crime;No longer can be seen that land whose shoresAre washed by double seas. While in amazeWe look in fear and wonder, suddenlyThe whole sea bellows, and on every sideThe towering cliffs re-echo with the roar;While all their tops the leaping spray bedews.The deep spouts forth and vomits up its wavesIn alternating streams, like some huge whaleWhich roves the ocean, spouting up the floods.Then did that mound of waters strongly heaveAnd break itself, and threw upon the shoreA thing more terrible than all our fears.The sea itself rushed landward, followingThat monstrous thing. I shudder at the thought.What form and bearing had the monster huge!A bull it was in form, with dark-green neckUplifted high, its lofty front adornedWith verdant mane. Its ears with shaggy hairWere rough; its horns with changing color flashed,Such as the lord of some fierce herd would have,Both earth and ocean-born. He vomits flames;With flames his fierce eyes gleam. His glossy neckGreat couch-like muscles shows, and as he breathes,His spreading nostrils quiver with the blastOf his deep panting. Breast and dewlap hangAll green with clinging moss; and on his sidesRed lichens cling. His hinder parts appearIn monstrous shape, and like some scaly fishHis vast and shapeless members drag along;As are those monsters of the distant seasWhich swallow ships, and spout them forth again.The country-side was panic stricken; herdsIn frenzied terror scattered through the fields;Nor did the herdsmen think to follow them.The wild beasts in the forest pastures fledIn all directions, and the hunters shookWith deadly fear. Hippolytus aloneWas not afraid, but curbed his frantic steedsWith close-drawn reins, and with his well-known voiceHe cheered them on. The road to Argos runsPrecipitous along the broken hills,On one side bordered by the roaring sea.Here does that massive monster whet himselfAnd kindle hot his wrath; then, when he feltHis courage strong within his breast, and whenHis power to attempt the strife he had rehearsed,He charged Hippolytus with headlong course,The ground scarce touching with his bounding feet;And, fearful, stopped before the trembling steeds.But this thy son, with savage countenance,Stood steadfast, threatening, before the foe.His features changed not, while he thundered loud:"This empty terror cannot daunt my soul,For 'twas my father's task to vanquish bulls."But straightway, disobedient to the reins,The horses hurried off the car. And now,The highway leaving, maddened by their fear,They plunged along where'er their terror led,And took their way among the rocky fields.But he, their driver, as some captain strongHolds straight his bark upon the boisterous sea,Lest she oppose her side against the waves,And by his art escapes the yawning floods;Not otherwise he guides the whirling car.For now with tight-drawn reins he curbs his steeds,And now upon their backs he plies the lash.But doggedly that monster kept along,Now running by their side, now leaping straightUpon them as they came, from every handGreat fear inspiring. Soon all further flightWas checked; for that dread, hornéd, ocean beastWith lowering front charged full against their course.Then, truly, did the horses, wild with fear,Break loose from all control; and from the yokeThey madly struggled to withdraw their necks,Their master hurling to their stamping feet.Headlong among the lossened reins he fell,His form all tangled in their clinging strands.The more he struggled to release himselfThe tighter those relentless fetters bound.The steeds perceived what they had done, and now,With empty car, and no one mastering them,They ran where terror bade. Just so, of old,Not recognizing their accustomed load,And hot with anger that the car of dayHad been entrusted to a spurious sun,The steeds of Phoebus hurled young PhaëthonFar through the airs of heaven in wandering course.Now far and wide he stains the fields with blood,His head rebounding from the smitten rocks.The bramble thickets pluck away his hair,And that fair face is bruised upon the stones.His fatal beauty which had been his bane,Is ruined now by many a wound. His limbsAre dragged along upon the flying wheels.At last, his bleeding trunk upon a charredAnd pointed stake is caught, pierced through the groin;And for a little, by its master held,The car stood still. The horses by that woundWere held awhile, but soon they break delay--And break their master too. While on they rush,The whipping branches cut his dying form,The rough and thorny brambles tear his flesh,And every bush retains its part of him.Now bands of servants scour those woeful fields,Those places where Hippolytus was dragged,And where his bloody trail directs the way;And sorrowing dogs trace out their master's limbs.But not as yet has all this careful toilOf grieving friends sufficed to gather all.And has it come to this, that glorious form?But now the partner of his father's realm,And his acknowledged heir, illustrious youth,Who shone refulgent like the stars--beholdHis scattered fragments for the funeral pileThey gather up and heap them on the bier!

Theseus: O mother Nature, all too potent thou!How firmly dost thou hold me by the tiesOf blood! How thou dost force me to obeyThy will! I wished to slay my guilty son,While yet he lived; but now I mourn his loss.Messenger: One may not rightly mourn what he has willed.

Theseus: This is indeed the crowning woe, I think,When chance fulfils the prayers we should not make.

Messenger: If still you hate your son, why weep for him?

Theseus: Because I slew, not lost my son, I weep.

Chorus: How on the wheel of circumstanceWe mortals whirl! 'Gainst humble folkDoes fate more gently rage, and GodMore lightly smites the lightly blest.A life in dim retirement spentInsures a peaceful soul; and heWho in a lowly cottage dwellsMay live to tranquil age at last.The mountain tops that pierce the skies,Feel all the stormy winds that blow,Fierce Eurus, Notus, and the threatsOf Boreas, and Corus too,Storm bringer.The vale low lying seldom feelsThe thunder's stroke; but Caucasus,The huge, and the lofty Phrygian grovesOf mother Cybele have feltThe bolts of Jove the Thunderer.For Jupiter in jealousyAttacks the heights too near his skies;But never is the humble roofUptorn by jealous heaven's assaults.Round mighty kings and homes of kingsHe thunders.The passing hour on doubtful wingsFlits ever; nor may any claimSwift Fortune's pledge. Behold our king,Who sees at last the glowing starsAnd light of day, the gloom of hellBehind him left, a sad returnLaments; for this his welcome homeHe finds more sorrowful by farThan dismal, dark Avernus' self.O Pallas, by the Athenian raceIn reverence held, that once againThy Theseus sees the light of day,And has escaped the pools of Styx,Thou owest naught to greedy Dis;For still the number of the shadesWithin the infernal tyrant's powerRemains the same.But why the sounds of wailing that we hear?And what would Phaedra with her naked sword?