Page:Acharnians and two other plays (1909).djvu/193

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That I must wait for; and the priest that's coming.

Holloh, you boy there! bring the basin and ewer!

In the passage which follows the author ridicules the rage for vulgar realities (a corruption of the theatric art, essentially destructive of all illusion, as we have witnessed at home, with real water, real horses, real elephants). The stage of Athens it should seem had been degraded by a real sacrifice, the paltriness of such a spectacle, is marked by the magnificent exhortation of the Chorus, contrasted with the meanness of the execution which they anticipate.

Chorus. We urge, we exhort you, and advise,

To ordain a mighty sacrifice;

And before the gods to bring

A stupendous offering;

Either a sheep or some such thing!

To please the critics of the age,

Sacrificed upon the stage.

Sound amain the Pythian strain!

Let Chœris be brought here to sing. Peis. Have done there with your purring Heaven and Earth,

What's here! I've seen many curious things,

But never saw the like of this before,

A Crow with a flute and a mouthpiece. Priest, your office:

Perform it! Sacrifice to the new deities! Pri. I will—but where's the boy gone with the basket?

Let us pray to the holy flame,

And the holy Hawk that guards the same;

To the sovereign Deities,

All and each, of all degrees,

Female and male! Chorus. Hail, thou Hawk of Sunium, hail! Pri. To the Delian and the Pythian Swan,

And to the Latonian Quail,

All hail! Chorus. To the Bird of awful stature,

Mother of Gods, mother of Man;

Great Cybele! nurse of Nature!