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Rh A tender passage follows, in which the father bids his wife show all gentleness to her offending son. It is not unlike the tenderness with which the ghost in "Hamlet" ends his revelations, bidding the son be gentle to his mother:—

Again the Chorus chant the glories of Darius's reign, and sadly contrast them with the present ruin, while the queen goes away to put on her most gorgeous robes, according to the ghost's command, and meet her son.

As this chorus ends, Xerxes, in rent robes and with disfigured face, comes lamenting upon the scene, tortured with the thought of his lost heroes, and wishing