Page:Electra of Euripides (Murray 1913).djvu/70

54 Then, while the young men held the bull on high,

Slew it with one clean gash; and suddenly

Turned on thy brother: "Stranger, every true

Thessalian, so the story goes, can hew

A bull's limbs clean, and tame a mountain steed.

Take up the steel, and show us if indeed

Rumour speak true." Right swift Orestes took

The Dorian blade, back from his shoulders shook

His broochèd mantle, called on Pylades

To aid him, and waved back the thralls. With ease

Heelwise he held the bull, and with one glide

Bared the white limb; then stripped the mighty hide

From off him, swifter than a runner runs

His furlongs, and laid clean the flank. At once

Aegisthus stooped, and lifted up with care

The ominous parts, and gazed. No lobe was there;

But lo, strange caves of gall, and, darkly raised,

The portal vein boded to him that gazed

Fell visitations. Dark as night his brow

Clouded. Then spake Orestes: "Why art thou

Cast down so sudden?" "Guest," he cried, "there be

Treasons from whence I know not, seeking me.

Of all my foes, 'tis Agamemnon's son;

His hate is on my house, like war." "Have done!"

Orestes cried: "thou fear'st an exile's plot,

Lord of a city? Make thy cold heart hot

With meat.—Ho, fling me a Thessalian steel!

This Dorian is too light. I will unseal

The breast of him." He took the heavier blade,

And clave the bone. And there Aegisthus stayed,

The omens in his hand, dividing slow

This sign from that; till, while his head bent low,