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 buffets, is not wise. For Love rules the gods as he will, and me also—why should he not?—yes, and many another such as I. So that I am quite mad if I blame my husband for being taken with this malady, or blame this woman, who has had part in a thing nowise shameful, and not in any wrong to me....Come, tell the whole truth; it is a foul blight on a free man to be called a liar."

Lichas confesses all, and ends with this advice—"For both your sakes, for his and for thine own as well, bear with the woman;" and Deianeira pretends to have adopted his counsel: "Nay," she says, "even thus am I minded to do. Believe me, I will not bring on myself a self-sought bane by waging fruitless war with the gods."

But how different is the feeling which she presently avows to the chorus of Trachinian maidens: "Of anger against the man I have no thought; but to live in the same house with this girl—what woman could bear it?" Then she remembers the love-charm given her long ago by Nessus. There is a moment of feverish hope while she is preparing and despatching the robe for Heracles. But hardly has it gone when an accident reveals to her that she has anointed the robe with some poison of fearful virulence. In a moment, her thoughts rush forward to the worst; and her own words, in telling the story to the Chorus, foreshow the death to which she presently gives herself on hearing the tidings from Eubœa—"Life with a bad name must not be borne by her who glories to have been born not base."