Page:Four Plays of Aeschylus (1908) Morshead.djvu/170

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Last, let me name yon seventh antagonist,

Thy brother's self, at the seventh portal set—

Hear with what wrath he imprecates our doom,

Vowing to mount the wall, though banished hence,

And peal aloud the wild exulting cry—

The town is ta'en—then clash his sword with thine,

Giving and taking death in close embrace,

Or, if thou 'scapest, flinging upon thee,

As robber of his honour and his home,

The doom of exile such as he has borne.

So clamours he and so invokes the gods

Who guard his race and home, to hear and heed

The curse that sounds in Polynices' name!

He bears a round shield, fresh from forge and fire,

And wrought upon it is a twofold sign—

For lo, a woman leads decorously

The figure of a warrior wrought in gold;

And thus the legend runs—I Justice am,

And I will bring the hero home again,

To hold once more his place within this town,

Once more to pace his sire's ancestral hall.

Such are the symbols, by our foemen shown—

Now make thine own decision, whom to send

Against this last opponent! I have said—

Nor canst thou in my tidings find a flaw—

Thine is it, now, to steer the course aright.

Ah me, the madman, and the curse of Heaven!

And woe for us, the lamentable line

Of Oedipus, and woe that in this house

Our father's curse must find accomplishment!