Page:Four Plays of Aeschylus (1908) Morshead.djvu/179

Rh And echoes round a tomb!

Dead are they, dead! in their own blood they lie—

Ill-omened the concent that hails our victory!

The curse a father on his children spake

Hath faltered not, nor failed!

Nought, Laïus! thy stubborn choice availed—

First to beget, then, in the after day

And for the city's sake,

The child to slay!

For nought can blunt nor mar

The speech oracular!

Children of teen! by disbelief ye erred—

Yet in wild weeping came fulfilment of the word!

[ and approach, with a train of mourners, bearing the bodies of  and.

Look up, look forth! the doom is plain,

Nor spake the messenger in vain!

A twofold sorrow, twofold strife—

Each brave against a brother's life!

In double doom hath sorrow come—

How shall I speak it?—on the home!

Alas, my sisters! be your sighs the gale,

The smiting of your brows the plash of oars,

Wafting the boat, to Acheron's dim shores

That passeth ever, with its darkened sail,

On its uncharted voyage and sunless way,

Far from thy beams, Apollo, god of day—

The melancholy bark

Bound for the common bourn, the harbour of the dark!

Look up, look yonder! from the home

Antigone, Ismene come,