Page:Four Plays of Aeschylus (1908) Morshead.djvu/68

38 Long may the old

Crowd to the altars kindled to consume

Gifts rich and manifold—

Offered to win from powers divine

A benison on city and on shrine:

Let all the sacred might adore

Of Zeus most high, the lord

Of guestright and the hospitable board,

Whose immemorial law doth rule Fate's scales aright:

The garners of earth's store

Be full for evermore,

And grace of Artemis make women's travail light;

No devastating curse of fell disease

This city seize;

No clamour of the State arouse to war

Ares, from whom afar

Shrinketh the lute, by whom the dances fail—

Ares, the lord of wail.

Swarm far aloof from Argos' citizens

All plague and pestilence,

And may the Archer-God our children spare!

May Zeus with foison and with fruitfulness

The land's each season bless,

And, quickened with Heaven's bounty manifold,

Teem grazing flock and fold.

Beside the altars of Heaven's hallowing

Loud let the minstrels sing,

And from pure lips float forth the harp-led strain in air!

And let the people's voice, the power

That sways the State, in danger's hour

Be wary, wise for all;

Nor honour in dishonour hold,

But—ere the voice of war be bold—

Let them to stranger peoples grant

Fair and unbloody covenant—