Page:Four Plays of Aeschylus (1908) Morshead.djvu/74

44 Alack, alack! the ravisher—

He leaps from boat to beach, he draweth near!

Away, thou plunderer accurst!

Death seize thee first,

Or e'er thou touch me—off! God, hear our cry,

Our maiden agony!

Ah, ah, the touch, the prelude of my shame.

Alas, my maiden fame!

O sister, sister, to the altar cling,

For he that seizeth me,

Grim is his wrath and stern, by land as on the sea.

Guard us, O king!

[Enter the.

Hence to my barge—step swiftly, tarry not.

Alack, he rends—he rends my hair! O wound on wound!

Help! my lopped head will fall, my blood gush o'er the ground!

Aboard, ye cursèd—with a new curse, go!

Would God that on the wand'ring brine

Thou and this braggart tongue of thine

Had sunk beneath the main—

Thy mast and planks, made fast in vain!

Thee would I drive aboard once more,

A slayer and a dastard, from the shore!