Page:Four Plays of Aeschylus (Cookson).djvu/138

126 Blood, he thrusts in fire; he anoints with defilement of smoke

man's home;

The soul of all reverence a mad breath pollutes when

Ares hath masterdom!

Tumult and roaring in all streets and wynds;

The fenced bulwark fails; and man to man each finds

His foe; and, having found

Lets drive his spear and bears him to the ground.

And blood-bedabbled mothers of babes new-born

For their dead sucklings like the ewe-flock bleat;

By harrying bands

Kindred from kin are torn;

And two shall meet

Each with his load; or one with empty hands

Shall call upon his fellow in like case,

Neither with less nor equal satisfied,

Saying 'Since all men for themselves provide,

'How shall we fare if backward in the race?'

All manner store the housewife's eyes distress,

Chance-lying where it fell: all earth's largesse

Foamed recklessly to waste.

And, new to sorrow, with worse bonds disgraced,

The young girl-slave looks for a conqueror's bed;—

A rich lord, yet in love most destitute,

Whose only mark

Of greatness is the slaver's attribute,

When fierce embraces in the lustful dark

Exact with nightly ravishment his pay;

And her bewailed griefs find this redress

That tears let fall in day-long loneliness,

Night's all-abhorred endearments wipe away!