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Have thou too heed, nor let thy fear prevail

Above thy will. And do thou guard him, Hermes,

Whose blood is brother unto mine, whose sire

The same high God. Men call thee guide and guard,

Guide therefore thou and guard my suppliant;

For Zeus himself reveres the outlaw's right,

Boon of fair escort, upon man conferred.

[Exeunt Apollo, Hermes, and Orestes. The Ghost of Clytemnestra rises.

Sleep on! awake! what skills your sleep to me—

Me, among all the dead by you dishonoured—

Me from whom never, in the world of death,

Dieth this curse, 'Tis she who smote and slew,

And shamed and scorned I roam? Awake, and hear

My plaint of dead men's hate intolerable.

Me, sternly slain by them that should have loved,

Me doth no god arouse him to avenge,

Hewn down in blood by matricidal hands.

Mark ye these wounds from which the heart's blood ran,

And by whose hand, bethink ye! for the sense

When shut in sleep hath then the spirit-sight,

But in the day the inward eye is blind.

List, ye who drank so oft with lapping tongue

The wineless draught by me outpoured to soothe

Your vengeful ire! how oft on kindled shrine

I laid the feast of darkness, at the hour

Abhorred of every god but you alone!

Lo, all my service trampled down and scorned!

And he hath baulked your chase, as stag the hounds;

Yea, lightly bounding from the circling toils,

Hath wried his face in scorn, and flieth far.