Page:Masterpieces of Greek Literature (1902).djvu/141

111 PROMETHEUS BOUND 111

When round the bath and round the bed The hymeneal chant instead

I sang for thee, and smiled, And thou didst lead, with gifts and vows,

Hesione, my father's child, ms

To be thy wedded spouse.^

[^Third Episode.'] lo enters. lo. What land is this ? what people is here ? And who is he that writhes, I see,

In the rock -hung chain ? Now what is the crime that hath brought thee to

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Now what is the land — make answer free — AVhich I wander through in my wrong and fear,

Ah, ah, ah me ! The gad-fly stingeth to agony !

Ο Earth, keep off that phantasm pale ess

Of earth-born Argus ! — ah ! I quail

AVhen my soul descries That herdsman with the myriad eyes Which seem, as he comes, one crafty eye. Graves hide him not, though he should die ; ^ eeo

But he doggeth me in my misery From the roots of death, on high, on high ; And along the sands of the siding deep, All famine- worn, he follows me. And his waxen reed doth under sound ees

The waters round. And giveth a measure that giveth sleep.

1 I. e., How different is this song of the chorus from their joyous song at his marriage.

- More literally, " though he was slain (by Hermes), the Earth does not hide him." In her half frenzied state, lo considers the oes- trus (gadfly) to be the ghost of Argus.