Page:Masterpieces of Greek Literature (1902).djvu/265

235 ALCESTIS 235

Into the utter dark, thy palace-core ! " leos

I7iey tried what they called comfort^ " touched the

quick Of the ulceration in his soul," he said. With memories, — " once thy joy was thus and

thus ! " True comfort were to let him fling himself ^ Into the hollow grave o' the tomb, and so leio

Let him lie dead along with all he loved.

One bade him note that his own family

Boasted a certain father whose sole son,

Worthy bewailment, died : and yet the sire

Bore stoutly up against the blow and lived ; leis

For all that he was childless now, and prone

Already to gray hairs, far on in life.

Could such a good example miss effect ?

Why fix foot, stand so, staring at the house,

Why not go in, as that wise kinsman would ? 1620

" Oh that arrangement of the house I know !

How can I enter, how inhabit thee

Now that one cast of fortune changes all ?

Oh me, for much divides the then from now !

Then — with those pine-tree torches, Pelian pomp 162.5

And marriage-hymns, I entered, holding high

The hand of my dear wife ; while many-voiced

The revelry that followed me and her

That 's dead now, — friends felicitating both,

As who were lofty-lineaged, each of us leso

Born of the best, two wedded and made one ;

Now — wail is wedding-chant's antagonist,

And, for white peplos, stoles in sable state

Herald my way to the deserted couch ! "

1 Verses 1609-1G19 are a paraphrase.