Page:Modern Greek folklore and ancient Greek religion - a study in survivals.djvu/487

 Strong and terrible would be the oath even if the Alastores, whose wrath Medea thus defies, were gods or spirits; but the force and the horror are doubled, if the Alastores here are of the same order as those whom Jason names Miastores but a little later in the same drama, and if therefore among those Avengers, in whose name the murderous oath was sworn, were soon to be numbered those very children whom Medea loved best and yet bound herself to slay most foully.

The second passage occurs in Jason's outburst of fury against Medea when he first learns her crime. Tis thine Avenger whom the gods have let light on me; for truly thou didst slay thine own brother at his own hearth, or ever thou didst set foot in Argo's shapely hull .' Surely we are meant to understand that the dead Absyrtus is himself the Alastor—for one Alastor only is named this time, and that too as distinct from the gods ([Greek: theoi])—and that Jason diverted to himself a portion of the dead man's wrath by wedding the blood-guilty woman. Again then the interpretation of Alastor in the same sense in which, only a little later in the same scene, Miastor is undoubtedly employed is, if not necessary, yet vastly preferable.

To review here all the passages of Greek Tragedy in which the word may advantageously be so understood, when at the same time no single one of them constitutes a final proof of my view, would be to encumber this enquiry to no purpose; but I may perhaps be permitted to select one instance from a story of blood-guilt other than that of which Medea is the centre.

This shall be from that scene in the Hercules Furens in which the hero, sane now and overwhelmed with horror at the ghastly slaughter of his own children which in a moment of sudden madness he had wrought, receives from Theseus some measure of consolation and advice. Early in that colloquy, ere yet Theseus has had time to soothe the sufferings or to guide the course of his stricken friend, Heracles cries to him in bitterness of soul,

Theseus, hast view'd my triumph o'er my children?

and Theseus answers with gentle simplicity,

I heard, and now I see the woes thou showst me.