Page:Sophocles - Seven Plays, 1900.djvu/70

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. See, from the palace cometh close to us

Creon’s unhappy wife, Eurydicè.

Is it by chance, or heard she of her son?

. Ye men of Thebes, the tidings met mine ear

As I was coming forth to visit Pallas

With prayerful salutation. I was loosening

The bar of the closed gate, when the sharp sound

Of mine own sorrow smote against my heart,

And I fell back astonied on my maids

And fainted. But the tale? tell me once more;

I am no novice in adversity.

. Dear lady, I will tell thee what I saw,

And hide no grain of truth: why should I soothe

Thy spirit with soft tales, when the harsh fact

Must prove me a liar? Truth is always best.

I duly led the footsteps of thy lord

To the highest point of the plain, where still was lying,

Forlorn and mangled by the dogs, the corse

Of Polynices. We besought Persephonè

And Pluto gently to restrain their wrath,

And wash’d him pure and clean, and then we burned

The poor remains with brushwood freshly pulled,

And heaped a lofty mound of his own earth

Above him. Then we turned us to the vault,

The maiden’s stony bride-chamber of death.

And from afar, round the unhallowed cell,

One heard a voice of wailing loud and long,

And went and told his lord: who coming near

Was haunted by the dim and bitter cry,

And suddenly exclaiming on his fate

Said lamentably, ‘My prophetic heart

Divined aright. I am going, of all ways

That e’er I went, the unhappiest to-day.

My son’s voice smites me. Go, my men, approach

With speed, and, where the stones are torn away,

Press through the passage to that door of death,

Look hard, and tell me, if I hear aright