Page:The Antigone of Sophocles (1911).djvu/58

54 They lead me hence, they lead me—nay,

Ye Theban princes!—Now away

They drag me to my doom, behold!

The only daughter of your old

And glorious house of kings, the last,

And in a dungeon to be cast,

Alone,—the only princess left

Of kindred and of aid bereft.

See, what I suffer at their hands

For doing what the law of holiness demands!

[Antigone is led off R. by the guards.

E’en thus did the beautiful Danaë

Endure to exchange the light of day

For a dwelling bound with brass,

And a prisoner in that grave-like room,

Though of noble birth, was she held, while as groom

To the bride did Zeus to her pass,

In a shower of golden rain his seed

Entrusted to her. Dread and mighty, indeed,

Is the baneful force of fate;

Neither wealth nor war nor towers strong

Nor wave-beaten ships by the winds swept along

Can deliver from powers so great.

And immured in a prison of stone, and tamed,

The king of Edonians, Quick-temper named,

Son or Dryas, the god Dionysus

Made atone for the taunt he in madness flung.

There the wrath in his heart, for his rashness of tongue,

Doth simmer down slow whence it rises.

He found too late ’t was a god had appeared

That with mocking tongue he rashly had jeered,

When the Mænads all frenzied, possessed

With the fire Bacchanalian, he began to abuse,

And stirred to fierce anger the flute-loving Muse—

Thus dearly he paid for his jest.