Page:The Dramas of Aeschylus (Swanwick).djvu/120

50 To save her sacred wall!

But cure was none: she perished; vain the toil!

I too, soul-kindled, soon shall press the soil.

This tallies with thy former strain;

Sure some ill demon smites thy brain,

And falling on thee moves thee thus to tell

In piteous chant thy doleful pain.

The end I cannot spell.

In sooth the oracle no more shall peer

Forth from a veil, like newly wedded bride;

But flushing on the soul, like wind that blows

Sunward, it dasheth 'gainst the orient beams

A mighty surge that doth this grief o'ertop.

No more through dark enigmas will I teach!

And bear me witness, how in eager chase

The track I scent of crimes wrought long ago.

For from this roof departeth never more

A choir, concordant but unmusical,

To evil tuned. Ay, drunk with human blood,

And by the draught made bold, within these halls

Abides a rout, not easy to eject,

Of sister Furies; lodged within these walls

They chant in chorus the primeval curse.

Hostile to him his brother's couch who trod,

In turn they tell their loathing. Have I missed,

Or, like true archer, have I hit the mark?

Or strolling cheat, or lying prophet am I?