Page:The Dramas of Aeschylus (Swanwick).djvu/178

108 "If that Ægisthos knoweth, being at home,

Why 'gainst the suppliant doth he shut the door?"

Then if the threshold of the gates I cross,

And him discover on my father's seat,—

Or should he meet me face to face, and set

His eyes on me, ere he can speak the word,

"Whence is this stranger?"—I will lay him dead,

Spitting his body round my nimble steel.

The Fury thus, of gore insatiate,

Shall blood untempered quaff, third, crowning draught.

[To.

Go thou,—keep watchful guard within the house,

That all, well ordered, fitly may combine.

[To the Chorus.

To you a tongue of wisdom I commend,

To speak in season, or from speech refrain.—

[To.

And for the rest let this man look to it,

When in the strife of swords this arm hath won.

Full many a horror drear

And ghastly, Earth doth rear;—

With direful monsters teems encircling Ocean;

Meteors, with threatening sheen,

Hang heaven and earth between;—

The tempest's wrath still raves with wild commotion;

These, and dire wingèd things, and things that crawl,

Thou mayst describe them all.