Page:The Dramas of Aeschylus (Swanwick).djvu/461

Rh

Go quickly, lest harsh thunder's bray

With terror smite your soul.

In other style exhort and preach

If to persuade me thou art fain;

For all unbearable this speech

Which from thy lips hath burst amain.

How canst thou bid me consummate

A dastard's part? With him the worst

I'll brave, for I have learn'd to hate

Traitors, than whom no pest is more accursed.

Then my forewarnings mark, nor dare

When tangled in fell ruin's snare

Fortune to blame, nor ever say

That Zeus hath plunged you unaware

In doleful plight;—nay, truly nay,

But ye yourselves; for not untaught,

Not stealthily, by sudden blow,

Ye through sheer folly will be caught

In net of boundless woe.

And lo in act, in word no more,

Earth totters;—from below

Loud bellows the discordant roar

Of thunder; lightning's wreathèd glow

Blazes around me; dust elate

Rides on the whirlwind; forward leap