Page:The poems of Edmund Clarence Stedman, 1908.djvu/262

POEMS OF GREECE Round me were slain off-hand, like white-toothed swine that are slaughtered

Thus, when some lordly man, abounding in power and riches,

Orders a wedding-feast, or a frolic, or mighty carousal.

Thou indeed hast witnessed the slaughter of numberless heroes

Massacred, one by one, in the battle's heat; but with pity

All thy heart had been full, if thou hadst seen what I tell thee,—

How in the hall we lay among the wine-jars, and under

Tables laden with food; and how the pavement, on all sides,

Swam with blood! And I heard the dolorous cry of Kassandra,

Priam's daughter, whom treacherous Klytaimnestra anear me

Slew; and upon the ground I fell in my death-throes, vainly

Reaching out hands to my sword, while the shameless woman departed,

Nor did she even stay to press her hands on my eyelids,

No, nor to close my mouth, although I was passing to Hades.

O, there is naught more dire, more insolent than a woman

After the very thought of deeds like these has possessed her,—

One who would dare to devise an act so utterly shameless,

Lying in wait to slay her wedded lord. I bethought me,

Verily, home to my children and servants giving me welcome

Safe to return; but she has wrought for herself confusion,

Plotting these grievous woes, and for other women hereafter,

Even for those, in sooth, whose thoughts are set upon goodness."

Thus he spake, and I, in turn replying, adressed him:

"Heavens! how from the first has Zeus the thunderer hated, 232