Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1894) v1.djvu/260

224 Hiding what hidden from men's eyes should be.

But when she had spent her breath 'neath that death-stroke,

Each Argive 'gan his task—no man the same:

But some upon the dead were strawing leaves

Out of their hands, and some heap high the pyre,

Bringing pine-billets thither: whoso bare not

Heard such and such rebukes of him that bare:

"Dost stand still, basest heart, with nought in hand—

Robe for the maiden, neither ornament?

Nought wilt thou give to one in courage matchless,

Noblest of soul?"

Such is the tale I tell

Of thy dead child. Most blest in motherhood

I count thee of all women, and most hapless.

Dread bale on Priam's line and city hath poured

Its lava-flood:—'tis heaven's resistless doom.

Daughter, I know not on what ills to look,

So many throng me: if to this I turn,

That hindereth me: thence summoneth me again

Another grief, on-ushering ills on ills.

And now I cannot from my soul blot out

Thine agony, that I should wail it not.

Yet hast thou barred the worst, proclaimed to me

So noble. Lo, how strange, that evil soil

Heaven-blest with seasons fair, bears goodly crops,

While the good, if it faileth of its dues,

Gives evil fruit: but always among men

The caitiff nothing else than evil is,