Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1896) v2.djvu/433

Rh

To Athens, glad to have 'scaped the underworld.

Come, children, follow to the house your sire;

For fairer to you is your entering-in

Than your outgoing. Nay then, pluck up heart,

And shed the tear-floods from your eyes no more;

And rally thou, my wife, thy fainting spirit:

From trembling cease: and ye, let go my cloak.

I am no winged thing, nor would I fly my friends.

Ha!

These let not go, but hang upon my cloak

Only the more! Was doom so imminent then?

E'en must I lead them clinging to mine hands,

As ship that tows her boats. Not I reject

Care of my sons. Men's hearts be all like-framed:

They love their babes, as well the nobler sort,

As they that are but naught. In wealth they differ;

These have, those lack: their children all men love.

[Exeunt Herakles, Amphitryon, Megara, and children.

Ah, sweet is youth!—but always eld,

On mine head weighing, downward drags,

A heavier load than lay the crags

Of Etna on the Titan quelled,

Muffling mine eyes in mantle-fold

Of gloom. Not mine be wealth that lies

In Asian tyrants' treasuries;

Not mine be halls of hoarded gold,

If forfeit youth for these must fleet—

Youth, fairest gem of high estate,