Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1898) v3.djvu/108

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Weeping and wailing, that all of her coming were ware,

Hasted she. Unto her children she bare, O she bare

Sacredest breasts of a mother with suppliant prayer.

And she found her sons at Electra's portal,

In the mead with the clover fair,

Closing with spears in the combat mortal:

As lions that strive in their lair

They grappled, with falchions ruthless-gashing:

Yea, now the oblation of death fell plashing

Which Ares giveth when Hades the spoil will share.

And she snatched from the dead, and the bronze-hammered blade through her bosom she thrust;

And in grief for her children, enclasping her children, she fell in the dust.

Lo, all the griefs of our line, one marshalled array,

Have been gathered, O father, against our house this day

Of the God in whose hands their accomplishment lay.

Many an ill to Oedipus' house begins

This day. May happier life be yet in store!

Refrain laments: time is it we gave heed

To burial. Unto these words, Oedipus,

Hearken: thy son Eteokles gave me rule

O'er this land, making it a marriage-dower

To Haimon with thy child Antigonê.

Therefore thou mayest dwell therein no more;

For plainly spake Teiresias—never Thebes