Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1898) v3.djvu/223



Enter from temple Iphigeneia.

, the son of Tantalus, with fleet steeds

To Pisa came, and won Oenomaus' child:

Atreus she bare; of him Menelaus sprang

And Agamemnon, born of whom was I,

Iphigeneia, Tyndareus' daughter's babe.

Me, by the eddies that with ceaseless gusts

Euripus shifteth, rolling his dark surge,

My sire slew—as he thinks—for Helen's sake

To Artemis, in Aulis' clefts renowned.

For king Agamemnon drew together there

The Hellenic armament, a thousand ships,

Fain that Achaia should from Ilium win

Fair victory's crown, and Helen's outraged bed

Avenge—all this for Menelaus' sake.

But, in that dead calm and despair of winds,

To altar-flames he turned, and Kalchas spake:

"Thou captain of this battle-host of Greece,

Agamemnon, thou shalt sail not from the land