Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1898) v3.djvu/278

250 Where from throats of the swans to the Muses upwelleth

Song-service still.

O tears on my cheeks that as fountains plashing

Were rained that day,

When I sailed, from our towers that in ruin were crashing,

In our galleys, the prey

Of the oars of the foe, of the spears that had caught me,

And for gold in the balances weighed men bought me,

And unto a barbarous home they brought me,

To the handmaid-array

Of Atreides' daughter, who sacrificeth

To the Huntress-queen

On the altars whence reek of the slain Greeks riseth!

Ah, the man that hath seen

Bliss never, full gladly his lot would I borrow!

For he faints not 'neath ills, who was cradled in sorrow;

On his night of affliction may dawn bright morrow:

But whom ruin, in happiness ambushed, surpriseth,

Ah, their stroke smiteth keen!

And the fifty oars shall dip of the Argive gallant ship

That shall waft thee to the homeland shore;

And the waxèd pipe shall ring of the mountain Shepherd-king

To enkindle them that tug the strenuous oar;

And the Seer shall wing their fleetness, even Phœbus, by the sweetness

Of the seven-stringed lyre in his hand;