Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1898) v3.djvu/406

378 Ino, Agavê, who bare me to Echion,

Autonoê withal, Aktaion's mother.

In toils of iron trapped, full soon shall they

Cease from this pestilent Bacchic revelling.

Men say a stranger to the land hath come,

A juggling sorcerer from Lydia-land,

With essenced hair in golden tresses tossed,

Wine-flushed, Love's witching graces in his eyes,

Who with the damsels day and night consorts,

Making pretence of Evian mysteries.

If I within these walls but prison him,

Farewell to thyrsus-taboring, and to locks

Free-tossed; for neck from shoulders will I hew.

He saith that Dionysus is a God!

Saith, he was once sewn up in Zeus's thigh—

Who, with his mother, was by lightning-flames

Blasted, because she lied of Zeus's love.

Is not this worthy hanging's awful doom,

Thus to blaspheme, whoe'er the stranger be?

But lo, another marvel this—the seer

Teiresias, in dappled fawnskins clad!

Yea, and my mother's sire—O sight for laughter!—

Tossing the reed-wand! Father, I take shame

Beholding these grey hairs so sense-bereft.

Fling off the ivy; let the thyrsus fall,

And set thine hand free, O my mother's sire.

Thou didst, Teiresias, draw him on to this:

'Tis thou wouldst foist this new God upon men