Page:Tragedies of Seneca (1907) Miller.djvu/271

Rh O wretched piety! O filial love! If now my mother's death I should prevent, I wrong my father; if I let her die, 'Gainst her I sin. Crime stands on either hand; Yet must I check her and true crime withstand.

Chorus: The sacred singer's word was true Which once on Thracian Rhodope, Orpheus, the heavenly Muse's son, Sang to his lute Pierian: That naught for endless life is made. At his sweet strains the rushing stream Its uproar stilled, and all its waves Paused in forgetfulness of flight; And while the waters stayed to hear, The tribes far down the Hebrus' stream Deemed that their river was no more. All wingéd creatures of the wood And e'en the woods themselves came near To listen; or, if far on high Some bird was wheeling through the air, To that sweet music swift he fell On drooping wings. The mountains came: Rough Athos with its Centaur herd, And Rhodope, its drifted snows Loosed by the magic of that song, Stood by to hear. The Dryads left The shelter of their oaken trunks And gathered round the tuneful bard. The beasts came, too, and with them came Their lairs; hard by the fearless flocks The tawny Afric lion crouched; The timid does feared not the wolves; And serpents crawled forth to the light, Their venom quite forgot. When through the doors of Taenara He made his way to the silent land, Sounding his mournful lyre the while, The glooms of Tartara were filled