Page:Tragedies of Seneca (1907) Miller.djvu/73



Oedipus [to Antigone, who has followed him into exile]: O thou, who guid'st thy blinded father's steps, Sole comfort of my weary heart, my child, Begotten at such heavy cost to me, Leave thou the unpropitious way I tread. Why shouldst thou seek to lead my feet aright Which fain would wander? Let me stumble on. Far better shall I find my way, alone, The path that from the miseries of life Shall take me, and the face of heaven and earth Free from the sight of this ill-omened head. hand of mine, how little hast thou done! For, though I do not see the light of day Which looked upon my crime, still am I seen. Unclasp thy clinging hand from mine; permit My sightless feet to wander where they will. I go, I go where my Cithaeron lifts His rugged crags on high; where to his dogs Actaeon, speeding through the rocky ways, Became a booty strange and pitiful; Where through the dim old woods and dusky glades, By Bacchic frenzy fired, the mother wild Her sisters led, rejoicing in the crime, When on the waving thyrsus' point she bore The gory head of Pentheus; where the bull Of Zethus rushed along, the mangled corpse Of Dirce dragging (through the thorny briars The mad beast's flight was traceable in blood); Or where the cliff of Ino lifts its head High o'er the heaving sea, into whose depths The mother leaped, fleeing an unknown crime, Yet daring other crime, by terror driven To sink her son with her beneath the waves. Oh, happy they whose better fortune gave Mothers like these! There is another place