Page:Tragedies of Sophocles (Plumptre 1878).djvu/129

Rh And that old man himself; and then in rage

I strike the driver, who had turned me back.

And when the old man sees it, watching me

As by the chariot-side I passed, he struck

My forehead with a double-pointed goad.

But we were more than quits, for in a trice

With this right hand I struck him with my staff,

And he rolls backward from his chariot's seat.

And then I slay them all. And if it chance

That Laios and this stranger are akin,

What man more wretched than this man who speaks?

What man more harassed by the vexing Gods?

He whom none now, or alien, or of Thebes,

May welcome to their house, or speak to him,

But thrust him forth an exile. And 'twas I,

None other, who against myself proclaimed

These curses. And the bed of him that died

I with my hands, by which he fell, defile.

Am I not born to evil, all unclean?

If I must flee, yet still in flight my doom

Is never more to see the friends I love,

Nor tread my country's soil; or else to bear

The guilt of incest, and my father slay,

Yea, Polybos, who begat and brought me up.

Would not a man say right who said that here

Some cruel God was pressing hard on me?

Not that, not that, at least, thou Presence, pure

And awful, of the Gods; may I ne'er look

On such a day as that, but far away

Depart unseen from all the haunts of men,

Before such great pollution comes on me.

Chorus. We, too, Ο king, are grieved, yet hope thou on,

Till thou hast asked the man who then was by.