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220 With sorrow's pain, and now

Their children's strife no more may be appeased

By kindly intercourse.

Elcctra, left alone,

Sails on a troubled sea,

Still wailing evermore, with piteous cry,

The father whom she loved,

Like nightingale whose song is fraught with woe,

Nor has she any shrinking fear of death,

Ready to close her eyes

In darkness as of night,

If only she the Erinnys pair destroy.

Who lives there true in soul

To noble stock as she?

None of the great and good

Would lose his ancient name,

And stain his glory by a wretched life.

So thou, my child, my child, did'st choose the fate.

The fate which all bewail,

And, having warred with ill,

Did'st gain, in one brief word,

The good report of daughter wise and best.

May'st thou, in might and wealth,

Prevail o'er those thy foes,

As much as now thou liv'st beneath their hands;

For I have found thee, not in high estate

Wending thy way, yet still,

In love and fear of Zeus,

Gaining the foremost prize

In all the laws that best and greatest are.