Page:Tragedies of Sophocles (Plumptre 1878).djvu/406

308 Aias. I praise thy deed, and prudence which thou showed'st.

Tec. What service then could I next render thee?

Aias. Give me to speak with him, and look on him.

Tec. He is hard by, in our attendants' care.

Aias. Why this delay? Why comes he not at once?

Tec. Ho, boy! Thy father calls. Come hither, thou,

Who chancest now to guide him with thy hands.

Aias. Speak'st thou to one who comes, or fails to hear?

Tec. Behold, this servant brings him in to thee.

Aias. Lift him, then, lift him here. He will not shrink,

Beholding all this slaughter newly wrought,

If he be rightly named his father's son:

But we to these his father's savage ways

Must break him in, and make him like in soul.

Ο boy, may'st thou be happier than thy sire,

In all things else be like him. And not bad

Would'st thou be then. And yet thy lot e'en now

Doth move my envy, that thou feelest nought

Of all these evils. Sweetest life is found

In those unconscious years ere yet thou know

Or joy or sorrow. When thou com'st to this,

Then thou must show thy breeding to thy foes,

What son of what a father: but till then,

In gentle breezes grow, and rear thy life

A joy to this thy mother. And I know

That none of all the Achæan host will dare

Insult thee with foul scorn, though I be gone;

Such a stout guardian will I leave for thee

In Teucros, still unsparing for thy need,

Though now far off he hunts our enemies.

And ye, who bear the shield, my sailor band,