Page:Tragedies of Sophocles (Plumptre 1878).djvu/453

355 Neop. Dead is he, not by any man shot down,

But by a God,—by Phœbos, as they say.

Phil. Well, noble He that slew, and he that fell;

And I, my son, am much in doubt, if first

To ask thy sufferings, or to mourn for him.

Neop. Thine own misfortunes are enough, I trow;

Thou need'st not sorrow o'er thy neighbour's lot.

Phil. Thou sayest well, and therefore tell again

That business in the which they outraged thee.

Neop. There came for me in ship all gaily decked,

High-born Odysseus, and my father's friend,

Who reared his youth, and said, or true or false,

That since my father's death none else but me

Might take the Towers. And so with words like these,

Ο stranger, no long time they kept me there

From sailing quickly; chiefly in my love,

My longing love for him who lay there dead,

That I might see him yet unsepulchred,

For never had I known him. Next to this,

Promise full fair there was that I should go,

And take the Towers that over Troïa hang.

And as I sailed our second morning's voyage,

With prospering oar Sigeion's shore I reached,

Full bitter to me; and forthwith the host,

All standing round, with one voice greeted me,

E'en as I landed, swearing that they saw

Achilles who was gone, alive again;

He then lay there, and I, poor hapless boy,

Wept over him, and not long after went

To those Atreidæ as my friends, (for so