The Trojan women of Euripides | Page 5

the Argives break Their camp for sailing!
HECUBA.
Ah, not Cassandra! Wake not her Whom God hath maddened, lest the foe Mock at her dreaming. Leave me clear From that one edge of woe. O Troy, my Troy, thou diest here Most lonely; and most lonely we The living wander forth from thee, And the dead leave thee wailing!
[One of the huts on the left is now open, and the rest of the CHORUS come out severally. Their number eventually amounts to fifteen.
FOURTH WOMAN.
[Antistrophe I.
Out of the tent of the Greek king I steal, my Queen, with trembling breath: What means thy call? Not death; not death! They would not slay so low a thing!
FIFTH WOMAN.
O, 'tis the ship-folk crying To deck the galleys: and we part, we part!
HECUBA.
Nay, daughter: take the morning to thine heart.
FIFTH WOMAN.
My heart with dread is dying!
SIXTH WOMAN.
An herald from the Greek hath come!
FIFTH WOMAN.
How have they cast me, and to whom A bondmaid?
HECUBA.
Peace, child: wait thy doom. Our lots are near the trying.
FOURTH WOMAN.
Argos, belike, or Phthia shall it be, Or some lone island of the tossing sea, Far, far from Troy?
HECUBA.
And I the agèd, where go I, A winter-frozen bee, a slave Death-shapen, as the stones that lie Hewn on a dead man's grave: The children of mine enemy To foster, or keep watch before The threshold of a master's door, I that was Queen in Troy!
A WOMAN TO ANOTHER.
[Strophe 2.
And thou, what tears can tell thy doom?
THE OTHER.
The shuttle still shall flit and change Beneath my fingers, but the loom, Sister, be strange.
ANOTHER (wildly).
Look, my dead child! My child, my love, The last look....
ANOTHER.
Oh, there cometh worse. A Greek's bed in the dark....
ANOTHER.
God curse That night and all the powers thereof!
ANOTHER.
Or pitchers to and fro to bear To some Pirênê[12] on the hill, Where the proud water craveth still Its broken-hearted minister.
ANOTHER.
God guide me yet to Theseus' land[13], The gentle land, the famed afar....
ANOTHER.
But not the hungry foam--Ah, never!-- Of fierce Eurotas, Helen's river, To bow to Menelaus' hand, That wasted Troy with war!
A WOMAN.
[Antistrophe 2.
They told us of a land high-born, Where glimmers round Olympus' roots A lordly river, red with corn And burdened fruits.
ANOTHER.
Aye, that were next in my desire To Athens, where good spirits dwell....
ANOTHER.
Or Aetna's breast, the deeps of fire That front the Tyrian's Citadel: First mother, she, of Sicily And mighty mountains: fame hath told Their crowns of goodness manifold....
ANOTHER.
And, close beyond the narrowing sea, A sister land, where float enchanted Ionian summits, wave on wave, And Crathis of the burning tresses Makes red the happy vale, and blesses With gold of fountains spirit-haunted Homes of true men and brave!
LEADER.
But lo, who cometh: and his lips Grave with the weight of dooms unknown: A Herald from the Grecian ships. Swift comes he, hot-foot to be done And finished. Ah, what bringeth he Of news or judgment? Slaves are we, Spoils that the Greek hath won!
[TALTHYBIUS[14], followed by some Soldiers, enters from the left.
TALTHYBIUS.
Thou know'st me, Hecuba. Often have I crossed Thy plain with tidings from the Hellene host. 'Tis I, Talthybius.... Nay, of ancient use Thou know'st me. And I come to bear thee news.
HECUBA.
Ah me, 'tis here, 'tis here, Women of Troy, our long embosomed fear!
TALTHYBIUS.
The lots are cast, if that it was ye feared.
HECUBA.
What lord, what land.... Ah me, Phthia or Thebes, or sea-worn Thessaly?
TALTHYBIUS.
Each hath her own. Ye go not in one herd.
HECUBA.
Say then what lot hath any? What of joy Falls, or can fall on any child of Troy?
TALTHYBIUS.
I know: but make thy questions severally.
HECUBA.
My stricken one must be Still first. Say how Cassandra's portion lies.
TALTHYBIUS.
Chosen from all for Agamemnon's prize!
HECUBA.
How, for his Spartan bride A tirewoman? For Helen's sister's pride?
TALTHYBIUS.
Nay, nay: a bride herself, for the King's bed.
HECUBA.
The sainted of Apollo? And her own Prize that God promised Out of the golden clouds, her virgin crown?...
TALTHYBIUS.
He loved her for that same strange holiness.
HECUBA.
Daughter, away, away, Cast all away, The haunted Keys[15], the lonely stole's array That kept thy body like a sacred place!
TALTHYBIUS.
Is't not rare fortune that the King hath smiled On such a maid?
HECUBA.
What of that other child Ye reft from me but now?
TALTHYBIUS (speaking with some constraint).
Polyxena? Or what child meanest thou?
HECUBA.
The same. What man now hath her, or what doom?
TALTHYBIUS.
She rests apart, to watch Achilles' tomb.
HECUBA.
To watch a tomb? My daughter? What is this?... Speak, Friend? What fashion of the laws of Greece?
TALTHYBIUS.
Count thy maid happy! She hath naught of ill To fear....
HECUBA.
What meanest thou? She liveth still?
TALTHYBIUS.
I mean, she hath one toil[16] that holds her free From all toil else.
HECUBA.
What of Andromache, Wife of mine iron-hearted Hector, where Journeyeth she?
TALTHYBIUS.
Pyrrhus, Achilles' son, hath taken her.
HECUBA.
And I, whose slave am I, The shaken head, the arm that creepeth by, Staff-crutchèd, like to fall?
TALTHYBIUS.
Odysseus[17], Ithaca's king, hath thee for thrall.
HECUBA.
Beat, beat the