 | Iphigenia in Delphi |  |
7
Hermes
(conducting the Shade of Achilles).
How should the world's great edifice subsist,
But by appointed ministries of Gods,
Power multiplied, one Form of many names,
In heaven and hell and earth-embracing sea?
Therefore I, Hermes, have my rightful place,
And sway usurped not by another God,
But to myself peculiar, so that thou,
My glorious brother, Lord of light and song,
Phœbus, wert fain to invoke my ministry,
Saying, “O fleetest, from whose hands I erst
Received the lyre whose melody doth make
More godlike the festivity of Gods,
And whom for recompense I did equip
With the caduceus, by whose might thou art prince
And marshaller of all the airy shades,
8
Go, seek the realms by no celestial God
Traversed save thee, arising from the obscure
Of Stygian gulfs profoundest on the plain
Elysian, where the great Achilles pines.
Aye, pines, for well thou knowest that not amid
The sweetness of undying asphodel
Can rest the spirit of its right divine
Frustrate on earth and in Elysium.
And therefore hath he ever sat apart,
Moody and undelighted to converse
With them who won the Fleece, or whom the plain
Of Thebes entombed, or himself with strenuous arm
Slew or avenged around the ramparts vast
Immortals laboured for Laomedon.
Nay, but he shuns Patroclus! Even for this,
That she, at whose behest the night is clear
Or dim with her pure emblem's wax or wane,
Artemis, my chaste sister, bore away
Iphigenia, daughter of the King
Of Argolis, from all the flowery troops
Of Grecian maids elected for his bride.
But I, remembering how Achilles forced
9
Chryseis to her sire, priest of my shrine
Sminthian, thus to stay the ravage of shafts
Dreadfully speeding from my silver bow;
Have pity on him, decreeing that this day,
Here in this Delphian sanctuary, where most
Divine is breathed my oracular might, before
The starry sequence of nocturnal hours,
Iphigenia shall be his again.
But go, the rest shall be a care to me.”
Therefore I went, and with the heroic birth
Of Thetis silver-footed have returned;
Giving him once again to see the sun;
And Æther, milk of life to mortal men
To quaff well-pleased; in these omniscient halls
Hovering a shade all-seeing and unseen;
And, witting of the issue, not the way,
To wait on destiny's accomplishment,
Expectant, yet, as suits the scholar of Death,
Serene in observation unperturbed,
Knowing that nought is done without the Gods,
And knowing that the Gods do all things well.
[They disappear. Iphigenia and the Attendant come forward.
Attendant.
Bethink thee, princess, of the Aulian fane,
10
Didst sob a helpless girl, whose limbs relaxed
Rough hands sustained; and with thy hair drawn back
Another's hand entwined, exposing all
The agonising neck to the bare knife,—
When lo! a Voice, and in thy place a hind!
Shall not the Gods who guarded then guard now?
Iphigenia.
They saved me haply for Orestes' sake.
Who seeks the fallen blossom when the fruit
It heralded hangs ripe in rounded gold?
Attendant.
Seest thou, then, peril, or the sign of it?
Iphigenia.
No more than when I went to wed Pelides,
Or wove the fillet for Orestes' head!
The Immortals need not, when they launch their shafts,
The ambush of a cloud.
Attendant.
A pair divine,
Apollo, I have heard, and Artemis,
Erst with avenging arrows smote and slew
Her progeny, who with irreverent speech
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On Sipylos, distilling clammy tears;
But neither priestess unto Artemis
Was Niobe, nor have I ever heard
Iphigenia wrong with lip unschooled
The Gods, unless in deeming them to make
No difference 'twixt the sinner and the just.
Iphigenia.
Am I not then a sinner, who have fled
Artemis' altars, I her minister?
And robbed her of her sacrifice, and snatched
Her image away, and made her fane a void?
Attendant.
Nay, verily, for thou hast given her Greece!
Free offerings for servile, lyres for drums,
And cheerful rites for savage butcheries.
Iphigenia.
It may be so, and yet will I beseech
Apollo, lest an evil come of it.
O Phœbus, is it not an augury
Of good, that Fate hath led me to thy shrine
Whom most of all the Gods I should implore?
For, when division anciently was made
Above, and each Immortal took his own,
'Twas given to thee to be our human kind's
Enlightener and healing comforter.
12
Is splendid, and the drowsy hand resumes
The necessary task; thou signallest,
And incense straight goes up to all the Gods.
Thou measurest the year, the earth is drest
By thee in all her seasonable garbs;
Yea, even thy departing beam inflames
Innumerable lights, the moon walks forth
Clad in the pure redundance of thy ray.
By thee the herbage prospers, and the trees,
And herds, and flocks thyself hast shepherded,
Serving the throne Thessalian. In thy name
Men rear the citied homes of wealth and law,
And walls rise high with battlements and towers.
Moreover thou by wisest oracles
Dost make the future present, and hast found
Medicine, leniment of corporal pangs,
And Music, the assuager of the soul.
And, taught of thee, the sacred minstrels sing
Civility, and pious rites, and love,
And all that makes man loveable to man.
Needs must thou then hate all barbarity,
All jealousy and jarring dissonance,
All blood and vengeance, all the cloud of grief
That folds a kinsman for a kinsman slain.
13
Thy face erewhile in Argolis, and make
Thy radiant car invisible, and all
The earth a darkness, when my grandsire—O
The horror, and the fortune of our house!
O be it spent! and may a younger race
Entreat thee for an unwithholden boon!
I plead not my own woes. I do not urge
The Aulian altar or the Scythian years,
Or even remind thee how thou promised'st
Orestes lustral purity, and peace
From madness, and proclaim that it befits
The God to keep the promise of the God.
But rather would I say, with simple speech,
I have a brother, thou a sister, God!
Artemis, huntress virginal, whose car
Is glory of lone night, as thine of day.
If thou lov'st her as I Orestes (else
Thou God wert less than man, since well 'tis sung,
Divine and human needs must love alike,
The human being divine oppressed with bonds,
Divine the human in glad liberty),
Then, I adjure thee, aid him! set him free
From spasm and panic, lead him to his throne
Ancestral, granting me to sit with him
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And with us she who saved him, greatly took
The stain of half his fault, my sister dear
Electra, whom not having seen I love.
Attendant.
O princess, be it to thy brother and thee
Even as thou desirest from the God!
[Electra, carrying an axe, appears at the entrance to the temple. Iphigenia and the Attendant withdraw towards the back of the scenes.]
Electra.
O thou earth-centre where in olden time
Met the strong eagle-twain dismissed by Zeus,
This from the east, that from the western verge:
Altar, what suppliant hails thee with a heart
Grateful as mine? For as one grasps a plank,
Sole stable thing in the dissolving sea,
Clasped thee Orestes; at thy precinct fell
His frenzy from his soul, before thee paused
With grinded teeth the baffled dogs of hell.
And now would I make question—
[Iphigenia comes forward.]
But methinks
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Or bore this form of aspect blanched and mild
Quiver or crescent, she were deemed of me
Thy statue, animate, unpedestalled.
Iphigenia.
Surely she is the daughter of a king!
Electra.
What if she be the fateful Pythia's self?
Iphigenia.
My heart to hers cries inarticulately.
Electra.
The tongue my love would loose, my awe restrains.
Iphigenia.
Yet why do I delay to question her?—
Thou stately one, art thou, then, sprung from Troy?
Electra.
Ill greet'st thou me with an abhorrèd word.
Iphigenia.
Thou look'st so noble and so sorrowful.
Electra.
What, then? Delay not to unfold thy thought.
Iphigenia.
I deemed that haply in captivity—
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O enviable to mine the captive's lot!
Iphigenia.
Hath Ilion wrought thee, then, such wretched doom?
Electra.
Sire, sister, mother, brother, all she took.
Iphigenia.
Thou speak'st an unintelligible word.
Electra.
Wherefore? How is my speech incredible?
Iphigenia.
Fathers may fall, fighting in Ares' fields—
Electra.
Mine sought the Styx by a more dismal road.
Iphigenia.
But sisters, mothers, how shall these be slain?
Electra.
Forbear, thrust not thy fingers in my wounds.
Iphigenia.
Forgive me; I have known wounds' anguish, too.
Electra.
Unfortunate, what, then, hath been thy pang?
17
The captive's doom thou deemest enviable.
Electra.
O were it mine, were but my brother safe!
Iphigenia.
Thou hast a brother, then. What fate is his?
Electra.
'Twere best he weltered on the uneasy main.
Iphigenia.
O miserable, if this indeed the best!
Electra.
Else much I fear his limbs, repast of kites—
Iphigenia.
Lie unentombed on some barbaric strand?
Electra.
Where never shall a sister bury them.
Iphigenia.
I pray the Gods to send ye happier doom.
Electra.
Why weepest thou? Thou hast a brother, then?
Iphigenia.
Whose presence every instant I await.
Electra.
O happy thou! What need of further bliss!
But I have come to entreat the God for mine.
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Then will I leave thee, deeming not the God
Demands a listener at his conference;
And only say, may he be favourable!
[Iphigenia retires; Electra lays the axe on the altar.
Detested instrument of infamy!
Well pleased, I lay thee now where ne'er shall man
Uplift thee for our misery again.
Another word was mine, O axe, what time
I gave thee to Orestes' hand, and said,
“Seest thou this rust? It is thy father's blood,
Till thou efface it with another stain.”
And now it is my mother's; and whose next?
Knowest thou, Latona-born, prophetic God?
Ah me! how I mistrust thy oracle,
Which said to Agamemnon's son, “Go forth,
And, where the inhospitable billow beats
Sullen on Tauris, and a bloody steam
Wavers around the effigy severe
Of Artemis, my sister, do thou seize
That image, hither bear it, and have rest.”
Gladly he heard, and his sea-cleaving bark
Equipped with mast, and sail, and oar, and bench
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Glowed ardour like a racer's when he sees
Near and more near the distinguishable goal.
And I beside the billow stood, and waved
My veil, while mist, born spray-like from the bright
Wild fluctuation of my smiles and tears,
Concealed the diminution of his sails.
But, Phœbus, morn by morn thou issuest forth,
A splendour pacing in four-steeded car,
With light displaying nothing that I love,
And warmth that cannot dry a tear of mine.
And eve by eve thou duly dost commit
Thy chariot to thy Hour, whose silvery star
Smiles on thy forfeit pledge—and thou a God!
Yet, haply, thou wert true to happier men;
But our sad house, the refuge of all crime,
Where son with mother wars, with husband wife,
Brother with brother; wherefore should the Gods
Deal with us as we deal not with ourselves?
Ah me!
Orestes, is my anguish all my own?
If, as I trust, thy effort hath prevailed
To win the statue, and thou bear'st it home
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“How shall one subtly, with ambiguous speech,
Prepare Electra, lest she die of joy?”
Or if, alas! alas! thou hast stood forlorn
For slaughter in that fane, was then thy thought,
“Alas, for my Electra when she hears!”?
Indeed I know not, but too well I know
Sooner a girl shall slay a weaponed man
Than man love woman with a woman's love.
Eurycles
(entering the temple).
Daughter of Agamemnon, turn and hear
A heavy word from a reluctant tongue.
Electra.
Who art thou, man? whence sent? what thing to tell?
Eurycles.
One of Orestes' comrades, bound with him
To Scythia—bound without him back to Greece.
Electra.
Without! without! thou darest not to call Orestes dead!
Eurycles.
I have not seen him die.
21
Then animate? Thou darest to be mute!
Eurycles.
O princess, listen only to my tale,
And I will tell thee truly all I know.
Electra.
Speak quickly, while I yet have life to hear.
Eurycles.
Long did the north wind baffle, but at length
We gained the coast of massacre, and found
A cave low-arched, wave-whispering at its mouth,
But vaulted loftily within, and dry.
Therein we entered, and with food and drink
Refreshed ourselves; and then Orestes spake,
“Rest here, my friends, while Pylades with me
Goes forth to explore this region what it is,
And how the Goddess' image may be won.”
And so they parted, venturous; but the hours
Wore on; nor came there any sign from them.
Then took we counsel, and cast forth a lot
For perquisition, and it fell on me.
Then went I forth, and found an open space
Before a moated city, and in it
Pylades and thy brother standing bound;
22
With blood and dust, and from the brow of each
Oozed the thick sullen droppings, and I judged
Our friends the booty of a multitude,
Beset by rustics armed with clubs and stones,
And turned me round to fly, but as I turned
Came forth a wondrous woman tall and fair,
Grecian in aspect, in a Grecian garb
Draping her stateliness symmetrical.
And truly I had deemed her Artemis;
But that, the while she approached and shore a lock
From either captive, thundering pealed acclaim
Exultant from the barbarous multitude,
“The priestess, who shall give the men to death!”
I turned and fled, and flying saw her still.
And hastening to our ambush I called forth
My comrades to the rescue, but alas!
One said, How shall we brave a host in arms?
And one, The slaughter is performed ere this.
And one, The Pythian but fulfils his pledge,
What peace is peaceful as the peace of death?
23
So rigidly with thy dismaying eyes!
For verily, had I prevailed, thou hadst heard
Thy brother's fortunes from thy brother's lips,
Or never from the lips of any man.
Electra.
I hate thee not, but get thee from my sight.
Eurycles.
I go as thou commandest, yet not far;
Full surely thou wilt soon have need of me.
[Goes out.
Electra.
Now see I all the blindness of our race,
Now see I all the malice of the Gods.
O my Orestes! O my brother! now
A mangled victim! who could e'er conceive
The time to have been when thou didst come a swift
Avenger, terrible and beautiful,
Yet cloaked with craft, unrecognisable,
Bearing the urn thou feignd'st to contain thy dust?
And I believed, and took it to my arms,
And wept such tears as I am shedding now,
But then did never deem to shed again;
Till thy dear heart was melted, and thy arms
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“Believe it not, Electra, but believe
Thou clasp'st the living brother, not the dead,”
Who had not deemed me mad had I rejoined,
“I would, Orestes, that the tale were true...
Yet, had it been true, then hadst thou obtained
Decorous rites of sepulture most meet,
Paid by a kindred hand, thy sister had warmed
Thy chill ash for a little with her breast,
And then avenged it. Yea, this hand had reeked
And dripped with the adulterous blood, thou pure,
And I sole quarry of the hounds of hell.”
Ah me! the gladness I was glad to lose!
What sudden thought grasps and enkindles me?
The wheel of circumstance brings all things back.
Again thou diest, my brother, and again
My vengeance lives. Alas! I cannot go,
And with this hatchet cleave thy hateful head,
25
Vassal of Artemis. But thou, false God,
Smooth murderer with ambiguous oracles,
Thou art not safe as thou esteem'st thyself.
Look down, and thou shalt see to what a deed
A desperate heart can prompt a daring hand.
Forsake thy nectared and ambrosial feast,
And save thy shrine, if thou art indeed a God!
[Snatches a brand from the altar.
Iphigenia
(entering).
Ha, wretched, what art doing with that brand?
Electra.
I fire the fane of a deceitful God.
Iphigenia.
Nay, truly, if this hand can hinder thee.
Electra.
Thou would'st then rather I should burn thy eyes!
Iphigenia.
Apollo will protect his combatant.
Electra.
Ah me! the brand is caught out from my grasp.
Iphigenia.
Thou seest, the weak are strong by piety.
26
O miserable slave of the Unjust!
May these requite thee, abject, with the doom
Bestowed by them upon the brave and free!
Thou hast a brother?—may'st thou see him die!
A sister?—may'st thou slay her with thy hand!
Iphigenia.
Curse, frantic, with a curse I do not heed;
For surely thou art crazed with wretchedness.
Electra.
O maiden, as a mother who has lost
Daughter or son, clasps the insensible urn,
And fondles it, and feigns it is her child—
So thee, though thou art colder than an urn,
Yet will I feign another, and will make
Thee umpire of my quarrel with the Gods.
I had, alas! alas! a brother; his name
Thou knowest not, nor shalt. Suffice, he turned
Hither, inquiring of his death or life.
Now, had the God said “death,” who would have blamed?
But it was little for my brother to die,
Unless the Gods could have their sport with him,
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He went to find it, and he found the grave.
Now, if I stood and railed, the God would say,
“What rest so deep as the grave's quietude?”
O base, contemptible, and lying God!
I see thou chokest with thy zeal to earn
The wages of thy supple abjectness.
Come, plead thy masters' cause, and be repaid
With some reward unenviable by me.
Iphigenia.
Alas! for all thy solemn hierarchy,
Olympus, and the Order that controls
The world, had Love dominion for an hour!
But this was craft and wisdom of the Gods,
That, knowing Love by nature masterful,
Inconstant, wilful, proud, tyrannical,
They compassed him with all fragility,
Set him at subtlest variance with himself,
Stronger than Change or Death, than Time that leaves
The storied bronze with unengraven front,
Yet weak as weakness' self; nor weak alone,
But without weakness inconceivable.
Say now we grant it were impossible
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Asking the God for him with thy wild voice?
Thou buyest not Love save with the anxious heart,
That quakes at what may happen—often must;
Else were thy love as empty as thy fear.
Electra.
Methinks I hear the main's inhabitant
Marvelling why the foolish seaman drowns.
Thy brother is alive, and mine is dead.
Iphigenia.
'Tis for that thing I pity thee, and now
Would offer thee a sister in his room.
Electra.
Thee for a sister, heartless! Say as soon
Artemis' image, or her cruel self;
Or even her satellite, the murderess.
Iphigenia.
Alas! thou knowest not what thou dost reject.
But why curse Artemis? 'tis her I serve.
Electra.
Thou servest Artemis! Had I but known!
Off! off! detested!
Iphigenia.
Whence this frantic rage?
29
Off! ere I smite thee! Thou my sister, thou!
Iphigenia.
Again I warn thee that thou dost reject,
Thou knowest not what. A sister's were a breast
Whereon to weep, venting in rainy tears
The fury thou amassest now in clouds,
And hurlest at the Gods in thunderbolts.
Electra.
Hear then, I had a sister, and have not.
Iphigenia.
Wretched, by what calamity deprived?
Electra.
A Mighty One (inquire not for her name)
Looked upon her, and thought—How beautiful!
Simple, and sweet, and innocent, and blithe
With buoyant life, yet must the virgin die,
For I have some strange pleasure in her death;
Wherefore she took the maid, and slaughtered her.
Iphigenia.
Thou talkest idly, grief hath turned thy brain.
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Is poured upon thee all from head to foot.
Electra.
Sister, ere me a victim of the Unjust,
Leave ghostly Acheron, if thou canst, awhile,
And see how thy beloved avenges thee!
(Snatches a brand from the altar.)
Iphigenia.
Madwoman cease! ah, me! help! rescue! help!
Eurycles
(running in).
What means this clamour and commotion?
(perceiving Iphigenia).
Gods!
Electra.
Thou palsiest me with look unspeakable.
Eurycles.
Behold thy brother's murderess!
Iphigenia.
I? I?
Eurycles.
The Scythian woman, vowed to Artemis!
Electra.
Kind Gods, I do not curse ye any more.
(Snatches the axe from the altar, and strikes Iphigenia.)
31
[Iphigenia falls.
O, drunkenness of joy!
Aye, moan. Thy moans are music to mine ears.
Orestes
(entering).
Eyes? what do ye behold?
Electra.
Orestes!
Eurycles.
Prince!
Electra.
O day of happiness! O crown of life!
Orestes! clasp—
Orestes.
Off! off! abominable!
O temple, fall upon us! bury us!
Electra! wretch detestable!
Iphigenia.
Electra!
Hasten and kiss me ere it be too late.
(Dies. Orestes throws himself upon the body.)
Eurycles.
The Gods be thanked, there yet is time to fly.
[Escapes.
Electra.
Orestes, to this sudden shock of joy
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Glad clamour in my bosom silences
All dissonancy, and I do not ask
How here? how sped? how saved? how taken for lost?
Or why thou spurnest my embrace, the while
Thou kneelest to caress a murderer.
Orestes
(not regarding Electra).
O speak, look, make some sign, or only breathe!
Electra.
How, when thou deign'st no look or word to me?
Orestes.
Thou slayest me, counterfeiting to be slain.
Electra.
Met ever brother with a greeting like this—
Orestes.
Woe! woe! it is most certain she is dead.
[Rising.
Peace, execrable, red with sister's blood!
Electra.
Orestes, thou art mad or mockest me.
What ravest thou of sisters and their blood?
Look upon me, thou hast no sister else.
33
Too true the word thou spakest then, accursed!
Yet rather say I have no sister at all,
For never will I hail thee sister more.
Electra.
Alas! alas! the Fury grasps thee again!
Too long have I perceived thou knowest me not.
O hide thee in my bosom, ere she gaze
Thy heart cold with her petrifying eyes!
Orestes.
I see indeed a Fury, seeing thee.
Electra
(to Iphigenia).
Abominable! more hateful than I deemed.
Who thought thee but his murderer, for then
Most surely I had kissed him by the Styx.
But thou hast stolen his love away from me,
And how to win it back I do not know.
Orestes.
Thou sayest well: not the abyss of Acheron
Could part us with a chasm like thy crime.
Electra.
Why ravest thou, and idly talk'st of crime?
I have slain who would have slain thee, have I not?
34
No, thou hast murdered my deliverer.
Electra.
What? not the ministrant of Artemis?
Orestes.
Yea; and thy sister, for thy better knowledge.
Electra.
O foolish! Deem'st thou her Chrysothemis?
Orestes.
Chrysothemis sleeps sound in Argive earth.
Electra.
And all men know Iphigenia slain
At Aulis, by the vengeful Artemis.
Orestes.
Thou art near the mark; yet call the place
Delphi, not Aulis, and the murderer of blood
Electra, and no longer Artemis.
For Artemis was merciful, and caught
The victim away in darkness, and the Greeks
Slaughtered a hind, esteeming it the maid.
But she was rapt to Tauris, there became
The priestess of the sanctuary, gave
Me life and sweet return, for herself took death,
For thee, most miserable, fratricide.
Electra.
Apollo, how thou art avenged of me!
35
Woe worth the Gods' inimitable craft
To frame delight from peril and distress,
And utter anguish from felicity!
O sister, o'er whose gashed and prostrate corpse
The red blood rushes, smoking like a steed,
How were we happy in the days of toil!
When, spent and dizzy with the uncontrolled
Climbing and lapsing of the clashing brine,
We hailed the expected joy more confidently
Than birds the sure appearing of the morn.
“Orestes,” thou wouldst say, (“for I have lost
The memory of the land I left so young),
Come, tell me of our Argos, how it is.
O foolish me, forgetting thou wert torn
Away in younger years than mine, yet thou
Hast seen whom chiefly I desire—Electra!
Describe her; is she liker thee or me?
O kindest Gods, what greeting will be ours!
How will she marvel whom Orestes brings!
With what inquiry will she scan my face!
With what amazement listen to my tale!
With what enchantment leap into my arms!”
O, fondly has thy sister welcomed thee!
Alas! I know not whom to pity most,
36
Robbed of two sisters by one evil blow.
Electra.
Thou sayest well, Orestes. I am dead;
Touch not this hand again, press not this lip,
Give me no tears, this corpse demands them all.
Speak not one word of pity or of love,
And never call me sister any more.
Only be patient with some sad last words
Before I go away and slay myself.
Think not Iphigenia yearned alone
To greet me. Often in the dismal nights,
When thou wert far in exile, and our roof
Rang with adulterous revel, and I lay
Hearkening on my lone couch, burning with hate
And shame for her who knew no shame, a dream
Has stolen upon me, and my sister appeared
Departing for the Aulian armament,
Bashful and joyous, bending to appease
My childish grief: “Farewell till thou dost go,
The bride of the most valiant of the Greeks.”
And, wakening, I have passionately sobbed,
37
A sepulchre I summoned to restore
Iphigenia only for an hour.
And I have had my hour, and in my hour
Reviled, outraged, and lastly murdered her
Whom most I loved of mortals after thee.
Orestes, now I go, but hear and mark
My last sad words, as though a spirit spake,
Crave nought intemperately from Gods more kind
Withholding, haply, than conferring boons.
Orestes.
Thou didst not crave Iphigenia alone?
Electra.
There was for whom I longed with such excess—
Orestes.
That? Haste to tell me, though indeed I know.
Electra.
The tears I shed for her seemed even relief.
Orestes.
Thou meanest thy brother surely, or whom else?
Electra.
To whom else should a wretched sister look?
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O faithful heart, enfolded in these arms—
Electra.
Off! wouldst thou be polluted with this blood?
Orestes.
What is pollution like ingratitude?
Electra.
So guilty, known to all Gods and men!
Orestes.
So long with thee, and have not kissed thee yet!
Electra.
Thou claspest, soothest me, the murderess, thou!
Orestes.
To whom else should a wretched sister look?
Electra.
Thou dost forget, methinks, whose blood this is.
Orestes.
And thou, whose thou hast kissed from off these hands.
Electra.
No murderer thou, but executioner.
Orestes.
And thou, thou thoughtest to avenge my death.
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Thou wilt be purified, but what of me?
Orestes.
Thou shalt be purified, or I will not.
But yield thee to my will, resist no more;
For neither will I suffer thee to die,
Nor quit thee while thou breathest on the earth.
[The temple is illuminated by the sudden appearance of Apollo. In the background Hermes is seen departing with the shades of Achilles and Iphigenia.]
Apollo.
Orestes, while the man of noble heart
Yet strives with circumstance, the Gods look on,
Willing the glory to be all his own;
But then descend, and take him by the hand
When at the last he shines a conqueror.
So now that thou hast wholly put away
All hatred and revenge and evil thought,
And art most wholly Love's, hear the reward
Of deeds divinely done from lips divine.
And, first, no Fury at thee shall hurl again
Her torch, or lash thee with a snaky lock,
Whom now the purifying vase awaits,
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And also for Electra there is peace,
Who, deeming to slay an enemy with an axe,
Did set a bride's wreath on a sister's brow.
O ignorance of blind mortality!
For know, it hath been all-constraining Love's
Ancient and solemn counsel, that the bride
Reft from Achilles erst, he should regain,
And rule with her the sacred island-realm
Invisible, inviolate, the home
Of innocent sprites and hero-shades august,
Screened in the secrecy of western seas.
Yet by thy hand must first the hallowed dues
Of sepulture be rendered. These performed,
My sister's fane at Brauron seek, therein
Instal the Taurian effigy, not now
With carnage placable, but some young maid,
With one warm drop drawn from her throbbing neck,
Shall stain it, nor shall Artemis crave more.
There, too, shalt thou be purged of blood, nor less
Electra. Thence to Argolis return,
And prosperously reign, a kingly life
Proved and accepted; by stern fate, swift change,
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Splendid and dark, tempered and sealed for sway.
Orestes.
O Phœbus, with a glad and grateful mind
Will I accomplish all thou bid'st me do.
A little while, dear shade, and we will come,
And fondly with befitting obsequies
Dismiss thee to the regions of the blest.
Electra, hear'st thou?
Come, grasp my hand; erect thee from the earth.
Electra.
Leave thou me here to grovel where I lie,
And reign in Argolis, forgetting me.
Orestes.
I see thou art my Furies' friend, not mine,
Who dost debar me from the lustral fount,
Which never will I seek but by thy side.
Electra.
O sister, sister, how forsake thy corpse?
Orestes.
O sister, sister, how repel my hand?
Electra.
Thou forcest me, Orestes, I obey;
But know, more easily in Argolis
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Phantasmal, with my kisses making blind
Thy eyes against the serpents, from thy lips
Wiping the foam—
Orestes.
As I the blood from thee.
Griev'st thou that I repay thee at the last?
Come, my Electra, we will weep no more;
Knowing that nought is done without the Gods,
And knowing that the Gods do all things well.
| Iphigenia in Delphi | |