GHOST OF DARIUS. Nay—scarce a tithe of all those myriads, If man may trust the oracles of Heaven When he beholds the things already wrought, Not false with true, but true with no word false If what I trow be truth, my son has left A chosen rear-guard of our host, in whom He trusts, now, with a random confidence! They tarry where Asopus laves the ground With rills that softly bless Boeotia’s plain— There is it fated for them to endure The very crown of misery and doom, Requital for their god-forgetting pride! For why? they raided Hellas, had the heart To wrong the images of holy gods, And give the shrines and temples to the flame! Defaced and dashed from sight the altars fell, And each god’s image, from its pedestal Thrust and flung down, in dim confusion lies! Therefore, for outrage vile, a doom as dark They suffer, and yet more shall undergo— They touch no bottom in the swamp of doom, But round them rises, bubbling up, the ooze! So deep shall lie the gory clotted mass Of corpses by the Dorian spear transfixed Upon Plataea’s field! yea, piles of slain To the third generation shall attest By silent eloquence to those that see— _Let not a mortal vaunt him overmuch_. For pride grows rankly, and to ripeness brings The curse of fate, and reaps, for harvest, tears! Therefore when ye behold, for deeds like these, Such stern requital paid, remember then Athens and Hellas. Let no mortal wight, Holding too lightly of his present weal And passionate for more, cast down and spill The mighty cup of his prosperity! Doubt not that over-proud and haughty souls Zeus lours in wrath, exacting the account. Therefore, with wary warning, school my son, Though he be lessoned by the gods already, To curb the vaunting that affronts high Heaven! And thou, O venerable Mother-queen, Beloved of Xerxes, to the palace pass And take therefrom such raiment as befits Thy son, and go to meet him: for his garb In this extremity of grief hangs rent Around his body, woefully unstitched, Mere tattered fragments of once royal robes! Go thou to him, speak soft and soothing words— Thee, and none other, will he bear to hear, As well I know. But I must pass away From earth above, unto the nether gloom; Therefore, old men, take my farewell, and clasp, Even amid the ruin of this time, Unto your souls the pleasure of the day, For dead men have no profit of their gold! [_The GHOST OF DARIUS sinks._] CHORUS. Alas, I thrill with pain for Persia’s woes— Many fulfilled, and others hard at hand! ATOSSA. O spirit of the race, what sorrows crowd Upon me! and this anguish stings me worst, That round my royal son’s dishonoured form Hang rags and tatters, degradation deep! I will away, and, bringing from within A seemly royal robe, will straightway strive To meet and greet my son: foul scorn it were To leave our dearest in his hour of shame. [_Exit ATOSSA._]