_Apol._ Out, out, I bid you, quickly from this temple; Go forth, and leave this shrine oracular, 170 Lest, smitten with a serpent winged and bright, Forth darted from my bow-string golden-wrought, Thou in sore pain bring up dark foam, and vomit The clots of blood thou suck'dst from human veins. This is no house where ye may meetly come, But there where heads upon the scaffold lie,[487] And eyes are gouged, and throats of men are cut, *And mutilation mars the bloom of youth, Where men are maimed and stoned to death, and groan With bitter wailing, 'neath the spine impaled; 180 Hear ye what feast ye love, and so become Loathed of the Gods? Yes, all your figure's fashion Points clearly to it. Such as ye should dwell In cave of lion battening upon blood, Nor tarry in these sacred precincts here, Working defilement. Go, and roam afield Without a shepherd, for to flock like this Not one of all the Gods is friendly found. _Chor._ O king Apollo, hear us in our turn: No mere accomplice art thou of these things, 190 But guilty art in full as principal. _Apol._ How then? Prolong thy speech to tell me this. _Chor._ Thou bad'st this stranger be a matricide. _Apol._ I bade him to avenge his sire. Why not? _Chor._ Then thou did'st welcome here the blood just shed. _Apol._ I bade him seek this shrine as suppliant. _Chor._ Yet us who were his escort thou revilest. _Apol._ It is not meet that ye come nigh this house. _Chor._ Yet is this self-same task appointed us. _Apol._ What function's this? Boast thou of nobler task? 200 _Chor._ We drive from home the murderers of their mothers. _Apol._ What? Those who kill a wife that slays her spouse? _Chor._ That deed brings not the guilt of blood of kin.[488] _Apol._ *Truly thou mak'st dishonoured, and as nought, The marriage-vows of Zeus and Hera great; And by this reasoning Kypris too is shamed, From whom men gain the ties of closest love. For still to man and woman marriage bed, Assigned by Fate and guided by the Right, Is more than any oath. If thou then deal So gently, when the one the other slays, 210 And dost not even look on them with wrath, I say thou dost not justly chase Orestes; For thou, in the one case, I know, dost rage; I' the other, clearly tak'st it easily: The Goddess Pallas shall our quarrel judge. _Chor._ That man I ne'er will leave for evermore. _Apol._ Chase him then, chase, and gain yet more of toil. _Chor._ Curtail thou not my functions by thy speech. _Apol._ Ne'er by my choice would I thy functions own. _Chor._ True; great thy name among the thrones of Zeus: 220 But I, his mother's blood constraining me, Will this man chase, and track him like a hound. _Apol._ And I will help him and my suppliant free; For dreadful among Gods and mortals too The suppliant's curse, should I abandon him.