JASON. Fulfil, O King, thy sentence on my wife! She can no longer tarry where I am, So, let her go; the sentence is not harsh. Forsooth, though I am less to blame than she, My lot is bitt'rer, harder far than hers. She but returns to that grim wilderness Where she was born, and, like a restive colt From whom the galling yoke is just removed, Will rush to freedom, and become once more Untamed and stubborn. But my place is here; Here must I sit and while away the days In meek inaction, burdened with the scorn And scoffing of mankind, mine only task Dully to muse upon my vanished past. KING. Thou wilt be great and famous yet again, Believe me. Like the bow which, once set free From the fierce strain, doth speed the arrow swift And straight unto its mark, whenso the hand Is loosed that bent it, so wilt thou spring back And be thyself again, once she is gone. JASON. Naught feel I in my breast to feed such hopes! Lost is my name, my fame; I am no more Than Jason's shadow, not that prince himself. KING. The world, my son, is not so harsh as thou: An older man's misstep is sin and crime; The youth's, a misstep only, which he may Retrace, and mend his error. All thy deeds In Colchis, when thou went a hot-head boy, Will be forgot, if thou wilt show thyself Henceforth a man. JASON. O, might I trust thy words, I could be happy once again! KING. Let her But leave thy side, and thou wilt say I'm right. Before the Amphictyons' judgment-seat I'll go And speak for thee, defend thy righteous cause, And prove that it was she alone, Medea, Who did those horrid deeds wherewith thou'rt charged, Prove her the wanton, her the darksome witch. Lifted shall be the doom of banishment From off thy brow. If not, then thou shalt rise In all thy stubborn strength, and to the breeze Unfurl the glorious banner of pure gold Which thou didst bring from earth's most distant land, And, like a rushing torrent, all the youth Of Greece will stream to serve thee once again And rally 'round thy standard to oppose All foes that come, rally 'round thee, now purged Of all suspicion, starting life anew, The glorious hope of Greece, and of the Fleece The mighty hero!--Thou hast got it still? JASON. The Fleece? KING. Ay. JASON. Nay, not I. KING. And yet thy wife Bore it away from old King Pelias' house.