KING. How say'st thou? To escape from marriage thou art here, displaying These fresh-cropt branches, snowy-wreathed, before The Agonian gods? CHORUS. Ay! Never, never may we Be thralled to Ægyptus' sons! KING. Speak'st thou of hate To them, or of a bond your laws forbid? CHORUS. Both this and that.[n27] Who should be friends were foes, And blood with blood near-mingled basely flows. KING. But branch on branch well grafted goodlier grows. CHORUS. Urge not this point; but rather think one word From thee the wretched rescues. KING. How then shall I My friendly disposition show? CHORUS. We ask But this--from our pursuers save us. KING. What! Shall I for unknown exiles breed a war? CHORUS. Justice will fight for him who fights for us. KING. Doubtless; if Justice from the first hath stamped Your cause for hers. CHORUS. (_pointing to the altar_) The state's high poop here crowned Revere. KING. This green environment of shade, Mantling the seats of the gods I see, and shudder. CHORUS. The wrath of suppliant Jove[n28] is hard to bear. STROPHE I. O hear my cry, benignly hear! Thou son of Palæcthon, hear me! The fugitive wandering suppliant hear! Thou king of Pelasgians, hear me! {230} Like a heifer young by the wolf pursued[n29] O'er the rocks so cliffy and lonely, And loudly it lows to the herdsman good, Whose strength can save it only. KING. My eyes are tasked; there, 'neath the shielding shade Of fresh-lopt branches I behold you clinging To these Agonian gods; but what I do Must spare the state from harm. I must provide That no unlooked-for unprepared event Beget new strife; of this we have enough. ANTISTROPHE I. CHORUS. Great Jove that allotteth their lot to all, By his sentence of right shall clear thee, Dread Themis that heareth the suppliants' call, No harm shall allow to come near thee. Though I speak to the old with the voice of the young, Do the will of the gods, and surely Their favour to thee justly weighed shall belong, When thy gifts thou offerest purely. KING. Not at my hearth with precatory boughs Ye lie. The state, if guilty taint from you Affect the general weal, will for the state Take counsel. I nor pledge nor promise give, Till all the citizens hear what thou shalt say. STROPHE II. CHORUS. Thou art the state, and the people art thou,[n30] The deed that thou doest who judges? The hearth and the altar before thee bow, The grace that thou grantest who grudges? Thou noddest; the will that thou willest is thine, Thy vote with no voter thou sharest; The throne is all thine, and the sceptre divine, And thy guilt, when thou sinnest, thou bearest.