CASSANDRA. Ah me! the god! like fire within my breast Burns the Lycéan god.[f29] Ah me! pain! pain! A lioness two-footed with a wolf Is bedded, when the noble lion roamed Far from his den; and she will murder me. She crowns the cup of wrath; she whets the knife Against the neck of the man, and he must pay The price of capture, I of being captive. Vain gauds, that do but mock my grief, farewell! This laurel-rod, and this diviner's wreath About my neck, should they outlive the wearer? Away! As ye have paid me, I repay. Make rich some other prophetess with woe! Lo! where Apollo looks, and sees me now Doff this diviner's garb, the self-same weeds He tricked me erst withal, to live for him, The public scorn, the scoff of friends and foes, The mark of every ribald jester's tongue, The homeless girl, the raving mountebank, The beggar'd, wretched, starving maniac. And now who made the prophetess unmakes her, And leads me to my doom--ah! not beside My father's altar doomed to die! the block From my hot life shall drink the purple stain. But we shall fall not unavenged: the gods A mother-murdering shoot shall send from far To avenge his sire; the wanderer shall return To pile the cope-stone on these towering woes. The gods in heaven a mighty oath have sworn, To raise anew the father's prostrate fate By the son's arm.--But why stand here, and beat {80} The air with cries, seeing what I have seen; When Troy hath fallen, suffering what it suffered, And they who took the city by the doom Of righteous gods faring as they shall fare? I will endure to die, and greet these gates Of Hades gaping for me. Grant me, ye gods, A mortal stroke well-aimed, and a light fall From cramped convulsion free! Let the red blood Flow smoothly from its fount, that I may close These eyes in peaceful death. CHORUS. O hapless maid! And wise as hapless! thou hast spoken long! But if thou see'st the harm, why rush on fate Even as an ox, whom favouring gods inspire To stand by the altar's steps, and woo the knife. CASSANDRA. I'm in the net. Time will not break the meshes. CHORUS. But the last moment of sweet life is honoured. CASSANDRA. My hour is come; what should I gain by flight? CHORUS. Thou with a stout heart bravely look'st on fate. CASSANDRA. Bravely thou praisest: but the happy hear not Such commendations.[n82] CHORUS. Yet if death must come, His fame is fair who nobly fronts the foe. CASSANDRA. Woe's me, the father and his noble children! CHORUS. Whither now? What father and what children? Speak. CASSANDRA. (_Approaching and starting back from the house_.) Woe! woe! CHORUS. What means this WOE? What horrid fancy scares thee? CASSANDRA. Blood-dripping murder reeks from yonder house. CHORUS. How? 'Tis the scent of festal sacrifice. CASSANDRA. The scent of death--a fragrance from the grave.