O father, by the praises of my deeds, By thine own name which ever was to me Propitious, tell, I pray thee, who it is Who hath o'erthrown my house. Whose prey am I? 1185 _Amphitr.:_ Let ills like these in silence pass away. _Hercules:_ And I be unavenged? _Amphitryon:_ But vengeance hurts. _Hercules:_ Who has, inactive, ever borne such wrongs? _Amphitr.:_ He who feared greater wrongs. _Hercules:_ Than these my wrongs Can any greater, heavier be feared? 1190 _Amphitr.:_ The part thou knowest of thy woes is least. _Hercules:_ Have pity. See, I stretch my suppliant hands. But what is this? He will not touch my hands. In these must be the sin. But whence this blood? Why is that shaft, once dipped in Hydra's gall, 1195 Now wet with infant gore? They are my own, These arrows that I see; the guilty hand I need no longer seek; for who but me Could bend that mighty bow, or whose right hand Could draw the string that scarcely yields to me? [_To_ Amphitryon _and_ Theseus.] To you I turn again. O father, tell: Is this my deed? 1200 [_Both men hesitate in silence._] They hesitate--'tis mine. _Amphitr.:_ Thine is the grief; thy stepdame's is the crime. From fault of thine this sad mischance is free. _Hercules:_ Now hurl thy wrathful bolts from all the heavens, O sire, who hast forgotten me, thy son; Avenge at least, though with a tardy hand, Thy grandsons. Let the star-set heavens resound, And darting lightnings leap from pole to pole. 1205 Let me be bound upon the Caspian rocks, And let the birds of prey devour my flesh. Why lacks Prometheus' cliff a prisoner? Prepare for me the bare, steep mountain side Of Caucasus, that, on his towering peak, The birds and beasts of prey may feed on me. Or let the blue Symplegades, which hedge 1210 The Scythian deep, stretch out my fettered hands This way and that; and, when with rhythmic change The rocks together clash, which fling to heaven The sea that lies between the rushing cliffs, May I lie there, the mountains' restless check. 1215 Or why not heap a mighty pyre of wood, And burn my body stained with impious blood? Thus, thus it must be done; so Hercules Shall to the lower world return again. _Amphitr.:_ Not yet has madness ceased to vex his heart. But now his wrath has changed, and, fury's sign, 1220 He rages 'gainst himself.