The book of the ancient Greeks: An introduction to the history and civilization of Greece from the coming of the Greeks to the conquest of Corinth by Rome in 146 B.C.
John Stuart Mill · en
_Orestes._
I too have tasted of her wizardry.
_Iphigenia._
And came the armies home, as the tales run?
_Orestes._
To answer that were many tales in one.
_Iphigenia._
Oh, give me this hour full! Thou soon wilt die.
_Orestes._
Ask, if such longing holds thee. I will try.
_Iphigenia._
A seer called Calchas! Did he ever come?
_Orestes._
Calchas is dead, as the news went at home.
_Iphigenia._
Good news, ye gods!--Odysseus, what of him?
_Orestes._
Not home yet, but still living, as men deem.
_Iphigenia._
Curse him! And may he see his home no more.
_Orestes._
Why curse him? All his house is stricken sore.
_Iphigenia._
How hath the Nereid's son, Achilles, sped?
_Orestes._
Small help his bridal brought him! He is dead.
_Iphigenia._
A fierce bridal, so the sufferers tell!
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_Orestes._
Who art thou, questioning of Greece so well?
_Iphigenia._
I was a Greek. Evil caught me long ago.
_Orestes._
Small wonder, then, thou hast such wish to know.
_Iphigenia._
That war-lord, whom they call so high in bliss--
_Orestes._
None such is known to me. What name was his?
_Iphigenia._
They called him Agamemnon, Atreus' son.
_Orestes._
I know not. Cease,--My questioning is done.
_Iphigenia._
'Twill be such joy to me! How fares he? Tell!
_Orestes._
Dead. And hath wrecked another's life as well.
_Iphigenia._
Dead? By what dreadful fortune? Woe is me!
_Orestes._
Why sighest thou? Had he any link with thee?
_Iphigenia._
I did but think of his old joy and pride.
_Orestes._
His own wife foully stabbed him, and he died.
_Iphigenia._
O God!
I pity her that slew--and him that slew.
_Orestes._
Now cease thy questions. Add no word thereto.
_Iphigenia._
But one word. Lives she still, that hapless wife?
_Orestes._
No. Her own son, her first-born, took her life.
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_Iphigenia._
O shipwrecked house! What thought was in his brain?
_Orestes._
Justice on her, to avenge his father slain.
_Iphigenia._
Alas!
A bad false duty bravely hath he wrought.
_Orestes._
Yet God, for all his duty, helps him not.
_Iphigenia._
And not one branch of Atreus' tree lives on?
_Orestes._
Electra lives, unmated and alone.
_Iphigenia._
The child they slaughtered--is there word of her?
_Orestes._
Why, no, save that she died in Aulis there.
_Iphigenia._
Poor child! Poor father, too, who killed and lied.
_Orestes._
For a bad woman's worthless sake she died.
_Iphigenia._
The dead King's son, lives he in Argos still?
_Orestes._
He lives, now here, now nowhere, bent with ill.
_Iphigenia._
O dreams, light dreams, farewell! Ye too were lies.
* * * * *
_Leader._
We too have kinsmen dear, but, being low,
None heedeth, live they still or live they not.
_Iphigenia._ (_With sudden impulse._)