Captive!
And first word of the conqueror
Was “Down with those Long Walls, Peiraios’ pride!
Destroy, yourselves, your bulwarks! Peace needs none!”
And “We obey” they shuddered in their dream.
But, at next quick imposure of decree —
“No longer democratic government!
Henceforth such oligarchy as ourselves
Please to appoint you!” — then the horror stung
Dreamers awake; they started up a-stare
At the half-helot captain and his crew
— Spartans, “men used to let their hair grow long,
To fast, be dirty, and just — Socratize” —
Whose word was “Trample on Themistokles!”
So, as the way is with much misery,
The heads swam, hands refused their office, hearts
Sunk as they stood in stupor. “Wreck the Walls?
Ruin Peiraios? — with our Pallas armed
For interference? — Herakles apprised,
And Theseus hasting? Lay the Long Walls low?”
Three days they stood, stared, — stonier than their walls.
Whereupon, sleep who might, Lusandros woke:
Saw the prostration of his enemy,
Utter and absolute beyond belief,
Past hope of hatred even. I surmise
He also probably saw fade in fume
Certain fears, bred of Bakis-prophecy,
Nor apprehended any more that gods
And heroes, — fire, must glow forth, guard the ground
Where prone, by sober day-dawn, corpse-like lay
Powerless Athenai, late predominant
Lady of Hellas, — Sparté’s slave-prize now!
Where should a menace lurk in those slack limbs?
What was to move his circumspection? Why
Demolish just Peiraios?
“Stay!” bade he:
“Already promise-breakers? True to type,
Athenians! past and present and to come —
The fickle and the false! No stone dislodged,
No implement applied, yet three days’ grace
Expire! Forbearance is no longer-lived.
By breaking promise, terms of peace you break —
Too gently framed for falsehood, fickleness!
All must be reconsidered — yours the fault!”
Wherewith, he called a council of allies.
Pent-up resentment used its privilege, —
Outburst at ending: this the summed result.
“Because we would avenge no transient wrong
But an eternity of insolence,
Aggression, — folly, no disasters mend,
Pride, no reverses teach humility, —
Because too plainly were all punishment,
Such as comports with less obdurate crime,
Evadable by falsehood, fickleness —
Experience proves the true Athenian type, —
Therefore, ‘t is need we dig deep down into
The root of evil; lop nor bole nor branch.
Look up, look round and see, on every side,
What nurtured the rank tree to noisome fruit!
We who live hutted (so they laugh) not housed,
Build barns for temples, prize mud-monuments,
Nor show the sneering stranger aught but — men, —
Spartans take insult of Athenians just
Because they boast Akropolis to mount,
And Propulaia to make entry by,
Through a mad maze of marble arrogance
Such as you see — such as let none see more!
Abolish the detested luxury!
Leave not one stone upon another, raze
Athenai to the rock! Let hill and plain
Become a waste, a grassy pasture-ground
Where sheep may wander, grazing goats depend
From shapeless crags once columns! so at last
Shall peace inhabit there, and peace enough.”
Whereon, a shout approved “Such peace bestow!”
Then did a Man of Phokis rise — O heart!
Rise — when no bolt of Zeus disparted sky,
No omen-bird from Pallas scared the crew,
Rise — when mere human argument could stem
No foam-fringe of the passion surging fierce,
Baffle no wrath-wave that o’er barrier broke —
Who was the Man of Phokis rose and flung
A flower i’ the way of that fierce foot’s advance,
Which — stop for? — nay, had stamped down sword’s assault!
Could it be He stayed Sparté with the snatch
“Daughter of Agamemnon, late my liege,
Elektra, palaced once, a visitant
To thy poor rustic dwelling, now I come?”
Ay, facing fury of revenge, and lust
Of hate, and malice moaning to appease
Hunger on prey presumptuous, prostrate now —
Full in the hideous faces — last resource,
You flung that choric flower, my Euthukles!
And see, as through some pinhole, should the wind
Wedgingly pierce but once, in with a rush
Hurries the whole wild weather, rends to rags
The weak sail stretched against the outside storm —
So did the power of that triumphant play
Pour in, and oversweep the assembled foe!
Triumphant play, wherein our poet first
Dared bring the grandeur of the Tragic Two
Down to the level of our common life,
Close to the beating of our common heart.
Elektra? ‘T was Athenai, Sparté’s ice
Thawed to, while that sad portraiture appealed —
Agamemnonian lady, lost by fault
Of her own kindred, cast from house and home,
Despoiled of all the brave inheritance,
Dowered humbly as befits a herdsman’s mate,
Partaker of his cottage, clothed in rags,
Patient performer of the poorest chares,
Yet mindful, all the while, of glory past
When she walked darling of Mukenai, dear
Beyond Orestes to the King of Men!
So, because Greeks are Greeks, though Sparté’s brood,
And hearts are hearts, though in Lusandros’ breast,
And poetry is power, and Euthukles
Had faith therein to, full-face, fling the same —
Sudden, the ice-thaw! The assembled foe,
Heaving and swaying with strange friendliness,
Cried “Reverence Elektra!” — cried “Abstain
Like that chaste Herdsman, nor dare violate
The sanctity of such reverse! Let stand
Athenai!”
Mindful of that story’s close,
Perchance, and how, — when he, the Herdsman chaste,
Needs apprehend no break of tranquil sleep, —
All in due time, a stranger, dark, disguised,
Knocks at the door: with searching glance, notes keen,
Knows quick, through mean attire and disrespect,
The ravaged princess! Ay, right on, the clutch
Of guiding retribution has in charge
The author of the outrage! While one hand,
Elektra’s, pulls the door behind, made fast
On fate, — the other strains, prepared to push
The victim-queen, should she make frightened pause
Before that serpentining blood which steals
Out of the darkness where, a pace beyond,
Above the slain Aigisthos, bides his blow
Dreadful Orestes!
Klutaimnestra, wise
This time, forbore; Elektra held her own;
Saved was Athenai through Euripides,
Through Euthukles, through — more than ever — me,
Balaustion, me, who, Wild-pomegranate-flower,
&nb
sp; Felt my fruit triumph, and fade proudly so!
But next day, as ungracious minds are wont,
The Spartan, late surprised into a grace,
Grew sudden sober at the enormity,
And grudged, by daybreak, midnight’s easy gift;
Splenetically must repay its cost
By due increase of rigour, doglike snatch
At aught still left dog to concede like man.
Rough sea, at flow of tide, may lip, perchance,
Smoothly the land-line reached as for repose —
Lie indolent in all unquestioned sway;
But ebbing, when needs must, all thwart and loth,
Sea claws at sand relinquished strugglingly.
So, harsh Lusandros — pinioned to inflict
The lesser penalty alone — spoke harsh,
As minded to embitter scathe by scorn.
“Athenai’s self be saved then, thank the Lyre!
If Tragedy withdraws her presence — quick,
If Comedy replace her, — what more just?
Let Comedy do service, frisk away,
Dance off stage these indomitable stones,
Long Walls, Peiraian bulwarks! Hew and heave,
Pick at, pound into dust each dear defence!
Not to the Kommos — eleleleleu
With breast bethumped, as Tragic lyre prefers,
But Comedy shall sound the flute, and crow
At kordax-end — the hearty slapping-dance!
Collect those flute-girls — trash who flattered ear
With whistlings and fed eye with caper-cuts
While we Lakonians supped black broth or crunched
Sea-urchin, conchs and all, unpricked — coarse brutes!
Command they lead off step, time steady stroke
To spade and pickaxe, till demolished lie
Athenai’s pride in powder!”
Done that day —
That sixteenth famed day of Munuchion-month!
The day when Hellas fought at Salamis,
The very day Euripides was born,
Those flute-girls — Phaps-Elaphion at their head —
Did blow their best, did dance their worst, the while
Sparté pulled down the walls, wrecked wide the works,
Laid low each merest molehill of defence,
And so the Power, Athenai, passed away!
We would not see its passing. Ere I knew
The issue of their counsels, — crouching low
And shrouded by my peplos, — I conceived,
Despite the shut eyes, the stopped ears, — by count
Only of heart-beats, telling the slow time, —
Athenai’s doom was signed and signified
In that assembly, — ay, but knew there watched
One who would dare and do, nor bate at all
The stranger’s licensed duty, — speak the word
Allowed the Man from Phokis! Nought remained
But urge departure, flee the sights and sounds,
Hideous exultings, wailings worth contempt,
And press to other earth, new heaven, by sea
That somehow ever prompts to ‘scape despair.
Help rose to heart’s wish; at the harbour-side,
The old grey mariner did reverence
To who had saved his ship, still weather-tight
As when with prow gay-garlanded she praised
The hospitable port and pushed to sea.
“Convoy Balaustion back to Rhodes, for sake
Of her and her Euripides!” laughed he.
Rhodes, — shall it not be there, my Euthukles,
Till this brief trouble of a life-time end,
That solitude — two make so populous! —
For food finds memories of the past suffice,
May be, anticipations, — hope so swells, —
Of some great future we, familiar once
With who so taught, should hail and entertain?
He lies now in the little valley, laughed
And moaned about by those mysterious streams,
Boiling and freezing, like the love and hate
Which helped or harmed him through his earthly course.
They mix in Arethousa by his grave.
The warm spring, traveller, dip thine arms into,
Brighten thy brow with! Life detests black cold.
I sent the tablets, the psalterion, so
Rewarded Sicily; the tyrant there
Bestowed them worthily in Phoibos’ shrine.
A gold-graved writing tells — ”I also loved
The poet, Free Athenai cheaply prized —
King Dionusios, — Archelaos-like!”
And see if young Philemon, — sure one day
To do good service and be loved himself, —
If he too have not made a votive verse!
“Grant, in good sooth, our great dead, all the same,
Retain their sense, as certain wise men say,
I’d hang myself — to see Euripides!”
Hands off, Philemon! nowise hang thyself,
But pen the prime plays, labour the right life,
And die at good old age as grand men use, —
Keeping thee, with that great thought, warm the while, —
That he does live, Philemon! Ay, most sure!
“He lives!” hark, — waves say, winds sing out the same,
And yonder dares the citied ridge of Rhodes
Its headlong plunge from sky to sea, disparts
North bay from south, — each guarded calm, that guest
May enter gladly, blow what wind there will, —
Boiled round with breakers, to no other cry!
All in one choros, — what the master-word
They take up? — hark! “There are no gods, no gods!
Glory to God — who saves Euripides!”
THE AGAMEMNON OF AESCHYLUS
PERSONS.
Warder.
Choros of Old Men.
Klutaimnestra.
Talthubios , Herald .
Agamemnon.
Kassandra.
Aigisthos.
THE AGAMEMNON OF AESCHYLUS 1877.
WARDER.
The gods I ask deliverance from these labours,
Watch of a year’s length whereby, slumbering through it
On the Atreidai’s roofs on elbow, — dog-like —
I know of nightly star-groups the assemblage,
And those that bring to men winter and summer
Bright dynasts, as they pride them in the æther
— Stars, when they wither, and the uprisings of them.
And now on ward I wait the torch’s token,
The glow of fire, shall bring from Troia message
And word of capture: so prevails audacious
The man’s-way-planning hoping heart of woman.
But when I, driven from night-rest, dew-drenched hold to
This couch of mine — not looked upon by visions,
Since fear instead of sleep still stands beside me,
So as that fast I fix in sleep no eyelids —
And when to sing or chirp a tune I fancy,
For slumber such song-remedy infusing,
I wail then, for this House’s fortune groaning,
Not, as of old, after the best ways governed.
Now, lucky be deliverance from these labours,
At good news — the appearing dusky fire!
O hail, thou lamp of night, a day-long lightness
Revealing, and of dances the ordainment!
Halloo, halloo!
To Agamemnon’s wife I show, by shouting,
That, from bed starting up at once, i’ the household
Joyous acclaim, good-omened to this torch-blaze,
She send aloft, if haply Ilion’s city
Be taken, as the beacon boasts announcing.
Ay, and, for me, myself will dance a prelude,
For, that my m
asters’ dice drop right, I’ll reckon:
Since thrice-six has it thrown to me, this signal.
Well, may it hap that, as he comes, the loved hand
O’ the household’s lord I may sustain with this hand!
As for the rest, I’m mute: on tongue a big ox
Has trodden. Yet this House, if voice it take should,
Most plain would speak. So, willing I myself speak.
To those who know: to who know not — I’m blankness.
CHOROS.
The tenth year this, since Priamos’ great match,
King Menelaos, Agamemnon King,
— The strenuous yoke-pair of the Atreidai’s honour
Two-throned, two-sceptred, whereof Zeus was donor —
Did from this land the aid, the armament despatch,
The thousand-sailored force of Argives clamouring
“Ares” from out the indignant breast, as fling
Passion forth vultures which, because of grief
Away, — as are their young ones, — with the thief,
Lofty above their brood-nests wheel in ring,
Row round and round with oar of either wing,
Lament the bedded chicks, lost labour that was love:
Which hearing, one above
— Whether Apollon, Pan or Zeus — that wail,
Sharp-piercing bird-shriek of the guests who fare
Housemates with gods in air —
Suchanone sends, against who these assail,
What, late-sent, shall not fail
Of punishing — Erinus. Here as there,
The Guardian of the Guest, Zeus, the excelling one,
Sends against Alexandros either son
Of Atreus: for that wife, the many-husbanded,
Appointing many a tug that tries the limb,
While the knee plays the prop in dust, while, shred
To morsels, lies the spear-shaft; in those grim
Marriage-prolusions when their Fury wed
Danaoi and Troes, both alike. All’s said:
Things are where things are, and, as fate has willed,
So shall they be fulfilled.
Not gently-grieving, not just doling out
The drops of expiation — no, nor tears distilled —
Shall he we know of bring the hard about
To soft — that intense ire
At those mock rites unsanctified by fire.
But we pay nought here: through our flesh, age-weighed,
Left out from who gave aid
In that day, — we remain,
Staying on staves a strength
The equal of a child’s at length.
For when young marrow in the breast doth reign,
That’s the old man’s match, — Ares out of place
In either: but in oldest age’s case,
Foliage a-fading, why, he wends his way
On three feet, and, no stronger than a child,
Robert Browning - Delphi Poets Series Page 302