by Euripides
Tombs, the untrodden sanctuaries where lie
The ancient dead; yourselves so soon to die!
[Exit POSEIDON.
* * * * *
The day slowly dawns: HECUBA wakes.
HECUBA.
Up from the earth, O weary head!
This is not Troy, about, above —
Not Troy, nor we the lords thereof.
Thou breaking neck, be strengthenèd!
Endure and chafe not. The winds rave
And falter. Down the world’s wide road,
Float, float where streams the breath of God;
Nor turn thy prow to breast the wave.
Ah woe!… For what woe lacketh here?
My children lost, my land, my lord.
O thou great wealth of glory, stored
Of old in Ilion, year by year
We watched … and wert thou nothingness?
What is there that I fear to say?
And yet, what help?… Ah, well-a-day,
This ache of lying, comfortless
And haunted! Ah, my side, my brow
And temples! All with changeful pain
My body rocketh, and would fain
Move to the tune of tears that flow:
For tears are music too, and keep
A song unheard in hearts that weep.
[She rises and gazes towards the Greek ships far off on the shore.
O ships, O crowding faces
Of ships, O hurrying beat
Of oars as of crawling feet,
How found ye our holy places?
Threading the narrows through,
Out from the gulfs of the Greek,
Out to the clear dark blue,
With hate ye came and with joy,
And the noise of your music flew,
Clarion and pipe did shriek,
As the coilèd cords ye threw,
Held in the heart of Troy!
What sought ye then that ye came?
A woman, a thing abhorred:
A King’s wife that her lord
Hateth: and Castor’s shame
Is hot for her sake, and the reeds
Of old Eurôtas stir
With the noise of the name of her.
She slew mine ancient King,
The Sower of fifty Seeds,
And cast forth mine and me,
As shipwrecked men, that cling
To a reef in an empty sea.
Who am I that I sit
Here at a Greek king’s door,
Yea, in the dust of it?
A slave that men drive before,
A woman that hath no home,
Weeping alone for her dead;
A low and bruisèd head,
And the glory struck therefrom.
[She starts up from her solitary brooding, and calls to the other
Trojan Women in the huts.
O Mothers of the Brazen Spear,
And maidens, maidens, brides of shame,
Troy is a smoke, a dying flame;
Together we will weep for her:
I call ye as a wide-wing’d bird
Calleth the children of her fold,
To cry, ah, not the cry men heard
In Ilion, not the songs of old,
That echoed when my hand was true
On Priam’s sceptre, and my feet
Touched on the stone one signal beat,
And out the Dardan music rolled;
And Troy’s great Gods gave ear thereto.
[The door of one of the huts on the right opens, and the Women steal out severally, startled and afraid.
FIRST WOMAN.
[Strophe I.
How say’st thou? Whither moves thy cry,
Thy bitter cry? Behind our door
We heard thy heavy heart outpour
Its sorrow: and there shivered by
Fear and a quick sob shaken
From prisoned hearts that shall be free no more!
HECUBA.
Child, ’tis the ships that stir upon the shore….
SECOND WOMAN.
The ships, the ships awaken!
THIRD WOMAN.
Dear God, what would they? Overseas
Bear me afar to strange cities?
HECUBA.
Nay, child, I know not. Dreams are these,
Fears of the hope-forsaken.
FIRST WOMAN.
Awake, O daughters of affliction, wake
And learn your lots! Even now the Argives break
Their camp for sailing!
HECUBA.
Ah, not Cassandra! Wake not her
Whom God hath maddened, lest the foe
Mock at her dreaming. Leave me clear
From that one edge of woe.
O Troy, my Troy, thou diest here
Most lonely; and most lonely we
The living wander forth from thee,
And the dead leave thee wailing!
[One of the huts on the left is now open, and the rest of the CHORUS come out severally. Their number eventually amounts to fifteen.
FOURTH WOMAN.
[Antistrophe I.
Out of the tent of the Greek king
I steal, my Queen, with trembling breath:
What means thy call? Not death; not death!
They would not slay so low a thing!
FIFTH WOMAN.
O, ’tis the ship-folk crying
To deck the galleys: and we part, we part!
HECUBA.
Nay, daughter: take the morning to thine heart.
FIFTH WOMAN.
My heart with dread is dying!
SIXTH WOMAN.
An herald from the Greek hath come!
FIFTH WOMAN.
How have they cast me, and to whom
A bondmaid?
HECUBA.
Peace, child: wait thy doom.
Our lots are near the trying.
FOURTH WOMAN.
Argos, belike, or Phthia shall it be,
Or some lone island of the tossing sea,
Far, far from Troy?
HECUBA.
And I the agèd, where go I,
A winter-frozen bee, a slave
Death-shapen, as the stones that lie
Hewn on a dead man’s grave:
The children of mine enemy
To foster, or keep watch before
The threshold of a master’s door,
I that was Queen in Troy!
A WOMAN TO ANOTHER.
[Strophe 2.
And thou, what tears can tell thy doom?
THE OTHER.
The shuttle still shall flit and change
Beneath my fingers, but the loom,
Sister, be strange.
ANOTHER (wildly).
Look, my dead child! My child, my love,
The last look….
ANOTHER.
Oh, there cometh worse.
A Greek’s bed in the dark….
ANOTHER.
God curse
That night and all the powers thereof!
ANOTHER.
Or pitchers to and fro to bear
To some Pirênê on the hill,
Where the proud water craveth still
Its broken-hearted minister.
ANOTHER.
God guide me yet to Theseus’ land,
The gentle land, the famed afar….
ANOTHER.
But not the hungry foam — Ah, never! —
Of fierce Eurotas, Helen’s river,
To bow to Menelaus’ hand,
That wasted Troy with war!
A WOMAN.
[Antistrophe 2.
They told us of a land high-born,
Where glimmers round Olympus’ roots
A lordly river, red with corn
And burdened fruits.
ANOTHER.
Aye, that were next in my desire
To Athens, where good spirits dwell….
ANOTHER.
Or Aetna’s breast
, the deeps of fire
That front the Tyrian’s Citadel:
First mother, she, of Sicily
And mighty mountains: fame hath told
Their crowns of goodness manifold….
ANOTHER.
And, close beyond the narrowing sea,
A sister land, where float enchanted
Ionian summits, wave on wave,
And Crathis of the burning tresses
Makes red the happy vale, and blesses
With gold of fountains spirit-haunted
Homes of true men and brave!
LEADER.
But lo, who cometh: and his lips
Grave with the weight of dooms unknown:
A Herald from the Grecian ships.
Swift comes he, hot-foot to be done
And finished. Ah, what bringeth he
Of news or judgment? Slaves are we,
Spoils that the Greek hath won!
[TALTHYBIUS, followed by some Soldiers, enters from the left.
TALTHYBIUS.
Thou know’st me, Hecuba. Often have I crossed
Thy plain with tidings from the Hellene host.
’Tis I, Talthybius…. Nay, of ancient use
Thou know’st me. And I come to bear thee news.
HECUBA.
Ah me, ’tis here, ’tis here,
Women of Troy, our long embosomed fear!
TALTHYBIUS.
The lots are cast, if that it was ye feared.
HECUBA.
What lord, what land…. Ah me,
Phthia or Thebes, or sea-worn Thessaly?
TALTHYBIUS.
Each hath her own. Ye go not in one herd.
HECUBA.
Say then what lot hath any? What of joy
Falls, or can fall on any child of Troy?
TALTHYBIUS.
I know: but make thy questions severally.
HECUBA.
My stricken one must be
Still first. Say how Cassandra’s portion lies.
TALTHYBIUS.
Chosen from all for Agamemnon’s prize!
HECUBA.
How, for his Spartan bride
A tirewoman? For Helen’s sister’s pride?
TALTHYBIUS.
Nay, nay: a bride herself, for the King’s bed.
HECUBA.
The sainted of Apollo? And her own
Prize that God promised
Out of the golden clouds, her virgin crown?…
TALTHYBIUS.
He loved her for that same strange holiness.
HECUBA.
Daughter, away, away,
Cast all away,
The haunted Keys, the lonely stole’s array
That kept thy body like a sacred place!
TALTHYBIUS.
Is’t not rare fortune that the King hath smiled
On such a maid?
HECUBA.
What of that other child
Ye reft from me but now?
TALTHYBIUS (speaking with some constraint).
Polyxena? Or what child meanest thou?
HECUBA.
The same. What man now hath her, or what doom?
TALTHYBIUS.
She rests apart, to watch Achilles’ tomb.
HECUBA.
To watch a tomb? My daughter? What is this?…
Speak, Friend? What fashion of the laws of Greece?
TALTHYBIUS.
Count thy maid happy! She hath naught of ill
To fear….
HECUBA.
What meanest thou? She liveth still?
TALTHYBIUS.
I mean, she hath one toil that holds her free
From all toil else.
HECUBA.
What of Andromache,
Wife of mine iron-hearted Hector, where
Journeyeth she?
TALTHYBIUS.
Pyrrhus, Achilles’ son, hath taken her.
HECUBA.
And I, whose slave am I,
The shaken head, the arm that creepeth by,
Staff-crutchèd, like to fall?
TALTHYBIUS.
Odysseus, Ithaca’s king, hath thee for thrall.
HECUBA.
Beat, beat the crownless head:
Rend the cheek till the tears run red!
A lying man and a pitiless
Shall be lord of me, a heart full-flown
With scorn of righteousness:
O heart of a beast where law is none,
Where all things change so that lust be fed,
The oath and the deed, the right and the wrong,
Even the hate of the forked tongue:
Even the hate turns and is cold,
False as the love that was false of old!
O Women of Troy, weep for me!
Yea, I am gone: I am gone my ways.
Mine is the crown of misery,
The bitterest day of all our days.
LEADER.
Thy fate thou knowest, Queen: but I know not
What lord of South or North has won my lot.
TALTHYBIUS.
Go, seek Cassandra, men! Make your best speed,
That I may leave her with the King, and lead
These others to their divers lords…. Ha, there!
What means that sudden light? Is it the flare
Of torches?
[Light is seen shining through the crevices of the second hut on the right. He moves towards it.
Would they fire their prison rooms,
Or how, these dames of Troy?— ‘Fore God, the dooms
Are known, and now they burn themselves and die
Rather than sail with us! How savagely
In days like these a free neck chafes beneath
Its burden!… Open! Open quick! Such death
Were bliss to them, it may be: but ‘twill bring
Much wrath, and leave me shamed before the King!
HECUBA.
There is no fire, no peril: ’tis my child,
Cassandra, by the breath of God made wild.
[The door opens from within and CASSANDRA enters, white-robed and wreathed like a Priestess, a great torch in her hand. She is singing softly to herself and does not see the Herald or the scene before her.
CASSANDRA.
Lift, lift it high: [Strophe.
Give it to mine hand!
Lo, I bear a flame
Unto God! I praise his name.
I light with a burning brand
This sanctuary.
Blessèd is he that shall wed,
And blessèd, blessèd am I
In Argos: a bride to lie
With a king in a king’s bed.
Hail, O Hymen red,
O Torch that makest one!
Weepest thou, Mother mine own?
Surely thy cheek is pale
With tears, tears that wail
For a land and a father dead.
But I go garlanded:
I am the Bride of Desire:
Therefore my torch is borne —
Lo, the lifting of morn,
Lo, the leaping of fire! —
For thee, O Hymen bright,
For thee, O Moon of the Deep,
So Law hath charged, for the light
Of a maid’s last sleep.
Awake, O my feet, awake: [Antistrophe.
Our father’s hope is won!
Dance as the dancing skies
Over him, where he lies
Happy beneath the sun!…
Lo, the Ring that I make….
[She makes a circle round her with a torch, and visions appear to her.
Apollo!… Ah, is it thou?
O shrine in the laurels cold,
I bear thee still, as of old,
Mine incense! Be near to me now.
[She waves the torch as though bearing incense.
O Hymen, Hymen fleet:
Quick torch that makest one!…
How? Am I still alone?
Laugh as I laugh, and twine
In the dance, O Mother mine:
Dear feet, be near my feet!
Come, greet ye Hymen, greet
Hymen with songs of pride:
Sing to him loud and long,
Cry, cry, when the song
Faileth, for joy of the bride!
O Damsels girt in the gold
Of Ilion, cry, cry ye,
For him that is doomed of old
To be lord of me!
LEADER.
O hold the damsel, lest her trancèd feet
Lift her afar, Queen, toward the Hellene fleet!
HECUBA.
O Fire, Fire, where men make marriages
Surely thou hast thy lot; but what are these
Thou bringest flashing? Torches savage-wild
And far from mine old dreams. — Alas, my child,
How little dreamed I then of wars or red
Spears of the Greek to lay thy bridal bed!
Give me thy brand; it hath no holy blaze
Thus in thy frenzy flung. Nor all thy days
Nor all thy griefs have changed them yet, nor learned
Wisdom. — Ye women, bear the pine half burned
To the chamber back; and let your drownèd eyes
Answer the music of these bridal cries!
[She takes the torch and gives it to one of the women.
CASSANDRA.
O Mother, fill mine hair with happy flowers,
And speed me forth. Yea, if my spirit cowers,
Drive me with wrath! So liveth Loxias,
A bloodier bride than ever Helen was
Go I to Agamemnon, Lord most high
Of Hellas!… I shall kill him, mother; I
Shall kill him, and lay waste his house with fire
As he laid ours. My brethren and my sire
Shall win again….
(Checking herself) But part I must let be,
And speak not. Not the axe that craveth me,
And more than me; not the dark wanderings
Of mother-murder that my bridal brings,
And all the House of Atreus down, down, down….
Nay, I will show thee. Even now this town
Is happier than the Greeks. I know the power
Of God is on me: but this little hour,
Wilt thou but listen, I will hold him back!
One love, one woman’s beauty, o’er the track
Of hunted Helen, made their myriads fall.
And this their King so wise, who ruleth all,
What wrought he? Cast out Love that Hate might feed:
Gave to his brother his own child, his seed
Of gladness, that a woman fled, and fain
To fly for ever, should be turned again!
So the days waned, and armies on the shore
Of Simois stood and strove and died. Wherefore?
No man had moved their landmarks; none had shook
Their wallèd towns. — And they whom Ares took,
Had never seen their children: no wife came
With gentle arms to shroud the limbs of them
For burial, in a strange and angry earth
Laid dead. And there at home, the same long dearth:
Women that lonely died, and aged men