strongest; Æschylus is showing us the wrath of gods, which is simple, direct, and unrepenting.
At length, in the end of the play, Ægisthus himself appears, and he exhibits the character of a violent and cowardly tyrant. He congratulates himself shamelessly on his success, and shows how his father Thyestes is avenged. "Now," he says,—
"Now, 'twere a glorious thing for me to die,
Seeing him caught in justice' iron toils."
The Chorus threaten him with the curse of the people and with stoning; but Ægisthus despises the elders of his city, and confidently asserts his ill-gotten power. Violence is on the point of being used, when Clytemnestra interposes. She pacifies Ægisthus with tenderest words—"purring," says Professor Wilson, "like a satiated tigress round her prey;" and while the Chorus threaten them with the possible return of Orestes, she leads her accomplice in "to set in order all things in that ancient kingly house." Truly they are sadly out of order at present.
The first part of the great threefold drama is over, and while we sit waiting for the next, there can be no want of reflections to occupy our minds. The conversation which ordinarily fills up such intervals in the performance can hardly find place now, for all minds have been oppressed with a weight of awe which does not easily pass away. A confused mass of giant forms and deeds of blood is before our eyes, and mingled tones
