was likely to anticipate, that the ceremony shall proceed as soon as ever there is a body to bury. Noticeable moreover is their conviction of the king's determined haste. It does not seem inconceivable to some of them, that, if the death has occurred before their arrival, Admetus may have dispensed with a convoy altogether; for instead of accepting the contrary suggestion as conclusive, they continue their inferences from the state of the house—'no holy water, no lock of hair' and so on—inferences which, as appears from the sequel, do less than justice to the king's unity of purpose and indifference to needless detail.
They suppose him therefore ready to commit, if necessary, what to Greek minds was more repugnant than a crime. Even among ourselves and with the 'psychical' doctrines now prevailing, a prince, who conveyed the corpse of his wife to the grave with no other attendant than himself, would be censured severely. What Greeks with their 'corporeal' doctrines would think of him, we may see in Aeschylus. Even the guilt of a Clytaemnestra, murderess of her lord, can take a blacker shade from the fact that she buried him 'without the lament of a husband or the train of a king[1]': and this it is which, more than anything else in the story, arouses the frenzy of the avenger.
But Admetus is not driven to this extremity. The queen's procession, such as it is, happily arrives at the palace before she is actually dead. From the report of a maid-servant, who presently comes out of doors to weep, we learn among other things both why these few persons have been selected for invitation and why others would not have been welcome. 'I will go', she says, 'and say that you are here. It is not by any means all, who feel for my lord[2] so kindly as to bring to his griefs a sympathetic presence. But you have been from of old the master's friend'. That Admetus just at this time is not popular, in his realm any more than in his household, we hear without surprise. By requesting and accepting the sacrifice of his more amiable lady, he would have somewhat dimmed in the general eye the glory of
