ORESTES.
Orestes asleep on his bed, Electra watching beside it.
Electra.
Nothing there is so terrible to tell,[1]
Nor fleshly pang, nor visitation of God,
But poor humanity may have to bear it.
For the once blest,—I taunt his misery not,—
Begotten of Zeus, as men say, Tantalus,5
Dreading the crag which topples o'er his head,
Now hangs mid air; and pays this penalty,
As the tale telleth, for that he, a man,
Honoured to sit god-like at meat with Gods,
In shameful madness kept unreined his tongue.10
He begat Pelops; born to him was Atreus
For whom with her doom-threads Fate twined a strand
Of strife against Thyestes, yea, his brother;—
Why must I tell o'er things unspeakable?
Atreus for their sire's feasting slew his sons.15
Of Atreus—what befell between I tell not—
Famed Agamemnon sprang,—if this be fame,—
And Menelaus, of Cretan Aeropê.
And Menelaus wedded Helen, loathed
Of heaven, the while King Agamemnon won20
- ↑ Or, "Nothing there is so awful—dare I say?—"
