Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1898) v3.djvu/400

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Made meet by the sacred purifying
For the Bacchanal rout o'er the mountains flying,
For the orgies of Cybelê mystery-folden,
Of the Mother olden,
Wreathed with the ivy sprays, 80
The thyrsus on high doth he raise,
Singing the Vine-god's praise—
Come, Bacchanals, come!
The Clamour-king, child of a God,
O'er the mountains of Phrygia who trod,
Unto Hellas's highways broad
Bring him home, bring him home!—
(Ant. 2)
The God whom his mother,—when anguish tore her
Of the travail resistless that deathward bore her
On the wings of the thunder of Zeus down-flying,— 90
Brought forth at her dying
An untimely birth, as her spirit departed
Stricken from life by the flame down-darted:
But in birth-bowers new did Zeus Kronion
Receive his scion;
For, hid in a cleft of his thigh,
By the gold-clasps knit, did he lie
Safe hidden from Hera's eye
Till the Fates' day came;
Then a God bull-horned Zeus bare, 100
And with serpents entwined his hair:
And for this do his Maenads wear
In their tresses the same.
(Str. 3)
Thebes, nursing-town of Semelê, crown
With the ivy thy brows, and be
All bloom, embowered in the starry-flowered
Lush green of the briony,