Euripides' ELECTRA Complete

Translated by E. Coleridge.

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66 pages - You are on Page 43

Meantime the servants, that composed their master's bodyguard,
laid aside their weapons, and one and all were busied at their tasks.
Some brought the bowl to catch the blood, others took up baskets,
while others kindled fire and set cauldrons round about the altars,
and the whole house rang. Then did thy mother's husband take the barley
for sprinkling, and began casting it upon the hearth with these words,
"Ye Nymphs, who dwell among the rocks, grant that I may often sacrifice
with my wife, the daughter of Tyndareus, within my halls, as happily
as now, and ruin seize my foes!" (whereby he meant Orestes and thyself)
. But my master, lowering his voice, offered a different prayer,
that he might regain his father's house. Next Aegisthus took from
basket a long straight knife, and cutting off some of the calf's hair,
laid it with his right hand on the sacred fire, and then cut its throat
when the servants had lifted it upon their shoulders, and thus addressed
thy brother; "Men declare that amongst the Thessalians this is counted
honourable, to cut up a bull neatly and to manage steeds. So take
the knife, sir stranger, and show us if rumour speaks true about the
Thessalians." Thereon Orestes seized the Dorian knife of tempered
steel and cast from his shoulders his graceful buckled robe; then
choosing Pylades to help him in his task, he made the servants withdraw,
and catching the calf by the hoof, proceeded to lay bare its white
flesh, with arm outstretched, and he flayed the hide quicker than
a runner ever finishes the two laps of the horses' race-course; next
he laid the belly open, and Aegisthus took the entrails in his hands
and carefully examined them. Now the liver had no lobe, while the
portal vein leading to the gall-bladder portended dangerous attack
on him who was observing it. Dark grows Aegisthus' brow, but my master
asks, "Why so despondent, good sir?" Said he, "I fear treachery from
a stranger.

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