Euripides' ORESTES Complete

Translated by E. Coleridge.

Euripides Bilingual Anthology  Studies  Euripides in Print

42 pages - You are on Page 27

Phrygian: With a loud cry we battered down the doors and doorposts
of the rooms we had been penned in, by means of bars, and ran to her
assistance from every direction, one arming himself with stones, another
with javelins, a third having a drawn sword; but Pylades came to meet
us, all undaunted, like Hector of Troy or Ajax triple-plumed, as I
saw him on the threshold of Priam's palace; and we met point to point.
But then it became most manifest how inferior we Phrygians were to
the warriors of Hellas in martial prowess. There was one man flying,
another slain, a third wounded, yet another craving mercy to stave
off death; but we escaped under cover of the darkness: while some
were falling, others staggering, and some laid low in death. And just
as her unhappy mother sunk to the ground to die, came luckless Hermione
to the palace; whereon those twain, like Bacchanals when they drop
their wands and seize a mountain-cub, rushed and seized her; then
turned again to the daughter of Zeus to slay her; but lo! she had
vanished from the room, passing right through the house by magic spells
or wizards'arts or heavenly fraud; O Zeus and earth, O day and night!

What happened afterwards I know not, for I stole out of the palace
and ran away. So Menelaus went through all his toil and trouble to
recover his wife Helen from Troy to no purpose. (Orestes comes out
of the palace.)

Leader of the Chorus: Behold another strange sight succeeding its
predecessors; I see Orestes sword in hand before the palace, advancing
with excited steps.

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