The Bacchae of Euripides Part 11

Marked of every eye.

PENTHEUS.

For that I go!

DIONYSUS.

Thou shalt be borne on high!

PENTHEUS.

That were like pride!

DIONYSUS.

Thy mother's hands shall share Thy carrying.

PENTHEUS.

Nay; I need not such soft care!

DIONYSUS.

So soft?

PENTHEUS.

Whate'er it be, I have earned it well!

[_Exit_ PENTHEUS _towards the Mountain_.

DIONYSUS.

Fell, fell art thou; and to a doom so fell Thou walkest, that thy name from South to North Shall s.h.i.+ne, a sign for ever!--Reach thou forth Thine arms, Agave, now, and ye dark-browed Cadmeian sisters! Greet this prince so proud To the high ordeal, where save G.o.d and me, None walks unscathed!--The rest this day shall see.

[_Exit_ DIONYSUS _following_ PENTHEUS.

CHORUS.

_Some Maidens._

O hounds raging and blind, Up by the mountain road, Sprites of the maddened mind, To the wild Maids of G.o.d; Fill with your rage their eyes, Rage at the rage unblest, Watching in woman's guise, The spy upon G.o.d's Possessed.

_A Baccha.n.a.l._

Who shall be first, to mark Eyes in the rock that spy, Eyes in the pine-tree dark-- Is it his mother?--and cry: "Lo, what is this that comes, Haunting, troubling still, Even in our heights, our homes, The wild Maids of the Hill?

What flesh bare this child?

Never on woman's breast Changeling so evil smiled; Man is he not, but Beast!

Lion-shape of the wild, Gorgon-breed of the waste!"

_All the Chorus._

Hither, for doom and deed!

Hither with lifted sword, Justice, Wrath of the Lord, Come in our visible need!

Smite till the throat shall bleed, Smite till the heart shall bleed, Him the tyrannous, lawless, G.o.dless, Echion's earth-born seed!

_Other Maidens._

Tyrannously hath he trod; Marched him, in Law's despite, Against thy Light, O G.o.d, Yea, and thy Mother's Light; Girded him, falsely bold, Blinded in craft, to quell And by man's violence hold Things unconquerable.

_A Baccha.n.a.l._

A strait pitiless mind Is death unto G.o.dliness; And to feel in human kind Life, and a pain the less.

Knowledge, we are not foes!

I seek thee diligently; But the world with a great wind blows, s.h.i.+ning, and not from thee; Blowing to beautiful things, On, amid dark and light, Till Life, through the trammellings Of Laws that are not the Right, Breaks, clean and pure, and sings Glorying to G.o.d in the height!

_All the Chorus._

Hither for doom and deed!

Hither with lifted sword, Justice, Wrath of the Lord, Come in our visible need!

Smite till the throat shall bleed, Smite till the heart shall bleed, Him the tyrannous, lawless, G.o.dless, Echion's earth-born seed!

LEADER.

Appear, appear, whatso thy shape or name O Mountain Bull, Snake of the Hundred Heads, Lion of Burning Flame!

O G.o.d, Beast, Mystery, come! Thy mystic maids Are hunted!--Blast their hunter with thy breath, Cast o'er his head thy snare; And laugh aloud and drag him to his death, Who stalks thy herded madness in its lair!

_Enter hastily a_ MESSENGER _from the Mountain, pale and distraught_.

MESSENGER.

Woe to the house once blest in h.e.l.las! Woe To thee, old King Sidonian, who didst sow The dragon-seed on Ares' b.l.o.o.d.y lea!

Alas, even thy slaves must weep for thee!

LEADER.

News from the mountain?--Speak! How hath it sped?

MESSENGER.

Pentheus, my king, Echion's son, is dead!

LEADER.

All hail, G.o.d of the Voice, Manifest ever more!

MESSENGER.