Book of illustrations : Ancient Tragedy

My son that holds endearing converse with thee {315}
Hath in his father a secure protection;
But who, my daughter, shall with honour guide
Thy virgin years? What woman shalt thou find
New-wedded to thy father, whose vile arts
Will not with slanderous falsehoods taint thy name,
And blast thy nuptials in youth's freshest bloom?
For never shall thy mother see thee led
A bride, nor at thy throes speak comfort to thee,
Then present when a mother's tenderness
Is most alive: for I must die! {325}

The Chorus pledge their faith that the king will honour such a request as long as reason lasts. Admetus addresses a solemn vow to his dying wife, that her will shall be done:

Living thou wast mine, {334}
And dead thou only shalt be called my wife.

It will be only too easy to keep such a pledge as that, for life henceforth will be one long mourning to him.

Hence I renounce
The feast, the cheerful guest, the flow'ry wreath, {350}
And song that used to echo through my house:
For never will I touch the lyre again,
Nor to the Libyan flute's sweet measures raise
My voice: with thee all my delights are dead.
Thy beauteous figure, by the artist's hand
Skillfully wrought, shall in my bed be laid;
By that reclining, I will clasp it to me,
And call it by thy name, and think I hold
My dear wife in my arms, and have her yet,
Though now no more I have her: cold delight {360}
I ween, yet thus th' affliction of my soul
I shall relieve, and visiting my dreams
Shalt thou delight me.

O for the power of Orpheus's lyre, that might rescue thee even from the realms of the dead!

But there await me till I die; prepare {374}
A mansion for me, as again with me
To dwell; for in thy tomb I will be laid,
In the same cedar, by thy side composed:
For e'en in death I will not be disjoin'd
From thee who hast alone been faithful to me!

As the Chorus join in Admetus's sorrow the pledge is reiterated, and the dying mother is satisfied.

Alc. Thus pledging, from my hands receive thy children. {386}
Adm. A much-loved gift, and from a much-loved hand!

The strength Alcestis had summoned for her last effort now forsakes her: she sinks rapidly.

Alc. A heavy weight hangs on my darkened eye. {396} Adm. If thou forsake me I am lost indeed! Alc. As one that is no more I now am nothing. Adm. Ah, raise thy face! forsake not thus thy children! Alc. It must be so perforce: farewell, my children. Adm. Look on them, but a look. Alc. I am no more. Adm. How dost thou? Wilt thou leave us so? Alc. Farewell. Adm. And what a wretch, what a lost wretch am I! Cho. She's gone! Thy wife, Admetus, is no more!

The little Son flings himself passionately on the corpse [the metre breaking out into strophic alternations.]

Strophe

Son. O my unhappy fate! {405}
My mother sinks to the dark realms of night,
Nor longer views this golden light;
But to the ills of life exposed
Leaves my poor orphan state!
Her eyes, my father, see, her eyes are closed,
And her hand nerveless falls.
Yet hear me, O my mother, hear my cries!
It is thy son who calls,
Who prostrate on the earth breathes on thy lips his sighs.
Adm. On one that hears not, sees not! I and you
Must bend beneath affliction's heaviest load.

Antistrophe

Son. Ah! she hath left my youth – {417}
My mother, my loved mother is no more —
Left me my sufferings to deplore,
Left me a heritage of woe:
Who shall my sorrows soothe?
Thou too, my sister, thy full share shalt know
Of grief, thy heart to rend.
Vain, O my father, vain thy nuptial vows,
Brought to this speedy end:
For when my mother died in ruin sank our house! {425}

The Chorus [in calm blank verse] call on their king to command himself and bear what many have had to bear before. —Admetus knows he must: this calamity has not come without notice. He rouses himself to give orders as to the preparations for burial: the mourning rites shall last a whole year, and shall extend throughout the whole region of Thessaly: the very horses shall have their waving manes cut close, and no sound of flute or instrument of joy shall be heard in the city. {445}

The corpse is slowly carried out, and at last the Stage is vacant. Then the Chorus address themselves to a Choral Ode in memory of the Spirit now passed beneath the earth: the evolutions as usual, carrying them with each Strophe to one end of the Orchestra, and with the Antistrophe back to the Altar.

CHORAL INTERLUDE II

Strophe I

Immortal bliss be thine, {446}
Daughter of Pelias, in the realms below,
Immortal pleasures round thee flow,
Though never there the sun's bright beams shall shine.
Be the black-brow'd Pluto told,
And the Stygian boatman old,
Whose rude hands grasp the oar, the rudder guide,
The dead conveying o'er the tide, —
Let him be told, so rich a freight before