HIPPOLYTUS
OF EURIPIDES
DRAMATIS PERSONÆ
THE GODDESS APHRODITETHE NURSE OF PHÆDRA
THESEUS, King of Athens and TrozênA HENCHMAN OF HIPPOLYTUS
PHÆDRA，daughter of Minos, King ofTHE GODDESS ARTEMIS
Grete, wife to Theseus
HIPPLOYTUS, bastard son of Theseus andAN OLD HUNTSMAN
the Amazon Hippolyte A CHORUS OF HUNTSMEN
ATTENDANTS ON THE THREE ROYAL PERSONS
A CHORUS OF TROZENIAN WOMEN， WITH THEIR LEADER
“The scene is laid in Trozên. The play was first acted when Epameinon was Archon, Olympiad 87, year 4(B. C. 429) Euripides was first, Iophon second, Ion third. ”
Aphrodite
GREAT among men, and not unnamed am I,
The Cyprian, in God's inmost halls on high.
And wheresoe'er from Pontus to the far
Red West men dwell, and see the glad day-star,
And worship Me, the pious heart I bless,
And wreck that life that lives in stubbornness.
For that there is, even in a great God's mind,
That hungereth for the praise of human kind.
So runs my word; and soon the very deed
Shall follow. For this Prince of Theseus' seed,
Hippolytus, child of that dead Amazon,
And reared by saintly Pittheus in his own
Strait ways, bath dared, alone of all Trozên,
To hold me least of spirits and most mean,
And spurns my spell and seeks no woman's kiss.
But great Apollo's sister, Artemis,
He holds of all most high, gives love and praise,
And through the wild dark woods for ever strays,
He and the Maid together, with swift hounds
To slay all angry beasts from out these bounds,
To more than mortal friendship consecrate!
I grudge it not. No grudge know I, nor hate;
Yet, seeing he bath offended, I this day
Shall smite Hippolytus. Long since my way
Was opened, nor needs now much labour more.
For once from Pittheus' castle to the shore
Of Athens came Hippolytus over-seas
Seeking the vision of the Mysteries.
And Phædra there, his father's Queen high-born;
Saw him, and as she saw, her heart was torn
With great love, by the working of my will.
And for his sake, long since, on Pallas' hill,
Deep in the rock, that Love no more might roam,
She built a shrine, and named it Love-at-home:
And the rock held it, but its face alway
Seeks Trozên o'er the seas. Then came the day
When Theseus, for the blood of kinsmen shed,
Spake doom of exile on himself, and fled,
Phædra beside him, even to this Trozên.
And here that grievous and amazèd Queen,
Wounded and wondering, with ne'er a word,
Wastes slowly; and her secret none bath heard
Nor dreamed.
But never thus this love shall end!
To Theseus' ear some whisper will I send,
And all be bare! And that proud Prince, my foe,
His sire shall slay with curses. Even so
Endeth that boon the great Lord of the Main
To Theseus gave, the Three Prayers not in vain.
And she, not in dishonour, yet shall die.
I would not rate this woman's pain so high
As not to pay mine haters in full fee
That vengeance that shall make all well with me.
But soft, here comes he, striding from the chase,
Our Prince Hippolytus!—I will go my ways.—
And hunters at his heels: and a loud throng
Glorying Artemis with praise and song!
Little he knows that Hell's gates opened are,
And this his last look on the great Day-star!
［APHRODITE withdraws, unseen by HIPPOLYTUS and a band of huntsmen, who enter from the left, singing. They pass the Statue of APHRODITE without notice.
Hippolytus
Follow, O follow me,
Singing on your ways
Her in whose hand are we,
Her whose own flock we be,
The Zeus-Child the Heavenly;
To Artemis be praise!
Huntsmen
Hail to thee, Maiden blest,
Proudest and holiest:
God's Daughter, great in bliss,
Leto-born, Artemis!
Hail to thee, Maiden, far
Fairest of all that are,
Yea, and most high thine home,
Child of the Father's hall;
Hear, O most virginal,
Hear, O most fair of all,
In high God's golden dome.
［The huntsmen have gathered about the altar of ARTEMIS. HIPPOLYTUS now advances from them, and approaches the Statue with a wreath in his hand.
Hippolytus
To thee this wreathèd garland, from a green
And virgin meadow bear I, O my Queen,
Where never shepherd leads his grazing ewes
Nor scythe has touched. Only the river dews
Gleam, and the spring bee sings, and in the glade
Hath Solitude her mystic garden made.
No evil hand may cull it: only he
Whose heart bath known the heart of Purity,
Unlearned of man, and true whate'er befall.
Take therefore from pure hands this coronal,
O mistress loved, thy golden hair to twine.
For, sole of living men, this grace is mine,
To dwell with thee, and speak, and hear replies
Of voice divine, though none may see thine eyes.
Oh, keep me to the end in this same road!
［An OLD HUNTSMAN, who has stood apart from the rest, here comes up to HIPPOLYTUS. Huntsman
My Prince—for “Master” name I none but God—
Gave I good counsel, wouldst thou welcome it?
Hippolytus
Right gladly, friend; else were I poor of wit.
Huntsman
Knowest thou one law, that through the world has won?
Hippolytus
What wouldst thou? And how runs thy law? Say on.
Huntsman
It hates that Pride that speaks not all men fair!
Hippolytus
And rightly. Pride breeds hatred everywhere.
Huntsman
And good words love, and grace in all men's sight?
Hippolytus
Aye, and much gain withal, for trouble slight.
Huntsman
How deem'st thou of the Gods? Are they the same?
Hippolytus
Surely: we are but fashioned on their frame.
Huntsman
Why then wilt thou be proud, and worship not...
Hippolytus
Whom? If the name he speakable, speak out!Huntsman
She stands here at thy gate the Cyprian Queen!
Hippolytus
I greet her from afar: my life is clean.
Huntsman
Clean? Nay, proud, proud; a mark for all to scan!
Hippolytus
Each mind hath its own bent, for God or man.
Huntsman
God grant thee happiness... and wiser thought!
Hippolytus
These Spirits that reign in darkness like me not.
Huntsman
What the Gods ask, O Son, that man must pay!
Hippolytus(turning from him to the others)
On, huntsmen, to the Castle! Make your way
Straight to the feast room; 'tis a merry thing
After the chase, a board of banqueting.
And see the steeds be groomed, and in array
The chariot dight. I drive them forth to-day.
［He pauses, and makes a slight gesture of reverence to the Statue on the left. Then to the OLD HUNTSMAN.
That for thy Cyprian, friend, and nought beside!
［HIPPOLYTUS follows the huntsmen, who stream off by the central door in the Castle. The OLD HUNTSMAN remains.
Huntsman (approaching the Statue and kneeling)
O Cyprian—for a young man in his pride
I will not follow!—here before thee, meek,
In that one language that a slave may speak,
I pray thee; Oh, if some wild heart in froth
Of youth surges against thee, be not wroth
For ever! Nay, be far and hear not then:
Gods should be gentler and more wise than men!
［He rises and follows the others into the Castle.
The Orchestra is empty for a moment, then there enter from right and left several Trozenian women, young and old. Their number eventually amounts to fifteen.
Chorus
There riseth a rock-born river,
Of Ocean's tribe, men say;
The crags of it gleam and quiver,
And pitchers dip in the spray:
A woman was there with raiment white
To bathe and spread in the warm sunlight,
And she told a tale to me there by the river,
The tale of the Queen and her evil day:
How, ailing beyond allayment,
Within she hath bowed her head,
And with shadow of silken raiment
The bright brown hair bespread.
For three long days she hath lain forlorn,
Her lips untainted of flesh or corn,
For that secret sorrow beyond allayment
That steers to the far sad shore of the dead.
Some Women
Is this some Spirit, O child of man?
Doth Hecat hold thee perchance, or Pan?
Doth she of the Mountains work her ban,
Or the dread Corybantes bind thee?
Others
Nay, is it sin that upon thee lies,
Sin of forgotten sacrifice,
In thine own Dictynna's sea-wild eyes?
Who in Limna here can find thee;
For the Deep's dry floor is her easy way,
And she moves in the salt wet whirl of the spray.
Other Women
Or doth the Lord of Erechtheus' race,
Thy Theseus, watch for a fairer face,
For secret arms in a silent place,
Far from thy love or chiding?
Others
Or hath there landed, amid the loud
Hum of Piraeus' sailor-crowd,
Some Cretan venturer, weary-browed,
Who bears to the Queen some tiding;
Some far home-grief, that bath bowed her low,
And chained her soul to a bed of woe?
An Older Woman
Nay—know yet not?—this burden hath alway lain
On the devious being of woman; yea, burdens twain,
The burden of Wild Will and the burden of Pain.
Through my heart once that wind of terror sped;
But I, in fear confessèd,
Cried from the dark to Her in heavenly bliss,
The Helper of Pain, the Bow-Maid Artemis:
Whose feet I praise for ever, where they tread
Far off among the blessèd!
The Leader
But see, the Queen's grey nurse at the door,
Sad-eyed and sterner, methinks, than of yore,
With the Queen. Doth she lead her hither,
To the wind and sun?—Ah, fain would I know
What strange betiding hath blanched that brow,
And made that young life wither.
［The NURSE comes out from the central door, followed by PHAEDRA, who is supported by two handmaids. They make ready a couch for PHAEDRA to lie upon.
Nurse
O sick and sore are the days of men!
What wouldst thou? What shall I change again?
Here is the Sun for thee; here is the sky;
And thy weary pillows wind-swept lie,
By the castle door.
But the cloud of thy brow is dark, I ween;
And soon thou wilt back to thy bower within:
So swift to change is the path of thy feet,
And near things hateful, and far things sweet;
So was it before!
Oh, pain were better than tending pain!
For that were single, and this is twain,
With grief of heart and labour of limb.
Yet all man's life is but ailing and dim,
And rest upon earth comes never.
But if any far-off state there be,
Dearer than life to mortality;
The hand of the Dark hath hold thereof,
And mist is under and mist above.
And so we are sick of life, and cling
On earth to this nameless and shining thing.
For other life is a fountain sealed,
And the deeps below are unrevealed,
And we drift on legends for ever!
［PHÆDRA during this has been laid on her couch; she speaks to the handmaids.
Phœdra
Yes; lift me: not my head so low.
There, hold my arms.—Fair arms they seem!—
My poor limbs scarce obey me now!
Take off that hood that weighs my brow,
And let my long hair stream.
Nurse
Nay, toss not, Child, so feveredly.
The sickness best will win relief
By quiet rest and constancy.
All men have grief.
Phœdra (not noticing her)
Oh for a deep and dewy spring,
With runlets cold to draw and drink?
And a great meadow blossoming,
Long-grassed, and poplars in a ring,
To rest me by the brink!
Nurse
Nay, Child! Shall strangers hear this tone
So wild, and thoughts so fever-flown?
Phœdra
Oh, take me to the Mountain! Oh,
Past the great pines and through the wood,
Up where the lean hounds softly go,
A-whine for wild things' blood,
And madly flies the dappled roe.
O God, to shout and speed them there,
An arrow by my chestnut hair
Drawn tight, and one keen glimmering spear—
Ah! if I could!
Nurse
What wouldst thou with them—fancies all!—
Thy hunting and thy fountain brink?
What wouldst thou? By the city wall
Canst hear our own brook plash and fall
Downhill, if thou wouldst drink.
Phœdra
O Mistress of the Sea-lorn Mere
Where horse-hoofs beat the sand and sing,
O Artemis, that I were there
To tame Enetian steeds and steer
Swift chariots in the ring!
Nurse
Nay, mountainward but now thy hands
Yearned out, with craving for the chase;
And now toward the unseaswept sands
Thou roamest, where the coursers pace!
O wild young steed, what prophet knows
The power that holds thy curb, and throws
Thy swift heart from its race?
［At these words PHÆDRA gradually recovers herself and pays attention.
Phœdra
What have I said? Woe's me! And where
Gone straying from my wholesome mind?
What? Did I fall in some god's snare?
—Nurse, veil my head again, and blind
Mine eyes. —There is a tear behind
That lash. —Oh, I am sick with shame!
Aye, but it hath a sting,
To come to reason: yet the name
Of madness is an awful thing.—
Could I but die in one swift flame
Unthinking, unknowing!
Nurse
I veil thy face, Child. —Would that so
Mine own were veiled for evermore,
So sore I love thee!... Though the lore
Of long life mocks me, and I know
How love should be a lightsome thing
Not rooted in the deep o' the heart;
With gentle ties, to twine apart
If need so call, or closer cling. —
Why do I love thee so? O fool,
O fool, the heart that bleeds for twain,
And builds, men tell us, wails of pain,
To walk by love's unswerving rule
The same for ever, stern and true!
For “Thorough” is no word of peace:
'Tis “Naught-too-much” makes trouble cease.
And many a wise man bows thereto.
［The LEADER OF THE CHORUS here approaches the NURSE.
Leader
Nurse of our Queen, thou watcher old and true,
We see her great affliction, but no clue
Have we to learn the sickness. Wouldst thou tell
The name and sort thereof, 'twould like us well.
Nurse
Small leechcraft have I, and she tells no man.
Leader
Thou know'st no cause? Nor when the unrest began?
Nurse
It all comes to the same. She will not speak.
Leader (turning and looking at PHAEDRA).
How she is changed and wasted! And how weak!
Nurse
'Tis the third day she hath fasted utterly.
Leader
What, is she mad? Or doth she seek to die?
Nurse
I know not. But to death it sure must lead.
Leader
'Tis strange that Theseus takes hereof no heed.
Nurse
She hides her wound, and vows it is not so.
Leader
Can he not look into her face and know?
Nurse
Nay, he is on a journey these last days.
Leader
Canst thou not force her, then? Or think of ways
To trap the secret of the sick heart's pain?
Nurse
Have I not tried all ways, and all in vain?
Yet will I cease not now, and thou shalt tell
If in her grief I serve my mistress well!
［She goes across to where PHAEDRA lies; and presently, while speaking, kneels by her.
Dear daughter mine, all that before was said
Let both of us forget; and thou instead
Be kindlier, and unlock that prisoned brow.
And I, who followed then the wrong road, now
Will leave it and be wiser. If thou fear
Some secret sickness, there be women here
To give thee comfort. ［PHÆDRA shakes her head.
No; not secret? Then
Is it a sickness meet for aid of men?
Speak, that a leech may tend thee.
Silent still?
Nay, Child, what profits silence? If 'tis ill
This that I counsel, make me see the wrong:
If well, then yield to me.
Nay, Child, I long
For one kind word, one look!
［PHÆDRA lies motionless. The NURSE rises.
Oh, woe is me!
Women, we labour here all fruitlessly,
All as far off as ever from her heart!
She ever scorned me, and now hears no part
Of all my prayers!［Turning to PHÆDRA again.
Nay, hear thou shalt, and be,
If so thou will, more wild than the wild sea;
But know, thou art thy little ones' betrayer!
If thou die now, shall child of thine be heir
To Theseus' castle? Nay, not thine, I ween,
But hers! That barbed Amazonian Queen
Hath left a child to bend thy children low,
A bastard royal-hearted—sayst not so?—
Hippolytus...
Phœdra
Ah!
［She starts up, sitting, and throws the veil off.
Nurse
That stings thee?
Phœdra
Nurse, most sore
Thou hast hurt me! In God's name, speak that name no more.
Nurse
Thou seest? Thy mind is clear; but with thy mind
Thou wilt not save thy children, nor be kind
To thine own life.
Phœdra
My children? Nay, most dear
I love them,—Far, far other grief is here.
Nurse (after a pause, wondering).
Thy hand is clean, O Child, from stain of blood?
Phœdra
My hand is clean; but is my heart, O God?
Nurse
Some enemy's spell hath made thy spirit dim?
Phœdra
He hates me not that slays me, nor I him.
Nurse
Theseus, the King, hath wronged thee in man's wise?
Phœdra
Ah, could but I stand guiltless in his eyes!
Nurse
O speak! What is this death-fraught mystery?
Phœdra
Nay, leave me to my wrong. I wrong not thee.
Nurse (suddenly throwing herself in supplication at PHÆDRA'S feet)
Not wrong me, whom thou wouldst all desolate leave!
Phœdra (rising and trying to move away)
What wouldst thou? Force me? Slinging to my sleeve?
Nurse
Yea, to thy knees; and weep; and let not go!
Phœdra
Woe to thee, Woman, if thou learn it, woe!
Nurse
I know no bitterer woe than losing thee.
Phœdra
I am lost! Yet the deed shall honour me.
Nurse
Why hide what honours thee? 'Tis all I claim!
Phœdra
Why, so I build up honour out of shame!
Nurse
Then speak, and higher still thy fame shall stand.
Phœdra
Go, in God's name!—Nay, leave me; loose my hand!
Nurse
Never, until thou grant me what I pray.
Phœdra (yielding, after a pause).
So be it. I dare not tear that hand away.
Nurse (rising and releasing PHAEDRA).
Tell all thou wilt, Daughter. I speak no more.
Phœdra (after a long pause).
Mother, poor Mother, that didst love so sore!
Nurse
What mean'st thou, Child? The Wild Bull of the Tide?
Phœdra
And thou, sad sister, Dionysus' bride!
Nurse
Child! wouldst thou shame the house where thou wast born?
Phœdra
And I the third, sinking most all-forlorn!
Nurse (to herself)
I am all lost and feared. What will she say?
Phœdra
From there my grief comes, not from yesterday.
Nurse
I come no nearer to thy parable.
Phœdra
Oh, would that thou could'st tell what I must tell!
Nurse
I am no seer in things I wot not of.
Phœdra (again hesitating)
What is it that they mean, who say men... love?Nurse
A thing most sweet, my Child, yet dolorous.
Phœdra
Only the half, belike, hath fallen on us!
Nurse (starting)
On thee? Love?—Oh, what say'st thou? What man's son?
Phœdra
What man's? There was a Queen, an Amazon...
Nurse
Hippolytus, say'st thou?
Phœdra (again wrapping her face in the veil)
Nay, 'twas thou, not I!
［PHÆDRA sinks back on the couch an covers her face again. The NURSE starts violently from her and walks up and down.
Nurse
O God what wilt thou say, Child? Wouldst thou try
To kill me?—Oh, 'tis more than I can bear;
Women, I will no more of it, this glare
Of hated day, this shining of the sky.
I will fling down my body, and let it lie
Till life he gone!
Women, God rest with you,
My works are over! For the pure and true
Are forced to evil, against their own heart's vow,
And love it!
［She suddenly sees the Statute of CYPRIS, and stands with her eyes riveted upon it.
Ah, Cyprian! No god art thou,
But more than god, and greater, that hath thrust
Me and my queen and all our house to dust!
［She throws herself on the ground close to the statue.
Chorus
Some Women
O Women, have ye heard? Nay, dare ye hear
The desolate cry, of the young Queen's misery?
A Woman
My Queen, I love thee dear,
Yet liefer were I dead than framed like thee.
Others
Woe, woe to me for this thy bitter bane,
Surely the food man feeds upon is pain!
Others
How wilt thou bear thee through this livelong day,
Lost, and thine evil naked to the light?
Strange things are close upon us—who shall say
How strange?—save one thing that is plain to sight,
The stroke of the Cyprian and the fall thereof
On thee, thou child of the Isle of fearful Love!
［PHÆDRA during this has risen from the couch and comes forwardcollectedly. As she speaks the NURSE gradually rouses herself,and listens more calmly.
Phœdra
O Women, dwellers in this portal-seat
Of Pelops' land, gazing towards my Crete,
How oft, in other days than these, have I
Through night's long hours thought of man's misery,
And how this life is wrecked! And, to mine eyes,
Not in man's knowledge, not in wisdom, lies
The lack that makes for sorrow. Nay, we scan
And know the right—for wit bath many a man—
But will not to the last end strive and serve.
For some grow too soon weary, and some swerve
To other paths, setting before the Right
The diverse far-off image of Delight:
And many are delights beneath the sun!
Long hours of converse; and to sit alone
Musing—a deadly happiness!—and Shame:
Though two things there he hidden in one name,
And Shame can be slow poison if it will;
This is the truth I saw then, and see still;
Nor is there any magic that can stain
That white truth for me, or make me blind again.
Come, I will show thee how my spirit hath moved.
When the first stab came, and I knew I loved,
I cast about how best to face mine ill.
And the first thought that came, was to be still
And hide my sickness. —For no trust there is
In man's tongue, that so well admonishes
And counsels and betrays, and waxes fat
With griefs of its own gathering!—After that
I would my madness bravely bear, and try
To conquer by mine own heart's purity.
My third mind, when these two availed me naught
To quell love was to die—
［Motion of protest among the Women.
—the best, best thought—
—Gainsay me not—of all that man can say!
I would not have mine honour hidden away;
Why should I have my shame before men's eyes
Kept living? And I knew, in deadly wise,
Shame was the deed and shame the suffering;
And I a woman, too, to face the thing,
Despised of all!
Oh, utterly accurst
Be she of women, whoso dared the first
To cast her honour out to a strange man!
'Twas in some great house, surely, that began
This plague upon us; then the baser kind,
When the good led towards evil, followed blind
And joyous! Cursed be they whose lips are clean
And wise and seemly, but their hearts within
Rank with bad daring! How can they, O Thou
That walkest on the waves, great Cyprian, how
Smile in their husbands' faces, and not fall,
Not cower before the Darkness that knows all,
Aye, dread the dead still chambers, lest one day
The stones find voice, and all be finished!
Nay,
Friends, 'tis for this I die; lest I stand there
Having shamed my husband and the babes I bare,
In ancient Athens they shall some day dwell,
My babes, free men, free-spoken, honourable,
And when one asks their mother, proud of me!
For, oh, it cows a man, though bold he be,
To know a mother's or a father's sin.
'Tis written, one way is there, one, to win
This life's race, could man keep it from his birth,
A true clean spirit. And through all this earth
To every false man, that hour comes apace
When Time holds up a mirror to his face,
And girl-like, marvelling, there he stares to see
How foul his heart! Be it not so with me!
Leader of the Chorus
Ah, God, bow sweet is virtue, and how wise,
And honour its due meed in all men's eyes!
Nurse (who has now risen and recovered herself)
Mistress, a sharp swift terror struck me low
A moment since, hearing of this thy woe,
But now—I was a coward! And men say
Our second thought the wiser is alway.
This is no monstrous thing; no grief too dire
To meet with quiet thinking. In her ire
A most strong goddess bath swept down on thee.
Thou lovest. Is that so strange? Many there be
Beside thee!... And because thou lovest, wilt fall
And die! And must all lovers die, then? All
That are or shall be? A blithe law for them!
Nay, when in might she swoops, no strength can stem
Cypris; and if man yields him, she is sweet;
But is he proud and stubborn? From his feet
She lifts him, and—how think you?—flings to scorn!
She ranges with the stars of eve and morn,
She wanders in the heaving of the sea,
And all life lives from her. —Aye, this is she
That sows Love's seed and brings Love's fruit to birth;
And great Love's brethren are all we on earth!
Nay, they who con grey books of ancient days
Or dwell among the Muses, tell—and praise—
How Zeus himself once yearned for Semelê;
How maiden Eôs in her radiancy
Swept Kephalos to heaven away, away,
For sore love's sake. And there they dwell, men say,
And fear not, fret not; for a thing too stern
Hath met and crushed them!
And must thou, then, turn
And struggle? Sprang there from thy father's blood
Thy little soul all lonely? Or the god
That rules thee, is he other than our gods?
Nay, yield thee to men's ways, and kiss their rods!
How many, deem'st thou, of men good and wise
Know their own home's blot, and avert their eyes?
How many fathers, when a son has strayed
And toiled beneath the Cyprian, bring him aid,
Not chiding? And man's wisdom e'er hath been
To keep what is not good to see, unseen!
A straight and perfect life is not for man;
Nay, in a shut house, let him, if he can,
'Mid sheltered rooms, make all lines true. But here,
Out in the wide sea fallen, and full of fear,
Hopest thou so easily to swim to land?
Canst thou but set thine ill days on one hand
And more good days on the other, verily,
O child of woman, life is well with thee!
［She pauses, and then draws nearer to PHÆDRA.
Nay, dear my daughter, cease thine evil mind,
Cease thy fierce pride! For pride it is, and blind,
To seek to outpass gods!—Love on and dare:
A god hath willed it! And, since pain is there,
Make the pain sleep! Songs are there to bring calm,
And magic words. And I shall find the balm,
Be sure, to heal thee. Else in sore dismay
Were men, could not we women find our way!
Leader of the Chorus
Help is there, Queen, in all this woman says,
To ease thy suffering. But 'tis thee I praise;
Albeit that praise is harder to thine ear
Than all her chiding was, and bitterer!
Phœdra
Oh, this it is hath flung to dogs and birds
Men's lives and homes and cities—fair false words!
Oh, why speak things to please our ears? We crave
Not that 'Tis honour, honour, we must save!
Nurse
Why prate so proud! 'Tis no words, brave nor base,
Thou cravest; 'tis a man's arms!
［PHÆDRA moves indignantly.
Up and face
The truth of what thou art, and name it straight!
Were not thy life thrown open here for Fate
To beat on; hadst thou been a woman pure
Or wise or strong; never had I for lure
Of joy nor heartache led thee on to this!
But when a whole life one great battle is,
To win or lose—no man can blame me then.
Phœdra
Shame on thee! Lock those lips, and ne'er again
Let word nor thought so foul have harbour there!
Nurse
Foul, if thou wilt: but better than the fair
For thee and me. And better, too, the deed
Behind them, if it save thee in thy need,
Than that word Honour thou wilt die to win!
Phœdra
Nay, in God's name,—such wisdom and such sin
Are all about thy lips!—urge me no more.
For all the soul within me is wrought o'er
By Love; and if thou speak and speak, I may
Be spent, and drift where now I shrink away.
Nurse
Well, if thou wilt!—'Twere best never to err,
But, having erred, to take a counsellor
Is second. —Mark me now. I have within
Love-philtres, to make peace where storm hath been,
That, with no shame, no scathe of mind, shall save
Thy life from anguish; wilt but thou be brave!
［To herself, reflecting.
Ah, but from him, the well-beloved, some sign
We need, or word, or raiment's hem, to twine
Amid the charm, and one spell knit from twain.
Phœdra
Is it a potion or a salve? Be plain.
Nurse
Who knows? Seek to be helped, Child, not to know.
Phœdra
Why art thou ever subtle? I dread thee, so.
Nurse
Thou wouldst dread everything!—What dost thou dread?
Phœdra
Least to his ear some word be whispered.
Nurse
Let be, Child! I will make all well with thee!
—Only do thou, O Cyprian of the Sea,
Be with me! And mine own heart, come what may,
Shall know what ear to seek, what word to say!
［The NURSE, having spoken these last words in prayer apart to the Statue of CYPRIS, turns back and goes into the house. PHAEDRA sits pensive again on her couch till towards the end of the following Song, when she rises and bends close to the door.
Chorus
Erôs, Erôs, who blindest, tear by tear,
Men's eyes with hunger; thou swift Foe, that pliest
Deep in our hearts joy like an edgèd spear;
Come not to me with Evil haunting near,
Wrath on the wind, nor jarring of the clear
Wing's music as thou fliest!
There is no shaft that burneth, not in fire,
Not in wild stars, far off and flinging fear,
As in thine hands the shaft of All Desire,
Erôs, Child of the Highest
In vain, in vain, by old Alpheüs' shore
The blood of many bulls doth stain the river,
And all Greece bows on Phœbus' Pythian floor;
Yet bring we to the Master of Man no store,
The Keybearer, who standeth at the door
Close-barred, where hideth ever
The heart of the shrine. Yea, though he sack man's life
Like a sacked city, and moveth evermore
Girt with calamity and strange ways of strife,
Him have we worshipped never!
———————
There roamed a Steed in Oechalia's wild,
A Maid without yoke, without Master,
And Love she knew not, that far King's child;
But he came, he came, with a song in the night,
With fire, with blood; and she strove in flight,
A Torrent Spirit, a Maenad white,
Faster and vainly faster,
Sealed unto Heracles by the Cyprian's Might.
Alas, thou Bride of Disaster!
O Mouth of Dirce, O god-built wall,
That Dirce's wells run under,
Ye know the Cyprian's fleet footfall!
Ye saw the heavens around her flare,
When she lulled to her sleep that Mother fair
Of Twy-born Bacchus, and decked her there
The Bride of the bladed Thunder.
For her breath is on all that hath life, and she floats in the air,
Bee-like, death-like, a wonder.
［During the last lines PHAEDRA has approached the door and is listening.
Phœdra
Silence ye Women! Something is amiss.Leader
How? In the house?—Phædra, what fear is this?
Phœdra
Let me but listen! There are voices. Hark!
Leader
I hold my peace: yet is thy presage dark.
Phœdra
Oh, misery!
O God, that such a thing should fall on me!
Leader
What sound, what word,
O Women, Friend, makes that sharp terror start
Out at thy lips? What ominous cry half-heard
Hath leapt upon thine heart?
Phœdra
I am undone!—Bend to the door and hark,
Hark what a tone sounds there, and sinks away!
Leader
Thou art beside the bars. 'Tis thine to mark
The castle's floating message. Say, Oh, say
What thing hath come to thee?
Phœdra (calmly)
Why, what thing should it be?
The son of that proud Amazon speaks again
In bitter wrath: speaks to my handmaiden!
Leader
I hear a noise of voices, nothing clear.
For thee the din bath words. as through barred locks
Floating, at thy heart it knocks.Phœdra
“Pander of Sin” it says.—Now canst thou hear?—
And there: “Betrayer of a master's bed. ”
Leader
Ah me, betrayed! Betrayed!
Sweet Princess, thou art ill bested,
Thy secret brought to light, and ruin near,
By her thou heldest dear,
By her that should have loved thee and obeyed!
Phœdra
Aye, I am slain. She thought to help my fall
With love instead of honour, and wrecked all.
Leader
Where wilt thou turn thee, where?
And what help seek, O wounded to despair?
Phœdra
I know not, save one thing to die right soon.
For such as me God keeps no other boon.
［The door in the centre bursts open, and HIPPOLYTUS comes forth, closely followed by the NURSE. PHAEDRA cowers aside.
Hippolytus
O Mother Earth, O Sun that makest clean,
What poison have I heard, what speechless sin!
Nurse
Hush, O my Prince, lest others mark, and guess...
Hippolytus
I have heard horrors! Shall I hold my peace?
Nurse
Yea, by this fair right arm, Son, by thy pledge...Hippolytus
Down with that hand! Touch not my garment's edge!
Nurse
Oh, by thy knees, be silent or I die!
Hippolytus
Why, when thy speech was all so guiltless? Why?
Nurse
It is not meet, fair Son, for every ear!
Hippolytus
Good words can bravely forth, and have no fear.
Nurse
Thine oath, thine oath! I took thine oath before!
Hippolytus
'Twas but my tongue, 'twas not my soul that swore.
Nurse
O Son, what wilt thou? Wilt thou slay thy kin?
Hippolytus
I own no kindred with the spawn of sin!
［He flings her from him.
Nurse
Nay, spare me! Man was born to err; oh, spare!
Hippolytus
O God, why hast Thou made this gleaming snare,
Woman, to dog us on the happy earth?
Was it Thy will to make Man, why his birth
Through Love and Woman? Could we not have rolled
Our store of prayer and offering, royal gold,
Silver and weight of bronze before Thy feet,
And bought of God new child souls, as were meet
For each man's sacrifice, and dwelt in homes
Free, where nor Love nor Woman goes and comes?
How, is that daughter not a bane confessed,
Whom her own sire sends forth—(He knows her best!)—
And, will some man but take her, pays a dower!
And he, poor fool, takes home the poison-flower;
Laughs to hang jewels on the deadly thing
He joys in; labours for her robe-wearing,
Till wealth and peace are dead. He smarts the less
In whose high seat is set a Nothingness,
A woman naught availing Worst of all
The wise deep-thoughted! Never in my hall
May she sit throned who thinks and waits and sighs!
For Cypris breeds most evil in the wise,
And least in her whose heart has naught within;
For puny wit can work but puny sin.
Why do we let their handmaids pass the gate?
Wild beasts were best, voiceless and fanged, to wait
About their rooms, that they might speak with none,
Nor ever hear one answering human tone!
But now dark women in still chambers lay
Plans that creep out into light of day
On handmaids' lips—［Turning to the NURSE.
As thine accursèd head
Braved the high honour of my Father's bed,
And came to traffic.... Our white torrent's spray
Shall drench mine ears to wash those words away!
And couldst thou dream that I...? I feel impure
Still at the very hearing! Know for sure,
Woman, naught but mine honour saves ye both.
Hadst thou not trapped me with that guileful oath,
No power had held me secret till the King
Knew all! But now, while he is journeying,
I too will go my ways and make no sound.
And when he comes again, I shall be found
Beside him, silent, watching with what grace
Thou and thy mistress shall greet him face to face!
Then shall I have the taste of it, and know
What woman's guile is. —Woe upon you, woe!
How can I too much hate you, while the ill
Ye work upon the world grows deadlier still?
Too much? Make woman pure, and wild Love tame,
Or let me cry for ever on their shame!
［He goes off in fury to the left. PHAEDRA still cowering in her place begins to sob.
Phœdra
Sad, sad and evil-starred
Is Woman's state.
What shelter now is left or guard?
What spell to loose the iron knot of fate?
And this thing, O my God,
O thou sweet Sunlight, is but my desert!
I cannot fly before the avenging rod
Falls, cannot hide my hurt.
What help, O ye who love me, can come near,
What god or man appear,
To aid a thing so evil and so lost?
Lost, for this anguish presses, soon or late,
To that swift river that no life hath cross.
No woman ever lived so desolate!
Leader of the Chorus
Ah me, the time for deeds is gone; the boast
Proved vain that spake thine handmaid; and all lost!
［At these words PHAEDRA suddenly remembers the NURSE, who is cowering silently where HIPPOLYTUS had thrown her from him. She turns upon her.
Phœdra
O wicked, wicked, wicked! Murderess heart
To them that loved thee! Hast thou played thy part?
Am I enough trod down?
May Zeus, my sire,
Blast and uproot thee Stab thee dead with fire!
Said I not—Knew I not thine heart?—to name
To no one soul this that is now my shame?
And thou couldst not be silent! So no more
I die in honour. But enough; a store
Of new words must be spoke and new things thought,
This man's whole being to one blade is wrought
Of rage against me. Even now he speeds
To abase me to the King with thy misdeeds;
Tell Pittheus; fill the land with talk of sin!
Cursèd be thou, and whoso else leaps in
To bring bad aid to friends that want it not.
［The NURSE has raised herself, and faces PHÆDRA, downcast but calm.
Nurse
Mistress, thou blamest me; and all thy lot
So bitter sore is, and the sting so wild,
I bear with all. Yet, if I would, my Child,
I have mine answer, couldst thou hearken aught.
I nursed thee, and I love thee; and I sought
Only some balm to heal thy deep despair,
And found—not what I sought for. Else I were
Wise, and thy friend, and good, had all sped right.
So fares it with us all in the world's sight.
Phœdra
First stab me to the heart, then humour me
With words! 'Tis fair; 'tis all as it should be!
Nurse
We talk too long, Child. I did ill; but, oh,
There is a way to save thee, even so!
Phœdra
A way? No more ways! One way hast thou trod
Already, foul and false and loathed of god!
Begone out of my sight; and ponder how
Thine own life stands! I need no helpers now.
［She turns from the NURSE, who creeps abashed away into the Castle.
Only do ye, high Daughters of Trozên,
Let all ye hear be as it had not been;
Know naught, and speak of naught! 'Tis my last prayer.
Leader
By God's pure daughter, Artemis, I swear,
No word will I of these thy griefs reveal!
Phœdra
'Tis well. But now, yea, even while I reel
And falter, one poor hope, as hope now is,
I clutch at in this coil of miseries;
To save some honour for my children's sake;
Yea, for myself some fragment, though things break
In ruin around me. Nay, I will not shame
The old proud Cretan Castle whence I came,
I will not cower before King Theseus' eyes,
Abased, for want of one life's sacrifice!
Leader
What wilt thou? Some dire deed beyond recall?
Phœdra (musing)
Die; but how die?
Leader
Let not such wild words fall!
Phœdra (turning upon her)
Give thou not such light counsel! Let me be
To sate the Cyprian that is murdering me!
To-day shall be her day; and, all strife past,
Her bitter Love shall quell me at the last.
Yet, dying, shall I die another's bane!
He shall not stand so proud where I have lain
Bent in the dust! Oh, he shall stoop to share
The life I live in, and learn mercy there!
［She goes off wildly into the Castle.
Chorus
Could I take me to some cavern for mine hiding,
In the hill-tops where the Sun scarce hath trod;
Or a cloud make the home of mine abiding,
As a bird among the bird-droves of God!
Could I wing me to my rest amid the roar
Of the deep Adriatic on the shore,
Where the waters of Eridanus are clear,
And Phaëthon's sad sisters by his grave
Weep into the river, and each tear
Gleams, a drop of amber, in the wave.
To the strand of the Daughters of the Sunset,
The Apple-tree, the singing and the gold;
Where the mariner must stay him from his onset,
And the red wave is tranquil as of old;
Yea, beyond that Pillar of the End
That Atlas guardeth, would I wend;
Where a voice of living waters never ceaseth
In God's quiet garden by the sea,
And Earth, the ancient life-giver, increaseth
Joy among the meadows, like a tree.
—————
O shallop of Crete, whose milk-white wing
Through the swell and the storm-beating,
Bore us thy Prince's daughter,
Was it well she came from a joyous home
To a far King's bridal across the foam?
What joy hath her bridal brought her?
Sure some spell upon either hand
Flew with thee from the Cretan strand,
Seeking Athena's tower divine;
And there, where Munychus fronts the brine,
Crept by the shore-flung cables' line,
The curse from the Cretan water!
And, for that dark spell that about her clings,
Sick desires of forbidden things
The soul of her rend and sever;
The bitter tide of calamity
Hath risen above her lips; and she,
Where bends she her last endeavour?
She will hie her alone to her bridal room,
And a rope swing slow in the rafters' gloom;
And a fair white neck shall creep to the noose,
A-shudder with dread, yet firm to choose
The one strait way for fame, and lose
The Love and the pain for ever.
［The Voice of the NURSE is heard from within, crying, at first inarticulately, then clearly. Voice
Help ho! The Queen! Help, whoso hearkeneth!
Help! Theseus' spouse caught in a noose of death!
A Woman
God, is it so soon finished? That bright head
Swinging beneath the rafters! Phædra dead!
Voice
O haste! This knot about her throat is made
So fast! Will no one bring me a swift blade?
A Woman
Say, friends, what think ye? Should we haste within,
And from her own hand's knotting loose the Queen?
Another
Nay, are there not men there? 'Tis an ill road
In life, to finger at another's load.
Voice
Let it lie straight! Alas! the cold white thing
That guards his empty caste for the King!
A Woman
Ah! “Let it lie straight!” Heard ye what she said?
No need for helpers now; the Queen is dead!
［The Women, intent upon the voices from the Castle, have not noticed the approach of THESEUS. He enters from the left; his dress and the garland on his head show that he has returned from some oracle or special abode of a God. He stands for a moment perplexed.
Theseus
Ho, Women, and what means this loud acclaim
Within the house? The vassals' outcry came
To smite mine ears far off. It were more meet
To fling out wide the Castle gates, and greet
With a joy held from God's Presence!
［The confusion and horror of the Women's faces gradually affects him. A dirge-cry comes from the Castle.
How?
Not Pittheus? Hath Time struck that hoary brow?
Old is he, old, I know. But sore it were,
Returning thus, to find his empty chair!
［The Women hesitate; then the Leader comes forward.
Leader
O Theseus, not on any old man's head
This stroke falls. Young and tender is the dead.
Theseus
Ye Gods! One of my children torn from me?
Leader
Thy motherless children live, most grievously
Theseus
How sayst thou? What? My wife?...
Say how she died.
Leader
In a high death-knot that her own hands tied.
Theseus
A fit of the old cold auguish—Tell me all—
That held her? Or did some fresh thing befall?
Leader
We know no more. But now arrived we be,
Theseus, to mourn for thy calamity.
［THESEUS stays for a moment silent, and puts his hand on his brow. He notices the wreath.
Theseus
What? And all garlanded I come to her
With flowers, most evil-starred God's-messenger!
Ho, varlets, loose the porral bars; undo
The bolts; and let me see the bitter view
Of her whose death bath brought me to mine own.
［The great central door of the Castle is thrown open wide, and the body of PHAEDRA is seen lying on a bier, surrounded by a group of Handmaids, wailing.
The Handmaids
Ah me, what thou hast suffered and hast done:
A deed to wrap this roof in flame!
Why was thine hand so strong, thine heart so bold?
Wherefore, O dead in anger, dead in shame,
The long, long wrestling ere thy breath was cold?
O ill-starred Wife,
What brought this blackness over all thy life?
［A throng of Men and Women has gradually collected.
Theseus
Ah me, this is the last
—Hear, O my countrymen!—and bitterest
Of Theseus' labours! Fortune all unblest,
How hath thine heavy heel across me passed!
Is it the stain of sins done long ago,
Some fell God still remembereth,
That must so dim and fret my life with death?
I cannot win to shore; and the waves flow
Above mine eyes, to be surmounted not.
Ah wife, sweet wife, what name
Can fit thine heavy lot?
Gone like a wild bird, like a blowing flame,
In one swift gust, where all things are forgot!
Alas! this misery!
Sure 'tis some stroke of God's great anger rolled
From age to age on me,
For some dire sin wrought by dim kings of old.
Leader
Sire, this great grief bath come to many an one,
A true wife lost. Thou art not all alone.
Theseus
Deep, deep beneath the Earth,
Dark may my dwelling be,
And night my heart's one comrade, in the dearth,
O Love, of thy most sweet society.
This is my death, O Phædra, more than thine.
［He turns suddenly on the Attendants.
Speak who speak can! What was it? What malign
Swift stroke, O heart discounselled, leapt on thee?
［He bends over PHAEDRA; then, as no one speaks, looks fiercely up.
What, will ye speak? Or are they dumb as death,
This herd of thralls, my high house harboureth?
［There is no answer. He bends again over
PHAEDRA.
Ah me, why shouldst thou die?
A wide and royal grief I here behold,
Not to be borne in peace, not to be told.
As a lost man am I.
My children motherless and my house undone,
Since thou art vanished quite,
Purest of hearts that e'er the wandering Sun
Touched, or the star-eyed splendour of the Night.
［He throws himself beside the body.
Chorus
Unhappy one, O most unhappy one;
With what strange evil is this Castle vexed!
Mine eyes are molten with the tears that run
For thee and thine; but what thing follows next?
I tremble when I think thereon!
［They have noticed that there is a tablet with writing fastened to the dead woman's wrist. THESEUS also sees it.
Theseus
Ha, what is this that hangs from her dear hand?
A tablet! It would make me understand
Some dying wish, some charge about her bed
And children. 'Twas the last prayer, ere her head
Was bowed for ever.
［Taking the tablet.
Fear not, my lost bride,
No woman born shall lie at Theseus' side,
Nor rule in Theseus' house!
A seal! Ah, see
How her gold signet here looks up at me,
Trustfully. Let me tear this thread away,
And read what tale the tablet seeks to say.
［He proceeds to undo and read the tablet. The Chorus breaks into horrified groups.
Some Women
Woe, woe! God brings to birth
A new grief here, close on the other's tread!
My life bath lost its worth.
May all go now with what is finishèd!
The castle of my King is overthrown,
A house no more, a house vanished and gone!
Other Women
O God, if it may be in any way,
Let not this house he wrecked! Help us who pray!
I know not what is here: some unseen thing
That shows the Bird of Evil on the wing.
［THESEUS has read the tablet and breaks out in uncontrollable emotion.
Theseus
Oh, horror piled on horror!—Here is writ...
Nay, who could hear it, who could speak of it?
Leader
What, O my King? If I may hear it, speak!
Theseus
Doth not the tablet cry aloud, yea, shriek,
Things not to he forgotten?—Oh, to fly
And hide mine head! No more a man am I.
Ah, God, what ghastly music echoes here!
Leader
How wild thy voice! Some terrible thing is near.
Theseus
No; my lips' gates will hold it back no more:
This deadly word,
That struggles on the brink and will not o'er,
Yet will not stay unheard.
［He raises his hand, to make proclamation to all present.
Ho, hearken all this land!
［The people gather expectantly about him.
Hippolytus by violence bath laid hand
On this my wife, forgetting God's great eye.
［Murmurs of amazement and horror; THESEUS, apparently calm, raises both arms to heaven.
Therefore, O Thou my Father, hear my cry,
Poseidon! Thou didst grant me for mine own
Three prayers; for one of these, slay now my son,
Hippolytus; let him not outlive this day,
If true thy promise was! Lo, thus I pray.
Leader
Oh, call that wild prayer back! O King, take heed!
I know that thou wilt live to rue this deed.
Theseus
It may not be. —And more, I cast him out
From all my realms. He shall be held about
By two great dooms. Or by Poseidon's breath
He shall fall swiftly to the house of Death;
Or wandering, outcast, o'er strange land and sea,
Shall live and drain the cup of misery.
Leader
Ah, see! here comes he at the point of need.
Shake off that evil mood, O King; have heed
For all thine house and folk. —Great Theseus, hear!
［THESEUS stands silent in fierce gloom. HIPPOLYTUS comes in from the right.
Hippolytus
Father, I heard thy cry, and sped in fear
To help thee. —But I see not yet the cause
That racked thee so. —Say, Father, what it was.
［The murmurs in the crowd, the silent gloom of his Father, and the horror of the Chorus-women gradually work on HIPPOLYTUS and bewilder him. He catches sight of the bier.
Ah, what is that! Nay, Father, not the Queen
Dead!［Murmurs in the crowd.
'Tis most strange. 'Tis passing strange, I ween.
'Twas here I left her. Scarce an hour hath run
Since here she stood and looked on this same sun.
What is it with her? Wherefore did she die?
［THESEUS remains silent. The murmurs increase.
Father, to thee I speak. Oh, tell me, why,
Why art thou silent? What doth silence know
Of skill to stem the bitter flood of woe?
And human hearts in sorrow crave the more,
For knowledge, though the knowledge grieve them sore
It is not love, to veil thy sorrows in
From one most near to thee, and more than kin.
Theseus (to himself)
Fond race of men, so striving and so blind,
Ten thousand arts and wisdoms can ye find,
Desiring all and all imagining:
But ne'er have reached nor understood one thing,
To make a true heart there where no heart is!
Hippolytus
That were indeed beyond man's mysteries,
To make a false heart true against his will.
But why this subtle talk? It likes me ill,
Father; thy speech runs wild beneath this blow.
Theseus (as before)
O would that God had given us here below
Some test of love, some sifting of the soul,
To tell the false and true! Or through the whole
Of men two voices ran, one true and right,
The other as chance willed it; that we might
Convict the liar by the true man's tone,
And not live duped forever, every one!Hippolytus (misunderstanding him; then guessing at
something of the truth)
What? Hath some friend proved false?
Or in thine ear
Whispered some slander? Stand I tainted here,
Though utterly innocent?［Murmurs from the crowd.
Yea, dazed am I;
'Tis thy words daze me, falling all awry,
Away from reason, by fell fancies vexed!
Theseus
O heart of man, what height wilt venture next?
What end comes. to thy daring and thy crime?
For if with each man's life 'twill higher climb,
And every age break out in blood and lies
Beyond its fathers, must not God devise
Some new world far from ours, to hold therein
Such brood of all unfaithfulness and sin?
Look, all, upon this man, my son, his life
Sprung forth from mine! He hath defiled my wife;
And standeth here convicted by the dead,
A most black villain!
［HIPPOLYTUS falls back with a cry and covers his face with his robe.
Nay, hide not thine head!
Pollution, is it? Thee it will not stain.
Look up, and face thy Father's eyes again!
Thou friend of Gods, of all mankind elect;
Thou the pure heart, by thoughts of ill unflecked!
I care not for thy boasts. I am not mad,
To deem that Gods love best the base and bad,
Now is thy day! Now vaunt thee; thou so pure,
No flesh of life may pass thy lips! Now lure
Fools after thee; call Orpheus King and Lord;
Make ecstasies and wonders Thumb thine hoard
Of ancient scrolls and ghostly mysteries—
Now thou art caught and known!
Shun men like these,
I charge ye all! With solemn words they chase
Their prey, and in their hearts plot foul disgrace.
My wife is dead. —“Ha, so that saves thee now,”
That is what grips thee worst, thou caitiff, thou!
What oaths, what subtle words, shall stronger be
Than this dead hand, to clear the guilt from thee?
“She hated thee,” thou sayest; “the bastard born
Is ever sore and bitter as a thorn
To the true brood. ”—A sorry bargainer
In the ills and goods of life thou makest her,
If all her best-beloved she cast away
To wreck blind hate on thee!—What, wilt thou say,
“Through every woman's nature one blind strand
Of passion winds, that men scarce understand?”—
Are we so different? Know I not the fire
And perilous flood of a young man's desire,
Desperate as any woman, and as blind,
When Cypris stings? Save that the man behind
Has all men's strength to aid him. Nay, 'twas thou...
But what avail to wrangle with thee now,
When the dead speaks for all to understand,
A perfect witness!
Hie thee from this land
To exile with all speed. Come never more
To god-built Athens, not to the utmost shore
Of any realm where Theseus' arm is strong!
What? Shall I bow my head beneath this wrong,
And cower to thee? Not Isthmian Sinis so
Will bear men witness that I laid him low,
Nor Skiron's rocks, that share the salt sea's prey,
Grant that my hand bath weight vile things to slay!
Leader
Alas! whom shall I call of mortal men
Happy? The highest are cast down again.
Hippolytus
Father, the hot strained fury of thy heart
Is terrible. Yet, albeit so swift thou art
Of speech, if all this matter were laid bare,
Speech were not then so swift; nay, nor so fair....
［Murmurs again in the crowd.
I have no skill before a crowd to tell
My thoughts. 'Twere best with few, that know me well.—
Nay, that is natural; tongues that sound but rude
In wise men's ears, speak to the multitude
With music.
None the less, since there is come
This stroke upon me, I must not be dumb,
But speak perforce.... And there will I begin
Where thou beganst, as though to strip my sin
Naked, and I not speak a word!
Dost see
This sunlight and this earth? I swear to thee
There dwelleth not in these one man—deny
All that thou wilt!—more pure of sin than I.
Two things I know on earth: God's worship first;
Next to win friends about me, few, that thirst
To hold them clean of all unrighteousness.
Our rule doth curse the tempters, and no less
Who yieldeth to the tempters. —How, thou say'st,
“Dupes that I jest at?” Nay; I make a jest
Of no man. I am honest to the end,
Near or far off, with him I call my friend.
And most in that one thing, where now thy mesh
Would grip me, stainless quite! No woman's flesh
Hath e'er this body touched. Of all such deed
Naught wot I, save what things a man may read
In pictures or hear spoke; nor am I fain,
Being virgin-souled, to read or hear again.
My life of innocence moves thee not; so be it.
Show then what hath seduced me; let me see it.
Was that poor flesh so passing fair, beyond
All woman's loveliness?
Was I some fond
False plotter, that I schemed to win through her
Thy castle's heirdom? Fond indeed I were!
Nay, a stark madman! “But a crown,” thou sayest,
“Usurped, is sweet. ” Nay, rather most unblest
To all wise-hearted; sweet to fools and them
Whose eyes are blinded by the diadem.
In contests of all valour fain would I
Lead Hellas; but in rank and majesty
Not lead, but be at ease, with good men near
To love me, free to work and not to fear.
That brings more joy than any crown or throne.
［He sees from the demeanor of THESEUS and of the crowd that his words are not winning them, but rather making them bitterer than before. It comes to his lips to speak the whole truth.
I have said my say; save one thing... one alone.
O had I here some witness in my need,
As I was witness! Could she hear me plead,
Face me and face the sunlight; well I know,
Our deeds would search us out for thee, and show
Who lies!
But now, I swear—so hear me both,
The Earth beneath and Zeus who Guards the Oath—
I never touched this woman that was thine!
No words could win me to it, nor incline
My heart to dream it. May God strike me down,
Nameless and fameless, without home or town,
An outcast and a wanderer of the world;
May my dead bones rest never, but be hurled
From sea to land, from land to angry sea,
If evil is my heart and false to thee!
［He waits a moment; but sees that his Father is unmoved. The truth again comes to his lips.
If 'twas some fear that made her cast away
Her life. . . I know not. More I must not say.
Right hath she done when in her was no right;
And Right I follow to mine own despite!
Leader
It is enough! God's name is witness large,
And thy great oath, to assoil thee of this charge.
Theseus
Is not the man a juggler and a mage,
Cool wits and one right oath—what more?—to assuage
Sin and the wrath of injured fatherhood!
Hippolytus
Am I so cool? Nay, Father, 'tis thy mood
That makes me marvel! By my faith, wert thou
The son, and I the sire; and deemed I now
In very truth thou hadst my wife assailed,
I had not exiled thee, nor stood and railed,
But lifted once mine arm, and struck thee dead!
Theseus
Thou gentle judge! Thou shalt not so be sped
To simple death, nor by thine own decree.
Swift death is bliss to men in misery.
Far off, friendless forever, thou shalt drain
Amid strange cities the last dregs of pain!
Hippolytus
Wilt verily cast me now beyond thy pale,
Not wait for Time, the lifter of the veil?
Theseus
Aye, if I could past Pontus, and the red
Atlantic marge! So do I hate thine head.
Hipolytus
Wilt weigh nor oath nor faith nor prophet's word
To prove me? Drive me from thy sight unheard?
Theseus
This tablet here, that needs no prophet's lot
To speak from, tells me all. I ponder not
Thy fowls that fly above us! Let them fly.
Hippolytus
O ye great Gods, wherefore unlock not I
My lips, ere yet ye have slain me utterly,
Ye whom I love most? No. It may not be!
The one heart that I need I ne'er should gain
To trust me. I should break mine oath in vain.
Theseus
Death! but he chokes me with his saintly tone!—
Up, get thee from this land! Begone! Begone!
Hippolytus
Where shall I turn me? Think. To what friend's door
Betake me, banished on a charge so sore?Theseus
Whoso delights to welcome to his hall
Vile ravishers... to guard his hearth withal!
Hippolytus
Thou seekst my heart, my tears? Aye, let it be
Thus! I am vile to all men, and to thee!
Theseus
There was a time for tears and thought; the time
Ere thou didst up and gird thee to thy crime.
Hippolytus
Ye stones, will ye not speak? Ye castle walls!
Bear witness if I be so vile, so false!
Theseus
Aye, fly to voiceless witnesses! Yet here
A dumb deed speaks against thee, and speaks clear!
Hippolytus
Alas!
Would I could stand and watch this thing, and see
My face, and weep for very pity of me!
Theseus
Full of thyself, as ever! Not a thought
For them that gave thee birth; nay, they are naught!
Hippolytus
O my wronged Mother! O my birth of shame!
May none I love e'er bear a bastard's name!
Theseus (in a sudden blaze of rage)
Up, thralls, and drag him from my presence! What,
'Tis but a foreign felon! Heard ye not?
［The thralls still hesitate in spite of his fury.
Hippolytus
They touch me at their peril! Thine own hand
Lift, if thou canst, to drive me from the land.
Theseus
That will I straight, unless my will be done!
［HIPPOLYTUS comes close to him and kneels.
Nay! Not for thee my pity! Get thee gone!
［HIPPOLYTUS rises, makes a sign of submission, and slowly moves away. THESEUS, assoon as he sees him going, turns rapidly and enters the Castle. The door is closed again. HIPPOLYTUS has stopped for a moment before the Statue of ARTEMIS, and, as THESEUS departs, breaks out in prayer.
Hippolytus
So; it is done! O dark and miserable!
I see it all, but see not how to tell
The tale. —O thou belovèd, Leto's Maid,
Chase-comrade, fellow-rester in the glade,
Lo, I am driven with a caitiff's brand
Forth from great Athens! Fare ye well, O land
And city of old Erechtheus! Thou, Trozên,
What riches of glad youth mine eyes have seen
In thy broad plain! Farewell! This is the end;
The last word, the last look!
Come, every friend
And fellow of my youth that still may stay,
Give me god-speed and cheer me on my way.
Ne'er shall ye see a man more pure of spot
Than me, though mine own Father loves me not!
［HIPPOLYTUS goes away to the right, followed by many Huntsmen and other young men. The rest of the crowd has by this time dispersed, except the Women of the Chorus and some Men of the Chorus of Huntsmen.
Chorus
Men
Surely the thought of the Gods hath balm in it alway, to win me
Far from my griefs; and a thought, deep in the dark of my mind,
Clings to a great Understanding. Yet all the spirit within me
Faints, when I watch men's deeds matched with the guerdon they find.
For Good comes in Evil's traces,
And the Evil the Good replaces;
And Life, 'mid the changing faces,
Wandereth weak and blind.
Women
What wilt thou grant me, O God? Lo, this is the prayer of my travail—
Some well-being; and chance not very bitter thereby;
A Spirit uncrippled by pain; and a mind not deep to unravel
Truth unseen, nor yet dark with the brand of a lie.
With a veering mood to borrow
Its light from every morrow,
Fair friends and no deep sorrow,
Well could man live and die!
Men
Yet my spirit is no more clean,
And the weft of my hope is torn,
For the deed of wrong that mine eyes have seen,
The lie and the rage and the scorn;
A Star among men, yea, a Star
That in Hellas was bright,
By a Father's wrath driven far
To the wilds and the night.
Oh, alas for the sands of the shore!
Alas for the brakes of the hill,
Where the wolves shall fear thee no more,
And thy cry to Dictynna is still!
Women
No more in the yoke of thy car
Shall the colts of Enetia fleet;
Nor Limna's echoes quiver afar
To the clatter of galloping feet.
The sleepless music of old,
That leaped in the lyre,
Ceaseth now, and is cold,
In the halls of thy sire.
The bowers are discrowned and unladen
Where Artemis lay on the lea;
And the love-dream of many a maiden
Lost, in the losing of thee.
A Maiden
And I, even I,
For thy fall, O Friend,
Amid tears and tears,
Endure to the end
Of the empty years,
Of a life run dry.
In vain didst thou bear him,
Thou Mother forlorn!
Ye Gods that did snare him,
Lo, I cast in your faces
My hate and my scorn!
Ye love-linkèd Graces,
(Alas for the day!)
Was he naught, then, to you,
That ye cast him away,
The stainless and true,
From the old happy places?
Leader
Look yonder! 'Tis the Prince's man, I ween,
Speeding toward this gate, most dark of mien.
［A HENCHMAN enters in haste.
Henchman
Ye women, whither shall I go to seek
King Theseus? Is he in this dwelling? Speak!
Leader
Lo, where he cometh through the Castle gate!
［THESEUS comes out from the Castle.
Henchman
O King, I bear thee tidings of dire weight
To thee, aye, and to every man, I ween,
From Athens to the marches of Trozên.
Theseus
What? Some new stroke hath touched, unknown to me,
The sister cities of my sovranty?
Henchman
Hippolytus is ... Nay, not dead; hut stark
Outstretched, a hairsbreadth this side of the dark.
Theseus (as though unmoved)
How slain? Was there some other man, whose wife
He had like mine defiled, that sought his life?
Henchman
His own wild team destroyed him, and the dire
Curse of thy lips.
The boon of thy great Sire
Is granted thee, O King, and thy son slain.
Theseus
Ye Gods! And thou, Poseidon! Not in vain
I called thee Father; thou hast heard my prayer!
How did he die? Speak on. How closed the snare
Of Heaven to slay the shamer of my blood?
Henchman
'Twas by the bank of beating sea we stood,
We thralls, and decked the steeds, and combed each mane;
Weeping; for word had come that ne'er again
The foot of our Hippolytus should roam
This land, but waste in exile by thy doom.
So stood we till he came, and in his tone
No music now save sorrow's, like our own,
And in his train a concourse without end
Of many a chase-fellow and many a friend.
At last he brushed his sobs away, and spake:
“Why this fond loitering? I would not break
My Father's law—Ho, there! My coursers four
And chariot, quick! This land is mine no more. ”
Thereat, be sure, each man of us made speed.
Swifter than speech we brought them up, each steed
Well dight and shining, at our Prince's side.
He grasped the reins upon the rail: one stride
And there he stood, a perfect charioteer,
Each foot in its own station set. Then clear
His voice rose, and his arms to heaven were spread:
“O Zeus, if I be false, strike thou me dead!
But, dead or living, let my Father see
One day, how falsely he hath hated me!”
Even as he spake, he lifted up the goad
And smote; and the steeds sprang. And down the road
We henchmen followed, hard beside the rein,
Each hand, to speed him, toward the Argive plain
And Epidaurus.
So we made our way
Up toward the desert region, where the bay
Curls to a promontory near the verge
Of our Trozên, facing the southward surge
Of Saron's gulf. Just there an angry sound,
Slow-swelling, like God's thunder underground,
Broke on us, and we trembled. And the steeds
Pricked their ears skyward, and threw back their heads.
And wonder came on all men, and affright,
Whence rose that awful voice. And swift our sight
Turned seaward, down the salt and roaring sand.
And there, above the horizon, seemed to stand
A wave unearthly, crested in the sky;
Till Skiron's Cape first vanished from mine eye,
Then sank the Isthmus hidden, then the rock
Of Epidaurus. Then it broke, one shock
And roar of gasping sea and spray flung far,
And shoreward swept, where stood the Prince's car.
Three lines of wave together raced, and, full
In the white crest of them, a wild Sea-Bull
Flung to the shore, a fell and marvellous Thing.
The whole land held his voice, and answering
Roared in each echo. And all we, gazing there,
Gazed seeing not; 'twas more than eyes could bear.
Then straight upon the team wild terror fell.
Howbeit, the Prince, cool-eyed and knowing well
Each changing mood a horse has, gripped the reins
Hard in both hands; then as an oarsman strains
Up from his bench, so strained he on the thong,
Back in the chariot swinging. But the young
Wild steeds bit hard the curb, and fled afar;
Nor rein nor guiding hand nor morticed car
Stayed them at all. For when he veered them round,
And aimed their flying feet to grassy ground,
In front uprose that Thing, and turned again
The four great coursers, terror-mad. But when
Their blind rage drove them toward the rocky places,
Silent, and ever nearer to the traces,
It followed rockward, till one wheel-edge grazed.
The chariot tript and flew, and all was mazed
In turmoil. Up went wheel-box with a din,
Where the rock jagged, and nave and axle-pin.
And there—the long reins round him—there was he
Dragging, entangled irretrievably.
A dear head battering at the chariot side,
Sharp rocks, and rippled flesh, and a voice that cried:
“Stay, stay, O ye who fattened at my stalls,
Dash me not into nothing!—O thou false
Curse of my Father!—Help! Help, whoso can,
An innocent, innocent and stainless man!”
Many there were that laboured then, I wot,
To bear him succour, but could reach him not,
Till—who knows how?—at last the tangled rein
Unclasped him, and he fell, some little vein
Of life still pulsing in him.
All beside,
The steeds, the hornèd Horror of the Tide,
Had vanished—who knows where?—in that wild land.
O King, I am a bondsman of thine hand;
Yet love nor fear nor duty me shall win
To say thine innocent son bath died in sin.
All women born may hang themselves, for me,
And swing their dying words from every tree
On Ida! For I know that he was true!
Leader
O God, so cometh new disaster, new
Despair! And no escape from what must be!
Theseus
Hate of the man thus stricken lifted me
At first to joy at hearing of thy tale;
But now, some shame before the Gods, some pale
Pity for mine own blood, bath o'er me come.
I laugh not, neither weep, at this fell doom.
Henchman
How then? Behoves it bear him here, or how
Best do thy pleasure?—Speak, Lord. Yet if thou
Wilt mark at all my word, thou wilt not be
Fierce-hearted to thy child in misery.
Theseus
Aye, bring him hither. Let me see the face
Of him who durst deny my deep disgrace
And his own sin; yea, speak with him, and prove
His clear guilt by God's judgments from above.
［The HENCHMAN departs to fetch HIPPOLYTUS; THESEUS sits waiting in stern gloom, while the CHORUS sing. At the close of their song a Divine Figure is seen approaching on a cloud in the air and the voice of ARTEMIS speaks.
Chorus
Thou comest to bend the pride
Of the hearts of God and man,
Cypris and by thy side,
In earth-encircling span,
He of the changing plumes,
The Wing that the world illumes,
As over the leagues of land flies he,
Over the salt and sounding sea.
For mad is the heart of Love,
And gold the gleam of his wing;
And all to the spell thereof
Bend, when he makes his spring;
All life that is wild and young
In mountain and wave and stream,
All that of earth is sprung,
Or breathes in the red sunbeam;
Yea, and Mankind. O'er all a royal throne,
Cyprian, Cyprian, is thine alone!
A Voice from the Cloud
O thou that rulest in geus' Hall,
I charge thee, hearken!
Yea, it is I,
Artemis, Virgin of God most High.
Thou bitter King, art thou glad withal
For thy murdered son?
For thine ear bent low to a lying Queen,
For thine heart so swift amid things unseen?
Lo, all may see what end thou hast won!
Go, sink thine head in the waste abyss;
Or aloft to another world than this,
Birdwise with wings,
Fly far to thine hiding,
Far over this blood that clots and clings;
For in righteous men and in holy things
No rest is thine nor abiding!
［The cloud has become stationary in the air.
Hear, Theseus, all the story of thy grief!
Verily, I bring but anguish, not relief;
Yet, 'twas for this I came, to show how high
And clean was thy son's heart, that he may die
Honoured of men; aye, and to tell no less
The frenzy, or in some sort the nobleness,
Of thy dead wife. One Spirit there is, whom we
That know the joy of white virginity,
Most hate in heaven. She sent her fire to run
In Phædra's veins, so that she loved thy son.
Yet strove she long with love, and in the stress
Fell not, till by her Nurse's craftiness
Betrayed, who stole, with oaths of secrecy,
To entreat thy son. And he, most righteously,
Nor did her will, nor, when thy railing scorn
Beat on him, broke the oath that he had sworn,
For God's sake. And thy Phædra, panic-eyed,
Wrote a false writ, and slew thy son, and died,
Lying; but thou wast nimble to believe!
［THESEUS, at first bewildered, then dumfounded, now utters a deep groan.
It stings thee, Theseus?—Nay, hear on, and grieve
Yet sorer. Wottest thou three prayers were thine
Of sure fulfilment, from thy Sire divine?
Hast thou no foes about thee, then, that one—
Thou vile King!—must be turned against thy son?
The deed was thine. Thy Sea-born Sire but heard
The call of prayer, and bowed him to his word.
But thou in his eyes and in mine art found
Evil, who wouldst not think, nor probe, nor sound
The deeps of prophet's lore, nor day by day
Leave Time to search; but, swifter than man may,
Let loose the curse to slay thine innocent son!
Theseus
O Goddess, let me die!
Artemis
Nay; thou hast done
A heavy wrong; yet even beyond this ill
Abides for thee forgiveness. 'Twas the will
Of Cypris that these evil things should be,
Sating her wrath. And this immutably
Hath Zeus ordained in heaven no God may thwart
A God's fixed will; we grieve but stand apart.
Else, but for fear of the Great Father's blame,
Never had I to such extreme of shame
Bowed me, be sure, as here to stand and see
Slain him I loved best of mortality!
Thy fault, O King, its ignorance sunders wide
From very wickedness; and she who died
By death the more disarmed thee, making dumb
The voice of question. And the storm has come
Most bitterly of all on thee! Yet I
Have mine own sorrow, too. When good men die,
There is no joy in heaven, albeit our ire
On child and house of the evil falls like fire.
［A throng is seen approaching; HIPPOLYTUS enters, supported by his attendants.
Chorus
Lo, it is he! The bright young head
Yet upright there!
Ah, the torn flesh and the blood-stained hair;
Alas for the kindred's trouble!
It falls as fire from a God's hand sped,
Two deaths, and mourning double.
Hippolytus
Ah, pain, pain, pain!
O unrighteous curse! O unrighteous sire!
No hope. —My head is stabbed with fire,
And a leaping spasm about my brain.
Stay, let me rest. I can no more.
O fell, fell steeds that my own hand fed,
Have ye maimed me and slain, that loved me of yore?
—Soft there, ye thralls! No trembling hands
As ye lift me, now!—Who is that that stands
At the right?—Now firm, and with measured tread,
Lift one accursèd and stricken sore
By a father's sinning.
Thou, Zeus, dost see me? Yea, it is I;
The proud and pure, the server of God,
The white and shining in sanctity!
To a visible death, to an open sod,
I walk my ways;
And all the labour of saintly days
Lost, lost, without meaning!
Ah God, it crawls
This agony, over me!
Let be, ye thralls!
Come, Death, and cover me:
Come, O thou Healer blest
But a little more,
And my soul is clear,
And the anguish o'er!
Oh, a spear, a spear!
To rend my soul to its rest!
Oh, strange, false Curse! Was there some blood-stained head,
Some father of my line, unpunishèd,
Whose guilt lived in his kin,
And passed, and slept, till after this long day
It lights. . . . Oh, why on me? Me, far away
And innocent of sin?
O words that cannot save!
When will this breathing end in that last deep
Pain that is painlessness? 'Tis sleep I crave.
When wilt thou bring me sleep,
Thou dark and midnight magic of the grave!Artemis
Sore-stricken man, bethink thee in this stress,
Thou dost but die for thine own nobleness.
Hippolytus
Ah!
O breath of heavenly fragrance! Though my pain
Burns, I can feel thee and find rest again.
The Goddess Artemis is with me here.
Artemis
With thee and loving thee, poor sufferer!
Hippolytus
Dost see me, Mistress, nearing my last sleep?
Artemis
Aye, and would weep for thee, if Gods could weep.
Hippolytus
Who now shall hunt with thee or hold thy quiver?
Artemis
He dies; but my love cleaves to him for ever.
Hippolytus
Who guide thy chariot, keep thy shrine-flowers fresh?
Artemis
The accursèd Cyprian caught him in her mesh!
Hippolytus
The Cyprian? Now I see it!—Aye, 'twas she.
Artemis
She missed her worship, loathed thy chastity!Hippolytus
Three lives by her one hand! 'Tis all clear now.
Artemis
Yea, three; thy father and his Queen and thou.
Hippolytus
My father; yea, he too is pitiable!
Artemis
A plotting Goddess tripped him, and he fell.
Hippolytus
Father, where art thou?... Oh, thou sufferest sore!
Theseus
Even unto death, child, There is joy no more.
Hippolytus
I pity thee in this coil; aye, more than me.
Theseus
Would I could lie there dead instead of thee!
Hippolytus
Oh, bitter bounty of Poseidon's love!
Theseus
Would God my lips had never breathed thereof!
Hippolytus (gently)
Nay, thine own rage had slain me then, some wise!
Theseus
A lying spirit had made blind mine eyes!Hippolytus
Ah me!
Would that a mortal's curse could reach to God!
Artemis
Let be! For not, though deep beneath the sod
Thou liest, not unrequited nor unsung
Shall this fell stroke, from Cypris' rancour sprung,
Quell thee, mine own, the saintly and the true!
My hand shall win its vengeance through and through,
Piercing with flawless shaft what heart soe'er
Of all men living is most dear to Her.
Yea, and to thee, for this sore travail's sake,
Honours most high in Trozên will I make;
For yokeless maids before their bridal night
Shall shear for thee their tresses; and a rite
Of honouring tears be thine in ceaseless store;
And virgin's thoughts in music evermore
Turn toward thee, and praise thee in the Song
Of Phædra's far-famed love and thy great wrong.
O seed of ancient Aegeus, bend thee now
And clasp thy son. Aye, hold and fear not thou!
Not knowingly hart thou slain him; and man's way,
When Gods send error, needs must fall astray.
And thou, Hippolytus, shrink not from the King,
Thy father. Thou wast born to hear this thing.
Farewell! I may not watch man's fleeting breath,
Nor strain mine eyes with the effluence of death.
And sure that Terror now is very near.
［The cloud slowly rises and floats away.
Hippolytus
Farewell, farewell, most Blessèd! Lift thee clear
Of soiling men! Thou wilt not grieve in heaven
For my long love!... Father, thou art forgiven.
It was Her will. I am not wrath with thee....
I have obeyed Her all my days!...
Ah me,
The dark is drawing down upon mine eyes;
It hath me!... Father!... Hold me! Help me rise!Theseus (supporting him in his arms)
Ah, woe! How dost thou torture me, my son!
Hippolytus
I see the Great Gates opening. I am gone.
Theseus
Gone? And my hand red-reeking from this thing!
Hippolytus
Nay, nay; thou art assoiled of man slaying.
Theseus
Thou leav'st me clear of murder? Sayst thou so?
Hippolytus
Yea, by the Virgin of the Stainless Bow!
Theseus
Dear Son! Ah, now I see thy nobleness
Hippolytus
Pray that a true-born child may fill my place.
Theseus
Ah me, thy righteous and god-fearing heart!
Hippolytus
Farewell;
A long farewell, dear Father, ere we part!
［THESEUS bends down and embraces him passionately.
Theseus
Not yet!—O hope and bear while thou hast breath!
Hippolytus
Lo, I have borne my burden. This is death....
Quick, Father; lay the mantle on my face.
［THESEUS covers his face with a mantle and rises.
Theseus
Ye bounds of Pallas and of Pelops' race,
What greatness have ye lost!
Woe, woe is me!
Thou Cyprian, long shall I remember thee!
Chorus
On all this folk, both low and high,
A grief hath fallen beyond men's fears.
There cometh a throbbing of many tears,
A sound as of waters falling.
For when great men die,
A mighty name and a bitter cry
Rise up from a nation calling.
［They move into the Castle, carrying the body of HIPPOLYTUS.