Jocasta, in despair, hangs herself. Oedipus puts out his own eyes. The scene is described by a second messenger, who has witnessed it.
LINES 1223-1296.
MESSENGER.
O reverend priests and elders of this land,
What are ye doomed to hear? what to behold?
What sorrow will be yours if loyally
Ye love the royal house of Labdacus?
Ister or Phasis were too scant a stream,
To wash the bloodstains of this roof away,
Such horrors does it hide, and presently
Will show beneath the sun; horrors self-caused,
And self-caused woes are of all woes the worst.
CHORUS.
That which we knew already topped the height
Of misery. What hast thou more to tell?
MESSENGER.
What fewest words serve to impart is this,
Jocasta the illustrious is no more.
CHORUS.
Alas, poor Queen! How was it that she died?