'Twas different when a noble warrior fell,
One that the heaven-entrusted sceptre swayed,
Slain by a woman's hand, not with the bow,
As slays the fierce far-darting Amazon,
But in such wise as Pallas and the court
Impanelled to decide this cause shall hear.—
As from the war he happily returned
She met him with perfidious flatteries.
Then in his bath, as to the laver's edge
He came, she, like a canopy, outspread
A robe and smote him tangled in its folds.
By such foul practice died a man of all
Worshipped, the puissant leader of our host.
Such was his murderess; well the tale may touch
The hearts of those who shall pass judgment here.
CHORUS.
Zeus, then, it seems, is on the father's side,
Yet Zeus his aged father put in bonds.
How squares that story with thy present plea?
I pray the court to hark to his reply.
APOLLO.
O hateful brood, abhorred of all the gods,
He who is bound may be unbound again.
There's many a way to set a captive free;
But when the dust has drunk the blood of man,
Death knows no cure or resurrection.
For death my father hath no remedy,
All else he with his will omnipotent
Sorts as him lists, exhaustless in his power.
CHORUS.
Suppose yon wretch acquitted on thy plea,
Can he, polluted with a mother's blood,
At Argos dwell and in his father's home?
What public altar can he use, what guild
Of kinsmen will admit him to their rite?
APOLLO.
With this, too, will I deal, and mark me well,
The mother is not parent to the child,
But only fosters that she hath conceived.
The male is the true parent, and his mate
But holds the germ, so it 'scape blight, in trust.
This can I prove by puissant argument.
A father sans a mother there may be.
There stands the daughter of Olympian Zeus,
She ne'er was nurtured in the darkling womb,
Yet could no god in heaven beget her peer.
Pallas, as always my endeavour is
Thy city and thy people to exalt,
So I have sent this suppliant to thy hearth,
That he might be thy ever faithful friend,
And thou might'st count him as a sure ally,
Him and his race hereafter, and this bond
Unbroken through all ages might endure.