Ant. Alas! ye most miserable of all men.
Ism. Alas! ye possessed by Atè.
Ant. Alas! alas! where in the land shall we place them both? Alas! in the spot that is most honorable. Alas! alas! a woe fit to sleep beside my father.[177]
Enter Herald.
'Tis my duty to announce the good pleasure and the decree of the senators of the people of this city of Cadmus. It is resolved to bury this body of Eteocles for his attachment to his country, with the dear interment in earth! for in repelling our foes he met death in the city, and being pure in respect to the sacred rites of his country, blameless hath he fallen where 'tis glorious for the young to fall; thus, indeed, hath it been commissioned me to announce concerning this corpse: But [it has been decreed] to cast out unburied, a prey for dogs, this the corpse of his brother Polynices, inasmuch as he would have been the overturner of the land of Cadmus, if some one of the gods had not stood in opposition to his spear: and even now that he is dead, he will lie under the guilt of pollution with the gods of his country, whom he having dishonored was for taking the city by bringing against it a foreign host. So it is resolved that he, having been buried dishonorably by winged fowls, should receive his recompense, and that neither piling up by hands of the mound over his tomb should follow, nor any one honor him with shrill-voiced wailings, but that he be ungraced with a funeral at the hands of his friends. Such is the decree of the magistracy of the Cadmæans.
Ant. But I say to the rulers of the Cadmæans, if not another single person is willing to take part with me in burying him, I will bury him, and will expose myself[178] to peril by burying my brother. And I feel no shame at being guilty of this disobedient insubordination against the city. Powerful is the tie of the common womb from which we sprung, from a wretched mother and a hapless sire. Wherefore, my soul, do thou, willing with the willing share in his woes, with the dead, thou living, with sisterly feeling—and nought shall lean-bellied wolves tear his flesh—let no one suppose it. All woman though I be, I will contrive a tomb and a deep-dug grave for him, bearing earth in the bosom-fold of my fine linen robe, and I myself will cover him; let none imagine the contrary: an effective scheme shall aid my boldness.
Her. I bid thee not to act despite the state in this matter.
Ant. I bid thee not announce to me superfluous things.
Her. Yet stern is a people that has just escaped troubles.