Nikias.
Unmeet, unmeet? But Jason holds it so!
Mark you his white cheeks and his knitted brows,
What wrath and hate and scorn upon his face!
Jason.
Hear me, Medea, if you still can hear
That seem so strangely lifted from yourself:
But I, that know you long, do know you well,
A thing of moods and passions; so I bear
Once more with your wild words and savage gests,
Ay, and for all your fury speak you fair.
You say you love me. Can I deem it so,
When what does most advantage me and mine
You shrink to hear of? For I make no doubt,
Fleet-footed rumour did anticipate
The tidings I was hastening to bear,
When you, wide-eyed, unveiled, unfilleted,
Rushed out upon me.
Know then this once more:
That I have sworn to take as wedded wife
Glaukê, the daughter of our mighty king,
In this, in nowise hurting you and yours.
For you all fair provision I have made,
So but you get beyond the city walls
Before the night comes on. Our little ones—
They too shall journey with you. I have said.
And had I found you in a mood more mild,
Less swayed by savage passion, I had told
How this thing, which mayhap seems a thing hard,
Is but a blessing, wrapped and cloaked about
In harsh disguisements. For tho’ Kreon rule
To-day within the city; Kreon dead,
Who else shall rule there saving I alone,
The king’s son loved of him and other men?
And in those days Medea’s sons and mine
Shall stand at my right hand, grown great in power.
Medea, too, if she do but control
Her fiery spirit, may yet reign a queen
Above this land of Corinth. I have said.
Nikias.
Well said.
Ægeus.
But none the better that ’twas false.
Nikias.
I’d sooner speak, for my part, fair than true.
Mark Jason there; how firm his lithe, straight limbs;
How high his gold-curled head, crisped like a girl’s.
And yet for all his curled locks and smooth tones
Jason is very strong. I never knew
A man of such a strange and subtle strength.