[Enter Ægeus and Nikias, on the opposite side. Medea steps back on the threshold and pauses.]
Ha, that word!
’Tis Jason’s name they bandy to and fro.
I know not why, whene’er his name is spoke,
Once name of joy and ever name of love,
I wax white and do tremble; sudden seized
With shadowy apprehension. May’t forbode
No evil unto him I hold so dear;
And ever dearer with the waxing years:—
For this indeed is woman’s chiefest curse,
That still her constant heart clings to its love
Through all time and all chances; while the man
Is caught with newness; coldly calculates,
And measures pain and pleasure, loss and gain;
And ever grows to look with the world’s eye
Upon a woman, tho’ his, body and soul.
[She goes within.]
[The two citizens come forward.]
Nikias.
I, in this thing, do hold our Jason wise;
Kreon is mighty; Glaukê very fair.
Ægeus.
An ’twere for that—the Colchian’s fair enough.
Nikias.
I like not your swart skins and purple hair;
Your black, fierce eyes where the brows meet across.
By all the gods! when yonder Colchian
Fixes me with her strange and sudden gaze,
Each hair upon my body stands erect!
Zeus, ’tis a very tiger, and as mute!
Ægeus.