Have crushed the city of the Violet Crown
Beneath the force of overwhelming hordes;
Thus blotting out my heaven-aspiring sons,
Who, burning with a new Promethean fire,
Would fain have scaled god-crowned Olympus high
To match themselves ’gainst gods in equal strife.
Then, with the sudden energy of despair, she calls upon the heroes of Salamis, of Thermopylæ, of Marathon, to aid their mother in the time of need. Alas! no voice answers to her cry of anguish, and, overcome with a sense of hopelessness, Hellas, discrowned and chained, sinks weeping on the broken column of her fallen shrine.
Now enters the chorus proper of young Greek maidens, dressed in black stoles, to denote the sorrowful condition of their country. They sweep into the orchestra, and, having sprinkled the altar with incense, begin to question their fallen queen, as though they were ignorant of the cause of her grief.
CHORUS.
What madness drives thee, queen, to rend thine hair?