Question and answer thus goes on for some time, and then the chorus break out into a wailing song, in which they remind Hellas that, having forsaken the old gods who helped her in her need, she is now reaping the reward of such folly. “The curse of Ate is on thee,” they cry pitifully, “nor will the goddess be satisfied until she has exacted her due penalty for neglect of the Olympians.” They relate the former woes of Hellas, how she first was slave to the Macedonians, then to the Roman power; how the Latins set their mailed feet on her neck; and now the Moslems have again reduced her to the position of bondswoman. Ever a slave, ever desired, she is thrown from the one to the other, as it pleases them, unable to free herself from such degradation. When this chorus of reproach is ended, Hellas calls upon the tutelar genius of Greece to help her ere she perish.
In answer to her cry, Apollo (represented by Caliphronas) appears, and blames her for foolishly forsaking the old gods for the new, and thus falling into the hands of Nemesis. His power, which was engendered and kept alive solely by belief, has departed, and he cannot help her, much as he desires to do so. “I myself,” he says—
E’en I whose fanes were ever reverenced,
Am now bereft of shrine and oracle;
No longer do I hear the Delian hymn,
Nor taste the savors of the sacrifice,
But, lyre in hand, go wandering through the night,
Lamenting for my skyey chariot,
Wherein I bore the fierceness of the sun
Up eastern hills and down to western seas.