We with these hands have ta’en our prey, and rent
The mangled limbs of this grim beast asunder.
Where is mine aged sire? Let him draw near!
And where is my son Pentheus? Let him mount
On the broad stairs that rise before our house;
And on the triglyph nail this lion’s head
That I have brought him from our splendid chase.
Her position, then, differs from that of Ajax,[355] in that the deed really takes place and that she did not intend it. The act is, we shall find, analogous to, but less culpable than, that of Oedipus when he slew his father.
Cadmus, father of Agave, refers the ultimate guilt to Bacchus[356]:
Justly—too justly hath King Bromius