[Enter Medea, chanting her incantations.]

Medea: I supplicate the silent throng, and you, the gods740

Of death's sad rites, and groping chaos, and the home

Of gloomy Pluto, and the black abyss of death

Girt by the banks of Tartarus! Ye storied shades,

Your torments leave and haste to grace the festival

At Hymen's call! Let stop the whirling wheel that holds

Ixion's limbs and let him tread Corinthian ground;

Let Tantalus unfrighted drink Pirene's stream.745

On Creon's stock alone let heavier torments fall,