Iphigenia leaves him in sudden agitation, when informed of the death of Agamemnon. Returning, she finds in his place Orestes, whom she had not before seen, and draws from him by her artless questions the sequel to this terrible drama wrought by his hand. After he has concluded his narrative, in the deep tones of cold anguish, she cries,—
Immortals, you who through your bright days
Live in bliss, throned on clouds ever renewed,
Only for this have you all these years
Kept me separate from men, and so near yourselves,
Given me the child-like employment to cherish the fires on your altars,
That my soul might, in like pious clearness,
Be ever aspiring towards your abodes,
That only later and deeper I might feel
The anguish and horror that have darkened my house.
O Stranger,
Speak to me of the unhappy one, tell me of Orestes.
Orestes.
O, might I speak of his death!
Vehement flew up from the reeking blood
His Mother's Soul!
And called to the ancient daughters of Night,
Let not the parricide escape;
Pursue that man of crime; he is yours!
They obey, their hollow eyes
Darting about with vulture eagerness;
They stir themselves in their black dens,
From corners their companions
Doubt and Remorse steal out to join them.
Before them roll the mists of Acheron;
In its cloudy volumes rolls
The eternal contemplation of the irrevocable
Permitted now in their love of ruin they tread
The beautiful fields of a God-planted earth,
From which they had long been banished by an early curse,
Their swift feet follow the fugitive,
They pause never except to gather more power to dismay.
Iphigenia.
Unhappy man, thou art in like manner tortured,
And feelest truly what he, the poor fugitive, suffers!
Orestes.
What sayest thou? what meanest by "like manner"?
Iphigenia.
Thee, too, the weight of a fratricide crushes to earth; the tale
I had from thy younger brother.
Orestes.
I cannot suffer that thou, great soul,
Shouldst be deceived by a false tale;
A web of lies let stranger weave for stranger
Subtle with many thoughts, accustomed to craft,
Guarding his feet against a trap.
But between us
Be Truth;—
I am Orestes,—and this guilty head
Bent downward to the grave seeks death;
In any shape were he welcome.
Whoever thou art, I wish thou mightst be saved,
Thou and my friend; for myself I wish it not.
Thou seem'st against thy will here to remain;
Invent a way to fly and leave me here.
Like all pure productions of genius, this may be injured by the slightest change, and I dare not flatter myself that the English words give an idea of the heroic dignity expressed in the cadence of the original, by the words
| "Twischen uns |
| Seg Wahrheit! |
| Ich bin Orest!" |
where the Greek seems to fold his robe around him in the full strength of classic manhood, prepared for worst and best, not like a cold Stoic, but a hero, who can feel all, know all, and endure all. The name of two syllables in the German is much more forcible for the pause, than the three-syllable Orestes.
| "Between us |
| Be Truth," |
is fine to my ear, on which our word Truth also pauses with a large dignity.
The scenes go on more and more full of breathing beauty. The lovely joy of Iphigenia, the meditative softness with which the religiously educated mind perpetually draws the inference from the most agitating events, impress us more and more. At last the hour of trial comes. She is to keep off Thoas by a cunningly devised tale, while her brother and Pylades contrive their escape. Orestes has received to his heart the sister long lost, divinely restored, and in the embrace the curse falls from him, he is well, and Pylades more than happy. The ship waits to carry her to the palace home she is to free from a century's weight of pollution; and already the blue heavens of her adored Greece gleam before her fancy.
But, O, the step before all this can be obtained;—to deceive Thoas, a savage and a tyrant indeed, but long her protector,—in his barbarous fashion, her benefactor! How can she buy life, happiness, or even the safety of those dear ones at such a price?