But, sweetest Iphigenia! who knew thee, as to me thou art known? I was not born in vain, if only for the heavenly tears I have shed with thee. She will be grateful for them. I have understood her wholly, as a friend should; better than she understood herself.
With what artless art the narrative rises to the crisis! The conflicts in Agamemnon's mind, and the imputations of Menelaus, give us, at once, the full image of him, strong in will and pride, weak in virtue, weak in the noble powers of the mind that depend on imagination. He suffers, yet it requires the presence of his daughter to make him feel the full horror of what he is to do.
"Ah me! that breast, those cheeks, those golden tresses!"
It is her beauty, not her misery, that makes the pathos. This is noble. And then, too, the injustice of the gods, that she, this creature of unblemished loveliness, must perish for the sake of a worthless woman. Even Menelaus feels it the moment he recovers from his wrath.
"What hath she to do,
The virgin daughter, with my Helena!
* * Its former reasonings now
My soul forgoes. * * * *
For it is not just
That thou shouldst groan, while my affairs go pleasantly,
That those of thy house should die, and mine see the light."
Indeed, the overwhelmed aspect of the king of men might well move him.
"Men. Brother, give me to take thy right hand.
Aga. I give it, for the victory is thine, and I am wretched.
I am, indeed, ashamed to drop the tear,
And not to drop the tear I am ashamed."
How beautifully is Iphigenia introduced; beaming more and more softly on us with every touch of description! After Clytemnestra has given Orestes (then an infant) out of the chariot, she says:
"Ye females, in your arms
Receive her, for she is of tender age.
Sit here by my feet, my child,
By thy mother, Iphigenia, and show
These strangers how I am blessed in thee,
And here address thee to thy father.
Iphi. O, mother! should I run, wouldst thou be angry?
And embrace my father heart to heart?"
With the same sweet, timid trust she prefers the request to himself, and, as he holds her in his arms, he seems as noble as Guido's Archangel; as if he never could sink below the trust of such a being!