Of a dreadful Presence of fear.
Merope
ant. 5.
More piercing the second cry rang,
Wail'd from the palace within,
From the Children.... The Fury to them,
Fresh from their father, draws near.
Ah bloody axe! dizzy blows!
In these ears, they thunder, they ring,
These poor ears, still! and these eyes
Night and day see them fall,
Fiery phantoms of death,
On the fair, curl'd heads of my sons.
The Chorus
str. 6.
Not to thee only hath come
Sorrow, O Queen, of mankind.
Had not Electra to haunt
A palace defiled by a death unavenged,
For years, in silence, devouring her heart?
But her nursling, her hope, came at last.
Thou, too, rearest in hope,
Far 'mid Arcadian hills,
Somewhere, for vengeance, a champion, a light.
Soon, soon shall Zeus bring him home!
Soon shall he dawn on this land!
Merope
str. 7.
Him in secret, in tears,
Month after month, I await
Vainly. For he, in the glens
Of Lycæus afar,
A gladsome hunter of deer,
Basks in his morning of youth,
Spares not a thought to his home.
The Chorus
ant. 6.
Give not thy heart to despair.
No lamentation can loose
Prisoners of death from the grave;
But Zeus, who accounteth thy quarrel his own,
Still rules, still watches, and numb'reth the hours
Till the sinner, the vengeance, be ripe.
Still, by Acheron stream,
Terrible Deities throned
Sit, and eye grimly the victim unscourged.
Still, still the Dorian boy,
Exiled, remembers his home.
Merope