There is no end of worry and fuss going on. Odysseus, the King of Ithaca, has arrived here with his wife, Penelope. They discuss the prospects of the expedition from morning till night, and I am left alone with Penelope. She has borrowed my only embroidery frame, and is working some slippers for her husband. They are at least two sizes too small. She talks of nothing but her boy, her dog, her dairy, and her garden, and I can’t tell you how weary I am of it. She made me very angry yesterday by saying that I spoilt Orestes, and that I should be sorry for it some day. She is always throwing up her boy Telemachus to me. Whenever Helen is mentioned she puts on a face as much as to say: “Do not defile me.”
Your sincere friend,
Clytaemnestra.
Clytaemnestra to Aegisthus
Mycenae.
Most honoured Aegisthus,
My worst fears have been realized. They are going to make an expedition against Troy on a large scale. Odysseus is at the bottom of it. I cannot say how much I dislike him. All the Kings have volunteered to go, but the Fleet will not be ready for two years, so I am in hopes that something may happen in the meantime to prevent it.
Iphigenia is learning to make bandages, and says she will go to the front to look after the wounded. I am, of course, against this, and think it’s absurd, but unfortunately she can make her father do what she likes. My only consolation is that the war cannot possibly last more than a week. The Trojans have no regular army. They are a handful of untrained farmers, and the town cannot stand a siege. It is all too silly. It is too bad of Helen to have caused all this fuss.
Your sincere friend,
Clytaemnestra.
P.S.—No, of course I haven’t written to Helen. She is as good as dead to me.