In this revolving movement his Worshippers below join in a dance on the ground (expressive of the blending of the seven parts of his body), where one by one successively the seven Processions encircle the altar and the dancing Osiris. As they do so, they slough off their dark garments, weaving thus a whirling movement in which the proportion of black ever diminishes while the golden yellow increases, until finally—in a blaze only of gold-yellow radiance—the Priests raise aloft on its pedestal the disk, still spinning, while the flame-red god, still dancing, is borne away in procession by his joyous Worshippers, shouting aloud their shrill cries of “Osiris!”
When all have disappeared through the south gate of the circle, Prospero on his throne speaks to Ariel,[24] announcing the Second Action of the Interlude—his art of the drama in Greece.
INTERLUDE I
SECOND ACTION: GREEK
COMMUNITY ACTORS [175]
Comprise
| Participants [100] | |
| Individuals [2] | Actors [9] |
| Sophocles | Antigone |
| The Choregus[25] | Ismene |
| Friends of Sophocles [20] | Creon |
| Aristophanes | Haemon |
| Socrates | Eurydice |
| Anaxagoras | Teiresias |
| Alcibiades | A Watchman |
| Euripides | A Messenger |
| Fifteen Others | A Second Messenger |
| Chorus [60] | Trainers and Stage Leaders [5] |
| Choreutai [In four bands, | Chorodidaskalos [Chorus Master] |
| fifteen in each band.] | |
| Orchestrodidaskalos | |
| Musicians [4] | [Dancing Master] |
| Four Fute-players | Choryphaios [Stage Chorus Leader] |
| Two Parastatai [His | |
| Assistant Leaders] | |
| Figurants [75] | |
| Athenian Audience [75] | |
| Pericles | |
| Aspasia | |
| Seventy-three Others. | |
THEME
Sophocles rehearses the Second Chorus of his drama “Antigone” in the Theatre of Dionysus, at Athens, B. C. 440.