And beside those spear-won thralls in the bed of love they lay—
Cruel ones! Sooth, long time we endured it, if haply again,
Though late, their hearts might be turned; but our wrong and our bitter pain
Waxed evermore twofold; and the children of true-born blood
In our halls were dishonoured, and grew up amidst us a bastard brood. {810}
Yea, and our maids unwedded, and widowed wives thereto,
Uncared for about our city wandered to and fro.
No father had heeded, no, never so little, his daughter’s plight,
Not though before his eyes he beheld her slain outright
By a tyrannous stepdame’s hands: and sons would defend no more