GORA.
Nay!
Let her who knows her guilty lock her lips,
But I will speak. Forth from my peaceful home
There in far Colchis, thou hast lured me here,
To be thine haughty paramour's meek slave.
Freeborn am I, yet see! mine arms are chained!—
Through the long, troubled nights, upon my couch
I lie and weep; each morn, as the bright sun
Returns, I curse my gray hairs and my weight
Of years. All scorn me, flout me. All I had
Is gone, save heavy heart and scalding tears.—
Nay, I will speak, and thou shalt listen, too!
MEDEA. Say on.
GORA. All I foretold has come to pass.
'Tis scarce one moon since the revolted sea
Cast you ashore, seducer and seduced;
And yet e 'en now these folk flee from thy face,
And horror follows wheresoe'er thou goest.
The people shudder at the Colchian witch
With fearful whispers of her magic dark.
Where thou dost show thyself, there all shrink back
And curse thee. May the same curse smite them all!—
As for thy lord, the Colchian princess' spouse,
Him, too, they hate, for his sake, and for thine.
Did not his uncle drive him from his palace?
Was he not banished from his fatherland
What time that uncle perished, none knows how?
Home hath he none, nor resting-place, nor where
To lay his head. What canst thou hope from him?
MEDEA. I am his wife!
GORA. And hop'st—?
MEDEA. To follow him
In need and unto death.
GORA. Ay, need and death!
Ætes' daughter in a beggar's hut!
MEDEA. Let us pray Heaven for a simple heart;
So shall our humble lot be easier borne.
GORA. Ha!—And thy husband—?
MEDEA. Day breaks. Let us go.