GORA. Go in!
JASON. Not I!
'Tis she that shall come forth. Go thou within
And tell her so!
GORA. Well, well, I go, if but
To rid me of the sight of you, my lords;
Ay, and I'll bear your summons, but I know
Full well she will not come, for she is weak
And feels her sickness all too grievously.
[She goes into the palace.]
KING. Not one day longer will I suffer her
To stay in Corinth. This old dame but now
Gave utterance to the dark and fell designs
On which yon woman secretly doth brood.
Methinks her presence is a constant threat.
Thy doubts, I hope, are laid to rest at last?
JASON. Fulfil, O King, thy sentence on my wife!
She can no longer tarry where I am,
So, let her go; the sentence is not harsh.
Forsooth, though I am less to blame than she,
My lot is bitt'rer, harder far than hers.
She but returns to that grim wilderness
Where she was born, and, like a restive colt
From whom the galling yoke is just removed,
Will rush to freedom, and become once more
Untamed and stubborn.
But my place is here;
Here must I sit and while away the days
In meek inaction, burdened with the scorn
And scoffing of mankind, mine only task
Dully to muse upon my vanished past.
KING. Thou wilt be great and famous yet again,
Believe me. Like the bow which, once set free
From the fierce strain, doth speed the arrow swift
And straight unto its mark, whenso the hand
Is loosed that bent it, so wilt thou spring back
And be thyself again, once she is gone.
JASON. Naught feel I in my breast to feed such hopes!
Lost is my name, my fame; I am no more
Than Jason's shadow, not that prince himself.
KING. The world, my son, is not so harsh as thou:
An older man's misstep is sin and crime;
The youth's, a misstep only, which he may
Retrace, and mend his error. All thy deeds
In Colchis, when thou went a hot-head boy,
Will be forgot, if thou wilt show thyself
Henceforth a man.
JASON. O, might I trust thy words,
I could be happy once again!