Andromache

Perseus Greek · Perseus Greek · 394 sections

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remember me, my sufferings and my death, and tell thy father how I fared, with fond caress and streaming eye and arms thrown round his neck. Ah! yes, his children are to every man as his own soul; and whoso sneers at this through inexperience,
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though he suffers less anguish, yet tastes the bitter in his cup of bliss.
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Thy tale with pity fills me; for every man alike, stranger though he be, feels pity for another’s distress. Menelaus, ’tis thy duty to reconcile thy daughter and this captive, giving her a respite from sorrow.
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Ho! sirrahs, catch me this woman; hold her fast; for ’tis no welcome story she will have to hear. It was to make thee leave the holy altar of the goddess that I held thy child’s death before thy eyes, and so induced thee to give thyself up to me to die.
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So stands thy case, be well assured; but as for this child, my daughter shall decide whether she will slay him or no. Get thee hence into the house, and there learn to bridle thy insolence in speaking to the free, slave that thou art.
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Alas! thou hast by treachery beguiled me; I was deceived.
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Proclaim it to the world; I do not deny it
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Is this counted cleverness amongst you who dwell by the Eurotas?
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Yes, and amongst Trojans too, that those who suffer should retaliate.
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Thinkest thou God’s hand is shortened, and that thou wilt not be punished?
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Whene’er that comes, I am ready to bear it. But thy life will I have.
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Wilt likewise slay this tender chick, whom thou hast snatched from ’neath my wing?
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Not I, but I will give him to my daughter to slay if she will.
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Ah me! why not begin my mourning then for thee, my child?
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Of a truth ’tis no very sure hope that he has left.
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O citizens of Sparta, the bane of all the race of men, schemers of guile, and masters in lying, devisers of evil plots, with crooked minds and tortuous methods and ne’er one honest thought, ’tis wrong that ye should thrive in Hellas.
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What crime is wanting in your list? How rife is murder with you! How covetous ye are! One word upon your lips, another in your heart, this is what men always find with you. Perdition catch ye! Still death is not so grievous, as thou thinkest, to me. No! for my life ended
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in the day that hapless Troy was destroyed with my lord, that glorious warrior, whose spear oft made a coward like thee quit the field and seek thy ship. But now against a woman hast thou displayed the terrors of thy panoply, my would-be murderer. Strike then! for this
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my tongue shall never flatter thee or that daughter of thine. For though thou wert of great account in Sparta, why so was I in Troy. And if I am now in sorry plight, presume not thou on this; thou too mayst be so yet.
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Never, oh! never will I commend rival wives or sons of different mothers, a cause of strife, of bitterness, and grief every house. I would have a husband content with one wife whose rights
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he shareth with no other.
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Not even in states is dual monarchy better to bear than undivided rule;
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it only doubles burdens and causes faction amongst the citizens. Often too will the Muse sow strife ’twixt rivals in the art of minstrelsy.
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Again, when strong winds are drifting mariners,
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the divided counsel of the wise is not conducive to steering, and their collective wisdom has less weight than the inferior intelligence of the single man who has sole authority; for this is the essence of power alike in house and state, whene’er men care to find the proper moment.
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This Spartan, the daughter of the great chief Menelaus, proves this; for she hath kindled hot fury against a rival, and is bent on slaying the hapless Trojan maid
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and her child to further her bitter quarrel. Tis a murder gods and laws and kindness all forbid. Ah! lady, retribution for this deed will visit thee yet.
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But lo!
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before the house I see those two united souls, condemned to die. Alas! for thee, poor lady, and for thee, unhappy child, who art dying on account of thy mother’s marriage, though thou hast no share therein
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and canst not be blamed by the royal house.
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Behold me journeying on the downward path, my hands so tightly bound with cords that they bleed.
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O mother, mother mine! I too share thy
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downward path, nestling ’neath thy wing.
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A cruel sacrifice! ye rulers of Phthia!
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Come, father! succour those thou lovest.
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Rest there, my babe, my darling! on thy mother’s bosom, e’en in death and in the grave.
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Ah, woe is me! what will become of me and thee too, mother mine?
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Away, to the world below! from hostile towers ye came, the pair of you; two different causes necessitate your deaths; my sentence takes away thy life, and my daughter Hermione’s requires his; for it would be the
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height of folly to leave our foemen’s sons, when we might kill them and remove the danger from our house.
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O husband mine! I would I had thy strong arm and spear
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to aid me, son of Priam.
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Ah, woe is me! what spell can I now find to turn death’s stroke aside?
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Embrace thy master’s knees, my child, and pray to him.
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Spare, O spare my life, kind master!
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Mine eyes are wet with tears, which trickle down my cheeks, as doth a sunless spring from a smooth rock. Ah me!
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What remedy, alas! can I provide me ’gainst my ills?
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Why fall at my knees in supplication? hard as the rock and deaf as the wave am I. My own friends have I helped,
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but for thee have I no tie of affection; for verily it cost me a great part of my life to capture Troy and thy mother; so thou shalt reap the fruit thereof and into Hades’ halls descend.
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Behold! I see Peleus drawing nigh; with aged step he hasteth hither.
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calling out as he comes in sight. What means this? I ask you and your executioner; why is the palace in an uproar? give a reason; what mean your lawless machinations?
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Menelaus, hold thy hand. Seek not to outrun justice. To his attendant. Forward! faster, faster! for this matter, methinks, admits of no delay; now if ever would I fain resume the vigour of my youth. First however
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will I breathe new life into this captive, being to her as the breeze that blows a ship before the wind. Tell me, by what right have they pinioned thine arms and are dragging thee and thy child away? like a ewe with her lamb art thou led to the slaughter, while I and thy lord were far away.
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Behold them that are haling me and my child to death,
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e’en as thou seest, aged prince. Why should I tell thee? For not by one urgent summons alone but by countless messengers have I sent for thee. No doubt thou knowest by hearsay of the strife in this house with this man’s daughter, and the reason of my ruin.
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So now they have torn and are dragging me from the altar of Thetis, the goddess of thy chiefest adoration and the mother of thy gallant son, without any proper trial, yea, and without waiting for my absent master; because, forsooth, they knew my defencelessness
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and my child’s, whom they mean to slay with me his hapless mother, though he has done no harm. But to thee, O sire, I make my supplication, prostrate at thy knees, though my hand cannot touch thy friendly beard; save me, I adjure thee, reverend sir,
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or to thy shame and my sorrow shall we be slain.
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Loose her bonds, I say, ere some one rue it; untie her folded hands.
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I forbid it, for besides being a match for thee,
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I have a far better right to her.
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What! art thou come hither to set my house in order? Art not content with ruling thy Spartans?
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She is my captive; I took her from Troy.
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Aye, but my son’s son received her as his prize.
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Is not all I have his, and all his mine?
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For good, but not evil ends; and surely not for murderous violence.
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Never shalt thou wrest her from my grasp.
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With this good staff I’ll stain thy head with blood!
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Just touch me and see! Approach one step!
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What! shalt thou rank with men? chief of cowards, son of cowards! What right hast thou to any place ’mongst men? Thou who didst let a Phrygian rob thee of thy wife, leaving thy home without bolt or guard, as if forsooth the cursed woman thou hadst there was a model of virtue.
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No! a Spartan! maid could not be chaste, e’en if she would, who leaves her home and bares her limbs and lets her robe float free, to share; with youths their races and their sports,--
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customs I cannot away with. Is it any wonder then that ye fail to educate your women in virtue? Helen might have asked thee this, seeing that she said goodbye to thy affection and tripped off with her young gallant to a foreign land.
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And yet for her sake thou didst marshal all the hosts of Hellas and lead them to Ilium, whereas thou shouldst have shown thy loathing for her by refusing to stir a spear, once thou hadst found her false; yea, thou shouldst have let her stay there, and even paid a price to save ever having her back again.
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But that was not at all the way thy thoughts were turned; wherefore many a brave life hast thou ended, and many an aged mother hast thou left childless in her home, and grey-haired sires of gallant sons hast reft. Of that sad band am I a member, seeing in thee
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Achilles murderer like a malignant fiend; for thou and thou alone hast returned from Troy without a scratch, bringing back thy splendid weapons in their splendid cases just as they went. As for me, I ever told that amorous boy to form no alliance with thee
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nor take unto his home an evil mother’s child; for daughters bear the marks of their mothers’ ill-repute into their new homes. Wherefore, ye wooers, take heed to this my warning: Choose the daughter of a good mother. And more than this, with what wanton insult didst thou treat thy brother,
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bidding him sacrifice his daughter in his simpleness! So fearful wast thou of losing thy worthless wife. Then after capturing Troy,–for thither too will I accompany thee,–thou didst not slay that woman, when she was in thy power; but as soon as thine eyes caught sight of her breast, thy sword was dropped
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and thou didst take her kisses, fondling the shameless traitress, too weak to stem thy hot desire, thou caitiff wretch! Yet spite of all thou art the man to come and work havoc in my grandson’s halls when he is absent, seeking to slay with all indignity a poor weak woman and her babe; but that babe
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shall one day make thee and thy daughter in thy home rue it, e’en though his birth be trebly base. Yea, for oft ere now hath seed, sown on barren soil, prevailed o’er rich deep tilth, and many a bastard has proved a better man than children better born. Take thy daughter hence with thee! Far better is it for mortals
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to have a poor honest man either as married kin or friend than a wealthy knave; but as for thee, thou art a thing of naught.
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The tongue from trifling causes contrives to breed great strife ’mongst men; wherefore are the wise most careful not to bring about a quarrel with their friends.
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Why, pray, should one call these old men wise, or those who once had a reputation in Hellas for being so? when thou, the great Peleus, son of a famous father, connected with me by marriage, employest language disgraceful to thyself and abusive of me because of a barbarian woman,
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though thou shouldst have banished her far beyond the streams of Nile or Phasis, and ever encouraged me; seeing that she comes from Asia’s continent where fell so many of the sons of Hellas, victims to the spear; and likewise because she shared in the spilling of thy son’s blood;
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for Paris who slew thy son Achilles, was brother to Hector, whose wife she was. And dost thou enter the same abode with her, and deign to let her share thy board, and suffer her to rear her brood of vipers in thy house?
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But I, after all this foresight for thee, old man, and myself, am to have her torn from my clutches for wishing to slay her. Yet come now, for there is no disgrace in arguing the matter out; suppose my daughter has no child, while this woman’s sons grow up, wilt thou set them up to rule the land of Phthia,
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barbarians born and bred to lord it over Hellenes? Am I then so void of sense because I hate injustice, and thou so full of cleverness? Consider yet another point; say thou hadst given a daughter of thine to some citizen, and hadst then seen her thus treated,
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wouldst thou have sat looking on in silence? I trow not. Dost thou then for a foreigner rail thus at thy nearest friends? Again, thou mayst say, husband and wife have an equally strong case if she is wronged by him, and similarly if he find her guilty of indiscretion in his house;
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yet while he has ample powers in his own hands, she depends on parents and friends for her case. Surely then I am right in helping my own kin! Thou art in thy dotage; for thou wilt do me more, good by speaking of my generalship than by concealing it.
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Helen’s trouble was not of her own choosing, but sent by heaven, and it proved a great benefit to Hellas; her sons, till then untried in war or arms, turned to deeds of prowess, and it is experience which teaches man all he knows.
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I showed my wisdom in refraining from slaying my wife, directly I caught sight of her. Would that thou too hadst ne’er slain Phocus!
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All this I bring before thee in pure good-will, not from anger. But if thou resent it, thy tongue may wag till it ache,
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yet shall I gain by prudent forethought.
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Cease now from idle words, ’twere better far, for fear ye both alike go wrong.
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Alas! what evil customs now prevail in Hellas! Whene’er the host sets up a trophy o’er the foe,
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men no more consider this the work of those who really toiled, but the general gets the credit for it. Now he was but one among ten thousand others to brandish his spear; he only did the work of one; but yet he wins more praise than they. Again, as magistrates in all the grandeur of office
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they scorn the common folk, though they are naught themselves; whereas those others are ten thousand times more wise than they, if daring combine with judgment. Even so thou and thy brother, now take your seats in all the swollen pride of Trojan fame and Trojan generalship,
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exalted by the toilsome efforts of others. But I will teach thee henceforth to consider Idaean Paris a foe less terrible than Peleus, unless forthwith thou pack from this roof, thou and thy childless daughter too, whom my own true son
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will hale through his halls by the hair of her head; for her barrenness will not let her endure fruitfulness in others, because she has no children herself. Still if she is unlucky in the matter of offspring, is that a reason why we should be left childless?
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Begone! ye varlets, let her go! I will soon see if anyone will hinder me from loosing her hands.
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To Andromache. Arise; these trembling hands of mine will untie the twisted thongs that bind thee. Out on thee, coward! is this how thou hast galled her wrists?
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Didst think thou wert lashing up a lion or bull? or wert afraid she would snatch a sword and defend herself against thee? Come, child, nestle to thy mother’s arms; help me loose her bonds; I will yet rear thee in Phthia to be their bitter foe. If your reputation for prowess

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