Agamemnon

Perseus Greek · Perseus Greek · 1,735 sections

476
From fire, the good-news messenger: if true,
477
Who knows? Or is it not a god-sent lie?
479
Who is so childish and deprived of sense
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That, having, at announcements of the flame
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Thus novel, felt his own heart fired thereby,
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He then shall at a change of evidence,
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Be worsted just the same?
483
It is conspicuous in a woman’s nature,
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Before its view to take a grace for granted:
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Too trustful, — on her boundary, usurpature
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Is swiftly made;
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But swiftly, too, decayed,
487
The glory perishes by woman vaunted.
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Soon shall we know — of these light-bearing torches,
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And beacons and exchanges, fire with fire —
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If they are true, indeed, or if, dream-fashion,
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This gladsome light came and deceived our judgment.
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Yon herald from the shore I see, o’ershadowed
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With boughs of olive: dust, mud’s thirsty brother,
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Close neighbours on his garb, thus testify me
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That neither voiceless, nor yet kindling for thee
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Mountain-wood-flame, shall he explain by fire-smoke:
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But either tell out more the joyance, speaking ..
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Word contrary to which, I aught but love it!
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For may good be — to good that’s known — appendage!
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Whoever prays for aught else to this city
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— May he himself reap fruit of his mind’s error!
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Ha, my forefathers’ soil of earth Argeian!
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Thee, in this year’s tenth light, am I returned to —
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Of many broken hopes, on one hope chancing;
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For never prayed I, in this earth Argeian
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Dying, to share my part in tomb the dearest.
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Now, hail thou earth, and hail thou also, sunlight,
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And Zeus, the country’s lord, and king the Puthian
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From bow no longer urging at us arrows!
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Enough, beside Skamandros, cam’st thou adverse:
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Now, contrary, be saviour thou and healer,
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O king Apollon! And gods conquest-granting,
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All — I invoke too, and my tutelary
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Hermes, dear herald, heralds’ veneration, —
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And Heroes our forthsenders, — friendly, once more
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The army to receive, the war-spear’s leavings!
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Ha, mansions of my monarchs, roofs beloved,
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And awful seats, and deities sun-fronting —
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Receive with pomp your monarch, long time absent!
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For he comes bringing light in night-time to you,
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In common with all these — king Agamemnon.
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But kindly greet him — for clear shows your duty —
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Who has dug under Troia with the mattock
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Of Zeus the Avenger, whereby plains are out-ploughed,
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Altars unrecognizable, and gods’ shrines,
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And the whole land’s seed thoroughly has perished.
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And such a yoke-strap having cast round Troia,
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The elder king Atreides, happy man — he
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Comes to be honoured, worthiest of what mortals
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Now are. Nor Paris nor the accomplice-city
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Outvaunts their deed as more than they are done-by:
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For, in a suit for rape and theft found guilty,
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He missed of plunder and, in one destruction,
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Fatherland, house and home has mowed to atoms:
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Debts the Priamidai have paid twice over.
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Hail, herald from the army of Achaians!
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I hail: — to die, will gainsay gods no longer!
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Love of this fatherland did exercise thee?
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So that I weep, at least, with joy, my eyes full.
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What, of this gracious sickness were ye gainers?
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How now? instructed, I this speech shall master.
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For those who loved you back, with longing stricken.
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This land yearned for the yearning army, say’st thou?
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So as to set me oft, from dark mind, groaning.
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Whence came this ill mind — hatred to the army?
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Of old, I use, for mischiefs physic, silence.
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And how, the chiefs away, did you fear any?
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So that now, — late thy word, — much joy were — dying!
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For well have things been worked out: these, — in much time,
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Some of them, one might say, had luck in falling,
553
While some were faulty: since who, gods excepted,
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Goes, through the whole time of his life, ungrieving?
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For labours should I tell of, and bad lodgments,
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Narrow deckways ill-strewn, too, — what the day’s woe
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We did not groan at getting for our portion?
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As for land-things, again, on went more hatred!
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Since beds were ours hard by the foemen’s ramparts,
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And, out of heaven and from the earth, the meadow
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Dews kept a-sprinkle, an abiding damage
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Of vestures, making hair a wild-beast matting.
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Winter, too, if one told of it — bird-slaying —
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Such as, unbearable, Idaian snow brought —
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Or heat, when waveless, on its noontide couches
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Without a wind, the sea would slumber falling
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— Why must one mourn these? O’er and gone is labour:
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O’er and gone is it, even to those dead ones,
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So that no more again they mind uprising.
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Why must we tell in numbers those deprived ones,
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And the live man be vexed with fate’s fresh outbreak?
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Rather, I bid full farewell to misfortunes!
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For us, the left from out the Argeian army,
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The gain beats, nor does sorrow counterbalance.
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So that ’t is fitly boasted of, this sunlight,
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By us, o’er sea and land the aery flyers,

Perseus Greek. CTS URN tlg0085.tlg005.perseus-eng4. Via the Perseus Digital Library / Open Greek and Latin TEI corpora. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0. Source.