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Enter Medea from the house, then Jason by Eisodos B accompanied by the Nurse.
Jason
I have come at your bidding. For though you hate me, you will not fail to obtain a hearing from me. What further do you wish from me, woman? Medea
Jason, I beg you to forgive [870] what I said: it is reasonable for you to put up with my anger since many acts of love have passed between us in the past. I have talked with myself and reproached myself thus: ‘Foolish creature, why am I raving and fighting those who plan things for the best? [875] Why am I making myself an enemy to the rulers of this land and to my husband, who is acting in my interests by marrying a princess and begetting brothers for my children? Shall I not cease from my wrath （what has come over me?） when the gods are being so kind? [880] Do I not have the children? Is it not true that we are exiles and in need of friends?’ These reflections have made me realize that I was being very foolish and was being angry for nothing. So now I approve and I agree that you are acting with sober sense [885] by contracting this marriage-alliance for us. It is I who am the fool, since I ought to be sharing in your plans, helping you carry them out, standing by the marriage-bed, and taking joy in the match I was making with your bride. But we women are, I will not say bad creatures, [890] but we are what we are. So you ought not to imitate our nature or return our childishness with childishness. I give in: I admit that I was foolish then, but now I have taken a better view of the matter. Children, children, come here, leave the house, [895] come out, The children enter from the house with the Tutor.
greet your father, speak to him with me, and join your mother in making an end to our former hostility against one dear to us. We have made a truce, and our wrath has vanished. Take his right hand. Ah, how I think [900] of something the future keeps hid! My children, will you continue all your lives long to stretch out your dear hands so? Unhappy me! How prone to tears I am, how full of foreboding. And as I now at long last make up the quarrel with your father, [905] my tender eyes are filled with tears. Chorus-Leader
darkly
From my eyes too a pale tear starts. May misfortune go no further than it has!
Euripides. Euripides, with an English translation by David Kovacs. Cambridge. Harvard University Press. forthcoming.
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