This text is part of:
Search the Perseus Catalog for:
Table of Contents:
As for myself, the welling fountains of my tears are utterly dried up—not a drop remains. In night-long vigils my eyes are sore
[890]
with weeping for the beacon-lights set for you but always neglected. The faint whir of the buzzing gnat often waked me from dreams in which I beheld more disasters to you than the time of sleep could have compassed.
[895]
But now, having born all this, my heart freed from its anxiety, I would hail my husband here as the watchdog of the fold, the savior forestay of the ship, firm-based pillar of the lofty roof, only-begotten son of a father, or land glimpsed by men at sea beyond their hope,
[900]
dawn most fair to look upon after storm, the gushing stream to thirsty wayfarer—sweet is it to escape all stress of need. Such truly are the greetings of which I deem him worthy. But let envy1be far removed, since many were the ills
[905]
we endured before.
And now, I pray you, my dear lord, dismount from your car, but do not set on common earth the foot, my King, that has trampled upon Ilium.To her attendants Why this loitering, women, to whom I have assigned the task to strew with tapestries the place where he shall go?
[910]
Quick! With purple let his path be strewn, that Justice may usher him into a home he never hoped to see. The rest my unslumbering vigilance shall order duly, if it please god, even as is ordained.
1 By her fulsome address Clytaemestra invites, while seeming to deprecate, the envy of the gods.
Aeschylus. Aeschylus, with an English translation by Herbert Weir Smyth, Ph. D. in two volumes. 2.Agamemnon. Herbert Weir Smyth, Ph. D. Cambridge, MA. Harvard University Press. 1926.
The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text.
Purchase a copy of this text (not necessarily the same edition) from Amazon.com
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.