ENGLISH OPIUM-EATER.
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much to stoop to humble offices of kindness, and to servile[1] ministrations of tenderest affection;—to wipe away for years the unwholesome dews upon the forehead, or to refresh the lips when parched and baked with fever; nor, even when thy own peaceful slumbers had by long sympathy become infected with the spectacle of my dread contest with phantoms and shadowy enemies that oftentimes bade me "sleep no more!"—not even then, didst thou utter a complaint or any murmur, nor withdraw thy angelic smiles, nor shrink from thy service of love more than Electra did of old. For she too, though she was a Grecian woman, and the daughter of the king[2] of men, yet wept sometimes, and hid her face[3] in her robe.
But these troubles are past: and thou
- ↑ ῆδυ δουλευμα Eurip. Orest.
- ↑ ἀναξ ἀνδρων Άγαμεμνων.
- ↑ ὀμμα θεισ᾽ ἐισω πεπλων. The scholar will know that throughout this passage I refer to the early scenes of the Orestes; one of the most beautiful exhibitions of the domestic affections which even the dramas of Euripides can furnish, To the English reader, it may be necessary to say, that the situation at the opening
