Reproach among the shades forsakes me not;
Dire evil I have borne from those most dear, 100
And yet for me, by matricidal hands
Ruthlessly slain, no god is moved to wrath.
Behold these direful heart-wounds, whence they came,
For clear in sleep the vision of the mind,
While unforeseen by day the fate of men.
Full many gifts of mine have ye lapped up;
Wineless libations, sober, soothing rites,
And feasts, I offered on the sacred hearth,
At dead of night, the hour no god may share.
All these down-trampled now I must behold. 110
But gone is he, escaping like a fawn,
And, lightly bounding o'er the hunter's net,
At you he mocked, with many a scornful jeer.
Hear ye, how, pleading for my life, I speak.
Awake, dread demons of the lower world;
For Clytemnestra calls you, I, a dream.
Chorus.
[Moaning.]
Clytemnestra.
Moan on, but gone the man, flying far off;
For him are patron-gods, though not for me.
Chorus.
[Moaning.]
Clytemnestra.
By sleep oppressed, thou pitiest not my woe,
His mother's murderer, Orestes, flies. 120
