The lot I craved, and with a mighty host
Full many a warlike expedition led;
But ne'er on Susa brought I bale like this.
But Xerxes, young in years, is young of soul,
And my paternal charge remembers not.
For, be assured, ye my compeers in age, 780
Not all of us, of yore these powers who held,
Shall e'er be proven to have wrought such ills.
Chorus.
What then, O King Darius? What the goal
To which thine utterance tends? How in this strait
May we, thy Persians, fare hereafter best?
Darius.
March ye no more against the Hellenès' land,
Not though the Median host outnumber theirs;
The soil itself to them is an ally.
Chorus.
How meanest thou? In what way their ally?
Darius.
By famine slaying bloated armaments. 790
Chorus.
What if choice force we levy, well-equipped?
reasonably conjectured that a diligent reader had written out in verse the names of the seven conspirators, here called friendly chiefs, Maraphis and Artaphrenes being the two last names.
