Enter Handmaid, with bearers carrying a covered corpse.
Handmaid.
Women, O where is Hecuba, sorrow's queen,
Who passeth every man, all womankind,
In woes? No man shall take away her crown.660
Chorus.
What now, O hapless voice of evil-boding?
Shall they ne'er sleep, thy publishings of grief?
Handmaid.
To Hecuba I bring this pang: mid woes
Not easily may mortal lips speak fair.
Chorus.
Lo where she cometh from beneath the roofs:665
In season for thy tale appeareth she.
Handmaid.
O all-afflicted, more than lips can say!
Queen, thou art slain—thou seest the light no more!
Unchilded, widowed, cityless—all-destroyed!
Hecuba.
No news this: 'tis but taunting me who knew.670
But wherefore com'st thou bringing me this corpse,
Polyxena's, whose burial-rites, 'twas told,
By all Achaia's host were being sped?
Handmaid.
She nothing knows: Polyxena—ah me!—
Still wails she, and the new woes graspeth not.675
