Page:Tragedies of Euripides (Way 1898) v3.djvu/223

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IPHIGENEIA IN TAURICA.

Enter from temple Iphigeneia.


Iphigeneia.

Pelops, the son of Tantalus, with fleet steeds
To Pisa came, and won Oenomaus' child:
Atreus she bare; of him Menelaus sprang
And Agamemnon, born of whom was I,
Iphigeneia, Tyndareus' daughter's babe.5
Me, by the eddies that with ceaseless gusts
Euripus shifteth, rolling his dark surge,
My sire slew—as he thinks—for Helen's sake
To Artemis, in Aulis' clefts renowned.
For king Agamemnon drew together there10
The Hellenic armament, a thousand ships,
Fain that Achaia should from Ilium win
Fair victory's crown, and Helen's outraged bed
Avenge—all this for Menelaus' sake.
But, in that dead calm and despair of winds,[1]15
To altar-flames he turned, and Kalchas spake:
"Thou captain of this battle-host of Greece,
Agamemnon, thou shalt sail not from the land

  1. Or, reading πνευμάτων τε, "But, wearying mid dead calm and fitful gust," or, "But when, for adverse blasts, no ship might sail." (England).