Friends of youth, farewell, and statues of the Gods where sheep are slain!
For I know not if to me 'tis given to speak to you again.
But my hope not yet doth sleep, wherein I trust, with Gods to aid,
Him to slay, and hold the land of Thebes beneath my sceptre swayed.635
Eteokles.
Get thee forth! Ha, truly Polyneikes, "Man of many a feud,"
Named thy father thee, with heavenly prescience of thy feuds endued!
[Exit Polyneikes.
Chorus.
(Str. 1)
To this land from Phœnicia Kadmus speeding
Came, till the heifer unbroken, leading
The wanderer, cast her to earthward, telling640
That so was accomplished the oracle spoken
When the God for the place of his rest gave token,
Bidding take the Aonian plains for his dwelling,
Where the golden spears of the wheat-ranks quiver,
Where the outgushing flood of the lovely river
Forth flashes from fountains of Dirkê welling
Over meadows and tilth-lands harvest-teeming,
Where sprang from the spousals levin-gleaming
Of Zeus, the God of the shout wild-ringing;[1]650
- ↑ Bacchus, born of Semelê in the hour when she was consumed by the lightnings amid which Zeus appeared to her. The infant god was hidden among ivy from the vengeance of Hera.
