Page:Tragedies of Seneca (1907) Miller.djvu/405

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The throbbing pulse of hate, the pangs of love,
Base love that presses hard his heavy yoke 135
Upon my heart, and holds me vanquished quite.
And always, 'mid those flames that vex my soul,
Though faint indeed, and downcast, all undone,
Shame struggles on. By shifting seas I'm tossed:
As when here wind, there tide impels the deep,
The waves stand halting 'twixt the warring powers. 140
And so I'll strive no more to guide my bark.
Where wrath, where grief, where hope shall bear me on,
There will I speed my course; my helmless ship
I've giv'n to be the sport of winds and floods.
Where reason fails 'tis best to follow chance.
Nurse: Oh, rash and blind, who follows doubtful chance. 145
Clytemnestra: Who fears a doubtful chance, if 'tis his last?
Nurse: Thy fault may find safe hiding if thou wilt.
Clytemnestra: Nay, faults of royal homes proclaim themselves.
Nurse: Dost thou repent the old, yet plan the new?
Clytemnestra: To stop midway in sin is foolishness. 150
Nurse: His fears increase, who covers crime with crime.
Clytemnestra: But iron and fire oft aid the healer's art.
Nurse: Yet desperate measures no one first attempts.
Clytemnestra: The path of sin is headlong from the first.
Nurse: Still let thy wifely duty hold thee back. 155
Clytemnestra: What long-deserted wife regards her lord?
Nurse: Your common children—hast no thought of them?
Clytemnestra: I do think on my daughter's wedding rites.
High-born Achilles, and my husband's lies.
Nurse: She freed our Grecian fleet from long delay, 160
And waked from their dull calm the sluggish seas.
Clytemnestra: Oh, shameful thought! that I, the heaven-born child
Of Tyndarus, should give my daughter up
To save the Grecian fleet! I see once more
In memory my daughter's wedding day,
Which he made worthy of base Pelops' house, 165
When, with his pious face, this father stood
Before the altar fires—Oh, monstrous rites!
E'en Calchas shuddered at his own dread words
And backward-shrinking fires. bloody house,