Ch. Indeed (his skill apart) the rumours are but faint and old.290
Oe. What rumours are they? I look to every story.
Ch. Certain wayfarers were said to have killed him.
Oe. I, too, have heard it, but none sees him who saw it.
Ch. Nay, if he knows what fear is, he will not stay when he hears thy curses, so dire as they are.
Oe. When a man shrinks not from a deed, neither is he scared by a word.
Ch. But there is one to convict him. For here they bring at last the godlike prophet, in whom alone of men doth live the truth.
EnterTeiresias, led by a Boy.
Oe. Teiresias, whose soul grasps all things,300 the lore that may be told and the unspeakable, the secrets of heaven and the low things of earth,—thou feelest, though thou canst not see, what a plague doth haunt our State,—from which, great prophet, we find in thee our protector and only saviour. Now, Phoebus—if indeed thou knowest it not from the messengers—sent answer to our question that the only riddance from this pest which could come was if we should learn aright the slayers of Laïus, and slay them, or send them into exile from our land.310 Do thou, then, grudge neither voice of birds nor any other way of seer-lore that thou hast, but rescue thyself and the State, rescue me, rescue all that
