Page:Tragedies of Sophocles (Jebb 1917).djvu/54

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42
SOPHOCLES.
[1061—1085

thine own life, forbear this search! My anguish is enough.

Oe. Be of good courage; though I be found the son of servile mother,—aye, a slave by three descents,—thou wilt not be proved base-born.

Io. Yet hear me, I implore thee: do not thus.

Oe. I must not hear of not discovering the whole truth.

Io. Yet I wish thee well—I counsel thee for the best.

Oe. These best counsels, then, vex my patience.

Io. Ill-fated one! Mayst thou never come to know who thou art!

Oe. Go, some one, fetch me the herdsman hither,—and leave yon woman to glory in her princely stock.1070

Io. Alas, alas, miserable!—that word alone can I say unto thee, and no other word henceforth for ever.

[She rushes into the palace.

Ch. Why hath the lady gone, Oedipus, in a transport of wild grief? I misdoubt, a storm of sorrow will break forth from this silence.

Oe. Break forth what will! Be my race never so lowly, I must crave to learn it. Yon woman, perchance,—for she is proud with more than a woman's pride—thinks shame of my base source. But I, who hold myself son of Fortune that gives good,1080 will not be dishonoured. She is the mother from whom I spring; and the months, my kinsmen, have marked me sometimes lowly, sometimes great. Such being my lineage, never more can I prove false to it, or spare to search out the secret of my birth.