Elec. How say'st thou? To the man whom most she hates?
Chrys. "The man she slew"—'Tis that thou fain would'st say.
Elec. Who gave this counsel? Who has this approved?
Chrys. 'Tis, as I think, some terror of the night.410
Elec. Gods of my fathers! Be ye with me now!
Chrys. And does this terror give thee confidence?
Elec. If thou would'st tell the vision, I should know.
Chrys. I know it not, but just in briefest tale.
Elec. Ah, tell me that; brief words ere now have laid
Men low in dust, and raised them up again.
Chrys. A rumour runs that she our father's presence
(Yes, thine and mine) a second time to light
Saw coming, and he stood upon the hearth,
And took the sceptre which he bore of old,[1]420
Which now Ægisthos bears, and fixed it there,
And from it sprang a sucker fresh and strong,
And all Mykenæ rested in its shade.
This tale I heard from some one who was near
When she declared her vision to the Sun;[2]
But more than this I heard not, save that she
Now sends me hither through that fright of hers.
[Electra, wild and impassioned, is about to speak.
And now by all the Gods of kith and kin,
I pray thee, hearken to me; do not fall
Through lack of counsel; if thou turn'st me back,
In trouble sore thou 'It seek me yet again.430
Elec. Ah, sister dear, of what thy hands do bear
- ↑ The words of Homer (Iliad, ii. 101) had given a special fame and import to the sceptre of Agamemnon.
- ↑ The prayer is told to the Sun, as the great dispeller of the dreams of darkness. Comp. 637. There is, perhaps, also a special reference to the local worship of the Sun at Argos. An altar to the Sun-God, Helios, stood on the way from Argos to Mykenæ.
