Chapter 7

DIONYSUS (_while tending him_) And if thou prove Their madness true, aye, more than true, what love And thanks hast thou for me?

PENTHEUS (_not listening to him_) In my right hand Is it, or thus, that I should bear the wand To be most like to them?

DIONYSUS Up let it swing In the right hand, timed with the right foot's spring.... 'Tis well thy heart is changed!

PENTHEUS (_more wildly_) What strength is this! Kithaeron's steeps and all that in them is-- How say'st thou?--Could my shoulders lift the whole?

DIONYSUS Surely thou canst, and if thou wilt! Thy soul, Being once so sick, now stands as it should stand.

PENTHEUS Shall it be bars of iron? Or this bare hand And shoulder to the crags, to wrench them down?

DIONYSUS Wouldst wreck the Nymphs' wild temples, and the brown Rocks, where Pan pipes at noonday?

PENTHEUS Nay; not I! Force is not well with women. I will lie Hid in the pine-brake.

DIONYSUS Even as fits a spy On holy and fearful things, so shalt thou lie!

PENTHEUS (_with a laugh_) They lie there now, methinks--the wild birds, caught By love among the leaves, and fluttering not!

DIONYSUS It may be. That is what thou goest to see, Aye, and to trap them--so they trap not thee!

PENTHEUS Forth through the Thebans' town! I am their king, Aye, their one Man, seeing I dare this thing!

DIONYSUS Yea, thou shalt bear their burden, thou alone; Therefore thy trial awaiteth thee!--But on; With me into thine ambush shalt thou come Unscathed; then let another bear thee home!

PENTHEUS The Queen, my mother.

DIONYSUS Marked of every eye.

PENTHEUS For that I go!

DIONYSUS Thou shalt be borne on high!

PENTHEUS That were like pride!

DIONYSUS Thy mother's hands shall share Thy carrying.

PENTHEUS Nay; I need not such soft care!

DIONYSUS So soft?

PENTHEUS Whate'er it be, I have earned it well! [_Exit_ PENTHEUS _towards the Mountain._]

DIONYSUS Fell, fell art thou; and to a doom so fell Thou walkest, that thy name from South to North Shall shine, a sign for ever!--Reach thou forth Thine arms, Agâvê, now, and ye dark-browed Cadmeian sisters! Greet this prince so proud To the high ordeal, where save God and me, None walks unscathed!--The rest this day shall see. [_Exit_ DIONYSUS _following_ PENTHEUS.]

CHORUS

_Some Maidens_ O hounds raging and blind, Up by the mountain road, Sprites of the maddened mind, To the wild Maids of God; Fill with your rage their eyes, Rage at the rage unblest, Watching in woman's guise, The spy upon God's Possessed.

_A Bacchanal_ Who shall be first, to mark Eyes in the rock that spy, Eyes in the pine-tree dark-- Is it his mother?--and cry: "Lo, what is this that comes, Haunting, troubling still, Even in our heights, our homes, The wild Maids of the Hill? What flesh bare this child? Never on woman's breast Changeling so evil smiled; Man is he not, but Beast! Loin-shape of the wild, Gorgon-breed of the waste!"

_All the Chorus_ Hither, for doom and deed! Hither with lifted sword, Justice, Wrath of the Lord, Come in our visible need! Smite till the throat shall bleed, Smite till the heart shall bleed, Him the tyrannous, lawless, Godless, Echîon's earthborn seed!

_Other Maidens_ Tyrannously hath he trod; Marched him, in Law's despite, Against thy Light, O God, Yea, and thy Mother's Light; Girded him, falsely bold, Blinded in craft, to quell And by man's violence hold, Things unconquerable

_A Bacchanal_ A strait pitiless mind Is death unto godliness; And to feel in human kind Life, and a pain the less. Knowledge, we are not foes! I seek thee diligently; But the world with a great wind blows, Shining, and not from thee; Blowing to beautiful things, On, amid dark and light, Till Life, through the trammellings Of Laws that are not the Right, Breaks, clean and pure, and sings Glorying to God in the height!

_All the Chorus_ Hither for doom and deed! Hither with lifted sword, Justice, Wrath of the Lord, Come in our visible need! Smite till the throat shall bleed, Smite till the heart shall bleed, Him the tyrannous, lawless, Godless, Echion's earthborn seed!

LEADER Appear, appear, whatso thy shape or name O Mountain Bull, Snake of the Hundred Heads, Lion of Burning Flame! O God, Beast, Mystery, come! Thy mystic maids Are hunted!--Blast their hunter with thy breath, Cast o'er his head thy snare; And laugh aloud and drag him to his death, Who stalks thy herded madness in its lair! [_Enter hastily a_ MESSENGER _from the Mountain, pale and distraught._]

MESSENGER Woe to the house once blest in Hellas! Woe To thee, old King Sidonian, who didst sow The dragon-seed on Ares' bloody lea! Alas, even thy slaves must weep for thee!

LEADER News from the mountain?--Speak! How hath it sped?

MESSENGER Pentheus, my king, Echîon's son, is dead!

LEADER All hail, God of the Voice, Manifest ever more!

MESSENGER What say'st thou?--And how strange thy tone, as though In joy at this my master's overthrow!

LEADER With fierce joy I rejoice, Child of a savage shore; For the chains of my prison are broken, and the dread where I cowered of yore!

MESSENGER And deem'st thou Thebes so beggared, so forlorn Of manhood, as to sit beneath thy scorn?

LEADER Thebes hath o'er me no sway! None save Him I obey, Dionysus, Child of the Highest, Him I obey and adore!

MESSENGER One can forgive thee!--Yet 'tis no fair thing, Maids, to rejoice in a man's suffering.

LEADER Speak of the mountain side! Tell us the doom he died, The sinner smitten to death, even where his sin was sore!

MESSENGER We climbed beyond the utmost habitings Of Theban shepherds, passed Asopus' springs, And struck into the land of rock on dim Kithaeron--Pentheus, and, attending him, I, and the Stranger who should guide our way, Then first in a green dell we stopped, and lay, Lips dumb and feet unmoving, warily Watching, to be unseen and yet to see.

A narrow glen it was, by crags o'ertowered, Torn through by tossing waters, and there lowered A shadow of great pines over it. And there The Maenad maidens sate; in toil they were, Busily glad. Some with an ivy chain Tricked a worn wand to toss its locks again; Some, wild in joyance, like young steeds set free, Made answering songs of mystic melody.

But my poor master saw not the great band Before him. "Stranger," he cried, "where we stand Mine eyes can reach not these false saints of thine. Mount we the bank, or some high-shouldered pine, And I shall see their follies clear!" At that There came a marvel. For the Stranger straight Touched a great pine-tree's high and heavenward crown, And lower, lower, lower, urged it down To the herbless floor. Round like a bending bow, Or slow wheel's rim a joiner forces to. So in those hands that tough and mountain stem Bowed slow--oh, strength not mortal dwelt in them!-- To the very earth. And there he set the King, And slowly, lest it cast him in its spring. Let back the young and straining tree, till high It towered again amid the towering sky; And Pentheus in the branches! Well, I ween, He saw the Maenads then, and well was seen! For scarce was he aloft, when suddenly There was no stranger any more with me, But out of Heaven a Voice--oh, what voice else?-- 'Twas He that called! "Behold, O damosels, I bring ye him who turneth to despite Both me and ye, and darkeneth my great Light. Tis yours to avenge!" So spake he, and there came 'Twixt earth and sky a pillar of high flame. And silence took the air, and no leaf stirred In all the forest dell. Thou hadst not heard In that vast silence any wild things's cry. And up they sprang; but with bewildered eye, Agaze and listening, scarce yet hearing true. Then came the Voice again. And when they knew Their God's clear call, old Cadmus' royal brood, Up, like wild pigeons startled in a wood, On flying feet they came, his mother blind, Agâvê, and her sisters, and behind All the wild crowd, more deeply maddened then, Through the angry rocks and torrent-tossing glen, Until they spied him in the dark pine-tree: Then climbed a crag hard by and furiously Some sought to stone him, some their wands would fling Lance-wise aloft, in cruel targeting. But none could strike. The height o'ertopped their rage, And there he clung, unscathed, as in a cage Caught. And of all their strife no end was found. Then, "Hither," cried Agâvê; "stand we round And grip the stem, my Wild Ones, till we take This climbing cat-o'-the-mount! He shall not make A tale of God's high dances!" Out then shone Arm upon arm, past count, and closed upon The pine, and gripped; and the ground gave, and down It reeled. And that high sitter from the crown Of the green pine-top, with a shrieking cry Fell, as his mind grew clear, and there hard by Was horror visible. 'Twas his mother stood O'er him, first priestess of those rites of blood. He tore the coif, and from his head away Flung it, that she might know him, and not slay To her own misery. He touched the wild Cheek, crying: "Mother, it is I, thy child, Thy Pentheus, born thee in Echion's hall! Have mercy, Mother! Let it not befall Through sin of mine, that thou shouldst slay thy son!" But she, with lips a-foam and eyes that run Like leaping fire, with thoughts that ne'er should be On earth, possessed by Bacchios utterly, Stays not nor hears. Round his left arm she put Both hands, set hard against his side her foot, Drew ... and the shoulder severed!--not by might Of arm, but easily, as the God made light Her hand's essay. And at the other side Was Ino rending; and the torn flesh cried, And on Autonoë pressed, and all the crowd Of ravening arms. 'Yea, all the air was loud With groans that faded into sobbing breath, Dim shrieks, and joy, and triumph-cries of death. And here was borne a severed arm, and there A hunter's booted foot; white bones lay bare With rending; and swift hands ensanguinèd Tossed as in sport the flesh of Pentheus dead. His body lies afar. The precipice Hath part, and parts in many an interstice Lurk of the tangled woodland--no light quest To find. And, ah, the head! Of all the rest, His mother hath it, pierced upon a wand, As one might pierce a lion's, and through the land, Leaving her sisters in their dancing place, Bears it on high! Yea, to these walls her face Was set, exulting in her deed of blood, Calling upon her Bromios, her God, Her Comrade, Fellow-Render of the Prey, Her All-Victorious, to whom this day She bears in triumph ... her own broken heart. For me, after that sight, I will depart Before Agave comes.--Oh, to fulfil God's laws, and have no thought beyond His will, Is man's best treasure. Aye, and wisdom true, Methinks, for things of dust to cleave unto! [_The_ MESSENGER _departs into the Castle_.]

CHORUS

_Some Maidens_ Weave ye the dance, and call Praise to God! Bless ye the Tyrant's fall! Down is trod Pentheus, the Dragon's Seed! Wore he the woman's weed? Clasped he his death indeed, Clasped the rod?

_A Bacchanal_ Yea, the wild ivy lapt him, and the doomed Wild Bull of Sacrifice before him loomed!

_Others_ Ye who did Bromios scorn, Praise Him the more, Bacchanals, Cadmus-born; Praise with sore Agony, yea, with tears! Great are the gifts he bears! Hands that a mother rears Red with gore!

LEADER But stay, Agâvê cometh! And her eyes Make fire around her, reeling! Ho, the prize Cometh! All hail, O Rout of Dionyse! [_Enter from the Mountain_ AGAVE, _mad, and to all seeming wondrously happy, bearing the head of_ PENTHEUS _in her hand. The_ CHORUS MAIDENS _stand horror-struck at the sight; the_ LEADER, _also horror-struck, strives to accept it and rejoice in it as the God's deed_.]

AGAVE Ye from the lands of Morn!

LEADER Call me not; I give praise!

AGAVE Lo, from the trunk new-shorn Hither a Mountain Thorn Bear we! O Asia-born Bacchanals, bless this chase!

LEADER I see. Yea; I see. Have I not welcomed thee?

AGAVE (_very calmly and peacefully_) He was young in the wildwood Without nets I caught him! Nay; look without fear on The Lion; I have ta'en him!

LEADER Where in the wildwood? Whence have ye brought him?

AGAVE Kithaeron. . . .

LEADER Kithaeron?

AGAVE The Mountain hath slain him!

LEADER Who first came nigh him?

AGAVE

I, I, 'tis confessèd! And they named me there by him Agave the Blessèd!

LEADER Who was next in the band on him?

AGAVE The daughters....

LEADER The daughters?

AGAVE Of Cadmus laid hand on him. But the swift hand that slaughters Is mine; mine is the praise! Bless ye this day of days! [_The_ LEADER _tries to speak, but is not able;_ AGAVE _begins gently stroking the head_.]

AGAVE Gather ye now to the feast!

LEADER Feast!--O miserable!

AGAVE See, it falls to his breast, Curling and gently tressed, The hair of the Wild Bull's crest-- The young steer of the fell!

LEADER Most like a beast of the wild That head, those locks defiled.

AGAVE (_lifting up the head, more excitedly_) He wakened his Mad Ones, A Chase-God, a wise God! He sprang them to seize this! He preys where his band preys.

LEADER (_brooding, with horror_) In the trail of thy Mad Ones Thou tearest thy prize, God!

AGAVE Dost praise it?

LEADER I praise this?

AGAVE Ah, soon shall the land praise!

LEADER And Pentheus, O Mother, Thy child?

AGAVE He shall cry on My name as none other, Bless the spoils of the Lion!

LEADER Aye, strange is thy treasure!

AGAVE And strange was the taking!

LEADER Thou art glad?

AGAVE Beyond measure; Yea, glad in the breaking Of dawn upon all this land, By the prize, the prize of my hand!

LEADER Show them to all the land, unhappy one, The trophy of this deed that thou hast done!

AGAVE Ho, all ye men that round the citadel And shining towers of ancient Thêbê dwell, Come! Look upon this prize, this lion's spoil, That we have taken--yea, with our own toil, We, Cadmus' daughters! Not with leathern-set Thessalian javelins, not with hunter's net, Only white arms and swift hands' bladed fall Why make ye much ado, and boast withal Your armourers' engines? See, these palms were bare That caught the angry beast, and held, and tare The limbs of him! ... Father! ... Go, bring to me My father! ... Aye, and Pentheus, where is he, My son? He shall set up a ladder-stair Against this house, and in the triglyphs there Nail me this lion's head, that gloriously I bring ye, having slain him--I, even I! [_She goes through the crowd towards the Castle, showing the head and looking for a place to hang it. Enter from the Mountain_ CADMUS, _with attendants, bearing the body of_ PENTHEUS _on a bier_.]

CADMUS On, with your awful burden. Follow me, Thralls, to his house, whose body grievously With many a weary search at last in dim Kithaeron's glens I found, torn limb from limb, And through the intervening forest weed Scattered.--Men told me of my daughters' deed, When I was just returned within these walls, With grey Teiresias, from the Bacchanals. And back I hied me to the hills again To seek my murdered son. There saw I plain Actaeon's mother, ranging where he died, Autonoë; and Ino by her side, Wandering ghastly in the pine-copses.

Agâvê was not there. The rumour is She cometh fleet-foot hither.--Ah! 'Tis true; A sight I scarce can bend mine eyes unto.

AGAVE (_turning from the Palace and seeing him_) My father, a great boast is thine this hour. Thou hast begotten daughters, high in power And valiant above all mankind--yea, all Valiant, though none like me! I have let fall The shuttle by the loom, and raised my hand For higher things, to slay from out thy land Wild beasts! See, in mine arms I bear the prize, That nailed above these portals it may rise To show what things thy daughters did! Do thou Take it, and call a feast. Proud art thou now And highly favoured in our valiancy!

CADMUS O depth of grief, how can I fathom thee Or look upon thee!--Poor, poor bloodstained hand! Poor sisters!--A fair sacrifice to stand Before God's altars, daughter; yea, and call Me and my citizens to feast withal!

Nay, let me weep--for thine affliction most, Then for mine own. All, all of us are lost, Not wrongfully, yet is it hard, from one Who might have loved--our Bromios, our own!

AGAVE How crabbèd and how scowling in the eyes Is man's old age!--Would that my son likewise Were happy of his hunting, in my way When with his warrior bands he will essay The wild beast!--Nay, his valiance is to fight With God's will! Father, thou shouldst set him right. Will no one bring him thither, that mine eyes May look on his, and show him this my prize!

CADMUS Alas, if ever ye can know again The truth of what ye did, what pain of pain That truth shall bring! Or were it best to wait Darkened for evermore, and deem your state Not misery, though ye know no happiness?

AGAVE What seest thou here to chide, or not to bless?

CADMUS (_after hesitation, resolving himself_) Raise me thine eyes to yon blue dome of air!

AGAVE 'Tis done. What dost thou bid me seek for there?

CADMUS Is it the same, or changèd in thy sight?

AGAVE More shining than before, more heavenly bright!

CADMUS And that wild tremour, is it with thee still?

AGAVE (_troubled_) I know not what thou sayest; but my will Clears, and some change cometh, I know not how.

CADMUS Canst hearken then, being changed, and answer, now!

AGAVE I have forgotten something; else I could.

CADMUS What husband led thee of old from mine abode?

AGAVE Echîon, whom men named the Child of Earth.

CADMUS And what child in Echîon's house had birth?

AGAVE Pentheus, of my love and his father's bred.

CADMUS Thou bearest in thine arms an head--what head?

AGAVE (_beginning to tremble, and not looking at what she carries_) A lion's--so they all said in the chase.

CADMUS Turn to it now--'tis no long toil--and gaze.

AGAVE Ah! But what is it? What am I carrying here?

CADMUS Look once upon it full, till all be clear!

AGAVE I see... most deadly pain! Oh, woe is me!

CADMUS Wears it the likeness of a lion to thee?

AGAVE No; 'tis the head--O God!--of Pentheus, this!

CADMUS Blood-drenched ere thou wouldst know him! Aye, 'tis his.

AGAVE Who slew him?--How came I to hold this thing?

CADMUS O cruel Truth, is this thine home-coming?

AGAVE Answer! My heart is hanging on thy breath!

CADMUS 'Twas thou.--Thou and thy sisters wrought his death.

AGAVE In what place was it? His own house, or where?

CADMUS Where the dogs tore Actaeon, even there.

AGAVE Why went he to Kithaeron? What sought he?

CADMUS To mock the God and thine own ecstasy.

AGAVE But how should we be on the hills this day?

CADMUS Being mad! A spirit drove all the land that way.

AGAVE 'Tis Dionyse hath done it! Now I see.

CADMUS (_earnestly_) Ye wronged Him! Ye denied his deity!

AGAVE (_turning from him_) Show me the body of the son I love!

CADMUS (_leading her to the bier_) 'Tis here, my child. Hard was the quest thereof.

AGAVE Laid in due state? [_As there is no answer, she lifts the veil of the bier, and sees._] Oh, if I wrought a sin, 'Twas mine! What portion had my child therein!

CADMUS He made him like to you, adoring not The God; who therefore to one bane hath brought You and this body, wrecking all our line, And me. Aye, no man-child was ever mine; And now this first-fruit of the flesh of thee, Sad woman, foully here and frightfully Lies murdered! Whom the house looked up unto, [_Kneeling by the body._] O Child, my daughter's child! who heldest true My castle walls; and to the folk a name Of fear thou wast; and no man sought to shame My grey beard, when they knew that thou wast there, Else had they swift reward!--And now I fare Forth in dishonour, outcast, I, the great Cadmus, who sowed the seed-rows of this state Of Thebes, and reaped the harvest wonderful. O my belovèd, though thy heart is dull In death, O still belovèd, and alway Beloved! Never more, then, shalt thou lay Thine hand to this white beard, and speak to me Thy "Mother's Father"; ask "Who wrongeth thee? Who stints thine honour, or with malice stirs Thine heart? Speak, and I smite thine injurers!" But now--woe, woe, to me and thee also, Woe to thy mother and her sisters, woe Alway! Oh, whoso walketh not in dread Of Gods, let him but look on this man dead!

LEADER Lo, I weep with thee. 'Twas but due reward God sent on Pentheus; but for thee ... 'Tis hard.

AGAVE My father, thou canst see the change in me, * * * * * * * * * * [_A page or more has here been torn out of the MS. from which all our copies of "The Bacchae" are derived. It evidently contained a speech of Agâvê (followed presumably by some words of the Chorus), and an appearance of_ DIONYSUS _upon a cloud. He must have pronounced judgment upon the Thebans in general, and especially upon the daughters of_ CADMUS, _have justified his own action, and declared his determination to establish his godhead. Where the MS begins again, we find him addressing_ CADMUS.] * * * * *

DIONYSUS * * * * * * * * * * And tell of Time, what gifts for thee he bears, What griefs and wonders in the winding years. For thou must change and be a Serpent Thing Strange, and beside thee she whom thou didst bring Of old to be thy bride from Heaven afar, Harmonia, daughter of the Lord of War. Yea, and a chariot of kine--so spake The word of Zeus--thee and thy Queen shall take Through many lands, Lord of a wild array Of orient spears. And many towns shall they Destroy beneath thee, that vast horde, until They touch Apollo's dwelling, and fulfil Their doom, back driven on stormy ways and steep. Thee only and thy spouse shall Ares keep, And save alive to the Islands of the Blest. Thus speaketh Dionysus, Son confessed Of no man but of Zeus!--Ah, had ye seen Truth in the hour ye would not, all had been Well with ye, and the Child of God your friend!

AGAVE Dionysus, we beseech thee! We have sinned!

DIONYSUS Too late! When there was time, ye knew me not!

AGAVE We have confessed. Yet is thine hand too hot.

DIONYSUS Ye mocked me, being God; this your wage.