Part 4
Oh, darling hand! Oh, darling mouth, and eye, And royal mien, and bright brave faces clear, May you be blessed, but not here! What here Was yours, your father stole. . . . Ah God, the glow Of cheek on cheek, the tender touch; and Oh, Sweet scent of childhood. . . . Go! Go! . . . Am I blind? . . . Mine eyes can see not, when I look to find Their places. I am broken by the wings Of evil. . . . Yea, I know to what bad things I go, but louder than all thought doth cry Anger, which maketh man's worst misery.
[_She follows the_ CHILDREN _into the house_.
CHORUS.
My thoughts have roamed a cloudy land, And heard a fierier music fall Than woman's heart should stir withal: And yet some Muse majestical, Unknown, hath hold of woman's hand, Seeking for Wisdom--not in all: A feeble seed, a scattered band, Thou yet shalt find in lonely places, Not dead amongst us, nor our faces Turned alway from the Muses' call.
And thus my thought would speak: that she Who ne'er hath borne a child nor known Is nearer to felicity: Unlit she goeth and alone, With little understanding what A child's touch means of joy or woe, And many toils she beareth not.
But they within whose garden fair That gentle plant hath blown, they go Deep-written all their days with care-- To rear the children, to make fast Their hold, to win them wealth; and then Much darkness, if the seed at last Bear fruit in good or evil men! And one thing at the end of all Abideth, that which all men dread: The wealth is won, the limbs are bred To manhood, and the heart withal Honest: and, lo, where Fortune smiled, Some change, and what hath fallen? Hark! 'Tis death slow winging to the dark, And in his arms what was thy child.
What therefore doth it bring of gain To man, whose cup stood full before, That God should send this one thing more Of hunger and of dread, a door Set wide to every wind of pain?
[MEDEA _comes out alone from the house_.
MEDEA.
Friends, this long hour I wait on Fortune's eyes, And strain my senses in a hot surmise What passeth on that hill.--Ha! even now There comes . . . 'tis one of Jason's men, I trow. His wild-perturbed breath doth warrant me The tidings of some strange calamity.
[_Enter_ MESSENGER.
MESSENGER.
O dire and ghastly deed! Get thee away, Medea! Fly! Nor let behind thee stay One chariot's wing, one keel that sweeps the seas. . . .
MEDEA.
And what hath chanced, to cause such flights as these?
MESSENGER.
The maiden princess lieth--and her sire, The king--both murdered by thy poison-fire.
MEDEA.
Most happy tiding! Which thy name prefers Henceforth among my friends and well-wishers.
MESSENGER.
What say'st thou? Woman, is thy mind within Clear, and not raving? Thou art found in sin Most bloody wrought against the king's high head, And laughest at the tale, and hast no dread?
MEDEA.
I have words also that could answer well Thy word. But take thine ease, good friend, and tell, How died they? Hath it been a very foul Death, prithee? That were comfort to my soul.
MESSENGER.
When thy two children, hand in hand entwined, Came with their father, and passed on to find The new-made bridal rooms, Oh, we were glad, We thralls, who ever loved thee well, and had Grief in thy grief. And straight there passed a word From ear to ear, that thou and thy false lord Had poured peace offering upon wrath foregone. A right glad welcome gave we them, and one Kissed the small hand, and one the shining hair: Myself, for very joy, I followed where The women's rooms are. There our mistress . . . she Whom now we name so . . . thinking not to see Thy little pair, with glad and eager brow Sate waiting Jason. Then she saw, and slow Shrouded her eyes, and backward turned again, Sick that thy children should come near her. Then Thy husband quick went forward, to entreat The young maid's fitful wrath. "Thou will not meet Love's coming with unkindness? Nay, refrain Thy suddenness, and turn thy face again, Holding as friends all that to me are dear, Thine husband. And accept these robes they bear As gifts: and beg thy father to unmake His doom of exile on them--for my sake." When once she saw the raiment, she could still Her joy no more, but gave him all his will. And almost ere the father and the two Children were gone from out the room, she drew The flowered garments forth, and sate her down To her arraying: bound the golden crown Through her long curls, and in a mirror fair Arranged their separate clusters, smiling there At the dead self that faced her. Then aside She pushed her seat, and paced those chambers wide Alone, her white foot poising delicately-- So passing joyful in those gifts was she!-- And many a time would pause, straight-limbed, and wheel Her head to watch the long fold to her heel Sweeping. And then came something strange. Her cheek Seemed pale, and back with crooked steps and weak Groping of arms she walked, and scarcely found Her old seat, that she fell not to the ground. Among the handmaids was a woman old And grey, who deemed, I think, that Pan had hold Upon her, or some spirit, and raised a keen Awakening shout; till through her lips was seen A white foam crawling, and her eyeballs back Twisted, and all her face dead pale for lack Of life: and while that old dame called, the cry Turned strangely to its opposite, to die Sobbing. Oh, swiftly then one woman flew To seek her father's rooms, one for the new Bridegroom, to tell the tale. And all the place Was loud with hurrying feet. So long a space As a swift walker on a measured way Would pace a furlong's course in, there she lay Speechless, with veiled lids. Then wide her eyes She oped, and wildly, as she strove to rise, Shrieked: for two diverse waves upon her rolled Of stabbing death. The carcanet of gold That gripped her brow was molten in a dire And wondrous river of devouring fire. And those fine robes, the gift thy children gave-- God's mercy!--everywhere did lap and lave The delicate flesh; till up she sprang, and fled, A fiery pillar, shaking locks and head This way and that, seeking to cast the crown Somewhere away. But like a thing nailed down The burning gold held fast the anadem, And through her locks, the more she scattered them, Came fire the fiercer, till to earth she fell A thing--save to her sire--scarce nameable, And strove no more. That cheek of royal mien, Where was it--or the place where eyes had been? Only from crown and temples came faint blood Shot through with fire. The very flesh, it stood Out from the bones, as from a wounded pine The gum starts, where those gnawing poisons fine Bit in the dark--a ghastly sight! And touch The dead we durst not. We had seen too much. But that poor father, knowing not, had sped, Swift to his daughter's room, and there the dead Lay at his feet. He knelt, and groaning low, Folded her in his arms, and kissed her: "Oh, Unhappy child, what thing unnatural hath So hideously undone thee? Or what wrath Of gods, to make this old grey sepulchre Childless of thee? Would God but lay me there To die with thee, my daughter!" So he cried. But after, when he stayed from tears, and tried To uplift his old bent frame, lo, in the folds Of those fine robes it held, as ivy holds Strangling among your laurel boughs. Oh, then A ghastly struggle came! Again, again, Up on his knee he writhed; but that dead breast Clung still to his: till, wild, like one possessed, He dragged himself half free; and, lo, the live Flesh parted; and he laid him down to strive No more with death, but perish; for the deep Had risen above his soul. And there they sleep, At last, the old proud father and the bride, Even as his tears had craved it, side by side. For thee--Oh, no word more! Thyself will know How best to baffle vengeance. . . . Long ago I looked upon man's days, and found a grey Shadow. And this thing more I surely say, That those of all men who are counted wise, Strong wits, devisers of great policies, Do pay the bitterest toll. Since life began, Hath there in God's eye stood one happy man? Fair days roll on, and bear more gifts or less Of fortune, but to no man happiness.
[_Exit_ MESSENGER.
CHORUS.
_Some Women._
Wrath upon wrath, meseems, this day shall fall From God on Jason! He hath earned it all.
_Other Women._
O miserable maiden, all my heart Is torn for thee, so sudden to depart From thy king's chambers and the light above To darkness, all for sake of Jason's love!
MEDEA.
Women, my mind is clear. I go to slay My children with all speed, and then, away From hence; not wait yet longer till they stand Beneath another and an angrier hand To die. Yea, howsoe'er I shield them, die They must. And, seeing that they must, 'tis I Shall slay them, I their mother, touched of none Beside. Oh, up and get thine armour on, My heart! Why longer tarry we to win Our crown of dire inevitable sin? Take up thy sword, O poor right hand of mine, Thy sword: then onward to the thin-drawn line Where life turns agony. Let there be naught Of softness now: and keep thee from that thought, 'Born of thy flesh,' 'thine own beloved.' Now, For one brief day, forget thy children: thou Shalt weep hereafter. Though thou slay them, yet Sweet were they. . . . I am sore unfortunate.
[_She goes into the house._
CHORUS.
_Some Women._
O Earth, our mother; and thou All-seer, arrowy crown Of Sunlight, manward now Look down, Oh, look down! Look upon one accurst, Ere yet in blood she twine Red hands--blood that is thine! O Sun, save her first! She is thy daughter still, Of thine own golden line; Save her! Or shall man spill The life divine? Give peace, O Fire that diest not! Send thy spell To stay her yet, to lift her afar, afar-- A torture-changed spirit, a voice of Hell Wrought of old wrongs and war!
_Others._
Alas for the mother's pain Wasted! Alas the dear Life that was born in vain! Woman, what mak'st thou here, Thou from beyond the Gate Where dim Symplegades Clash in the dark blue seas, The shores where death doth wait? Why hast thou taken on thee, To make us desolate, This anger of misery And guilt of hate? For fierce are the smitings back of blood once shed Where love hath been: God's wrath upon them that kill, And an anguished earth, and the wonder of the dead Haunting as music still. . . .
[_A cry is heard within._
_A Woman._
Hark! Did ye hear? Heard ye the children's cry?
_Another._
O miserable woman! O abhorred!
_A Child within._
What shall I do? What is it? Keep me fast From mother!
_The Other Child._
I know nothing. Brother! Oh, I think she means to kill us.
_A Woman._
Let me go! I will--Help! Help!--and save them at the last.
_A Child._
Yes, in God's name! Help quickly ere we die!
_The Other Child._
She has almost caught me now. She has a sword.
[_Many of the Women are now beating at the barred door to get in. Others are standing apart._
_Women at the door._
Thou stone, thou thing of iron! Wilt verily Spill with thine hand that life, the vintage stored Of thine own agony?
_The Other Women._
A Mother slew her babes in days of yore, One, only one, from dawn to eventide, Ino, god-maddened, whom the Queen of Heaven Set frenzied, flying to the dark: and she Cast her for sorrow to the wide salt sea, Forth from those rooms of murder unforgiven, Wild-footed from a white crag of the shore, And clasping still her children twain, she died.
O Love of Woman, charged with sorrow sore, What hast thou wrought upon us? What beside Resteth to tremble for?
[_Enter hurriedly_ JASON _and Attendants_.
JASON.
Ye women by this doorway clustering Speak, is the doer of the ghastly thing Yet here, or fled? What hopeth she of flight? Shall the deep yawn to shield her? Shall the height Send wings, and hide her in the vaulted sky To work red murder on her lords, and fly Unrecompensed? But let her go! My care Is but to save my children, not for her. Let them she wronged requite her as they may. I care not. 'Tis my sons I must some way Save, ere the kinsmen of the dead can win From them the payment of their mother's sin.
LEADER.
Unhappy man, indeed thou knowest not What dark place thou art come to! Else, God wot, Jason, no word like these could fall from thee.
JASON.
What is it?--Ha! The woman would kill me?
LEADER.
Thy sons are dead, slain by their mother's hand.
JASON.
How? Not the children. . . . I scarce understand. . . . O God, thou hast broken me!
LEADER.
Think of those twain As things once fair, that ne'er shall bloom again.
JASON.
Where did she murder them? In that old room?
LEADER.
Open, and thou shalt see thy children's doom.
JASON.
Ho, thralls! Unloose me yonder bars! Make more Of speed! Wrench out the jointing of the door. And show my two-edged curse, the children dead, The woman. . . . Oh, this sword upon her head. . . .
[_While the Attendants are still battering at the door_ MEDEA _appears on the roof, standing on a chariot of winged Dragons, in which are the children's bodies_.
MEDEA.
What make ye at my gates? Why batter ye With brazen bars, seeking the dead and me Who slew them? Peace! . . . And thou, if aught of mine Thou needest, speak, though never touch of thine Shall scathe me more. Out of his firmament My fathers' father, the high Sun, hath sent This, that shall save me from mine enemies' rage.
JASON.
Thou living hate! Thou wife in every age Abhorred, blood-red mother, who didst kill My sons, and make me as the dead: and still Canst take the sunshine to thine eyes, and smell The green earth, reeking from thy deed of hell; I curse thee! Now, Oh, now mine eyes can see, That then were blinded, when from savagery Of eastern chambers, from a cruel land, To Greece and home I gathered in mine hand Thee, thou incarnate curse: one that betrayed Her home, her father, her . . . Oh, God hath laid Thy sins on me!--I knew, I knew, there lay A brother murdered on thy hearth that day When thy first footstep fell on Argo's hull. . . . Argo, my own, my swift and beautiful That was her first beginning. Then a wife I made her in my house. She bore to life Children: and now for love, for chambering And men's arms, she hath murdered them! A thing Not one of all the maids of Greece, not one, Had dreamed of; whom I spurned, and for mine own Chose thee, a bride of hate to me and death, Tigress, not woman, beast of wilder breath Than Skylla shrieking o'er the Tuscan sea. Enough! No scorn of mine can reach to thee, Such iron is o'er thine eyes. Out from my road, Thou crime-begetter, blind with children's blood! And let me weep alone the bitter tide That sweepeth Jason's days, no gentle bride To speak with more, no child to look upon Whom once I reared . . . all, all for ever gone!
MEDEA.
An easy answer had I to this swell Of speech, but Zeus our father knoweth well, All I for thee have wrought, and thou for me. So let it rest. This thing was not to be, That thou shouldst live a merry life, my bed Forgotten and my heart uncomforted, Thou nor thy princess: nor the king that planned Thy marriage drive Medea from his land, And suffer not. Call me what thing thou please, Tigress or Skylla from the Tuscan seas: My claws have gripped thine heart, and all things shine.
JASON.
Thou too hast grief. Thy pain is fierce as mine.
MEDEA.
I love the pain, so thou shalt laugh no more.
JASON.
Oh, what a womb of sin my children bore!
MEDEA.
Sons, did ye perish for your father's shame?
JASON.
How? It was not my hand that murdered them.
MEDEA.
'Twas thy false wooings, 'twas thy trampling pride.
JASON.
Thou hast said it! For thy lust of love they died.
MEDEA.
And love to women a slight thing should be?
JASON.
To women pure!--All thy vile life to thee!
MEDEA.
Think of thy torment. They are dead, they are dead!
JASON.
No: quick, great God; quick curses round thy head!
MEDEA.
The Gods know who began this work of woe.
JASON.
Thy heart and all its loathliness they know.
MEDEA.
Loathe on. . . . But, Oh, thy voice. It hurts me sore.
JASON.
Aye, and thine me. Wouldst hear me then no more?
MEDEA.
How? Show me but the way. 'Tis this I crave.
JASON.
Give me the dead to weep, and make their grave.
MEDEA.
Never! Myself will lay them in a still Green sepulchre, where Hera by the Hill Hath precinct holy, that no angry men May break their graves and cast them forth again To evil. So I lay on all this shore Of Corinth a high feast for evermore And rite, to purge them yearly of the stain Of this poor blood. And I, to Pallas' plain I go, to dwell beside Pandion's son, Aegeus.--For thee, behold, death draweth on, Evil and lonely, like thine heart: the hands Of thine old Argo, rotting where she stands, Shall smite thine head in twain, and bitter be To the last end thy memories of me.
[_She rises on the chariot and is slowly borne away._
JASON.
May They that hear the weeping child Blast thee, and They that walk in blood!
MEDEA.
Thy broken vows, thy friends beguiled Have shut for thee the ears of God.
JASON.
Go, thou art wet with children's tears!
MEDEA.
Go thou, and lay thy bride to sleep.
JASON.
Childless, I go, to weep and weep.
MEDEA.
Not yet! Age cometh and long years.
JASON.
My sons, mine own!
MEDEA.
Not thine, but mine . . .
JASON.
. . . Who slew them!
MEDEA.
Yes: to torture thee.
JASON.
Once let me kiss their lips, once twine Mine arms and touch. . . . Ah, woe is me!
MEDEA.
Wouldst love them and entreat? But now They were as nothing.
JASON.
At the last, O God, to touch that tender brow!
MEDEA.
Thy words upon the wind are cast.
JASON.
Thou, Zeus, wilt hear me. All is said For naught. I am but spurned away And trampled by this tigress, red With children's blood. Yet, come what may, So far as thou hast granted, yea, So far as yet my strength may stand, I weep upon these dead, and say Their last farewell, and raise my hand
To all the daemons of the air In witness of these things; how she Who slew them, will not suffer me To gather up my babes, nor bear To earth their bodies; whom, O stone Of women, would I ne'er had known Nor gotten, to be slain by thee!
[_He casts himself upon the earth._
CHORUS.
Great treasure halls hath Zeus in heaven, From whence to man strange dooms be given, Past hope or fear. And the end men looked for cometh not, And a path is there where no man thought: So hath it fallen here.
NOTES TO MEDEA
P. 3, l. 2, To Colchis through the blue Symplegades.]--The Symplegades ("Clashing") or Kuaneai ("Dark blue") were two rocks in the sea which used to clash together and crush anything that was between them. They stood above the north end of the Bosphorus and formed the Gate (l. 1264, p. 70) to the Axeinos Pontos, or "Stranger-less Sea," where all Greeks were murdered. At the farthest eastern end of that sea was the land of Colchis.
P. 3, l. 3, Pelion.]--The great mountain in Thessaly. Iolcos, a little kingdom between Pelion and the sea, ruled originally by Aeson, Jason's father, then by the usurping Pelias.
P. 3, l. 9, Daughters of Pelias.]--See Introduction, p. vii.
P. 4, l. 18, Wed.]--Medea was not legally married to Jason, and could not be, though in common parlance he is sometimes called her husband. Intermarriage between the subjects of two separate states was not possible in antiquity without a special treaty. And naturally there was no such treaty with Colchis.
This is, I think, the view of the play, and corresponds to the normal Athenian conceptions of society. In the original legend it is likely enough that Medea belongs to "matriarchal" times before the institution of marriage.
P. 4, l. 18, Head of Corinth.]--A peculiar word ([Greek: aisumnan]) afterwards used to translate the Roman _dictator_. Creon is, however, apparently descended from the ancient king Sisyphus.
P. 4, l. 40, She hath a blade made keen, &c.]--These lines (40, 41) are repeated in a different context later on, p. 23, ll. 379, 380. The sword which to the Nurse suggested suicide was really meant for murder. There is a similar and equally dramatic repetition of the lines about the crown and wreath (786, 949, pp. 46, 54), and of those about the various characters popularly attributed to Medea (ll. 304, 808, pp. 18, 46).
P. 5, l. 48, ATTENDANT.]--Greek _Paidagogos_, or "pedagogue"; a confidential servant who escorted the boys to and from school, and in similar ways looked after them. Notice the rather light and cynical character of this man, compared with the tenderness of the Nurse.
P. 5, l. 57, To this still earth and sky.]--Not a mere stage explanation. It was the ancient practice, if you had bad dreams or terrors of the night, to "show" them to the Sun in the morning, that he might clear them away.
P. 8, l. 111, Have I not suffered?]--Medea is apparently answering some would-be comforter. Cf. p. 4. ("If friends will speak," &c.)
P. 9, l. 131, CHORUS.]--As Dr. Verrall has remarked, the presence of the Chorus is in this play unusually awkward from the dramatic point of view. Medea's plot demands most absolute secrecy; and it is incredible that fifteen Corinthian women, simply because they were women, should allow a half-mad foreigner to murder several people, including their own Corinthian king and princess--who was a woman also--rather than reveal her plot. We must remember in palliation (1) that these women belong to the faction in Corinth which was friendly to Medea and hostile to Creon; (2) that the appeal to them as women had more force in antiquity than it would now, and the princess had really turned traitor to her sex. (See note on this subject at the end of the present writer's translation of the _Electra_.) (3) The non-interference of the Chorus seems monstrous: yet in ancient times, when law was weak and punishment was chiefly the concern of the injured persons, and of no one else, the reluctance of bystanders to interfere was much greater than it is now in an ordered society. Some oriental countries, and perhaps even California or Texas, could afford us some startling instances of impassiveness among bystanders.
P. 12, l. 167, Oh, wild words!]--The Nurse breaks in, hoping to drown her mistress's dangerous self-betrayal. Medea's murder of her brother (see Introduction, p. vi) was by ordinary standards her worst act, and seems not to have been known in Corinth. It forms the climax of Jason's denunciation, l. 1334, p. 74.
P. 13, l. 190, Alas, the brave blithe bards, &c.]--Who is the speaker? According to the MSS. the Nurse, and there is some difficulty in taking the lines from her. Yet (1) she has no reason to sing a song outside after saying that she is going in; and (2) it is quite necessary that she should take a little time indoors persuading Medea to come out. The words seem to suit the lips of an impersonal Chorus.
The general sense of the poem is interesting. It is an apology for tragedy. It gives the tragic poet's conception of the place of his art in the service of humanity, as against the usual feeling of the public, whose serious work is devoted to something else, and who "go to a play to be amused."