Page:Four Plays of Aeschylus (Cookson).djvu/155

Ah, stranger from the far-off land,—
Scyth—Chalyb—in thine iron hand
The lots are shaken; thine award
Is dealt with the devouring sword,
Whose biting edge doth make partition cold
Of all the goodly gear men get and hold.
With them so shall it be,
These, next of kin
In blood and guilt and sin,
Of all their father's famous fields widespread
They shall at last be disinherited,
Lords of so much earth as dead men have in fee.

When children, by one sire begot,
To whom one woeful womb gave birth,
In mortal combat meet and die,
And that bright pool wherein they lie
Drunk by the dust of thirsty earth
Is curdled to a darker clot,
What power of prayer shall purify,
What water wash away the stain?
But, ah, what drops incarnadine
The new, the old, the mingled wine,
That Laius' house must drain!

From springs of old transgression flow
The guilt, the sorrow swift to follow.
Not yet, not yet is vengeance spent,
Son's sons abide the chastisement
Of him who hearkened not Apollo,—
Laius, first-parent of this woe.
Three sacred embassies he sent,
And thrice where Delphic rocks are piled,