Page:Four Plays of Aeschylus (Cookson).djvu/84

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72
AESCHYLUS

Queen.

A light indeed
To me and all my house! A glad day-break
After black mirk of night.


Messenger.

But Artembares
Chief of ten thousand horse, is brayed and beat
All up and down the sharp Silenian shore.
And Dadakas, the Chiliarch, struck by a spear
Dropped like an airy diver in the sea.
And Tenagon, most noble Tenagon,
True Bactrian to the core, is a wanderer now
Round Ajax' wave-washed, ocean-echoing isle.
Lilaeus, Arsames and Argétes
Fell fighting, and are ground against the rocks
That gird the steep holm where the ring-doves breed:
And Arcteus, neighbour once of inland streams,
Founts of Egyptian Nilus, and Adeues,
Yea, and Pharnuchus, weighted with the load
Of ponderous armour—three from out one ship—
Plunged overboard. The Chrysian Matallus,
Lord of ten thousand fighting men, went down.
And he who marshalled thirty thousand horse,
All black, his dark, flame-coloured, bushy beard
Dyed gules in his own gore. The Arabian
Magus, and Artames the Bactrian,
Far from the rough, stern land he chose for home,
Perished in those disastrous seas. There sank
Amistris; and Amphistreus cast away
His spear. And Ariomardus, good as brave,
To the great grief of Sardis met his death.