And so it came to pass that Œdipus left Thebes, bitterly denouncing the ingratitude of his sons, and praying that sooner or later they might feel the weight of a father's curse. (In the "Seven against Thebes" of Æschylus, it has already been told how terribly this curse was fulfilled.[1]) The daughters proved kinder than the sons. Ismene indeed stayed at Thebes, but her heart was with her father in his exile; while Antigone, with unflinching affection, had guided his steps in his wanderings from city to city. Œdipus himself, in this play, describes how her tender affection for him knew no rest, and how she,
"Still wandering sadly with me evermore,
Leads the old man through many a wild wood's paths,
Hungry and footsore, threading on her way.
And many a storm, and many a scorching sun,
Bravely she bears, and little recks of home,
So that her father find his daily bread."—(P.)
The reader of Dickens—and the modern novehst is not unworthy, perhaps, of comparison with the Athenian poet—will remember the picture of "little Nell."
But, in spite of all these hardships, we can well imagine the delight it must have been to escape from the polluted city to the fresh pure breezes of Cithæron or Hymettus, and how
"The pair
Wholly forgot their first sad life, and home,
And all that Theban woe, and ever stray
Through sunny glens, or on the warm sea-shore,
