THE BACCHANALS.
413
Pentheus.
Yea, by my right foot so, meseems, it is.
To left, true by the sinew hangs the robe.
Dionysus.
Me wilt thou surely count thy chiefest friend,
When sight of sober Bacchants cheats thine hopes. 940
Pentheus.
This thyrsus—shall I hold it in this hand,
Or this, the more to seem true Bacchanal.
Dionysus.
In the right hand, and with the right foot timed
Bear it:—all praise to thy converted heart!
Pentheus.
Could I upon my shoulders raise the glens[1] 945
Of Mount Kithairon, yea, and the Bacchanals?
Dionysus.
Thou mightest, an thou wouldst: erewhile thy soul
Was warped; but now 'tis even as befits.
Pentheus.
With levers?—or shall mine hands tear it up
With arm or shoulder thrust beneath its crests? 950
- ↑ Among signs of incipient madness is a failure to discriminate resistance, so that the patient, while raising slight weights, (here, the thyrsus), imagines himself to be putting forth strength enough to raise enormous ones.
